Letters to the editor

City has other needs than downtown

I have had a number of issues to write in about but haven't until now. I think the push to spruce up downtown and make it a quaint shopping area has been a big success. We now have, for the most part, nice sidewalks, facelifts of the stores, we've even narrowed a bridge and added a crossing stop light.

But none of this is what I wanted to bring up in this letter. While we put our full attention on downtown, we are missing a valuable asset by letting people trash up our creek. On the west side of Bob Henry Park just past the volleyball area is (or was) a quaint, basically natural wild life area of Sager Creek. A nature trail where the deer had paths, the ducks had a place to swim and feed away from the hustle and bustle of city life, and groundhogs had a place to live. But while we spend millions on downtown we are letting people ride four-wheelers and cut up the natural plants, ruin the habitat of the residing animals and make a mess of that part of the creek. There by University Street is a very large tree which should have been cleaned up by the city but it remains an eye sore. The city is letting someone dump truckloads of concrete in big piles on the west side of the creek in full view of everyone to see.

I contacted the Mayor John Turner about this and asked him why this was being tolerated. He said he'd look into it and get back to me, I still haven't heard from him. I also asked a city board member, Frank Johnson, about the dumping and the destruction, he said he would get back to me, I've not heard from him either. I went to the first board meeting of the year and made my concerns known to the Mayor, he said that was private land and they weren't sure the city had any say in what was being done to that area. I guarantee if it were my land being dumped on, the city would be pretty sure they had a say in the matter. Well I'm not sure what is to be done about this but the right to voice my opinion might be why they passed that new nuisance ordinance.

Bobby Garrett

Siloam Springs