Well, Well! I know that all of Cascade is interested in my exchanges with the National League of Cities and the Iowa NLC, pursuant to the question of: Is Cascade’s Sidewalk Ordinance a) legal or b) fair? The way the councilmen carry on, you’d think it was chiseled in stone. On tablets given to Moses! Here is the response from NLC, and must say I am not too surprised.
Hi
Keyron:
Thank you for the inquiry.
We do not have a model
sidewalk ordinance. Iowa is a Home Rule
state and ordinances like these are determined at the local level by the city
council. Any time a city enacts an ordinance--even when we may have a sample
ordinance to share--we always recommend they work with their city attorney to
ensure it works well for their community and that the ordinance is lawful. With
that said, we do have general guidance about right of way responsibilities
which includes sidewalk maintenance/installation on the League's website which
can be found here: https://www.iowaleague.org/resource/right-of-way-responsibilities/ Hope this helps.
Sincerely,
Bill Goldy, Iowa League of Cities Consultant goldyconsultingllc@gmail.com
Of course, even if NLC or
ILC did have a generic sidewalk ordinance, it would never have taken into
consideration the particular historical development of situation here. The city
and its voters have to come to a fair resolution of that ourselves in terms of
the reality on the ground. It appears we have put several people back on
council who appear to be less than honest.
Still, I really don’t think you need a model ordinance or anything of the sort, to tell you it is unfair that the least well-off citizens are forced to install and maintain sidewalk. If they have to do it, they should get a tax rebate for providing the city a service. This summer, nearly every M, W & F, I passed a knot of women whome i believe live in the Conrad Addition walking in the old part of the city. This is hardly fair.
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