nlp541

Agreed, the City Council denial of the Robal Road location was…mystifying. As is the ongoing campaign to change the scope of library projects. Perhaps clues can be found in a recent Guest Editorial in The Bulletin.

That writer questions the will of the voters two years after Deschutes County residents reviewed the Library Board’s plans, studied the $195m bond and said “yes” to to a new Central Library and Branch Library upgrades. He argues that voters were mislead, that the Central Library - now planned for Stevens Ranch - is too big, too flawed and too far away. He deems that a book warehouse on the Eastside is sufficient, “Leaving funds,” he says, “for future system expansion.”

Expansion? Where?

He doesn’t say. Maybe he - and others - are thinking of the Bend Central District (BCD), where development lags despite its many cheerleaders, public investments and special tax incentives. Downscale the Central Library to central warehouse and might leftover bond funds be available to goose BCD development? Perhaps a library is desired there, but the type, as the writer imagines, “without stacks…freeing up space for other uses - community meeting rooms, technology centers…cultural events.” Is this enticement part of the call for “a new library board majority and a fresh look at the plan?” No sé.

But the dogged campaign to reorient the $195m bond feels like Round 2 of Thwart the Library, keeping it up in the air until it lands right where we* want it. Never mind how the majority of Library Board members voted, what the majority of Deschutes County voters wanted, and whose money it is.

Hmmm, “expats” making decisions that affect the daily lives of Oregonians while not having to live with the consequences of those decisions themselves. Small grace: the two OR lottery heads profiled by WW moved to TX and FL and are not taking up two scarce housing units in Bend.

Thank you GSKY, I couldn’t agree more with in inequity of the City’s approach. In siting its shelters the City has normalized one part of Bend as the “logical” place for the homeless. Then it pretends that all of Bend is sharing the burden. It isn’t now and it won’t. If they say shelters anywhere then shelters everywhere, not just on the East Side. Don’t call protestors to the Shelter Code unfeeling because they see the rig and refuse to be dupes.

It’s long past time for Wards in city governance.

Journalists from Missouri must like to write about bears. Your colleague in St. Louis, Sarah Kendzior, also wrote about bears hiding in plain sight.

To avoid the appearance of political favoritism in the appointment to a vacant councilor seat let the voters decide. Until a City Charter change, a council seat vacated by election to mayor (as in 2020) should go to the next highest vote getter in the council election, no matter the position for which they ran. At least the voters would have had a chance to vet the person, unlike a political appointee.

And, yes, a new charter review please. The last bipartisan one recommended 4 wards (needed) and 2 at-large councilors plus an elected mayor. We’re only part way there. Minimally we need to eliminate “hold-my-council-seat-in-case-I-lose-my-mayoral-run”. Resign from the council to run for mayor.

I heartily welcome public town halls, in-person, full City Council hearings on the proposed homeless shelter code. The changes are sweeping and will impact Bend greatly. I do push back on the framing here that public participation in the months of City online meetings around homeless solutions and HB2001 (infill housing) was limited to a “more excitable group”, those “who can wade through the chatter on social media.” Every citizen with an internet connection had equal access to City meetings. Those sufficiently motivated acted.

Which actors were clamoring to be heard? Mostly homeowners from older Bend neighborhoods without the CC&R protections other areas of Bend enjoy. These “excitable” taxpayers know that lacking CC&R protection, homeless shelters will disproportionately land on their streets and in their neighborhoods and will disproportionately affect their home equity, their livability and their kids’ safety.

If ALL Bend neighborhoods were subject to the City’s proposed shelter solutions, no doubt “the larger community” would have been clamoring to be heard on Zoom, too.

Approach Walmart about donating their 30 acres, the old KOA camp. This is a great opportunity to burnish their community image. Wally World.