Eric Bartkus Lowell City Council

I have attended many council meetings and the mayor and team do a good job of making citizens aware of upcoming votes. One perfect example is Mayor Mike DeVore’s desire to hold two public meetings on the sale of the property at 990 N. Washington, adjacent to Scout Park. Those meetings were well publicized and attended. There were a lot of comments and they helped the council make a great decision of adding the land to Scout Park (read my Promise 21). This is a perfect guidebook for a successful city council.

There has been one decision that was important to me that didn’t seem to have enough early citizen input: selling the Line Shack. The selected plan was to demolish the building and erect a 6+ story apartment building. The lack of parking for the 17 units would have been a real problem. The sale was stopped after considerable negative response of the neighbors at two meetings.

I was one of six parties that tried to purchase the property. My woodworking friends and I were going to remodel the current building and form a gift shop / workshop. It would have been an additional draw for people to visit the downtown. I am also the closest residential neighbor. I am not upset that I wasn’t selected and believe the plan accepted by council is a good one.

The approved sale of the land is for a 3 story 4 unit condo with parking on the ground floor. The building design will fit in well with the current downtown and will add four new neighbors to the community. The city gets added tax revenue and the removal of the current eye-sore.

I do believe that there should have been better early involvement of the neighbors and public on the intended sale. The proposals and pictures of the buildings were not easily available on the city website. All of my neighbors didn’t even know what was happening. I had to ask a city official for the proposals. Once I made the neighbors aware of the sale, we filled the council chamber and ultimately moved to a better solution for that land.

In closing, I promise to make sure that the citizens have ample opportunity to learn about upcoming issues and votes. I desire to represent the citizens well and to vote for their best interest. I won’t support any important vote that hasn’t had citizen input. Thank you, Eric