City Government

“Clan McLean” Arrives At Boise Mayor’s Office


With police bagpipes wailing and drums beating, Lauren Mclean and “Clan McLean” marched into the city council chambers Tuesday night as Boise’s first elected female mayor took office in front of a standing room only crowd.

McLean exchanged a very brief arms length handshake from former Mayor Dave Bieter as he strode across the dais to hug councilor Lisa Sanchez following the swearing-in ceremony.

As McLean, Jimmy Hallyburton, Elaine Clegg, and Patrick Bageant were sworn-in, each offered thanks to supporters and spoke of their eagerness to serve the citizens of Boise.

McLean noted she was not the first female mayor, but the first ELECTED female mayor. She graciously acknowledged Carolyn Terteling who served as acting mayor during the turbulent times following the forced resignation of former mayor Brent Coles 18 years ago. Ironically and probably unnoticed by most, Coles was in the audience.

Next order of business was election of council president and pro-tem. Longest serving councilor Clegg was nominated and elected as council president. Then in a politically astute move, Councilor TJ Thomson suggested an “all woman leadership” team and nominated Holli Woodings for council pro-tem.

The roll call vote was suddenly stalled when it came to Councilor Lisa Sanchez. Sanchez mentioned that she and Woodings were not always on good terms. Then in a surprise move that injected a degree of tension into the festive love-in, Sanchez directly addressed Woodings and asked if she (Woodings) would commit to supporting and mentoring her for pro tem in 2021.

Woodings hemmed, hawed, dodged the question and said something about supporting all members of the council. Sanchez appeared to record the exchange on her smart phone. She ultimately voted “yes” for Woodings.

With the exception of Bieter’s former spokesman, Mike Journee, McLean hasn’t make any staff changes within the mayor’s office. She has assured the GUARDIAN that efforts are underway to save money within the office of mayor.

The next two years should prove interesting in city politics as the new politicos vie to promote pet projects and causes. At first blush, it would seem there will be fewer unanimous votes than in the past.

Comments & Discussion

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  1. western guy
    Jan 7, 2020, 9:16 pm

    What’s up with council member Lisa Sanchez? Starting an internal scuffle already?

    EDITOR NOTE–We see it as refreshing that she spoke her mind.

  2. Bring on the scuffles
    Jan 7, 2020, 10:42 pm

    I would like to see many more “scuffles” on the dais as too much “groupthink” and “groupspeak” has occured for far too long.

  3. To council pro tem:

    Un Um

  4. Oh yes….we have a new mayor and council members. I await the new 5 year plan to address all our ills and spread wokeness to the masses.

    I almost forgot about this ceremonial drivel, as I have been overdosing on Ricky Gervais’ monologue. What a mug of smackdown that was. Any liberty loving American should order that entree, and from a Brit, no less.

    Ok, back to Boise business. I heard that McClean is going to go into the trailer parks and search for vacancies to house homeless people. Not the worst idea in the world, but how will she qualify the tenants? There are homeless who are self functioning and those that are not. Where will the non self functioning homeless live? Is there a secret slush fund hiding somewhere that we can tap for this problem? There seemed to be one for the Crystal Palace Library idea.

    Can we identify if any newly arrived homeless are transplants from DeBlasio’s NYC? Return to sender. Or….sue NYC for all boarding and care of their people until they get on their feet.

    Is the Trolley dead? Are we still planning a commuter train from Boise to Nampa? Are we still going to pay more property taxes every year? Do we have adequate fire protection on the periphery? Are we in for more density housing? Dems need voting numbers and density will deliver it. It always has and always will. That’s been the plan from the start.

  5. Brian e Vermillion
    Jan 8, 2020, 2:55 am

    Note to editor: That was a classless move by Sanchez, anything but refreshing.

  6. Off to a rocky, but a good start.

  7. She “assured the Guardian”? Are you no longer persona non grata? Able to get press releases and all that?

  8. Hopefully the new mayor will address the issue of Boise taking the maximum hit on property taxes every year. As a small business owner its not government regulations that are killing us. It is this never stops increasing property tax burden that we have to either absorb or pass on in the form of price increases. With all the new development one would think the additional taxes generated would more than satisfy city greed.

  9. Glad to have Ms Sanchez on the Council. The women are offering great representation.

    And Councilmember Sanchez represents citizens other than the upper-income citizens and ‘stay at home moms able to do so’. TJ would have been better to nominate C. Sanchez.

    I expect overgrown-wood Clegg (since 2003) will now be the hurdle to new directions.

  10. For Boise, the property tax increase is mostly used to pay for increases to personnel, as stated by the City’s finance department (1/22/2019 budget workshop). Anyone can see this in the City budget on p. 40-41, where property tax and personnel costs have been in lock-step for years.

    Rather than placing all of the blame and responsibility on the state to address property tax, the City can do their part by addressing the compounding cost of personnel, otherwise the City will continue to take the 3% increase each year. The City can start by adjusting the annual 3% COLA, as this may have been sustainable years ago with far less employees, but that is no longer the case. Move toward shared insurance premiums, as the rising cost of healthcare has no end in sight. The private sector began using this method to keep costs in line years ago. The city employees will not want these changes, but the citizens are constantly told that with growth comes change. Well than change needs to take place across the board.

    EDITOR NOTE–Less advertising, incentives, and less expansion would tend to cut down on the need for more employees to serve the growth.

  11. THIS JUST IN: “Bloomberg sees California as model on climate change, guns”

    AP Wire- https://apnews.com/3e132696097bf5f9abcadf408d4d7cbb

    Then this: Police: Liberal prosecutors to blame for chaos, mayhem in San Francisco

    https://www.lawenforcementtoday.com/police-liberal-prosecutors-to-blame-for-chaos-mayhem-in-san-francisco/

    This is the permissiveness taken to a new level in Commiefornia. When do we start hearing this from our new Mayor and super progressives like Jimmy Halliburton? I spent many years steeped in this kind of viewpoint. I bought into much of it. You convince yourself that the groupthink is wiser than any critical thought process, even though I struggled with the logic. I kept telling myself that the greater good will be realized because of the fairy tale aura of leftist perception of the human condition was all based on class. That is total and utter crap. Life is much more complex than that.

    Once I broke out of my slumber, I saw just how bankrupt all of this stuff is. And now we can see the experiments of permissive leftist ideology on display in Commiefornia. And, insulated billionaires like Michael Bloomberg want to export this crap to the rest of the USA. Methinks that is exactly what the pro-density, Smart Growth types here in Boise want in the end. Be afraid. Be very afraid.

  12. Editor Note: Exactly; stop the sprawl and this will lead to less demand on city staff as well as all other taxpayer funded resources. Meanwhile, the City could choose to provide property tax relief by not taking the 3% this next year and instead, using some of the tax they already collected, but are choosing to sit-on by keeping nearly $53 million set aside for the library in the rebudget system.

  13. I’m very concerned because several of them have never worked for a living. Their biggest financial worry ever has been making a transfer from the pot of gold account to the checking account.

    I don’t agree with Sanchez on politic but at lease she knows what it’s like to say “oh crap I don’t have enough money this month”

    I truly believe this crew is going to do huge financial damage to the Boise homeowner before we can finally flush them out and replace with people who work for a living.

  14. Chickenhawk
    Jan 9, 2020, 6:44 pm

    I am just waiting for all of this hope, change and prosperity that she promised during the campaign. With this kind of elaborate welcome one would think the Royal Family was there.

  15. Our X Despot
    Jan 13, 2020, 1:04 am

    I must admit to an irreverent chuckle at the Bieter / Sanchez embrace. Unfortunately, it also underscores the long ago cautionary words “eternal vigilance” Still enjoyed the moment

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