February North District Council

Some updates from this month’s North District Council Meeting:

• Councilmember Tom Rasmussen discussed transportation issues, especially buses and sidewalks.
• Sharon Rogers from Schools First was reminding people to vote on the school levies. And really wanted to make sure people were aware of the greatly reduced drop boxes this year so you’ll probably have to find a stamp…
• Solynn McCurdy from Alliance for Education discussed community engagement. One topic that also came up was teacher quality. It wasn’t defined (nobody claimed to have a complete definition) but the idea was that it’s still worth having the discussion.
• The process we went through for Bridging the Gap was summarized. As mentioned previously, the sidewalk on 115th was submitted as a 3rd place tie (it lost the tiebreaker) but the rest of the process still has a ways to go. I’ve asked for some more information from those involved on where things stand and should hopefully have some info soon.
• Also, on a random note, I got nominated to be the Vice Chair of the North District Council. Which shouldn’t change much since I’m already attending as the Pinehurst representative. But it’s a more formal title I suppose…

I forgot to mention how nice it was to see so many different groups at the meeting this week. There were multiple representatives from the city (SDOT and Parks), multiple people speaking to education, and more. I think it’s great to get input from groups outside the community councils and other regulars.