Sugar Days 2022
Thanks to our sponsors and volunteers for this year's Community Breakfast and Sugar Days Celebration!
Dave Thompson also received the Civil Servant of the Year award for his many years of dedicated service to the city.
Kids (and adults!) enjoyed the inflatable activities: two bounce houses, two obstacle courses, and, of course, the mechanical bull. And the rock wall challenged the bravest.
We hope everyone enjoyed the day with their neighbors.
If you're interested in helping to plan and organize Sugar Days 2023, please contact me or city hall. We love our volunteers and always need more--a lot more.
Sprinkler Backflow Prevention Device Inspections
The city is attempting to verify that all homes and businesses that have water lines connected to the city's culinary water system are equipped with a required backflow preventer.
The city's system has to maintain a high standard of quality, and everyone that enjoys the great tasting Sugar City water understands why this is necessary and desirable.
Any system that could possibly backflow into the city's system due, for example, to an extreme drop in water pressure for some reason, has to have a device to prevent this from happening and possibly contaminating the culinary system.
The Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) requires the devices and the regular inspection of them. The city has had this requirement in place for many years, and it has been discussed in many city council meetings and announced though other venues such as the city newsletter. The earliest I recall since serving on the council was the discussion back in April 2021. If the requirement hasn't been enforced well in the past, it wasn't because it didn't exist, and the city is currently under pressure to get up to standard, as we should.
Within the past year or so, the city put out bids or announcements to find third parties who may be interested in performing these inspections for the residents at some agreed upon rate. We received no interested bids from any companies willing or able to make such a deal with the city. The investment of time and resources for the companies wasn't worth it, or the companies simply didn't have the labor power to conduct and monitor these inspections.
Residents can choose from numerous companies to arrange for inspection or installation of their backflow prevention device, and the city has made a list of such contractors available on its Facebook page and website.
Such requirements as this often seem a big hassle and even an "overreach of big government," but I think we can all agree we love our clean water. Let's do our best to keep it safe and pure.
If you have further questions or concerns, please contact city hall and the public works department.
City Dumpster and Clean-Up
We've heard from a number of residents both for and against the current city dumpster and clean-up plan. Here's where we sit right now:
The city council decided to remove the dumpster for now--Thursday the 14th will be the final day--so we will have enough money in the budget to cover the cost of a fall city-wide clean-up. The fees collected each month will go toward this. More details to come on the when and what and how of the clean-up.
The fees collected from residents ($3.60/month) simply don't cover the cost of the dumpster and the clean-ups. I can't speak for the rest of the council, but my current position is to drop the program all together. It is not covering the cost now, and it won't be able to in the future.
There are also additional challenges when we consider our neighbors who don't really have tree limbs and lawn and garden waste to take care of. Currently, we're asking them to subsidize the other residents who do. Yes, it's for the overall beauty of the city, but I'm not very comfortable with that argument.
And it's a tough challenge to figure out how to manage a city-wide clean-up for residents who don't have alleys. We're not allowed to bag our leaves and garden waste for the trucks. If we place such material in the streets the night before, it might all end up in our neighbor's yard by morning or clogging the city drains. If we put piles of stuff on our driveways instead of the streets for pick up, where do we put our vehicles? How does the city collect it from our driveways without damaging the driveway or accidentally hitting a mailbox, etc.?
If we were to hire someone to play guard at the dumpster
to ask for ID and to secure the dumpster site, the monthly fee would most
certainly have to go up, and doing that still wouldn't solve our other
challenges with the program.
It's a tough situation. It's a traditional service offered by the city--paid for by residents--but I think it's time to rethink it and maybe let it end. As the city welcomes more residents in various housing types, the dumpster and city-wide clean-up program will vex us even more, I think.
We love our clean city. Residents do a great job maintaining their homes and yards and other buildings. I'm confident that won't change if we drop the extra monthly fee and the current clean up plan.
The council is working on next year's budget right now, so this issue will need to be decided one way or another within the next few weeks. If you have thoughts about this issue, especially if you have some persuasive ideas for solving my concerns, I'd love to hear from you, (as would, I'm sure, the other members of the council and the mayor), or you can come and speak during the next public comment period during city council meeting.
Thanks!
PS. The city doesn't have a program to trap cats or dogs. There were some concerns going around about this.