Candidate statements

["Mike Curley" <curley@CYPHER.TURBONET.COM>]

Several of you have asked for information from the candidates for City Council 
and discussed a list of questions for us to answer.  I hope those questions are 
in the works, but felt that in the meantime I should respond to some of the 
questions that had already been asked.

I am Mike Curley, 1913 East E Street, Moscow,  882-3536.  I have a law practice 
in Moscow and a clinical professor at the University of Idaho College of Law.  
Since January of this year I have served as a member of the Moscow Planning and 
Zoning Commission.  One of the issues that came before the Commission this year 
was the 51 acre Parkview Estates annexation and subdivision request.  I was the 
only member of Planning and Zoning to vote against the subdivision in the form 
it was before us, and I would have voted against it in the form it was finally 
passed by the City Council.  I thought the development proposed was too dense 
(that is, too many residences) and that it was to be constructed in a manner to 
minimize traffic in the development at the expense of contiguous 
neighborhoods--primarily by making the primary residential streets in the 
development cul-de-sacs.  Additionally, I thought that the requirements 
inadequate to control the expanded load on the city drainage system.  Since the 
city had hop-scotched this acreage when it approved the Quail Run development 
further north of the city, it is not very practical or equitable to not annex 
the 51 acres if requested by the owners, but I do not think the development as 
proposed--and ultimately passed--was in the best interest of the city.  That 
development approval is history.  I can only say that as a member of the City 
Council I will look at development and annexation requests as critically as I 
did this one.  It is my hope that the Council will take a comprehensive look at 
the areas surrounding Moscow and anticipate and plan for the eventual inclusion 
of those areas most likely to be requested for annexation and development.  The 
process of reacting to individual development requests does not serve us well.  
All the professional information received in the process--including the public 
hearings--is prepared by those hired by the applicants.  Their job is to 
represent their client--not the city.  Yes, the City staff provides some input, 
but it is not their job--nor perhaps their expertise--to suggest other ways to 
develop the property.  They comment primarily on the impact of the development 
as proposed.  Only with some advanced thinking and planning can the 
problems with the current methods be avoided or minimized.

I have also commented on this list about my thoughts on the Corridor 
development.  It is not at all surprising to me that Whitman County officials 
seeminly paid little or no attention to the Moscow and Latah County citizens 
who responded to their request for input.  What I do think we have some control 
over is how and if Moscow participates in the process.  It appears to me that 
the Corridor WILL be developed.  The question for us is: where?  From the 
information I have received to date, it appears that to develop at the Moscow 
(east) end of the corridor, the Moscow water lines must be extended and water 
provided by Moscow.  The alternative is to extend lines from Pullman.  That 
would be an expensive alternative.  Perhaps business owners, Whitman County, 
and the City of Pullman would participate in the process.  My thought, however, 
is that Pullman does not want business being further diverted from its core, 
and that development is more likely to occur on the Pullman (west) end of the 
corridor if Moscow chooses not to help development on the east end.  At this 
point, absent significant input from the City of Moscow on development 
restrictions in the Corridor, I would not provide any services that encourage 
development on the east end.  Someone suggested when I posted this thought 
earlier that we should just charge more.  I don't think that is the answer, 
even if it were legal to do so (which another writer suggested it was not).

Another issue that landed before Planning and Zoning was the proposed amendment 
of the Moscow sign ordinance.  I came to the Commission when that project had 
already started.  An ordinance was proposed and a public hearing announced at 
which a group of business owners, organized in part through the Chamber of 
Commerce, came to speak in opposition to the proposal.  As a result, a 
subcommittee of 3 Commission members was appointed to meet with the business 
owners AND other interested city residents to hear and consider the objections 
and recommend any necessary changes.  The ordinance is (necessarily) complex 
because it is not being imposed on barren land about to be developed, but on a 
fully developed city with different zoning and construction from one block to 
another in some areas.  Nels Reese (chair of the subcommittee), Steve Baxter, 
and I were able to draft a proposal that the Commission ultimately passed and 
sent to the City Council that largely found approval among both business owners 
and other residents.  The process by which that ordinance was developed is one 
that I serves the City well and that I would continue, in cooperation with 
other Council members.  It is important that we not pit one segment of our 
community against the other, but that as elected or appointed officials we do 
our best to bring diverse constituencies together to reason in the best 
interests of the city as a whole.  And, ultimately, that is the standard by 
which I will be guided as a Council member as I have been as a Commission 
member.

I know there are many other issues of interest, but I will stop for now.  I 
hope other candidates will participate in whatever form you would like.  While 
I, too, want to hear from you just as Jack Hill recently requested, I do think 
it important that we as candidates express where we stand on exisiting issues 
or where we have been on some of the more recent ones.

Regards, and thanks for listening.


Mike Curley
curley@turbonet.com
208-882-3536