Neighborhood discussion continues

Becky Billups showed up at Grand Coulee’s council meeting last Tuesday to complain about the looks of her neighborhood.

She has appeared regularly at council meetings and told mayor Chris Christopherson that she planned to continue doing so. “We want you to, it’s your city also,” the mayor responded.

While things are a bit better, Billups stated about her Burdin Boulevard neighborhood, it still isn’t what she would like to see.

Her earliest complaints were about old cars, trucks and junk lying around. Since that time a lot of that has been cleaned up and neighbors have even tried to develop a park-like area for kids to play.

Mayor Christopherson assured Billups that the city is working on the problem, but that it is compounded because the places she has complained about are all rentals.

“We are looking for cost effective ways to deal with the problems up in that neighborhood,” Christopherson told council members and Billups.

Billups and the Toulou families in that neighborhood have been exchanges comments, at times at council meetings, and through “letters to the editor” in The Star newspaper.

Billups had once called the neighborhood a “ghetto,” a term with which Mel Toulou immediately took issue.

Billups said Tuesday night that, while the place has been cleaned up somewhat, during the night pickup loads of material are being brought back in. She was specific about what was being brought back in.

Councilmember Erin Nielsen responded to her concern about graffiti in the area and couldn’t find anything in the nuisance ordinance that would specifically deal with it.

The mayor again assured Billups that the city was “working the problem.”