Don’t Look Now, But …

Coeur d’Alene School Board Trustee Tom Hearn talks with Donna Montgomery at the Panhandle Pachyderm Club luncheon at Templins Red Lion in Post Falls today. At left is Bjorn Handeen, the Precinct 52 committeeman who lost to Hearn in the 2013 school board election. Hearn attended the luncheon to hear Reps. Kathy Sims and Donald Cheatham explain why they voted in the minority of the special session against the child support enforcement bill. (Photo Duane Rasmussen)

Don’t look now but … State Sen. Mary Souza and state Rep. Kathy Sims have both been appointed to an interim committee to study urban renewal laws in Idaho. And that is not a good thing for The Lake City. The two Coeur d’Alene Republicans have fought urban renewal for years, despite Coeur d’Alene’s use of the economic tool to transform the waterfront. Sims has failed so far in her attempts to hamstring the state’s urban renewal laws. But she now has Souza, her old RecallCDA buddy, to help lobby other legislators on the 10-member interim committee for recommendations to change the laws. I had forgotten all about these appointments until I saw a tweet today mentioning that Sims had brought up the topic at the Panhandle Pachyderm Club lunch at Post Falls. Sims, who is best known for voting against the child support bill, the North Idaho mental health center and even the giant salamander, lobbied for the interim committee. Still bitter about the use of urban renewal money to upgrade McEuen Park, she told the Coeur d’Alene Press in February: “The most basic reason why I want to do this is I’ve been working on urban renewal for about five years and nothing ever happens,” Sims said, then referred to the statewide outlook. “They are spending $55 million a year of taxpayers’ money without a vote of people. And they’re going deeply in debt.”

Question: Do you think the low opinion of urban renewal, held by state Sen. Mary Souza and state Rep. Kathy Sims, represent the think of their constituents on the issue?