September 25, 2008 in Opinion

Our View: Solutions can be as near as neighborhood council

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‘You don’t have to move to live in a better neighborhood.”

So goes the slogan Spokane’s Office of Neighborhood Services has coined to encourage residents to get active in one of the city’s 27 neighborhood councils. Getting involved, says acting director Jonathan Mallahan, is the first step toward making a difference.

Someone should tell that to Ronnie Claudy, whose frustration led him on Monday to the City Council meeting, where he appealed for help.

Claudy said students from nearby North Central High School congregate in front of his house, lean on his fence and spread litter rather than use the trash receptacles the school has placed nearby. When he asks for some respect, they treat him rudely, he says, and he fears he’ll eventually be facing fence-repair expenses.

He traipsed to City Hall after the logical channels left him exasperated.

School officials declined to deal with the problem because it happens off campus, he says. And police told him they don’t have the resources to give the matter the kind of attention it would take to make it stop. On Monday, Council President Joe Shogan said Claudy should approach the school again, or talk to the City Council members from his district, Steve Corker and Nancy McLaughlin.

Oddly, nobody suggested to Claudy that he turn to his neighborhood council – in this case Emerson-Garfield – as a vehicle for building a “better neighborhood.”

Actually, says Emerson-Garfield President Rusty Vlahovich, a similar issue arose a couple of years ago involving Havermale Alternative School. In that case, neighborhood representatives worked with Havermale officials, who ordered a team of students to do cleanup work in an area impacted by graffiti.

But on Tuesday morning Vlahovich hadn’t heard about Claudy’s current problems. Nor had Mallahan.

Council members Corker and McLaughlin did meet with Claudy, and they hope to facilitate some kind of solution, possibly involving NC students as goodwill ambassadors. McLaughlin reportedly assisted Claudy with a previous, similar problem, but any solutions worked out in that case apparently didn’t carry over into the current school year.

Meanwhile, as a citizen who is expected to support bonds, levies and other tax measures to pay for schools, streets, jails and a variety of public services, Claudy has a right to wonder why getting lasting relief from a threat to his property is such an ordeal.

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