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City Government

Mayor Hotline April 4 to 10

 April 15, 2009 ⋅  Post a comment

TORCH 2, CITY MOVING TRUCK? AIR, WATER
4/7/09
Gail Arnold
576 Victoria
Boise, ID
Torch 2: I’m calling in regard to the seemingly limitless remodel that the Torch 2 has at 610 Vista. I attended the Boise City Planning & Zoning hearing pertaining to his building permit request, which was denied in the form submitted and cut up into three approved parts. Those approved parts were – ADA bathroom, parking lot improvements, and provisions for a security guard. I understood the need for those; what I don’t understand is despite in that same council meeting being told that he could not redo the façade, raise the roof, or do new walls, why all of these things are happening. He’s placed a new vestibule on the front of the building; he’s removed walls; he’s expanding out the back. I question whether he’s not exceeding the 20 percent limit for the non-conforming use that he has. Weekends and after hours work seemingly is the only thing that the owners of the Torch do, and I don’t think that they’re getting their work inspected or prior approved. I’m calling in regards to that and would like to know if anything can be done to stop this. I don’t like what he does to my neighborhood; I don’t like the people that he brings through it, and it causes us nothing but grief to see that pretty much he gets to do whatever he wants despite continually being told that he’s limited in what he can do.
PDS

4/3/09
Anonymous
City Car: I would like to have somebody check into my neighbor using his city truck. The number is C13517, his truck number is 05T488 and it’s a white Chevy pickup. He looks like he’s an inspector; he lives down the street and he comes home every day for lunch, my wife tells me. He’s been doing that for the last six months since he’s lived in our neighborhood. I’m a mail carrier and I’ll be out and see him way downtown or over on Parkcenter. Every day he drives, and my concern is that he’s wasting city gas to come home every day for lunch when the city’s cutting back. I would like to have someone look into that to see why he’s doing that or what’s going on. I would sure appreciate it. Also, one other thing is that when the guy moved into the neighborhood down the street, he used his truck for moving his own furniture at night.
DFA

4/5/09
John Lavin
2509 Roanoak Dr.
Foothills East
345-4063
Dogs On Leash: I just wanted to call and give my support for the dog leash law. I think that’s very important; again today I was intimidated by a couple with their two dogs roaming down the street. I walk out of my own house and the dogs come and growl at me and intimidate me. So, I think there needs to be a leash law, not only for the foothills, but also for in town. Thank you very much.
Action Taken: left msj

4/6/09
Linda Moore
387-0972
Code Enforcement: I’m calling about a code violation at 310 Chester Dr. There has been an officer assigned to this code violation; his name is Joe Venneman and we have spoken. I am calling to try to get this case pushed forward and have it resolved. The neighbor in question has moved in a 40 ft. long trailer for storage and is also using his property for a construction storage facility. Mr. Venneman has done a very good job of keeping myself and the neighbors informed, but I am calling to urge you to push this case forward before there is any more construction materials moved in next to my house. Thank you.
PDS

4/6/09
Pete Peterson
6212 W. Lucky Ln.
Boise, ID 83703
853-0932
Political Aspirations: This is a message for Mayor Bieter. It will sound more than a little crazy; I think you’re kind of dead-ended in your political career currently. I don’t see you making Governor this next time out; you’re kind of blocked by Margaret at the Hollywood Market and by the Mormons, so I don’t think you could get past those two things. I have another idea which will sound very odd to you, but since you’re half Basque and the Basques have been interested in trying to have their homeland for the last 500 years with no success; their current tactics of shooting people and blowing people up seem to make people unhappy. If you wanted to kind of become a hero to the Basque Nationalist Movement, Diane at the Vista Book Gallery can order you a book entitled, Gandhi, The Man. It’s basically a study guide on how to achieve radical social change. That would look very good on your political resume. Anyway, have a nice day.

4/7/09
Evelyn Barker
2998 Maywood Ave.
Boise, ID 83704
322-88799
Air Quality: I have a complaint or whatever you want to call it, about burning in Idaho; Oregon doesn’t allow burning but yet we do in Idaho. Today is a beautiful day; it’s Tuesday; a beautiful breeze is coming in and all of a sudden my house is filled with smoke because somebody is burning fields or garbage or whatever they’re burning. I just feel that we need to take a little more care of our health and our environment. There should be a burn ban in the State of Idaho because I’m tired of smelling other people’s smoke; there are people who have lung problems who I’m sure don’t enjoy it either. If you could please address this, I would really appreciate it. Thank you.
DEQ
Action Taken: contacted

4/7/09
Cindy Beauclair
3809 Colllister Dr.
Boise 03
W – 338-9234 H – 384-1384
Irrigation: I have an issue with the Farmer’s Canal Co.; my property is adjacent to the Farmer’s Canal. They were here in January and made a big mess; I called them and we went back and forth and they said they can do whatever they want. I called my attorney and she said they can’t. I called them and they said they would come clean it up They did remove the sand piles from my property and off my sprinkler heads but there is still a large tree lying in my yard and they knocked down a fence. Many of the trees that were cut down and/or broken that landed into the tops of my trees and I can’t reach them. They don’t seem to have any oversight; if they do, I can’t figure out who it is. I would like some assistance in trying to resolve this problem with them because I do need to get it cleaned up. I’ve called a tree company and they want to charge me quite a bit of money to clean up a mess that these guys made. It’s sort of like cutting down a tree on your property and letting it fall on your neighbors and then telling them it’s their problem because it’s on their property. It doesn’t make sense and it doesn’t seem fair. So, if you could please call me back, I would really appreciate any information or helpful anything. Thank you.
Action Taken: contacted

4/7/09
Jan T. Petersen
3361 Forsythia Dr.
Boise, ID 83703
Misc: To the Mayor and City Council: I absolutely will not accept inferior construction practices through the City of Boise at 3 percent or any other figure; absolutely no way. I saw what you did to my friend, Mary Baird at 200 Peasley St., how she came to her demise after falling in Ann Morrison Park in your muddy, slick thing, over there with her dog, broke her ankle, ended up at St. Luke’s, then the Elks, and then a nursing home to die a few weeks later. It’s the most sickening thing I’ve seen done to another human being, especially one who lived here since she was 21, and she was aged. She didn’t deserve to go that way; she didn’t deserve the kind of house she ended up with; it is terrible. No way; if somebody is trying to arrange that sort of arrangement with this house, my home at 3361 Forsythia Dr., forget about it. No way, do you understand me? I speak for myself; I’ve got a lawyer coming up tomorrow and that will be good to go. You can all go, you know where.

4/7/09 @ 7:42 p.m.
Jan T. Petersen
3361 Forsythia Dr.
Boise, ID 83703
Misc: So, Mayor Bieter and City Council, I hear you’re still in session tonight. I have a request of you, not really, a demand. I give you one year to make the City of Boise handicapped accessible on the streets, the sidewalks, everything. I see you’re pretty busy back here giving some new cupboards to HUD housing; sorry, this takes precedence, it’s been put off too long. Yup, I need this handicapped accessibility and if the City of Boise can’t afford it, may I make a suggestion. Call “Make a Wish Foundation” and they will help you. It will put a lot of homeless people who are out of work, to work. That would be a good thing. Go ahead, make our city absolutely filthy, not green. We’re used to it; we’re used to the filth of Boise, Idaho. Thank you.

4/8/09
Gail Arnold
576 Victoria
Boise, ID 83705
860-3960
Torch 2: It has been brought to my attention that a building inspector has given his verbal approval for the owners of the Torch 2, located at 610 S. Vista Ave., to remove and rebuild the entire east wall of their business. This again shows the contempt that the owners of the Torch have for the surrounding neighborhood, the Boise City Council, as well as the Mayor’s office and the City Building Codes. Both the owner of the Torch and his architect are well aware of the City Council’s decision on August 6, 2007 to deny their application. Essentially they wanted to rebuild this building; three aspects were separated and approved by Council. One was to build ADA restrooms; two to repave the parking lot; and three to add security. No additional alterations were to be allowed. The Torch appealed this decision and on October 16, 2007 at a Council worksession with Mayor Bieter in attendance, the appeal was denied and the previous Planning & Zoning Commission’s decision was upheld. Despite their knowing the outcome of these two proceedings, the Torch, in an act of contempt, showed the building inspector how the east walls were rotting away, using the inspector’s lack of knowledge of the history of rejected applications to their favor, the inspector deemed there to be a life-safety issue, and okayed these walls to be replaced. This approval, gained through deception, directly contradicts the Planning & Zoning staff report dated April 9th, which states – “Intent in regulating and limiting the expansion alterations of non-conforming uses is to encourage them to eventually terminate through attrition rather than to be extended indefinitely.” Several elected officials have shown support of our neighborhood’s wish to have this sexually oriented business away from our homes and our children. This is the best opportunity to help us accomplish this. The building inspector’s termination that there is a life threat shows that this building shouldn’t be occupied by the public. I suggest that the city should pull his Occupancy Permit before there is a tragic incident in this dilapidated building. Doing this now will save the Torch owners the money they were going to spend on this questionable remodel. Perhaps they could use this money to relocate to a site that complies with all current setback laws, as well as having all the parking they need. Please stop this project today so these issues can be resolved. Thank you.
PDS

4/8/09
Michael Thompson
513 S. Victoria Dr.
Boise 05
Torch 2: My concern is the Torch 2 and his remodeling. The last time he applied for a permit and the City Council held a hearing, they approved him to upgrade his bathrooms to ADA compliance, and it looks like he’s tearing down the building and completely remodeling the whole thing. It seems to be that he is ignoring what the City Council has approved and doing his own thing. Can you please check this out and have Code Enforcement check it out. Thank you.
PDS

4/9/09
Linda Hawk
3719 W. Teton St.
Boise, ID 83705
342-7366
New Trash Program: Hi Mayor. I’m calling about our new trash thing that’s going to happen in June. I’ve learned all about it and I’m happy and everything and I probably will have no problem making the change. I think some people will have terrible problems because they put out 10 bags of grass every week (chuckle). Since I reuse, recycle, and compost, this will probably not be a problem for me. I understand that if we call in on about May 15th, that for my mother, she will be getting both the 65 gallon trash and the 65 gallon recycle thing. But for me, occasionally I do have some yard waste that has to go in; that means if it’s big enough to burn, it goes in the wood pile; if it’s small enough to compost, then it goes into the compost. But, occasionally there’s some in between, like in the spring and the fall. So I want to get the large bin, but for recycling, I only need the small bin. There’s just no reason to have anything bigger than that because I try to make sure that basically…well the newspapers go to the Kiwanis; aluminum goes to Pacific because I get money for that, and so that only leaves a few tin cans; I try to eat more fresh produce so there’s very little tin cans, then there are some plastic bottles for bottled water and a little bit of paper. So in one month I don’t even fill up the blue bin that we have now, so I would just only need the small bin. However, I’m told by Allied that Boise City is requiring that if you get the large trash can, you have to get the large recycling bin, and that seems sort of ridiculous, because after all it’s not the same truck and the recycle truck only comes every two weeks, and the trash guy comes every week. It’s just not the same thing at all, so it just seems ridiculous that I couldn’t get one large trash and one small recycle. That’s my comment, so let’s do something about that. I’ve informed all my neighbors that if they don’t put any chemicals on their grass, they can bring their grass over to my compost pile. It’s going to be fun, but nobody likes change, but hey change is the nature of the game and I think it will be kind of fun; it’s kind of exciting. I will be able to get rid of all my metal trash cans and plastic falling apart trash cans at Pacific Recycling. I’ll be down to just two cans; that will be kind of neat. I would like to get two different sizes, a large one for trash and the small for the recycling. So, let’s see if we can’t do something about that. Thank you very much.
PW
Action Taken: contacted

4/9/09
Michael Thompson
513 S. Victoria
338-6521
Torch 2: This is concerning the Torch 2 and the remodeling project. A few months ago Lance Montgomery applied to remodel his building; the city told him no, he could do bathroom upgrades to make them ADA compliant. He appealed to the City Council and they agreed. Now he is tearing out walls and putting in new footings; he has removed and replaced his front vestibule. All these things violate what the city told him he could do. We have called Code Enforcement and nobody has come out here to stop him. I want to know, do City Council decisions not matter anymore and any business can do what they want regardless of what decisions have been made? I’m very concerned. Thank you.
PDS

Lady from Sacramento called on: 4/3/09 PM, 4/3/09 PM, 4/4/09 AM, 4/5/09 AM, 4/6/09 AM, 4/6/09 PM, 4/7/09 AM, 4/7/09 AM, 4/8/09 PM, 4/9/09 AM, 4/10/09 AM @ 10:09 AM, and 4/10/09 @ 10:18 AM

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