Well folks, here's the latest. I have had a terrible time getting hold of some of the property owners so it's taking longer than I thought to get this done. Believe it or not, we are still getting negative responses from property owners! One retired couple just has no interest in seeing it change, another retired couple says their not giving the city anymore, another lady said the kids are welcome to walk through her yard and she doesn't care if the street gets fixed, one guy just owns a lot that abutts the street and he has it for sale(he also owns apartment buildings in the area)and he says he pays enough in taxes so he shouldn't have to fork out more and we have a set of PARENTS who said no based on their thinking that the city should pay for it all. We need 50% on the petition to assure the upgrade. I currently have 37%. I have a church whose elders were going to discuss the issue again after I made a plea to the reverend of how urgent this is. They met last night and yesterday afternoon I met with the property owner who added the 5% that brought us to 37%. He was missing from the plat the city gave us(he owns a stable that we thought belonged to someone else). Luckily his daughter drives a bus to our school and he has two granddaughters who attend there and he was quite sympathetic. If the church comes through, we will have 51%. I will talk with the reverend tonight.
KC & Lisa-Thank you for the kind words. When I updated the parent group on Tuesday they were thrilled and can't see why anyone would say "no" now. The issue will be formally presented to the school board tonight. I will be there with all my info just in case and hopefully will leave with a smile on my face. I did have the cahnce to talk to one of the property owners last week and gave him the new numbers. He was very impressed and will sign our new petition. I'm going to contact the other property owners this week and hopefully by week's end will have a petition filled with signatures. The only problem is the education reporter for the local paper has jumped on the topic again and AGAIN he had his facts all wrong. This time it hurts the city more than us-but goodness what a jerk. I've had it with his skewed and unfactual reporting-a letter to the editor is brewing! I'll let everyone know what happens this week. Cross your fingers and toes and say a prayer for us!!
LMK, that is fantastic news! Continue to keep us updated. Sounds to me like the only freight train is the one built from your determination to make your kids school a better, safer place; and that freight train is bearing down on bureacratic inertia and blowing right on through to success.
Just thought I would give an update. After discussing at length with the city manager the issues brought forth by the property owners, he said he would work behind the scenes to see if he could find another funding source. Meanwhile, one of the other committee members contacted the State Board of Education and got a call back from their legal counsel. She suggested we contact the county attorney and told us that if the city has been formally notified of the problem they have a responsibility to respond with due care(some legal terminology) otherwise they would be found negligent if anything happens. The county attorney said he only deals with criminal issues and suggested the city attorney. A committee member contacted him and told him the issue and he agreed to check on it. I also relayed our plight to a former neighbor who just happens to be an attorney who has done a lot of housing developments. I didn't ask for legal help yet, but I think he would give us some assistance if needed. Finally, we had a meeting last Friday. The city manager figured a way to use the gambling revenues the city receives to fund the project. Some of the revenues were slated for riverfront improvements but polls show that the citizens don't want anymore money spent there. He then suggested to the city council that they beef up the residential street program with the revenues and start doing some upgrades in certain areas. He then threw in the problems with our little street(tricky guy). The city council agreed this was important and should be the #1 street on the list. They also agreed that the funding was an option they would accept. What it would mean is that the city would now pay 75% of the cost instead of 35%.This was all done in work sessions so it has to be formally presented at a council meeting for vote. This would leave 25% for the property owners, but the school district thinks it could handle half of that 25%. It would still be less than what they had signed on for with the original assessment. We have sent letters to the other property owners and they should get them in the next couple of days. Next Monday the superintendent will present the proposal to the school board. Then during that week our committee members will go to the other property owners asking for their support on a petition requesting the city pay for the upgrade under the new street plan assessment. We need 50% of which the school is 20%. We would then take the petition to the city council meeting to help bolster the city manager's plan when presented. Our committee thinks it is a fair and acceptable proposal and we hope the property owners will too. If necessary we have found out that we could force the assessment through. I would have felt bad doing this at the previous high cost, but I'm ready to go with that option if we can't convince the property owners to sign on now. I think I see the light at the end of the tunnel-or is that the train that's coming to hit me head on?!
