The City Café

Below is the tracking list and the bills in committee.

Bills in Committee 2-20-13

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Below is the Tracking sheet and the Bills in Committee.

Bills In Committee 1-31-13

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Per previous blog posts, Cameron and Lincoln spent time in Nepal volunteering at an eye clinic in Phaplu with the University of Utah’s Moran Eye Center.  The entire trip was led by World Wide Trekking, a Utah-based expedition company, and its Human Outreach Project.   The blog now compares Utah city infrastructure to Nepali city infrastructure.  Two of the most visible services that Utah cities provide are public safety (police and fire departments) and parks and recreation.  Nepali cities also provide such services, though with a different level of service.

Police officers in Utah cities investigate crimes, apprehend criminals, and enforce the law. Same for Nepal, but we saw the most police officers on traffic duty in Kathmandu’s snarled and dusty streets.

Ok, we didn’t actually see any fire stations in Nepal. In Kathmandu, the valley of 3.5 million residents has just four fire engines. By comparison, Murray City has three fire engines to service a city of 46,000 people. In Nepali highland villages, they rely on a volunteer fire fighting force just like many rural Utah communities. Your correspondent does not believe there is sufficient water though…

Your correspondent was pleased to find a city park with a basketball court, complete with courtside seats!

Utah cities have tremendous parks and recreation facilities, from baseball and softball complexes to riverside trails. In Kathmandu, the above dirt patch beside the polluted Bagmati River is a soccer pitch. The Jordan River Parkway, it is not.

Most Utah cities, large and small, have a city park. Ditto, Nepal. Here, the kids are playing soccer in Namche Bazaar, a village of 1,700 people at an elevation of 11,300 feet. Could you play soccer on the summit of Mt. Timpanogos? What a home field advantage!

In Phaplu, the wide area of the main highway doubles as the playing field. You can see the entire playing area, where we played football, soccer, and Frisbee with the wonderful kids.

Per previous blog posts, Cameron and Lincoln spent time in Nepal volunteering at an eye clinic in Phaplu at the Moran Eye Center. The entire trip was led by World Wide Trekking, a Utah-based expedition company, and its Human Outreach Project.   The blog compares Utah cities to Nepalese cities.

Utah cities are proud of the public works and sanitation services that they provide.  Public works employees dig, excavate, build, pave, and develop the infrastructure on which our community and economy depend.   Utah cities contract with waste disposal companies to ensure that communities stay clean and waste is removed efficiently and disposed of in environmentally-friendly ways.  Nepal is… different.

Like Utah, Nepal boasts high mountain streams that result in fresh, clean water… or so they say. In Patan, residents come to a fountain near Durbar Square to draw water. Likewise, along the Everest trail we often saw water running through prayer wheels and labeled as “drinking water.” When your correspondent asked if he could get a drink, the Nepali tour guide laughed and said that water would make me sick! Thankfully, Utah cities have higher standards for treating drinking water to ensure its cleanliness. Utah city water consistently ranks among America’s finest water, with Beaver and Salt Lake City having won contests in recent years.  Your correspondent wishes that Utah had more water flowing through prayer wheels though!

Most homes within municipalities in Utah are hooked into the water system. Clean water flows in and gray water flows away. Utah city residents drink, shower, wash dishes, and flush the toilet without worrying about the water supply. In Nepal, however, the villages do not provide such a reliable water system. Many buildings store their own water on the rooftop and use it sparingly for washing. You must treat water before drinking it. Water may be a hassle, but the views are worth it!

Gray water? Well, funny you asked… this photo shows the outhouse in Tengboche. The facility is just a hole in the ground—no gray water involved. In other cases, a simple pipe carries the gray water away from the village. In Utah, the gray water travels to a sewage treatment facility where it is treated and released. In Nepal, however, the gray water travels down the simple pipe and arrives untreated in the river below. Like I said before—and never have to say in a Utah city—don’t drink the water!

Utah cities provide many ways to dispose of waste. The city encourages you to bring bagged leaves or dry Christmas trees to City Hall, provides garbage and recycling receptacles at your home and place of work, and collects the waste on a regular basis. In Nepal, the local residents traditionally just burn their waste, including yak dung. Unfortunately, sheer quantity of waste that trekkers bring to the Everest region has overwhelmed the residents’ ability to dispose of it. As such, the government has posted signs throughout the region urging trekkers and residents alike to “pack in, pack out” or to use the provided receptacles. Unfortunately, your correspondent only spotted a few such receptacles on the entire 30 mile trek and I am uncertain who collects the waste or what happens post-collection. This was the most scenic, with Mt. Everest looming above it (top left).

Because Nepal is richly blessed with water supplies but does not have the capacity to build large dams, rural communities are pioneering small hydro plants to supply their electricity.

In Utah, power and utility lines are often buried underground. Older Utah cities may still have the lines above ground, but it never looks like this!

So I’ve had a bit of a hiatus from blogging…but I’m back at. Hopefully, this spring we’ll spice this up with some more podcasts and possibly video-casts. 

So no one is quite sure where the economy is heading right now. It seems that more and more people are moving to a position of cautious optimism. However, I just read this article tonight: “Leading economic indicators dip more than expected“ 

According to this private sector index economic activity fell 0.3 percent in March, while many economists were expecting the decline to be closer to 0.2 percent.  This analysis includes a number of factors including: stock prices, the money supply, jobless claims, new orders by manufacturers and building permits.

Ken Goldstein, economist with Conference Board (conducting this analysis) says…

There have been some intermittent signs of improvement in the economy in April, but the leading economic index and most of its components are still pointing down.

A great article in the SL Tribune today about one of the nation’s finest mayors…Mayor Joe Piccolo. Mayor Piccolo is a past president of the ULCT and someone those of us here at League have a lot of admiration for and love to work with. You can read the full article here: Price mayor is a man for his time.

So where are we at with the latest confidence crisis? Well according to today NY Times the numbers for consumer spending are pretty alarming.

Sales of new vehicles have dropped 32 percent in the third quarter. Consumer spending appears likely to fall next year for the first time since 1980 and perhaps by the largest amount since 1942.

Circuit City has filed for bankruptcy and General Motors continues to struggle. Many clothing retailers are struggling too (Harold’s clothing, Mervyns, all going out of business recently).  The challenge for consumer spending is in recent years the American consumer has spent 99% of their income…now American’s are looking to save more. Economists seem to be forecasting that saving will increase to around 3%. The trend of consumer spending of couse is something we will monitor closely in the next few months.

You can read the full article here: Buying Binge Slams to Halt

Last week Brian, Meg, and I spent the afternoon and evening in Castle Dale. Mayor Peacock was not only a great host…but a great tourguide as well taking us for a quick visit to the San Rafael Swell. It was a perfect fall day, here are a few pictures…

We did do some work while we were there too…I spent an hour talking about local taxes, specifically sales tax and how to forecast sales tax during this uncertain economy. You can download a pdf of the presentation here: Castle Dale Presentation

Well, I made it. Here are the final stats:

Total miles: 853

Cities or towns visited: 49

“Moving violations”: ZERO

It was a lot of time in the car but I actually enjoyed it. I was quite interesting to see the various shapes and sizes of city and town halls around the state. And it was nice to meet some nice folks, although I found–not surprisingly–many town halls to be closed when I passed through town. Hopefully many of you found the parcel I left by the front door, or remnants of it after the stray pack of dogs had fun with it.

I’ll be undertaking part 2 of the tour, a more southern route, within the next 4-6 months.