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City Government

Mayor Hotline August 11 to 17

 August 19, 2007 ⋅  Post a comment

–NOISE, NOISE, NOISE!
–Bad cop, bad cop
–Beware, Vigilante at 10th and Franklin
–Mayor playing in traffic?! 🙂

8/15/07
Anonymous
Disregard of Four-Way Stop Intersection: As a follow-up to the 10th and Franklin, in the 15 or so minutes I was able to run and grab a piece of paper and come back out, I got the license plates of two cars. I’m waiting for the police to show up so there will be a police report involved in this. There’s a church, YMCA, and a child care here. In the past you were kind enough to send officers here and they wrote tickets like mad, so it’s not a figment of anybody’s imagination, it doesn’t require any follow-up; it just requires police presence and some re-education of the people in the school building.
BPD

8/13/07
Robert Skaggs
399 N. 30th #F102
Noise: I’m literally right by the gate where those trucks drive by every single night. Now let’s have a little fun here; one, it keeps me awake at nights, then when I actually go to sleep, I wake up five to ten times a night just because of those stupid trucks. Now my wife is disabled, she has a lot of middle-ear pressure which causes her extreme pain even though she is deaf. She is literally in tears over this situation every single night because it causes her that much pain. I don’t know how this can be acceptable when I’m a taxpaying citizen. I don’t remember signing anything that says this was okay. There’s got to be some kind of solution to this because my wife doesn’t deserve that kind of pain. We already have an attorney with her being hurt at work; do we need to get an attorney involved in this as well. Please get hold of me and let me know what we can do to take care of this situation. We’ve got to find a resolve to this.
Parks & Rec
Action Taken: BPR & M/O contacted

8/13/07
Pamela Thompson
1752 W. Cedar Grove
Meridian, ID 83646
Misc: I’m calling to find out who I call to get shoes cut down from the power wires. They are located at Linder and Loretta which is in Meridian.
Action Taken: Left msg

8/13/07
Mike & Robbie Clements
Scandia DownTaxi Stand Relocation: I’m calling about a property downtown, 112 N. 6th St. It’s an old building with the old Nixon Law Office and is owned by Cathy Dailey. You all recently in some ordinance revision, relocated the taxi stand to the area right in front of the building that Scandia Down is in. My wife, who runs Scandia Down, phoned immediately and talked to somebody and suggested that maybe it should be put across the street because she was concerned about the vandalism that would probably take place in the area because of the late night and the condition of the patrons while they’re waiting. She was told it was too late, nothing could be done, although I’m not sure there was any time for public comment, but in any event I think your ordinance went in over the weekend or just a couple of days ago. Sure enough, today this wonderful old building over 100 years old, maybe the oldest in the city, somebody took the initiative to carve their initials into that 110-120 year old porch. I would like to register a complaint on that, and I would like the Mayor and City Council to please reconsider it in light of their efforts and concern about keeping Old Boise intact and keeping it as much in its original condition as possible. My wife’s name is Robbie Clements and she is at the store on a daily basis. I think a call to her would be very useful. We have not informed the owner yet about it, but we’re going to have to do that today. Please consider that and give us a call as fast as you can.
BPD F&A
Action Taken: contacted

8/13/07
Mike McCombs
1508 S. Riverstone Ln.
Boise, ID 83706
Fitness area behind Willow Sports Complex: My concern is the little fitness area in back of Willow Sports Complex (State St. & Willow Ln.) that used to have the work out equipment, such as the chin-up bar, the sit-up bar, the jungle gym set. I know that the BMX track is on the other side of that, and I’m just wondering why they are tearing that out. There’s a nice shade tree there and a picnic table, and some things for the kids. I was wondering what the deal was. They used to have the Wild Program from the juvenile hall and they used to pull the weeds over there. Apparently a lot of people didn’t think that it was being used, but it was a very good place for the kids to get a little exercise. I was just wondering why that was being torn down, or is something new going to replace it over there. If so, I would like to see that be leveled out a little. I know the kids would really enjoy it. I would like to get some kind of ballot going to see if anybody has complained about putting those things back up, or what.
BPR
Action Taken: Contacted

8/13/07
Kit Schutte
399 N. 30th St.
(Reflections at River’s Edge which is the Old Clock Tower)
Noise: I live in F building which is adjacent to the Greenbelt and adjacent to city property next to Idaho River Sports on Pleasanton. My complaint is that I understand from the project manager and McAlvain supervisor that they’ve been told by the Mayor and City Council to do the renovations at the Capitol and bring the debris in at night. Last night multiple McAlvain trucks kept our family awake all night until 6:00 in the morning. There are multiple trucks coming and going; it started on Thursday, and I talked to the McAlvain supervisor, John Clark, and he was not helpful. David (Selvage), the project manager for the city at 384-4060, ext. 310, is a very nice man, but I don’t think anything is going to happen. There are a lot of my neighbors that are disturbed by this and they will be calling you as well, but we’ve got to not have trucks coming in and out and disturbing our sleep. I understand it’s a traffic issue during the day, but I would rather be stopped with traffic than not being able to sleep at night. If somebody could please, please, please get this to the Mayor and get this changed immediately because they gave us no end date, so this could go on for months and it’s not a good thing. Thank you.
BPR
Action Taken: BPR & M/O contacted

8/14/07
Mike Murphy
8th St. Congestion: A return call or follow-up is not necessary in so much as I’ve lodged the same complaint for years now and nothing has happened. I’m calling regarding 8th St. between Bannock and Main. More often than not, you couldn’t get a greased needle up 8th St. with a jackhammer because we have beer trucks, delivery trucks, all sorts of trucks just willy-nilly double parking, parking in the fire lane, etc. I have nothing against Bieter; I have nothing against the fact that merchants need to receive deliveries, but my objection to this is: it is not a question of if, it is a question of when someone’s pain is lengthened or somebody’s life is put at risk because a fire truck or other emergency vehicle will be unable to get up 8th St. because of these trucks. I’ve often wondered about the city’s unwillingness to do anything about this. You often pass it off to CCDC, Max Clark will contact me, and then nothing happens. But of course that’s the plausible deniability you love of CCDC. The question of the priorities of the traffic downtown was answered when I was traveling up 8th St. and some idiot just stepped out from between two parked vans, stepped right out in front of my car without looking, and I almost ran him down. Then he just gave me this smile and waved as he trotted on over to the new sushi place. The problem was, that idiot was the Mayor; he just walked right out in front of traffic, double-parked vehicles all around him, cars can barely move, but he doesn’t even see that. That’s a shame. It’s not a question of if, but a question of when you cause somebody’s pain to be lengthened or somebody’s life to be lost and that’s going to be because you guys have no political will to solve this issue. Merchants need to get somebody in there at 5:00 a.m. to accept deliveries, but to have fire lanes blocked; lanes of traffic blocked during morning and afternoon rush hours, you guys are not doing your jobs at all. That’s it, thank you very much for your time, and I fully expect nothing will be done. In parting, speaking with Mr. Eichmann, and I appreciate the position he’s in, I wouldn’t want that man’s job for all the money in the world. He referred to fire lanes in our conversation and I terminated our conversation after that, fire lanes as an obscure city code. He’s not going to have people towed or anything over an obscure city code. I’m glad to hear emergency lanes are now considered an obscure city code. Oh, and as a P.S. to the clear and present danger to public safety represented on 8th St., now that this is a matter of the public record, I imagine it’s all that a good attorney would need to sue you guys into the stone age when the time comes that somebody’s suffering is prolonged or somebody’s life is lost because you guys fail to have the political will to keep a simple street clear.
M/CC
Action Taken: Kris, Michael told me to wait and let you take care of this. (There are three others that I think go along with this one, read on – they’re all anonymous)

8/14/07
James Otradosky
652 N. Morningside Way
Boise, ID 83712
Airport : A couple of months ago I called the Mayor’s Hotline about the deficiency of parking at times at the Boise Airport. When it comes to the holiday time, you’re going to have a big problem like you did last year when long-term parking at the airport is full, and the satellite parking is all but full also. I don’t know what the delay is to try and get the other parking going up there. I know the election failed and that was mainly due mainly because the City of Boise dropped the ball in getting the right information out about that, and every year that goes by, it’s going to cost more and more to get that parking garage built, which is needed. Also, I had to pick up my son and his wife at the airport Sunday evening and the maintenance out there is absolutely pathetic. The crap on some of the floors was absolutely filthy; you walk outside on the sidewalks and there’s so much gum on the sidewalks you think sidewalk was paved in gum. Somebody better get in there and start cleaning the airport up. The Boise Airport is a the front door to Boise for a lot of people coming in and when they start seeing lousy maintenance, they’re not going get a very good impression of this city. I think the Mayor and City Council better wake up and I would appreciate a comment back from either the City Council or the Mayor on this problem. Thank you.
Airport
Action Taken: airport

8/14/07
John Ashby
Property owner and taxpayer
8890 Bradbury Dr.
Boise, ID 83704
Allied Waste: I wish to register a strong complaint on the waste management service. Mr. Mayor, I would whole heartedly suggest that maybe you ought to try getting hold of some of your department heads, like the common citizen has to do. If you’re not totally aggravated by the time you start, by the time you to get to the city people, it gets to you. If you could follow up on that, maybe I could vote for you, but right now, I can’t. Thank you.
PW

8/14/07
Cynthia Daniel
3005 Pleasanton Ave.
Boise, ID 83702
Noise: I’m calling to voice a complaint regarding the trucks that are traveling up and down Pleasanton Ave. all night long. It’s been several nights that this has occurred and I have enough trouble getting to sleep at night and this has been really disturbing. I would like to know how long this is going to last and why they’re going at night time. Why can’t these trucks travel during the day when all of us are awake? Not only that, it seems to be very dangerous at night time; they seem to be traveling awfully fast down that road. There are no stop signs to slow them down that entire length of the road and I think that’s something else that needs to be addressed. There needs to be a stop sign and some speed bumps put in. The Mayor needs to take a drive down that road and check it out. If you have any more questions, please give me a call. Thank you.
BPR
Action Taken: BPR and M/O contacted

8/15/07
Anonymous
Disregard of Four-Way Stop Intersection: This is regarding the intersection of 10th St. and Franklin St. behind Boise High School. As the Mayor’s Office, the Department of Education, and the Police Department are well aware because this is an on-going problem, students, faculty, and staff (including the principle in the past) treat this four-way stop like an Italian suggestion and just ride right through it. In thirty minutes’ time five cars have just blown right through it, and I’m not talking about California stops, rolling stops, I’m talking about 30-40 mph in a 20 mph zone. Before an inevitable tragedy occurs, could we get some more police presence down here, especially like for the first day of school, and could someone please talk to the faculty and staff? It’s kind of hard to bust the students when the staff is treating the residential neighborhood like Daytona.
N/R

8/15/07
Anonymous
Disregard of Four-Way Stop Intersection: Boy, I’m leaving a lot of messages today – 10th and Franklin, silver Mazda, right through that stop sign.
BPD

8/15/07
Anonymous
Disregard of Four-Way Stop Intersection: Hello, more news about 10th and Franklin. I’ve had the great pleasure of meeting Officer G. Sexton, looks like Badge #689. He was the one that BPD sent out to respond to my request for an officer regarding people treating 10th and Franklin like Daytona. In the 15 minutes we stood there and chatted, four people blew through the stop sign right in front of the police officer, with the cop car right on the corner. So, I want to hear from you and city hall, or from the school district, school district most of all. Even worse, the SRO from Boise High said there was no problem; there’s a big problem. While the officer was out here, far more respectable citizens than I came out to lodge the exact same complaint. Some people are driving through here like maniacs. It’s much like some other things; it’s not a question of if, it’s a question of when somebody is seriously injured or killed in this intersection because the powers that be refuse to do what’s necessary. This is an intersection near a school, a church, a day care, little children, mothers with strollers that cross the street, and the SRO, the principle, and the school district acted like there was no problem at all. The problem is well established, now somebody needs to do something about it.
BPD

8/15/07
Shawn Myers
2717 S. Vista Apt. 111
Boise, ID
Police: Yesterday I was assaulted right in front of a postal employee named Brian; the guy who assaulted me is named — in Apt. —, and the police did nothing about it. I can’t go out of my apartment because I’m a disabled veteran. I need to know; if the police are not going to do anything about it, what am I suppose to do. Thank you.
BPD

8/15/07
Lynn Sherwood
225 W. Thornberry Dr.
Boise, ID 83702
Police: I have noticed a significant increase in the number of people who are begging at different locations, such as the Mall entrance, Albertsons, Winco, the freeway off ramps, etc. One day I ran into them at five different locations, and I’m wondering if there isn’t something that we can do about that. It does not look good for the city and it’s becoming very annoying. Thank you.
BPD

8/15/07
Michael Shanafelt
2916 Dill Dr.
Boise ID
ACHD: I think you’re doing a good job; I appreciate what you have done for Boise; I know you’re concerned about the city. I ride a bicycle a lot, so I ride to work to try to help keep our air clean. They have repaved Vista and it’s beautiful, but as I ride my bicycle on that as I dodge the cars, I think how nice it would be if when they’re done if they would stripe a bicycle lane on both sides of Vista Ave. It would make our city so much friendlier, and so much more progressive. It would be nice to have this done on the big streets. I just wanted to pass that along. I’m going to go ahead and call the ACHD and see if I can get through to somebody and mention that to them. Thank you.
ACHD
Action Taken: contacted

8/16/07
Marylin Gabriel
4917 Lakes Edge Pl.
Boise, ID 83714
My daughter and I rode the Valley Ride bus the other day and we were in a hurry to get on the bus because we were trying to round up my little four year old grandson to get him on the bus before it left. I inadvertently left my purse in the car but I had a $20 bill and my car keys with me. We got on the bus and the driver was very surly. I asked him a question and he just shouted out an answer that was very, very rude. I thought gosh, what’s this all about. I handed my $20 bill to the driver and he points to this machine and said something about read that and do what it says. He said to put it in the machine, so I put my $20 bill in there; I was buying tickets for everybody. It came to $4 because the four-year old was free. Out comes a $16 credit on a ticket instead of any change. This was on a Saturday, and like I said I left the car so quickly I forgot my purse. So, I get downtown to the city market with not a blessed cent to spend on my grandson and my daughter. Fortunately my daughter had some money with her or we would not have had any money. What should have been a nice experience for us just wasn’t because of the surly bus driver and no money. It was my grandson’s first ride on a bus and it should have been fun. What am I supposed to do with a $16 credit when I’ll never ride the bus again? One of the ladies on the bus told me to call the bus company, so I did Monday morning. They put me through to someone who said I could get that credit exchanged for cash, but they haven’t called me back yet and today is Thursday. Are they that busy? Nobody rides the bus. I just find the whole scene ugly and I’m not happy.
Valley Ride

8/16/07
Marilyn Gabriel
4917 Lakes Edge Pl.
Boise, ID 83714
I just called about my bus Valleyride complaint. The person’s name from Valley Ride who I talked to and was supposed to call me back but hasn’t, is Karen Empey. She’s the one I’m supposed give my credit ticket to in exchange for cash. Apparently this woman is too busy to call her customers back. I would appreciate it if the Mayor’s Office could do something. Thank you.
Valley Ride
Action Taken: contacted

8/16/07 ☺
Joel Specht
8704 Ustick Rd.
Boise, ID 83704 
ACHD: I’m calling in regard to the wonderful construction and road improvement project at the corner of Ustick and Maple Grove. Since I live just a couple hundred yards from there, I have been experiencing the full thrust of the construction. Today, my complaint is — it’s unbelievable if you live in this area, but I just retired recently and I have been trying to sleep in, but I can’t sleep in because the construction now starts at 7:00 a.m. instead of 8:00 a.m. My complaint is the trucks all seem to be going in reverse and we all know what a truck sounds like in reverse – beep, beep, beep, beep, etc. Then when you interchange that with about four other trucks that are in reverse, the beeping is four-times as bad — constantly, forever, endlessly, you can’t sleep, no one can live, IT’S INSANE! I called the wonderful highway district and they told me, “Well that’s how construction goes, that’s how trucks work; gee didn’t you know that?” But, before 7:00 a.m. is just a little beyond anyone’s endurance. So, if anyone has a bright idea, why don’t you just disconnect the beepers, or make the trucks go forward, or make them start working after 8:00 so a person can actually sleep in. If anybody cares, and I truly doubt if anybody down there at city hall cares about what we’re going through out here, feel free to give me a call back and I’ll be glad to talk to you. How about the Mayor and Council coming out to have breakfast with me on the patio at 7:00 in the morning and they can hear all the wonderful beeping and experience the construction. I would love to have you all come out. If you want to call back, fine; if you want to come out, fine; if you want to leave town, that’s fine too. Have a nice day all you bright dimwits.
ACHD

8/16/07
Richard Donnelly
1970 Fairmeadow Dr.
Boise, ID 83704
375-2918
Police: I’m calling about the construction at Maple Grove and Fairview. It is indeed going to be an improvement; however, the vehicles, rather than putting up with the congestion, are using a residential street, Fairmeadow Drive, as a through street, totally disregarding the speed limit in this subdivision, and I think it’s going to be a problem. I hope no one gets injured or killed because of it. We don’t have cross walks or stop signs and we don’t have lines to separate traffic. At any rate, on August 10th I called the Hotline and I have not noticed since then any patrol cars in the area for the Boise Police to enforce the speed limit. I suggest that the neighborhood be posted as “local traffic only” and be enforced to alleviate the problem. On August 9th between 4:30 and 5:30 p.m., I counted 235 cars; a car every 15 seconds. The traffic is getting quite heavy and I hope the city can do something about it. Thank you.
BPD
Action Taken: Contacted

8/16/07
Charles Kinkead
8720 Cornwall Dr.
Boise, ID 83704
Code Enforcement: I was informed by the City Code Enforcement people that they cannot enforce the city code on such things as boats, trailers and things sitting on the street by the curb unless someone files a complaint to initiate an action. That seems rather strange to me; if it’s a violation, it seems to me the city could enforce it. I would just like to know if that’s correct and if there’s any way to change that.
PDS

8/16/07
Angel Petragallo
2900 Pleasanton
Boise, ID 83702
Noise: I’m calling to comment on the many, many trucks doing backfill, or whatever they’re doing at the proposed Esther Simplot Park. They’re very destructive at night; they’re keeping us awake, and the neighborhood is upset. We don’t care that there’s going to be a park there, in fact we love that there’s going to be a park there. Could you ask them not to drive their lousy, stinking trucks from midnight until 3, 4, or 5 in the morning? It’s getting very, very old. You’re certainly welcome to call me and ask me more about this issue. Thank you.
BPR
Action Taken: BPR and M/O contacted

8/16/07
Glenn Miles
1306 N. 26th
Boise, ID 83702
Drug Trafficking: We’ve been noticing in our area drug trafficking during the school period and I’ve been taking down license plate numbers of people who go through the alley that don’t live here. One gal stopped and said she lived over on the next block and she really resented her license plate number being taken down and that she was going to call the police on me and I should move out of the area; however, frankly in terms of the drug trafficking, I would as soon that she was mad that somebody wrote down her license plate than just one kid was hooked on drugs in the Lowell School / St. Mary’s area. My lawyer has been advising me to write down the license plates and I have been doing that. On a hot day if somebody gets mad at me for writing down a license plate, that’s sad, but the greater good for the greatest number.

8/16/07
Smith (female)
Collister Area
Library: I’m very, very disappointed with the Mayor putting in a library there in the Collister enter. We have plenty of libraries around here such as the Bookmobile, the Garden City library, and we have the one downtown. We have a lot of libraries. We have a lovely place there for antiques and one thing or another, and now he’s turned that into a library, which we did not need and I will not vote for him because I think he’s the worst man we’ve ever had!

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