Alley to be blocked to ease congestion

The Street Committee met with Steve Crockett, John Anderson, Paul Pippenger and the Orofino Youth Baseball committee to discuss problems with parking at the VFW and Rotary baseball fields during games. Neighborhood residents have been having problems with congestion, blocked driveways and foul balls hitting their vehicles. OYS will be putting up netting to stop the balls and the council has approved blocking of Riverside Alley during games to alleviate some of the problems.

Police Chief Ron Pomerinke said the group is going to police themselves and ask participants to be courteous to the neighbors. The police department will only be called if there is a serious problem.

City Administrator Rick Laam said he was scheduled to meet the airport engineers this week to put final touches on the design updates. He and Pomerinke had also met with City Attorney Clayne Tyler about the parking ordinance. Changes will come back to the Police Committee.

Some of the city elected officials and staff were involved in an Association of Idaho Cities meeting Monday. Of particular note was information about a case that went to the Idaho Supreme Court concerning ordinary expenses of the city and lease/purchase procedures. Laam said with the information that was shared it may be a good idea to have a ballot for long term equipment purchases, though it does not impact taxes or user fees. This could convey more information to the public about long term purchases.

Laam said there was also a discussion about federal legislation that would prevent cities from charging franchise fees to cable companies. He said this would mean that the cable companies would not have to pay the fees, have a business license or even ask permission to dig up streets to lay line. This would take away local control. He feels the legislation is part of the refusal of Cebridge to pay franchise fees.

Water/Waste Water supervisor Larry Annen said the water treatment episode the city experienced had been building up for several days. Operators were not able to manually keep up with the fluctuating turbidity in the river and give the water the appropriate treatment time. The city had been running off and on from reserves, but there was concern about having fire flow available if it was needed and they went ahead and pumped.