I still remember the culture shock I experienced when I moved to Chicago and saw the condition of some of the sidewalks, especially in less-affluent areas.
I came from a small city where, when a sidewalk needed repair, the city fixed it and the property owners paid up.
There was no argument, and if you ignored the bill, the charges just got added to your property tax.
Although I’m sure that this last detail couldn’t be incorporated into Cook County’s tax structure, Andrew Martin’s story “Peril lurks just outside your door” (Page 1, Feb. 21) makes it clear that some fix is essential.
Our block club circulated petitions to have property owners use the 50/50 program and this program was very well received.
The only people who didn’t fix their sidewalks were the absentee landlords and people with corner properties.
Consistently the price for new sidewalks along both the front and long sides of their lots was prohibitive.
Our community group also lobbies every year for the alderman to use some of the “free sidewalk” in our most deteriorated areas.
But people also complain that this rewards irresponsible owners.
And they’re right.
We made the suggestion that a better use for this money would be to subsidize those expensive corner pavement jobs, and were told this wasn’t fair.
Perhaps not, but neither is the Neighborhoods Alive program.
If the issue there is really helping people who can’t afford to pay for sidewalk repairs, it’s obvious that all wards don’t have the same level of need.
And is giving an alderman the sole authority to dole out the repairs really the best way to make decisions?
