The journey from rural potato fields to Boise City Hall is anything but typical — but that’s exactly what makes Boise City Councilor Lucy Willits’ voice so vital. As the only conservative on the council, Lucy brings a business-minded, community-focused lens to the city’s most pressing issues, from housing affordability to homelessness, public safety to libraries.
In this episode, Lucy shares how her upbringing in unincorporated Jefferson County shaped her no-nonsense, entrepreneurial perspective on governance. “When you’re a small business person, you get paid last,” she reflects — a mindset that influences her approach to economic policy and city budgeting.
We dive into:
- How civility in public service can elevate meaningful dialogue across political divides
- The future of Boise’s essential infrastructure: parks, libraries, fire and police services
- What’s working — and what needs to change — in tackling homelessness and housing costs
- The unintended consequences of well-meaning regulations that make affordability elusive
- Her vision for a more connected, inclusive Boise, including celebrations like America 250
Despite being a lone ideological voice, Lucy remains hopeful: “Boise works best when all voices are heard.” Join us for a compelling discussion on city leadership, common ground, and the importance of civic engagement in shaping Idaho’s capital city.
🎆 Learn more about Boise’s July 4th festivities at Boise4th.com
🇺🇸 Become an ambassador for America’s 250th anniversary at America250Idaho.gov
Your voice matters — will you join the conversation?
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Today on the Ever Onward podcast, we have Lucy
Willits.
Lucy serves on the Boise CityCouncil.
We are very excited to have heron to hear all things Boise and
her representation of ourpeople here.
She grew up in Eastern Idaho onpotato fields and worked in
agriculture before moving toBoise and has been on the Boise
(00:21):
City Council.
Now is in her second term.
We're really excited to talk toLucy, talk about her leadership
she's one of the tremendousleaders we do have here in the
Valley and excited to have heron our podcast.
Lucy Willits Lucy, welcome tothe podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
I am so excited to be here, I feel.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
We've tried to have you on a couple of times.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Well, I feel very honored to be here, especially
right after Memorial Day.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
It was yeah, did you have a great weekend?
Speaker 2 (00:58):
I had a wonderful weekend, I got to tell you.
Yesterday I went to Morris HillCemetery and I'd never done
this before but the Civil WarAssociation and I'm probably
saying that club wrong but theydo an amazing ceremony.
There was Lincoln.
I had a woman read a poem thata woman had wrote during the
(01:19):
Civil War about grief and death.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
I've never heard of this.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
It was amazing.
And then they did a 21-gunsalute.
They were all in and they do itevery 21-gun salute.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
They were all in, and they do it every year.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
Yeah, and it was all in authentic uniforms.
It was so meaningful, I justloved it.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Oh, I want to take my grandson.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
Yeah, you would, oh, yes.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
So they do it every year.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
Were you there as an invitee for your role.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Well, I learned about it because of a city press
release but I wasn't formallyinvited.
But I went and I was glad I didbecause I wanted to show
support from the city and theyare complete volunteers.
They do it at Morris Hill andthen they do it at the Military
Reserve.
Wow, it was so neat.
I kept telling them thank youfor taking your time to do this
(02:02):
on a holiday.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
It's so nice.
I mean, we have a lot ofholidays and it seems like
everything now is you celebratesomething every day.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
There's even an app, I think.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
Like every day is celebrating something, but for
us on Memorial Day to pause andjust reading through.
Last night, before I went tobed, I was reading through a
bunch of the tributes, yes, andjust reading through.
Last night, before I went tobed, I was reading through a
bunch of the tributes.
Yes, there's a bunch oftouching stuff that's out there
(02:34):
and you know, even the baseballgames had the poppy on it
yesterday, which was really cool.
Anyway, we live in anincredibly patriotic place and
it's awesome that we do.
I can't imagine livingsomewhere in the United States
where people didn't love,respect and revere what has
happened for this to become acountry.
And listen, it's not perfect.
(02:54):
I mean, you can go through eachwar and we have lots of warts.
There's a lot of warts oneverything, but what's
underlying is a bunch of peoplethat were willing to give their
lives for this country.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
It is a miracle.
It really is when you thinkabout what happened in this
country, and there is no reasonwe should have won the
Revolutionary War, nonewhatsoever.
My husband and I are bigLafayette folks.
We liked Lafayette before.
Hamilton made it cool, and whathe did?
He single-handedly helpedchange the world.
He was just a punk kid.
(03:27):
He was like I'm going to gofight with them.
He brought money and guns andchanged our lives forever.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
That's awesome.
It's awesome.
Well, I can't wait to getcaught up with you.
There's a lot going on, A lotgoing on in the city, a lot
going on in the Treasure Valley.
You're right in the middle ofit all, but before we get
blazing into that, can you justtell us a little bit about
yourself and for those peoplethat listen to this a lot of
business people listen to this,but people who may not know you.
(03:54):
Give a little intro for us.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
Yeah Well, thank you Again.
Thanks for the opportunity.
So I'm as close to being alifelong Idahoan as you can be.
My parents moved from Montanawhen I was two and I've lived
here virtually my entire life.
I grew up on the other side ofthe state, in potato country and
I joke that potato country isdifferent.
We had school released for twoweeks as children to work in the
(04:21):
fields.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
What town were you?
Speaker 2 (04:23):
I grew up in an unincorporated part of Jefferson
County, little wide spot in theroad called Grant, idaho, and
went to Rigby High School andjust really learned the value of
hard work and patriotism.
And my dad was thisentrepreneur that tried and
tried and tried.
He had all the good ideasbefore they could take off and
was a small business person andI really learned the value of
(04:47):
money.
He had all the good ideasbefore they could take off and
was a small business person andI really learned the value of
money and that when you are asmall business owner and a
business owner you get paid last.
And so that has reallyinstilled in me a real focus on
(05:07):
why the economy matters.
And then also because I thinkit's important that the people
have the opportunity to succeedand that there isn't artificial
barriers to do that and wereally need to focus on making
sure that people have thatopportunity and drive and
ambition.
So grew up on, you know, 50acres down a dirt road, you know
, rural Idaho, very, verydetermined to go to college.
I knew that that was my ticketout of poverty and did that
(05:29):
Married my arch enemy fromelementary school.
I know no one could believe wewere together when we showed up
at the five-year reunion and weraised two beautiful daughters.
I'm now a grandma.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Oh wow, I didn't know that.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Yeah, my little grandson.
Grandson celebrated his firstbirthday, isn't?
Speaker 1 (05:46):
that magical Lucy.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
It's amazing.
It's the whole reason I didn'tkick her out when she was a
teenager.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
Do they live around here?
Speaker 2 (05:53):
They do.
They live in CUNA.
Speaker 1 (05:55):
Oh, that's great, yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
So we love Idaho.
My husband's family helpedsettle the town of Manan, love
this place, have enjoyedpurposely raising our children
here, purposely staying in Idahoto be close to family, even
though they're five hours away.
And I really believe in thefuture of the state and this
(06:17):
valley and it's just given somuch to us.
And when people say they'vemoved to Boise, I said welcome
to paradise.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Welcome to paradise.
We're glad to have you.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
It's wonderful.
So tell us.
Well, first of all, can I ask aquestion?
Go back a little bit.
Oh yeah, what you said aboutsmall business, I think it was
just really powerful because,seeing it as the daughter of an
entrepreneur, this idea that weget paid last yeah, daughter of
an entrepreneur, this idea thatwe get paid last First of all,
(06:52):
entrepreneurial spirit.
Small businesses like thecountry's carried on the back of
small businesses A lot of times.
We, you know, you never have toworry about big business
because they've got morelobbyists than I mean, they've
got floors of lobbyists andthey're tracking every little
bill and every little thing,taking care of everything.
But it's the small businessesin this country.
If you look at the tax base, ifyou look at who burdens it, it
(07:17):
is small business, smallbusiness owners.
And so I love that.
When you said that that they getpaid last.
As a small business guy and I'mhelping on a couple right now,
but it's true I mean you don'teven ask him the question how
much am I going to make?
The first question is am Igoing to survive and become
profitable?
And then, now that I amprofitable, do I use that money
(07:37):
to grow or what do I do, andit's so healthy to have to
balance growth and what you takeand what you don't, what you
leave in the business, and so tohave someone that understands
that in politics is inleadership is a big deal.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
It's in my DNA.
I can tell you lots of stories,but first I will tell you my
dad, hiro.
My dad was so smart.
My dad had a high schooldiploma and figured out how to
build a feed mill All theengineering for a feed mill, and
my dad gave us jobs and we hadto invoice him in order to get
(08:16):
paid.
And if we didn't invoice him wedidn't get paid, and it was
like you have to keep track ofthis and whether you get paid or
not.
And when you got, I mean it wassuch a great life lesson for
accounting.
So I had Lucy's cleaningbusiness and I cleaned the mill
every Saturday and it took hourscause it's a mill and it's full
of dust, but he was so goodabout making me understand that
(08:42):
and that that had value.
And then, if I was going totake that $2 that I earned that
Saturday and spend it onsomething, was it worth that.
He was such an amazing personwhen it came to ideas and he
just never thought about itfailing, even though they all
ended up having some challenges.
But I'll tell you what I lovedabout my dad is he just
(09:05):
constantly reinvented himself,and that's what I love about the
American spirit.
I used to tease him that he wasa little bit like Madonna.
He was constantly reinventinghimself.
You know, he'd run cattleoperations, he'd farmed, he'd
owned a hardware store.
He did He'd.
When I was a kid we had a feedmill, so we roll and chop barley
(09:29):
for dairy cows.
And when the government came inand basically paid farmers to
kill all their cows, dairybuyout, it decimated the
business.
So I have seen what governmentcan do to a family when it
decides to take the market.
Yeah, can do to a family when itdecides to take the market, and
(09:50):
so all of those things haveplayed such an important part of
who I am and how I look atthings, because it's not only
how I was raised, but it's myDNA.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
Yeah, and those genuine, authentic things that
define what's in your heart,mind and soul, that allow you to
then set your base of values,that allows you to make good
decisions.
I mean, that's leadership 101,right.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
Yeah Well, I learned it from my family.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
That's cool, so let's jump forward here.
Okay, getting into citypolitics.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
Fun.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
How's it been?
Speaker 2 (10:22):
I tell people it's been the most difficult thing
I've ever done.
I have grown more in this thanI've ever done.
Speaker 1 (10:29):
What year were you elected?
Speaker 2 (10:30):
2021, and I started my term in 2022.
So it's been three years.
Three years Okay great and whatI have really loved about it is
the people I've got to meet,just amazing people that I would
never had the opportunity tomeet before, and that has been
just so rewarding.
You know there's there's otherparts of it that haven't been as
(10:52):
rewarding, but it just remindsyou of the goodness of the
community and you see people whocome to meetings when they
could be doing lots of otherthings.
I mean, there are cheap movieson Tuesday nights.
They could be there and theyshow up because they care.
And it is so incredible to meI'm honored and I'm always just
really humbled that people willtake their time to help craft a
(11:15):
government.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
People love this place, and for good reason.
They love this place, one ofthe things that you're known as.
You're known as the lone kindof conservative.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
I am.
I am the lone lioness.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
On the Boise City Council.
That comes up a lot.
Speaker 2 (11:34):
Yes, the statesman always likes to say that.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
It's interesting If you think about city governance,
you know, and the mayor beingthe CEO of the city of Boise,
right Capital City, and then youguys are the elected council to
help approve and make decisionson budget and everything else
run a city right.
You'd think that not too muchof it would be partisan, because
(12:00):
some of that stuff ought to be.
You know what's the best thingfor business, but a lot of it is
right.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
I think it comes down to philosophy.
You know how people, you knowwe were just talking about how
you view the world, and I thinkit's less partisan and more
philosophical.
And I definitely have a verydifferent philosophy.
Last city council I was theonly one that worked for a
for-profit company, the onlycity council person that worked
(12:29):
for a for-profit company, andthen now, with Meredith got
appointed, she also works for afor-profit company, but I come
from a very differentperspective on that, because I
know what it's like to dolayoffs, I know what it's like
to try to figure out the P&L,and I think that is really
important.
I always joke that you know themayor and I think about.
(12:52):
We wake up in the morningthinking about an E, the mayor
thinks about the environment andI think about the economy, and
that's just how we're wired, andso it's a good yin to the yang,
because you know you have tohave one to have the other yeah,
yeah and um, so I've met, Ithink I've, I think I've spent
time with every city councilmember you have.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
You have a good group of people, right now, yeah,
they're good people um, um andthat's you know, from when we do
development.
We interact a lot.
We'll interact a lot with citygovernments.
In fact, it's probably our mostimportant, like the piece of
our.
You know we like predictability, business likes predictability.
You just said about governmentcoming in and buying all the
(13:34):
cows, I mean governmentinteraction with business
predictability.
You know goalposts that are setand fixed for good reasons.
And then we like criticalthinkers, like if you can go
have an intelligent conversationwith someone on a council and
say, hey, we may see thisdifferently, but can we talk
about issue A right and you havea real healthy and you can
(13:58):
listen to the other side of itand I can tell you, I've come
out of those thinking, oh mygosh, I didn't understand that
other perspective of this otherperson that sees the world
differently than I do.
I've also come out of them like, oh my gosh, can you believe
that they see the world that way?
But that's what makes Americabeautiful is we do have such
varied opinions on so manydifferent things.
How has it been for you withthis current council?
Speaker 2 (14:21):
Because they were just a bunch of just sworn in
this last year, right, yeah, soit is a very new council.
You know, jimmy and I haveserved the longest.
When you think about that, it'skind of interesting because
prior to that there were folksthat had served for a long time.
I think it's really healthy tohave turnover.
I think it's incrediblyimportant.
Our system is based on it.
(14:42):
If someone starts thinking thatthe system can't work without
them, that's a problem.
I would say that all thecouncil members work really hard
.
They all pay a price for this.
It's time, it's money, it'semotional bandwidth, and I
really appreciate my councilmembers.
(15:02):
I think they are genuinely goodpeople who are trying to do the
right thing.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Do you guys get along .
Speaker 2 (15:08):
I think we get along.
Yeah, I mean, we obviouslythink things very differently,
but I have really worked to becivil and I think that's really
important that people see thatthat this is not a judgment call
on someone's character.
If they vote differently than Ido, it's just they have a
different opinion.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
Well, and you can't.
I mean, I think that's the, youcan be civil.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
We need to expect civility.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
For crying out loud.
This country was built onvarying ideas and people coming
together and saying how do wework through?
Where do we have commoninterests?
Where do we harmonize what wethink and where don't we?
Where do we have commoninterests, where do we harmonize
what we think and where don'twe?
And then these votes thathappen and you get to vote every
city council meeting.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
Yeah, and I think it's important that you have
different views at the tablebecause it will push change,
because when you point outsomething that's just not
logical and lacks common sense,that can help propel a change.
And I tell people often whenthey come to city council and
they get frustrated because itdoesn't go their way, I say you
know what?
What you've done is help propelchange, because now you've told
(16:15):
us what's not working and evenif we, if, if we're not, you
know voting the way you want usto do on this particular issue,
because of whatever reason, youhave given us that nugget that
we can go back and we can change.
And I think that's incrediblyimportant.
When people stop showing up, wehave a problem.
People need to keep showing up.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
That's powerful.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
And I also will say I'm very worried that when
people don't feel listened to,they become radicalized.
So someone they want to belistened to, who's going to
listen to them?
Yeah, If it's not their electedofficials, then they will find
somebody who will listen to them.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
With the current council makeup, do you ever feel
picked on?
Speaker 2 (16:59):
Oh yeah, are you kidding?
No, I go in.
I go in knowing every week thatI am the lone lioness, like I
don't have a machine behind me,I don't have the machine of City
Hall, I don't have a machine ofa campaign, I have me myself
(17:20):
and I.
But I think it's reallyimportant that people see that
you can do that and you can walkinto a place where you know
you're probably going to getoutvoted 90% of the time on the
big stuff and you can still walkout of the room and be okay.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
Where does that strength come from?
Well, let me just let mepreface that, but it's, it's
easy.
All of us in our lives willhave times when we're with the
uh, we're with the majority,right, we are in a comfortable
place because we know the peoplesurrounding us think like us,
believe like us emotionally orwith us, and it's a comfortable
(17:56):
place to be.
We also will have these timeswhen we're not, where, hey,
we're going to kind of be aloneand we're going to be forced
with hey.
And then I think for you, theother question I'd ask is not
only do you have to stand up forvoting a different way, but you
have to justify that with anintelligent response and reason
(18:18):
and realize that, even thoughyou're justifying and presenting
a position that's againstothers, they're still not going
to vote with you.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
Oh yeah, I mean, that's the hard part is-.
Speaker 1 (18:28):
They're never going to see things your way.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Once in a while.
I'll pick one or two off Oncein a while, but I think it's
really important that people usetheir voice.
So I know that there will mostlikely be times that I am not on
the winning side.
Once in a while I will join themajority.
But what can't be silenced isthat voice and that ability to
(18:56):
point things out that need tochange.
And you talked about going intoa friendly crowd.
So I worked with the Idaholegislature for years.
That is the exact opposite ofBoise.
Boise has a super majority ofDemocrats.
The Idaho legislature has asuper majority of Republicans.
When you testify at the Idaholegislature, when I used to like
they were friendly faces.
Yeah, and you know I often gointo city council not knowing if
(19:19):
I'm going to get a friendlyface.
You know and and people are,people are are professional.
Don't mean to to make any sortof judgment there, but I know
I'm going to be an outsider andso I've really worked to.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
Can you speak a little more to that Cause I do
think we've seen city.
I'm getting old enough now thatyou know, you kind of see the
local politics change.
Um, you know, mayors change,city councils change, even
leadership with the staff in acity change, and we're in all
jurisdictions.
Most of the time we're in otherjurisdictions, in other states
(19:58):
too.
It does feel like it'sprofessional and civil and with
you guys, and that's not alwaysthe case.
Is that the truth?
Does feel like it'sprofessional and civil and with
you guys, and that's not alwaysthe case.
Is that the truth?
Speaker 2 (20:07):
Well, I don't know about in depth about other city
councils and how they run.
I mean, I have enough on myplate watching ours and keeping
up.
But I think what sets Boiseapart is we do have a very, very
professional staff becausewe're big.
So I've gone to conferenceswhere the city council people
are having to make thesedecisions on very, very
(20:29):
technical aspects of watertreatment and I thought, oh my
gosh, we don't have to do that.
You need one expert to do that.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
You need one, an expert, to do that.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
We, we have the staff to do that and, as the capital
city and as one as the largestcity, we should.
But I also think that that wereally try as a as a council, to
to do that as well.
Like I, I really believe thatcouncil members, my current
council members especially, havereally worked to be civil and
(20:58):
to disagree, with that beingdisagreeable.
And there was one case whereone of my council members said
we were just arguing about that.
I said no, we weren't, we werediscussing.
Discussing is different thanarguing, but just to try to tamp
down the emotion so that peoplecan be people, I think is
(21:18):
important.
Speaker 1 (21:20):
That's awesome.
Let's talk about some of theissues in the city?
Speaker 2 (21:24):
Well, there's lots.
Speaker 1 (21:25):
There's lots.
I'm going to bring them up inkind of no order, but I do think
, and I'm going to start withsome things, that I think the
city and Mayor McLean has takenlead on.
I think the homelessness stuff,you know, I know there's a lot
of people that are worried aboutthat because they see what's
happened in jurisdictions aroundand I frankly just can't be
(21:48):
prouder of what you guys havebeen doing.
I mean, it's been great and youlook at it's combining public
safety, investment in police,it's it's.
That's a pillar of it.
Then it's creating housing.
That's a pillar of it.
And I think we're frankly alittle lucky that Caleb Roop and
Pacific Companies is like likelike when God looked down upon
(22:10):
us and saidHey, caleb, you know, put your
company in Eagle Idaho.
Caleb, you know, put yourcompany in Eagle Idaho.
For those listening, caleb Ruppin Pacific Companies is
probably the nation's number oneaffordable housing developer
and he happens to be from Eagle,idaho, just purely so.
He's done several greatprojects and I think that's been
great because I think the wholehousing you know, homelessness
(22:31):
is a housing problem.
I do believe that.
And then I think some of thecampaigns to not treat all
homeless people the same youknow, as an old time night shift
ER doc, I mean they're notright.
You have the, those women, andmostly women, domestic violence
with children that are homeless.
A giant percentage of kind ofthe family homelessness
population are somehow touchedby that.
(22:51):
Then you have the mentalillness.
We're just not getting thetreatment.
You need to stay off thestreets.
And then you do have kind ofthe drug, alcohol abuse, right,
still a disease, but they aredifferent, right.
And then you have there's a lotof people, especially with our
economy now and with theaffordability crisis that we're
(23:13):
experiencing, there are peoplethat are paycheck to paycheck,
the working poor, that asset,limited income, constrained,
employed population that they'rereally you know.
So if you look at the number ofpeople that are, of teenagers
that are probably couch surfing,bouncing around or just, and a
lot of these again are going tobe kind of broken families.
There's a lot of it.
But my point is I think youguys have done a really, really,
(23:36):
really good job on that.
Speaker 2 (23:39):
Well, and there's so much to do, and we've seen what
happens when you choose thewrong path and you only have to
drive north and west to see thatand it's scary.
You see suffering and you seecrime and you see unhealthy
situations that people shouldn'tbe in.
I think one of the things thatI think about with homelessness
(24:02):
is three things.
One is you need housing, youneed help and you also need
rules, because, to your point,there's lots of different
circumstances with homelessness.
Now, the person who is on thestreet with the cardboard sign
is what people usually think of,but there's a hidden
homelessness of families that isreally devastating as well, and
(24:24):
you've got kids who aren't ableto have a safe place to sleep
and then they go to school.
So there's as differentsituations with homelessness as
there are people.
For me, it's very important thatwe have rules, because I think
that sets the standard, and so Iwas very supportive of Senator
Galloway's bill that would makerules for our bigger cities when
(24:48):
it came to homelessness,because I think if you set the
standard, then you can move andattain that.
If you don't have a standard,which is people can sleep
outside anywhere, then what areyou working towards?
And so for me that's a veryimportant piece.
One of the things I think Boisedoes really well is coordinated
(25:09):
care.
Speaker 1 (25:10):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
Because, folks, you work with the government, you
know how frustrated it is whenyou call some place and they say
call another place and you havea home.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Yeah, I like as an old ER guy, like it's triage
right and the better you dotriage.
Not everybody needs to be in atrauma room, not everyone needs
to be in an ER, but they do needprimary care or urgent care and
so that having the reallyrobust triage system another
thing the city did two or threeyears ago.
Robust triage system.
Another thing the city did twoor three years ago because I
(25:39):
helped on that campaign was one,create ways to get families off
the streets by having units.
And then, two, they did a nicejob of redoing their triage
system so that they could getthe appropriate resources to the
appropriate families at theappropriate time.
It was a big big deal.
Speaker 2 (25:53):
Well, I always think about how hard and frustrated I
get if I can't get an answer.
That I need and I have a homeand healthy food.
Imagine if I was homelesstrying to do it.
The other thing that I thinkwhen we think about homelessness
that's really important I'vesaid this over and over again is
we have to have a nonprofitcommunity that helps us do this,
because that gives everyone anobligation and it also gives
(26:18):
people a way to help, becausewhat I've seen in this community
is people want to help but theyoften don't know how.
So one of the things that I thecampaign that you worked on is
the ability for folks to to givepersonal money as a as a
donation.
That can also help people.
And then you have catch and youhave Jesse tree and you have
interfaceuary.
We need all these partners andwe need more.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
Yeah, and you just mentioned a few of them.
What a tremendous amount ofwork that happens.
I mean we should be very proudof just.
You know you look at problemsaround us and I travel a lot.
Everywhere I go, it's like ohwow, I'm in Reno a ton now.
It's shocking, isn't it?
Yeah, I'm in Reno a lot and theproject we're doing is downtown
(27:06):
Reno and once these problemsget unraveled, it is almost
impossible to back up.
So proactive, thoughtfulleadership makes all the
difference in the world.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
It is necessary and when we talk about different
voices at the table we have tohave different voices at that
table too.
And I'd be remiss if I didn'ttalk about the.
Boise Rescue Mission and whatthey do with only donations.
They don't take any governmentfunding.
And you see, when people areable to truly change their lives
, which is so hard, it'smiraculous, it really is.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
Yeah, what Reverend Bill does I?
Speaker 2 (27:41):
mean angel.
It's unbelievable.
Yeah, he's an angel.
Speaker 1 (27:44):
Great.
So there's some good news.
There is good news, housing.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
Yeah, housing is tough.
I mean, you know people talk tome about, oh, we want more
single-family homes and I tellthem I do too.
Land is expensive.
Yeah, Land's expensive.
One of the things that I thinkit's important for us to do, and
the zoning code attempts to dothis.
There's parts that we need torefine, but just really let the
(28:12):
market be more of the driverthan the government.
When you have government that'stelling you you should do
things and you should do thisway, and it's artificially
raising costs, that will end uphurting people who are trying to
get into homes.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
I agree with you, and we were huge supporters of the
New Zola Code change.
I think it needed to happen.
I think it was a long longoverdue Way, overdue Way overdue
, a really hard thing.
So many unintended things aboutit, though, that are now, and
now you're living withgovernment saying, okay, how do
we clean up the stuff we have?
(28:44):
And it's hard.
So let me give you an examplethis electronic vehicle thing.
So new zoning code, you have tohave a parking garage.
Great Parking garages now areabout $45,000 to $50,000 a stall
.
Think about that for a minute$45,000 to $50,000 a stall.
(29:06):
And now, because electronicvehicles are required, that's
not the worst part.
(29:29):
That's not the worst part Now,because they catch on fire.
So then the fire departmentmakes you have a half a stall
per electronic vehicle stall incase the car catches on fire.
So for every electronic vehicleyou put, it's $75,000 a stall,
just like that.
And now the city is saying, hey, we want 20%.
Then the other thing Lucy, noone uses these things.
Speaker 2 (29:46):
No no.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
Like real practical when you leave our building
today.
We have a stack of them overhere.
There's no one parking in them.
Every one of our buildings noone parks in them.
Downtown we own three garages.
No one uses them.
If you have one, you plug in atnight at your home.
But I use it as an example ofbecause I think it's a real kind
(30:08):
of crystal clear example, reallife example of how government
is saying, hey, here are thethings we want, but then on the
other hand they just almostcan't get out of the way of
themselves with really badpolicy that they don't even
realize.
You just jacked the price of aparking stall up by 50% and
(30:28):
there's no way to get out of it.
Then if you want to reduce it,you have to go do a CUP and you
have to go in and, and, and nowit's three more months.
It's just.
It's.
It's just one example.
On a zoning code, that that,but.
But I don't know how it everchanges, because I don't think
that.
I think what happens is like Idon't think they're bad people,
but they're just saying, oh yeah, we, we want this, so we're
(30:50):
going to force this and you'regoing to like it and it makes
sense because we're saving theenvironment by doing it.
You're not saving theenvironment, first of all.
I mean I think there's enoughstuff.
I mean, if they ever trulylooked at what it costs to
create these batteries right nowand and what we're actually
doing, no one's using them andthey don't ask the people that
actually have the parking stallsto say, hey, are anyone using
(31:12):
these things?
And then, on top top of it,after all of that, there's no
one to listen to you on costs,right?
You're just saying so anyway, Ijust Well, amen, and this came
up with the county.
Speaker 2 (31:31):
I don't know how much you followed that.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
I've followed it all because it'll kill a project.
This is not hyperbole here,Because the zoning code forces
you how many stalls you have.
Then they force you to have oneand a half per each EV and
they're taking the cost.
It just kills projects.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
And this is why it's really important that people
talk about this, because we canfix it.
I always say, you know, it'snot the 10 commandments, we can
fix it.
Speaker 1 (32:02):
But can you?
Because I think the legislaturepassed a bill that says that
the cities can't require EVs andthen the city of Boise just
basically said hey, screw you,we're going to do it anyway.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
Well, I mean, this is something I think would be good
to come for a vote so thatpeople know Because, to your
point, every one of these thingsthe government demands
increases a cost, and I amconcerned that this is another
example where philosophy gets inthe way of good, old-fashioned
common sense.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
I'm going to be quiet .
You got me in a little soapboxhere, okay, but we said land's
too expensive, yeah, so we can'tsprawl.
So first of all, here's kind ofthe world according to
Boiseites we can't sprawl, we'regoing up, we're not going to go
use farmland, we're not goingto sprawl, we're going to do all
.
So I get that part.
(32:51):
Forget that sprawl is happeningand Forget that sprawl is
happening and it will alwayshappen, and it will always
happen.
And so my argument is if thecity of Boise is not going to
manage housing, then the valleywill manage housing.
And that's what's happening.
The county is doing it, theother cities are doing it and,
honestly, there ought to be afield trip required just to go
(33:12):
see what's going on.
It's crazy, what's going on.
So sprawl is happening.
But then you go back to thecity of Boise who's saying, hey,
we need more homes and we needhomes that people can afford.
That comes out of the lips,right, but now it's got to be
structured.
So there's lands too expensive.
So we want to make it easierfor you guys to do vertical
construction, all types, but nowwe're going to put parking
(33:34):
requirements on you that don'tmake any sense.
I mean, you see what I'm saying, like, like it, just the amount
of it's like, do you really?
Do you really think that?
Because if you really thoughtthat, you probably wouldn't be
doing what you're doing on yourpolicy.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
You're right and the reality is is that Boise can
have its rules, but that doesn'tmean that other people aren't
going to go other places, so itwill exasperate the problem.
I think there's a lot thatBoise can do.
We're going to have to go up,but I also think you're going to
have to go out.
I mean, there's entire land bymicron that you can develop
(34:14):
Southeast Boise.
The sewer moratorium was abeater thing.
Can we get over that?
Can we talk about that?
I think we have to.
There's a lot of things that wecan do that, I think, kind of
make people shudder a little bit, but they have to be talked
about.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
Well, I think they have to be talked about, because
or you can't say we wantaffordable housing, yeah because
you can't get it.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
You can't do both Because the math doesn't work.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
You can't do both things.
You can say we're going to havehighly regulated, highly
government-subscribed housingthat's going to fit this box and
it's going to be expensive inBoise.
You can say that.
But you can't say we're goingto try to be helpful to reduce
housing costs.
You can't do it.
Speaker 2 (34:58):
No, the math doesn't work.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
No.
Speaker 2 (34:59):
And the only way you get affordability is you take
tax dollars to do it, whichmeans you're taxing other people
for it.
That's what makes it affordable.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
Which to me is the greatest irony of all ironies.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
All of it, yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
Listen, we're in a friendly spot today because
we're a free market.
Yes friendly spot today becausewe're a free market.
Yes, like conservative people.
But when you go now, you'regoing to like well, now we're
just going to take governmentsubsidy and subsidize the house.
Think about this loop We've nowmade housing more expensive
because of our policy and nowwe're going to go get government
housing subsidies so that wecan afford You're not affording
(35:34):
anything.
Then the government getsinvolved.
Every time the government getsinvolved, it gets out of whack
the whole system.
Now you're subsidizing thingsthat are only making everything
more expensive.
So housing's one.
I don't know what happens, butwhat we should be doing of all
our local governments is sayingwe need to reduce regulation, we
(35:56):
need to improve.
Let the free market get allhousing types out there.
Apartments condominiums starterhomes, medium homes.
Lots of variety, lots of variety, and only if we do, only if we
do.
The other example I'll use iseven if you go around Idaho.
It was fun going around Idahowhen I ran for governor because
(36:16):
you can go around Idaho and findthe places that are most
liberal and most restricted.
This is eight years ago.
And now look at the cost.
I mean you know those.
Go to Teton County, go toBlaine County, go to Boise, like
everywhere you go that is mostregulated, is most costly, it
(36:39):
just is, and that always goestogether.
And yet it always.
Then it's those same placestrying to figure out workforce
housing, trying to figure outhousing costs, when it's like
actually you kind of created theproblem you're having.
Speaker 2 (36:50):
Yes, yeah, you have just described the loop of which
I live.
You have just described theloop of which I live, and then
you have others that would sayyou know, the pinnacle of us, of
our responsibility, is theenvironment.
So we have to have these EVspots.
Speaker 1 (37:09):
And so I'm not.
I don't believe that, but I'mjust saying that's kind of.
So let's talk about two thingscan be mutually true.
I mean, I think that that Iwould argue okay, how is you
killing a project in downtownBoise really going to change the
environment globally?
And if they really look back atthe data behind all this, I
(37:32):
think it's not a hill to die on.
I don't think it's a hill todie on.
Speaker 2 (37:37):
Let me give you an example, and I know that you I'm
sure you watch all the citycouncil meetings because,
they're scintillating.
But there was one a couple ofweeks ago where Starbucks is
putting in a drive-through bythe airport and they wanted more
parking spaces and the citycouncil denied them those
parking spaces because ofclimate change.
(37:57):
That was the reasoning.
So of course I voted no.
I was like, no, they need theirparking spaces, but that kind
of attitude of like, at allcosts we are going to force this
philosophy, even when itdoesn't make sense that doesn't
even make sense.
Speaker 1 (38:11):
No, it doesn't.
We were in there.
We're doing a building forquality electric out in what's
called Pleasant Valley 520.
It's out at the corner ofOrchard, where Orchard turns
into Lake Hazel.
It's out in the middle ofnowhere and in order to improve
their flow of their internalsite on their 10 acres they
wanted to have parking on oneside of the building so that
(38:33):
their trucks could come in forsafety.
It required a six-month CUP.
It was hotly debated, and I'mthinking, months CUP.
It was hotly debated and I'mthinking what has this world
become when a Idaho businesstaking their own dollars and
building their place out in themiddle of nowhere, and we're
arguing over where?
(38:53):
And, by the way, safety.
At some point somebody wouldsay, okay, is this better for
these big trucks to not be here?
But but it was it we.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
I don't know well, you experienced it, and that's
when.
That's when common sense hashas just been, has left the
building, and so I don't thinkit matters oh, I think it
matters I don't know, I I getpretty discouraged.
Speaker 1 (39:15):
I get pretty discouraged because I think, I
think, oh man, these peoplesometimes don't really
understand the way businessworks and the way dollars flow
and the way people take risk.
Speaker 2 (39:26):
They may not, but that's why it's really important
that we have this dialogue,because otherwise it won't
change, and so I'm an optimisteternally.
But if we don't learn aboutthese things, we can't fix them,
and so that's why it's reallyimportant.
Speaker 1 (39:42):
Let me ask you a question.
Uh-huh, this is serious.
If you look at the new zoningcode rewrite it went through and
it had a lot of you knowliterally good reasons why it
went through.
And then there's just it'snormal when you do something
this big to have some cleanup Isthere, is there like a
committee, Because some of thisis so predictable, Lucy.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Yes, well, there needs to be more.
Speaker 1 (40:00):
Some of this, you could go oh, that doesn't make
sense.
That doesn't make sense.
Why do we have to wait forcitizens to get like like it's
whack-a-mole right?
They just said boom, boom, boom, boom, boom until someone
finally is like I'm going to dosomething about this.
Why can't calmer heads?
Speaker 2 (40:17):
go in and say this is therapy for me.
I'm feeling very therapeutic.
I feel like I need to give youmy 25 copay.
I really do, because I I wasjust constantly saying we were
supposed to review this.
We were supposed to review thisand it's not just I don't want
typos, yeah, I.
I don't want a typo review, Iwant a real review and we need
to do better.
And I think that there is aview that if you, if you go too,
(40:41):
the whole thing will fall apart, and I don't believe that I
don't believe that.
But I think that there is thisnatural criticism.
Oh no, and I think we have tobecause it will affect our
economy for years to come.
And here's my nightmare.
My nightmare is that Boisebecomes old and tired and 10
Mile becomes the center of thevalley.
Speaker 1 (41:04):
The irony of all ironies that you've said earlier
is that will happen and youknow who's getting also very
aggressive is the county.
Yes, yeah, I mean becausethey're just saying, hey, we'll
approve these subdivisions then.
Speaker 2 (41:15):
So to me it is imperative to the future of
Boise because what will happenis Boisians will pay more taxes
because we're not growing likeeveryone else.
We take all of the impact, butwe're not growing like Meridian
or Star.
And then people are like I'mnot going to deal with downtown
Boise, it's not worth it, andthey will go other places and we
will suffer.
Speaker 1 (41:37):
And pricing.
It'll just get really, really.
It's going to get reallyexpensive, super elite.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
Yes, and it's going to get really expensive super
elite.
Speaker 1 (41:42):
Yes, and it's going to drive out families.
Yes, and that's what'shappening and that's not what
Boise should be.
But it's the North End.
Speaker 2 (41:51):
Well, there is a reality there.
Speaker 1 (41:53):
I mean that's and I think there's people from the
North End that would just saythat's what we should be.
Speaker 2 (41:59):
There definitely are, which I think is one of the
reasons it's so good that wehave districts.
You know when my husband and Imoved to the Valley.
We lived in Nampa and we got ourfirst little starter home.
We were so excited, we loved it.
We were in a great littlesubdivision with lots of young
families you know we're all incombat zone with little kids and
that commute over time justbecame so hard and we were
(42:23):
spending so much money and wejust looked how close can we get
to our jobs.
And we ended up in West Boiseand we've been there ever since
and we love it and it is ourlittle pocket of paradise.
But it is a different pocket ofparadise than the North End.
Speaker 1 (42:37):
And it has a different-.
Hey, listen, I'm not sayinganything negative about the
North End I and it has adifferent.
Speaker 2 (42:42):
Hey, listen, I'm not saying anything negative about
the North End, I'm just sayingit's super expensive.
It's crazy expensive.
Speaker 1 (42:44):
I mean, it's just you , you, you, you know.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
It's beautiful but very expensive.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
Yeah, it's just, it's just different.
It's not.
You're not going to get afriend, a family, friendly,
young, it's just, it's just not.
And so I think that you canlook around the country at
cities that have done what Boiseis doing and you're going to
have an elite, expensive, notgrowing place and then you're
going to have costs, right, Ithink Skip just put up his
(43:09):
building, his apartment building, right, that's beautiful and
you're going to have maybe somethings happen like that, but
like buildings that people canafford, it's just going to be
hard.
And I do think I want to hearone other thing you said I think
the valley is dynamic A lot ofways.
This happened in Salt Lake, youdon't have to go too far to see
what happened to Salt Lake Cityproper.
(43:31):
Yes same and you can lookeverywhere around it.
And luckily you do have superdynamic.
Speaker 2 (43:38):
You have dynamic community in Garden City Garden.
Speaker 1 (43:41):
City is doing incredible things.
You've got Garden City.
I saw Mary Evans is going torun again.
But you got Garden City, yougot CUNA, where?
Speaker 2 (43:48):
I am, you got, star you got.
Speaker 1 (43:48):
Middleton, you got Meridian, you got Nampa, you got
Caldwell, you got cities thatare just like saying, hey, we'll
figure this out for ourfamilies, and you got the county
the one catch.
Oh, one other thing I was goingto say is I don't think the one
thing that the city, um, Ithink this is pretty profound.
(44:09):
I'm gonna tell you this I thinkfor a long time, the one, the
one thing that allowed cities toto um, to dominate discussions
on development, largedevelopments, was sewer.
Really, it's been sewer andwater, but sewer was the biggie
right.
Speaker 2 (44:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (44:22):
And now with technology, you're going to have
these dynamic for $5 millionyou can put in a sewer treatment
plant and self do it withinyour thing for about $5 million
for about 500 homes.
And that's a game changer.
Because I think what's going tohappen is you're going to see
(44:44):
that stranglehold on, hey, we'regoing to, and then there's all
the other services that comealong with it.
I mean it's not easy, but it isgoing to force decisions to be
made especially.
Speaker 2 (44:55):
I'm thinking of South Boise.
Yeah, and they have to be made,and this is where we need some
new thinking, because if Boisecontinues to put its feet in the
cement, the county will approvethings and we will get all of
the impact and none of the fees.
And so we have to think biggerthan this.
(45:15):
And if you're a free marketperson, the more homes you have,
the price goes down.
Speaker 1 (45:25):
And I believe it.
Let's talk about some morestuff that's going great,
because I think there are somany Parks, libraries, I mean,
think of the other wonderfulthings that the city has done
and doing, and by the way,there's a lot of wonderful
things.
Speaker 2 (45:44):
I think we're just experiencing growth that's
causing some reallyuncomfortable conversations.
I think what makes a city andyou think about wherever you go,
it's the parks and the art,that is what, and the landscape.
That is what changes your feelabout a city, and it's something
that we need more of and weneed to preserve.
And it's something that we needmore of and we need to preserve
.
And we have a goal for a10-minute walk to a park, which
(46:05):
is a phenomenal goal because wewant to preserve some of these
open spaces.
That's where people gather andpeople need to gather.
And art is an important piecetoo, because that's why people
travel all around the world isto see different art, because it
represents your story, andwe're very lucky because the
river is our biggest art.
(46:26):
We've got the river and we'vegot the foothills, so we have
that already.
But these other services thataren't as visible but very
important are, I think, whatmake a city, and part of it is
libraries.
So consider this 25 years ago,boise had one library and one at
the mall, like a little outletstore at the mall, and now we
(46:50):
have several libraries and we'retrying to look at how we get
more.
And this is an incrediblyimportant issue for my district
because we're in this donut hole.
So you know, probably the veinof this conversation has been
speak up, get involved.
And the reason we are havingthis conversation in West Boise
about libraries is because ofone guy who looked at the map
(47:12):
and said we're in a donut hole.
And why do I have to drive toEagle or Garden City for a
library when I'm in Boise?
Mark Salisbury, he hassingle-handedly driven this
conversation.
I had lunch with him January of2022.
That's how long we've beenworking on this.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
So those are the kind of things the city has to
invest in, because we needparity in services, because if
people start thinking that, ifyou only Can you maybe hit the
importance of libraries asgathering places and just like I
mean, I think for, uh, we'lljust, I'll let you take swing at
this well, every source ofresearch will show you that the
most rewarding thing in yourlife is your relationships.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
And where do you go to meet people?
Yeah, and we have lots of newpeople, and if they don't have a
structured social circlethrough church or clubs or their
neighborhood, where do they goand how do they feel like they
can meet people?
And libraries are manyuniversities all around our city
and they're a place to gather.
They're a place for you know,places for people to come,
(48:17):
places for people to think,places for people to learn, and
I think that the most importantthing that we can do as a city
other than police and fire,because they help drive
individual change and ourlibraries do incredible things
you probably wouldn't want toknow that they do.
Speaker 1 (48:36):
So much community outreach and community
involvement in programs.
Much community outreach andcommunity involvement in
programs.
As you have this age oftechnology, it's also super cool
to me, so awesome that we canhold onto this thing that still
allows you to interact withpeople.
My daughter, we have threegrandkids and they go to the
library every week.
They go every week, sometimestwice a week and my grandkids
(48:59):
just love it.
And they go in and there's thestorytime programming, there's
the interactive things thathappen, and they go to different
libraries.
They live in South Meridian butthey go to different ones and
it's like part of their routineand I just love that part of it.
Speaker 2 (49:14):
But it is a fabric of our community and I'm so glad
that we're investing in thatpart of how people interact in
(49:35):
the community and a place at themall.
And you think about now you'vegot Bound Crossing and Hillcrest
and Collister and hopefully onein West Boise very soon.
Those are the things thatreally feed a neighborhood, and
I went to many, many of thelistening sessions on the
library and what people keptsaying is we like the staff here
(49:57):
, they know our names, they'revery helpful and that this is
our place to go, where we canlearn.
And you know it is a 21stcentury world.
Hey look, I use AI.
You know I use all of thatstuff, but there is something
meaningful about a library thatwe do need to hold on to.
Speaker 1 (50:19):
Wow, this went really really really fast.
Speaker 2 (50:22):
Thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (50:24):
There's so much we can talk about Thank you for,
well, one of the most importantthings.
So a little bit of background.
4th of July parade yes, Nearand dear to your heart.
Speaker 2 (50:33):
Very dear.
Speaker 1 (50:34):
Luckily we've been able to be some big supporters.
Speaker 2 (50:37):
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1 (50:37):
Thank you.
This is our second year kind ofgetting that what it is, but
with our, with our country, withthe two 50 coming up.
I wanted you to speak on thisbecause this is your passion and
I wanted this forum to telleveryone out there listening
about it.
Speaker 2 (50:49):
Well, I am unapologetically patriotic and I
think we have a miracle of acountry and we need to celebrate
it.
So there's lots of ways to dothat, and the first thing is,
you know, we've got 4th of Julycoming up and we've got a parade
in downtown Boise, our capitalcity.
But this year is also going tokick off something that I want
every Idahoan to know about, andthat's this 250th anniversary
(51:11):
of our country.
So think about that.
So, if you just do the math, ifyou're 50, you have been alive
for one fifthfifth of thiscountry.
Speaker 1 (51:21):
Amazing, isn't it to think about it that way Of the
country.
Speaker 2 (51:26):
This is a very young country with lots of
possibilities, and this is ourtime to celebrate.
This is our time to look to thefuture.
There's going to be so manyevents.
If you want to be part of it,you can Google Idaho, America,
250 Ambassadors.
You can sign up.
They'll give you all the thingsPaul Revere has already come.
There's going to be so many funthings that we can really take
(51:46):
upon and just enjoy this momentbecause it is historical.
And I've got to give one moreplug.
So I've been trying to become amember of the Daughters of the
American Revolution and it hasbeen fascinating to find where
my ancestors have gone and wherethey've served and when you
look at the courage that peoplehad.
I mean I was reading last nightabout one of my ancestors who
(52:08):
was in the middle of nowhere,New Hampshire, who basically,
when the declaration came out,people signed their own
declaration, said we're out,we're Americans.
That takes courage and we needto bottle that up and move it
forward, and the best way to doit is to look at what's happened
in the past, take those lessonsand move forward.
Speaker 1 (52:29):
Hey, Matthew, can you pull this up?
So if anyone wants moreinformation on this 4th of July
parade first, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (52:36):
So see, this is when I Idaho 4th.
Oh see, this is going to be sadwhen I don't know.
Speaker 1 (52:43):
We'll get there.
We'll get there.
Boise 4thcom.
Yes, so it's Boise 4thcom.
Speaker 2 (52:51):
It's, there's a veterans breakfast.
I mean there's even going to bea pet parade, Come on.
Speaker 1 (52:59):
And then the vice AMSOs and then there's the
actual parade route.
So fantastic website, yes,gives you all the details how
you can participate.
If you've got a company thatwants to participate, this is a
big deal.
Thank you for doing this.
This is like.
This is like so amazing andsuch a part, like you think, of
the next generation teachingthem about patriotism in our
country.
Speaker 2 (53:16):
This is awesome, so that's that this is childhood
memories.
Speaker 1 (53:19):
This is memories.
Speaker 2 (53:20):
And then if you go to Idaho, 250, america, 250.
Yep.
Speaker 1 (53:30):
There, you go there, we go, so this one, just so this
this, this URL isamericatw50idahogov.
Speaker 2 (53:37):
Yeah, and you can sign up to be an ambassador.
Julie Ellsworth, the statetreasurer, is really leading
this.
So many incredible things Bepart of this.
Speaker 1 (53:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (53:48):
This is history.
You're living it.
Speaker 1 (53:50):
So there's the countdown to the celebration.
We'll go up a little bit,Matthew.
It's 402 days, 21 hours, 11minutes, 14 seconds 17 seconds.
This is great, we had to hitthis and it was on my list, so
well, yeah, Anything elseanything else we missed?
Speaker 2 (54:07):
We have five more minutes.
Anything else that you want tosay?
Or?
Yeah, I think it's easy to bediscouraged in the political
environment and I often jokethat I have the serenity prayer
because there's lots of things Icould get upset about,
especially nationally.
We have an opportunity here togovern ourselves.
Yeah, and people are busy.
(54:29):
They're running businesses,they're raising families, all
the things that we expect peopleto do and we want them to do,
and we want people to be their,you know, be their best, live
their best lives, so to speak.
People can change the system.
Their voices are massivelyimportant and when people stop
(54:54):
thinking that we will no longerhave a government run by people
and so, as frustrated as peopleget and there is a notion in
politics that if you get tiredand you leave the building, then
other people win and it's true.
I always say if you leave thearena, you've lost the game, and
(55:18):
sometimes you might need to gosit in the stands for a while
and then you can get back on thefield.
But we have to stay involvedabout what we care about,
because these things, the thingsthat we've created, didn't
happen by accident.
Someone's blood, sweat, tears,ideas made this valley.
So how do we keep it and keepmoving forward?
We only do that with the peoplethat are here now doing the
(55:39):
work for the people that willcome tomorrow.
So, keep at it.
Speaker 1 (55:43):
I love it.
I love your optimism.
I love the way you interact.
I love the fact that we haveyou know.
You can say what you want aboutour city.
Like Jimmy Colin Jordan,they're great people.
They're passionate about theirthings, mayor McLean, and I
think of all the good workthat's happening right now.
(56:04):
I'm really proud of the wayit's happening.
And listen, these challengesare great challenges to have.
The fact that we're talkingabout all these things that are
challenging and hard for cities.
It's because we have such agreat place.
Everyone wants to live here.
So thank you for your efforts,thank you for your service.
It is a calling in a lot ofways, the number of hours you
(56:25):
put into this.
Speaker 2 (56:26):
Yes, there's a lot.
Speaker 1 (56:27):
And without very many thank yous.
So, on behalf of us and ourlisteners, thank you, Lucy for
what?
You do for your service.
Tell your family thanks forletting you go put up with it.
Speaker 2 (56:38):
They do bear a brunt of many, many monologues at home
.
Speaker 1 (56:44):
Yeah, they're there when you get home, right?
Speaker 2 (56:48):
Well, thank you and thanks for the opportunity to
talk about these things, because, you know, a bumper sticker
world won't get us this kind ofmovement and, again, if we don't
talk about it, it won't change.
Speaker 1 (57:01):
So thank you for the venue.
It's the hard work Well.
Appreciate you very much.
Thank you for your friendshipand for all you do for our state
and our people.
Speaker 2 (57:08):
I love Boise.
Thank you.
Today on the Ever Onward podcast, we have Lucy
Willits.
Lucy serves on the Boise CityCouncil.
We are very excited to have heron to hear all things Boise and
her representation of ourpeople here.
She grew up in Eastern Idaho onpotato fields and worked in
agriculture before moving toBoise and has been on the Boise
(00:21):
City Council.
Now is in her second term.
We're really excited to talk toLucy, talk about her leadership
she's one of the tremendousleaders we do have here in the
Valley and excited to have heron our podcast.
Lucy Willits Lucy, welcome tothe podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
I am so excited to be here, I feel.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
We've tried to have you on a couple of times.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Well, I feel very honored to be here, especially
right after Memorial Day.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
It was yeah, did you have a great weekend?
Speaker 2 (00:58):
I had a wonderful weekend, I got to tell you.
Yesterday I went to Morris HillCemetery and I'd never done
this before but the Civil WarAssociation and I'm probably
saying that club wrong but theydo an amazing ceremony.
There was Lincoln.
I had a woman read a poem thata woman had wrote during the
(01:19):
Civil War about grief and death.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
I've never heard of this.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
It was amazing.
And then they did a 21-gunsalute.
They were all in and they do itevery 21-gun salute.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
They were all in, and they do it every year.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
Yeah, and it was all in authentic uniforms.
It was so meaningful, I justloved it.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Oh, I want to take my grandson.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
Yeah, you would, oh, yes.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
So they do it every year.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
Were you there as an invitee for your role.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Well, I learned about it because of a city press
release but I wasn't formallyinvited.
But I went and I was glad I didbecause I wanted to show
support from the city and theyare complete volunteers.
They do it at Morris Hill andthen they do it at the Military
Reserve.
Wow, it was so neat.
I kept telling them thank youfor taking your time to do this
(02:02):
on a holiday.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
It's so nice.
I mean, we have a lot ofholidays and it seems like
everything now is you celebratesomething every day.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
There's even an app, I think.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
Like every day is celebrating something, but for
us on Memorial Day to pause andjust reading through.
Last night, before I went tobed, I was reading through a
bunch of the tributes, yes, andjust reading through.
Last night, before I went tobed, I was reading through a
bunch of the tributes.
Yes, there's a bunch oftouching stuff that's out there
(02:34):
and you know, even the baseballgames had the poppy on it
yesterday, which was really cool.
Anyway, we live in anincredibly patriotic place and
it's awesome that we do.
I can't imagine livingsomewhere in the United States
where people didn't love,respect and revere what has
happened for this to become acountry.
And listen, it's not perfect.
(02:54):
I mean, you can go through eachwar and we have lots of warts.
There's a lot of warts oneverything, but what's
underlying is a bunch of peoplethat were willing to give their
lives for this country.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
It is a miracle.
It really is when you thinkabout what happened in this
country, and there is no reasonwe should have won the
Revolutionary War, nonewhatsoever.
My husband and I are bigLafayette folks.
We liked Lafayette before.
Hamilton made it cool, and whathe did?
He single-handedly helpedchange the world.
He was just a punk kid.
(03:27):
He was like I'm going to gofight with them.
He brought money and guns andchanged our lives forever.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
That's awesome.
It's awesome.
Well, I can't wait to getcaught up with you.
There's a lot going on, A lotgoing on in the city, a lot
going on in the Treasure Valley.
You're right in the middle ofit all, but before we get
blazing into that, can you justtell us a little bit about
yourself and for those peoplethat listen to this a lot of
business people listen to this,but people who may not know you.
(03:54):
Give a little intro for us.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
Yeah Well, thank you Again.
Thanks for the opportunity.
So I'm as close to being alifelong Idahoan as you can be.
My parents moved from Montanawhen I was two and I've lived
here virtually my entire life.
I grew up on the other side ofthe state, in potato country and
I joke that potato country isdifferent.
We had school released for twoweeks as children to work in the
(04:21):
fields.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
What town were you?
Speaker 2 (04:23):
I grew up in an unincorporated part of Jefferson
County, little wide spot in theroad called Grant, idaho, and
went to Rigby High School andjust really learned the value of
hard work and patriotism.
And my dad was thisentrepreneur that tried and
tried and tried.
He had all the good ideasbefore they could take off and
was a small business person andI really learned the value of
(04:47):
money.
He had all the good ideasbefore they could take off and
was a small business person andI really learned the value of
money and that when you are asmall business owner and a
business owner you get paid last.
And so that has reallyinstilled in me a real focus on
(05:07):
why the economy matters.
And then also because I thinkit's important that the people
have the opportunity to succeedand that there isn't artificial
barriers to do that and wereally need to focus on making
sure that people have thatopportunity and drive and
ambition.
So grew up on, you know, 50acres down a dirt road, you know
, rural Idaho, very, verydetermined to go to college.
I knew that that was my ticketout of poverty and did that
(05:29):
Married my arch enemy fromelementary school.
I know no one could believe wewere together when we showed up
at the five-year reunion and weraised two beautiful daughters.
I'm now a grandma.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Oh wow, I didn't know that.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Yeah, my little grandson.
Grandson celebrated his firstbirthday, isn't?
Speaker 1 (05:46):
that magical Lucy.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
It's amazing.
It's the whole reason I didn'tkick her out when she was a
teenager.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
Do they live around here?
Speaker 2 (05:53):
They do.
They live in CUNA.
Speaker 1 (05:55):
Oh, that's great, yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
So we love Idaho.
My husband's family helpedsettle the town of Manan, love
this place, have enjoyedpurposely raising our children
here, purposely staying in Idahoto be close to family, even
though they're five hours away.
And I really believe in thefuture of the state and this
(06:17):
valley and it's just given somuch to us.
And when people say they'vemoved to Boise, I said welcome
to paradise.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Welcome to paradise.
We're glad to have you.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
It's wonderful.
So tell us.
Well, first of all, can I ask aquestion?
Go back a little bit.
Oh yeah, what you said aboutsmall business, I think it was
just really powerful because,seeing it as the daughter of an
entrepreneur, this idea that weget paid last yeah, daughter of
an entrepreneur, this idea thatwe get paid last First of all,
(06:52):
entrepreneurial spirit.
Small businesses like thecountry's carried on the back of
small businesses A lot of times.
We, you know, you never have toworry about big business
because they've got morelobbyists than I mean, they've
got floors of lobbyists andthey're tracking every little
bill and every little thing,taking care of everything.
But it's the small businessesin this country.
If you look at the tax base, ifyou look at who burdens it, it
(07:17):
is small business, smallbusiness owners.
And so I love that.
When you said that that they getpaid last.
As a small business guy and I'mhelping on a couple right now,
but it's true I mean you don'teven ask him the question how
much am I going to make?
The first question is am Igoing to survive and become
profitable?
And then, now that I amprofitable, do I use that money
(07:37):
to grow or what do I do, andit's so healthy to have to
balance growth and what you takeand what you don't, what you
leave in the business, and so tohave someone that understands
that in politics is inleadership is a big deal.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
It's in my DNA.
I can tell you lots of stories,but first I will tell you my
dad, hiro.
My dad was so smart.
My dad had a high schooldiploma and figured out how to
build a feed mill All theengineering for a feed mill, and
my dad gave us jobs and we hadto invoice him in order to get
(08:16):
paid.
And if we didn't invoice him wedidn't get paid, and it was
like you have to keep track ofthis and whether you get paid or
not.
And when you got, I mean it wassuch a great life lesson for
accounting.
So I had Lucy's cleaningbusiness and I cleaned the mill
every Saturday and it took hourscause it's a mill and it's full
of dust, but he was so goodabout making me understand that
(08:42):
and that that had value.
And then, if I was going totake that $2 that I earned that
Saturday and spend it onsomething, was it worth that.
He was such an amazing personwhen it came to ideas and he
just never thought about itfailing, even though they all
ended up having some challenges.
But I'll tell you what I lovedabout my dad is he just
(09:05):
constantly reinvented himself,and that's what I love about the
American spirit.
I used to tease him that he wasa little bit like Madonna.
He was constantly reinventinghimself.
You know, he'd run cattleoperations, he'd farmed, he'd
owned a hardware store.
He did He'd.
When I was a kid we had a feedmill, so we roll and chop barley
(09:29):
for dairy cows.
And when the government came inand basically paid farmers to
kill all their cows, dairybuyout, it decimated the
business.
So I have seen what governmentcan do to a family when it
decides to take the market.
Yeah, can do to a family when itdecides to take the market, and
(09:50):
so all of those things haveplayed such an important part of
who I am and how I look atthings, because it's not only
how I was raised, but it's myDNA.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
Yeah, and those genuine, authentic things that
define what's in your heart,mind and soul, that allow you to
then set your base of values,that allows you to make good
decisions.
I mean, that's leadership 101,right.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
Yeah Well, I learned it from my family.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
That's cool, so let's jump forward here.
Okay, getting into citypolitics.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
Fun.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
How's it been?
Speaker 2 (10:22):
I tell people it's been the most difficult thing
I've ever done.
I have grown more in this thanI've ever done.
Speaker 1 (10:29):
What year were you elected?
Speaker 2 (10:30):
2021, and I started my term in 2022.
So it's been three years.
Three years Okay great and whatI have really loved about it is
the people I've got to meet,just amazing people that I would
never had the opportunity tomeet before, and that has been
just so rewarding.
You know there's there's otherparts of it that haven't been as
(10:52):
rewarding, but it just remindsyou of the goodness of the
community and you see people whocome to meetings when they
could be doing lots of otherthings.
I mean, there are cheap movieson Tuesday nights.
They could be there and theyshow up because they care.
And it is so incredible to meI'm honored and I'm always just
really humbled that people willtake their time to help craft a
(11:15):
government.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
People love this place, and for good reason.
They love this place, one ofthe things that you're known as.
You're known as the lone kindof conservative.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
I am.
I am the lone lioness.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
On the Boise City Council.
That comes up a lot.
Speaker 2 (11:34):
Yes, the statesman always likes to say that.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
It's interesting If you think about city governance,
you know, and the mayor beingthe CEO of the city of Boise,
right Capital City, and then youguys are the elected council to
help approve and make decisionson budget and everything else
run a city right.
You'd think that not too muchof it would be partisan, because
(12:00):
some of that stuff ought to be.
You know what's the best thingfor business, but a lot of it is
right.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
I think it comes down to philosophy.
You know how people, you knowwe were just talking about how
you view the world, and I thinkit's less partisan and more
philosophical.
And I definitely have a verydifferent philosophy.
Last city council I was theonly one that worked for a
for-profit company, the onlycity council person that worked
(12:29):
for a for-profit company, andthen now, with Meredith got
appointed, she also works for afor-profit company, but I come
from a very differentperspective on that, because I
know what it's like to dolayoffs, I know what it's like
to try to figure out the P&L,and I think that is really
important.
I always joke that you know themayor and I think about.
(12:52):
We wake up in the morningthinking about an E, the mayor
thinks about the environment andI think about the economy, and
that's just how we're wired, andso it's a good yin to the yang,
because you know you have tohave one to have the other yeah,
yeah and um, so I've met, Ithink I've, I think I've spent
time with every city councilmember you have.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
You have a good group of people, right now, yeah,
they're good people um, um andthat's you know, from when we do
development.
We interact a lot.
We'll interact a lot with citygovernments.
In fact, it's probably our mostimportant, like the piece of
our.
You know we like predictability, business likes predictability.
You just said about governmentcoming in and buying all the
(13:34):
cows, I mean governmentinteraction with business
predictability.
You know goalposts that are setand fixed for good reasons.
And then we like criticalthinkers, like if you can go
have an intelligent conversationwith someone on a council and
say, hey, we may see thisdifferently, but can we talk
about issue A right and you havea real healthy and you can
(13:58):
listen to the other side of itand I can tell you, I've come
out of those thinking, oh mygosh, I didn't understand that
other perspective of this otherperson that sees the world
differently than I do.
I've also come out of them like, oh my gosh, can you believe
that they see the world that way?
But that's what makes Americabeautiful is we do have such
varied opinions on so manydifferent things.
How has it been for you withthis current council?
Speaker 2 (14:21):
Because they were just a bunch of just sworn in
this last year, right, yeah, soit is a very new council.
You know, jimmy and I haveserved the longest.
When you think about that, it'skind of interesting because
prior to that there were folksthat had served for a long time.
I think it's really healthy tohave turnover.
I think it's incrediblyimportant.
Our system is based on it.
(14:42):
If someone starts thinking thatthe system can't work without
them, that's a problem.
I would say that all thecouncil members work really hard
.
They all pay a price for this.
It's time, it's money, it'semotional bandwidth, and I
really appreciate my councilmembers.
(15:02):
I think they are genuinely goodpeople who are trying to do the
right thing.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Do you guys get along .
Speaker 2 (15:08):
I think we get along.
Yeah, I mean, we obviouslythink things very differently,
but I have really worked to becivil and I think that's really
important that people see thatthat this is not a judgment call
on someone's character.
If they vote differently than Ido, it's just they have a
different opinion.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
Well, and you can't.
I mean, I think that's the, youcan be civil.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
We need to expect civility.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
For crying out loud.
This country was built onvarying ideas and people coming
together and saying how do wework through?
Where do we have commoninterests?
Where do we harmonize what wethink and where don't we?
Where do we have commoninterests, where do we harmonize
what we think and where don'twe?
And then these votes thathappen and you get to vote every
city council meeting.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
Yeah, and I think it's important that you have
different views at the tablebecause it will push change,
because when you point outsomething that's just not
logical and lacks common sense,that can help propel a change.
And I tell people often whenthey come to city council and
they get frustrated because itdoesn't go their way, I say you
know what?
What you've done is help propelchange, because now you've told
(16:15):
us what's not working and evenif we, if, if we're not, you
know voting the way you want usto do on this particular issue,
because of whatever reason, youhave given us that nugget that
we can go back and we can change.
And I think that's incrediblyimportant.
When people stop showing up, wehave a problem.
People need to keep showing up.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
That's powerful.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
And I also will say I'm very worried that when
people don't feel listened to,they become radicalized.
So someone they want to belistened to, who's going to
listen to them?
Yeah, If it's not their electedofficials, then they will find
somebody who will listen to them.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
With the current council makeup, do you ever feel
picked on?
Speaker 2 (16:59):
Oh yeah, are you kidding?
No, I go in.
I go in knowing every week thatI am the lone lioness, like I
don't have a machine behind me,I don't have the machine of City
Hall, I don't have a machine ofa campaign, I have me myself
(17:20):
and I.
But I think it's reallyimportant that people see that
you can do that and you can walkinto a place where you know
you're probably going to getoutvoted 90% of the time on the
big stuff and you can still walkout of the room and be okay.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
Where does that strength come from?
Well, let me just let mepreface that, but it's, it's
easy.
All of us in our lives willhave times when we're with the
uh, we're with the majority,right, we are in a comfortable
place because we know the peoplesurrounding us think like us,
believe like us emotionally orwith us, and it's a comfortable
(17:56):
place to be.
We also will have these timeswhen we're not, where, hey,
we're going to kind of be aloneand we're going to be forced
with hey.
And then I think for you, theother question I'd ask is not
only do you have to stand up forvoting a different way, but you
have to justify that with anintelligent response and reason
(18:18):
and realize that, even thoughyou're justifying and presenting
a position that's againstothers, they're still not going
to vote with you.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
Oh yeah, I mean, that's the hard part is-.
Speaker 1 (18:28):
They're never going to see things your way.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Once in a while.
I'll pick one or two off Oncein a while, but I think it's
really important that people usetheir voice.
So I know that there will mostlikely be times that I am not on
the winning side.
Once in a while I will join themajority.
But what can't be silenced isthat voice and that ability to
(18:56):
point things out that need tochange.
And you talked about going intoa friendly crowd.
So I worked with the Idaholegislature for years.
That is the exact opposite ofBoise.
Boise has a super majority ofDemocrats.
The Idaho legislature has asuper majority of Republicans.
When you testify at the Idaholegislature, when I used to like
they were friendly faces.
Yeah, and you know I often gointo city council not knowing if
(19:19):
I'm going to get a friendlyface.
You know and and people are,people are are professional.
Don't mean to to make any sortof judgment there, but I know
I'm going to be an outsider andso I've really worked to.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
Can you speak a little more to that Cause I do
think we've seen city.
I'm getting old enough now thatyou know, you kind of see the
local politics change.
Um, you know, mayors change,city councils change, even
leadership with the staff in acity change, and we're in all
jurisdictions.
Most of the time we're in otherjurisdictions, in other states
(19:58):
too.
It does feel like it'sprofessional and civil and with
you guys, and that's not alwaysthe case.
Is that the truth?
Does feel like it'sprofessional and civil and with
you guys, and that's not alwaysthe case.
Is that the truth?
Speaker 2 (20:07):
Well, I don't know about in depth about other city
councils and how they run.
I mean, I have enough on myplate watching ours and keeping
up.
But I think what sets Boiseapart is we do have a very, very
professional staff becausewe're big.
So I've gone to conferenceswhere the city council people
are having to make thesedecisions on very, very
(20:29):
technical aspects of watertreatment and I thought, oh my
gosh, we don't have to do that.
You need one expert to do that.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
You need one, an expert, to do that.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
We, we have the staff to do that and, as the capital
city and as one as the largestcity, we should.
But I also think that that wereally try as a as a council, to
to do that as well.
Like I, I really believe thatcouncil members, my current
council members especially, havereally worked to be civil and
(20:58):
to disagree, with that beingdisagreeable.
And there was one case whereone of my council members said
we were just arguing about that.
I said no, we weren't, we werediscussing.
Discussing is different thanarguing, but just to try to tamp
down the emotion so that peoplecan be people, I think is
(21:18):
important.
Speaker 1 (21:20):
That's awesome.
Let's talk about some of theissues in the city?
Speaker 2 (21:24):
Well, there's lots.
Speaker 1 (21:25):
There's lots.
I'm going to bring them up inkind of no order, but I do think
, and I'm going to start withsome things, that I think the
city and Mayor McLean has takenlead on.
I think the homelessness stuff,you know, I know there's a lot
of people that are worried aboutthat because they see what's
happened in jurisdictions aroundand I frankly just can't be
(21:48):
prouder of what you guys havebeen doing.
I mean, it's been great and youlook at it's combining public
safety, investment in police,it's it's.
That's a pillar of it.
Then it's creating housing.
That's a pillar of it.
And I think we're frankly alittle lucky that Caleb Roop and
Pacific Companies is like likelike when God looked down upon
(22:10):
us and saidHey, caleb, you know, put your
company in Eagle Idaho.
Caleb, you know, put yourcompany in Eagle Idaho.
For those listening, caleb Ruppin Pacific Companies is
probably the nation's number oneaffordable housing developer
and he happens to be from Eagle,idaho, just purely so.
He's done several greatprojects and I think that's been
great because I think the wholehousing you know, homelessness
(22:31):
is a housing problem.
I do believe that.
And then I think some of thecampaigns to not treat all
homeless people the same youknow, as an old time night shift
ER doc, I mean they're notright.
You have the, those women, andmostly women, domestic violence
with children that are homeless.
A giant percentage of kind ofthe family homelessness
population are somehow touchedby that.
(22:51):
Then you have the mentalillness.
We're just not getting thetreatment.
You need to stay off thestreets.
And then you do have kind ofthe drug, alcohol abuse, right,
still a disease, but they aredifferent, right.
And then you have there's a lotof people, especially with our
economy now and with theaffordability crisis that we're
(23:13):
experiencing, there are peoplethat are paycheck to paycheck,
the working poor, that asset,limited income, constrained,
employed population that they'rereally you know.
So if you look at the number ofpeople that are, of teenagers
that are probably couch surfing,bouncing around or just, and a
lot of these again are going tobe kind of broken families.
There's a lot of it.
But my point is I think youguys have done a really, really,
(23:36):
really good job on that.
Speaker 2 (23:39):
Well, and there's so much to do, and we've seen what
happens when you choose thewrong path and you only have to
drive north and west to see thatand it's scary.
You see suffering and you seecrime and you see unhealthy
situations that people shouldn'tbe in.
I think one of the things thatI think about with homelessness
(24:02):
is three things.
One is you need housing, youneed help and you also need
rules, because, to your point,there's lots of different
circumstances with homelessness.
Now, the person who is on thestreet with the cardboard sign
is what people usually think of,but there's a hidden
homelessness of families that isreally devastating as well, and
(24:24):
you've got kids who aren't ableto have a safe place to sleep
and then they go to school.
So there's as differentsituations with homelessness as
there are people.
For me, it's very important thatwe have rules, because I think
that sets the standard, and so Iwas very supportive of Senator
Galloway's bill that would makerules for our bigger cities when
(24:48):
it came to homelessness,because I think if you set the
standard, then you can move andattain that.
If you don't have a standard,which is people can sleep
outside anywhere, then what areyou working towards?
And so for me that's a veryimportant piece.
One of the things I think Boisedoes really well is coordinated
(25:09):
care.
Speaker 1 (25:10):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
Because, folks, you work with the government, you
know how frustrated it is whenyou call some place and they say
call another place and you havea home.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Yeah, I like as an old ER guy, like it's triage
right and the better you dotriage.
Not everybody needs to be in atrauma room, not everyone needs
to be in an ER, but they do needprimary care or urgent care and
so that having the reallyrobust triage system another
thing the city did two or threeyears ago.
Robust triage system.
Another thing the city did twoor three years ago because I
(25:39):
helped on that campaign was one,create ways to get families off
the streets by having units.
And then, two, they did a nicejob of redoing their triage
system so that they could getthe appropriate resources to the
appropriate families at theappropriate time.
It was a big big deal.
Speaker 2 (25:53):
Well, I always think about how hard and frustrated I
get if I can't get an answer.
That I need and I have a homeand healthy food.
Imagine if I was homelesstrying to do it.
The other thing that I thinkwhen we think about homelessness
that's really important I'vesaid this over and over again is
we have to have a nonprofitcommunity that helps us do this,
because that gives everyone anobligation and it also gives
(26:18):
people a way to help, becausewhat I've seen in this community
is people want to help but theyoften don't know how.
So one of the things that I thecampaign that you worked on is
the ability for folks to to givepersonal money as a as a
donation.
That can also help people.
And then you have catch and youhave Jesse tree and you have
interfaceuary.
We need all these partners andwe need more.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
Yeah, and you just mentioned a few of them.
What a tremendous amount ofwork that happens.
I mean we should be very proudof just.
You know you look at problemsaround us and I travel a lot.
Everywhere I go, it's like ohwow, I'm in Reno a ton now.
It's shocking, isn't it?
Yeah, I'm in Reno a lot and theproject we're doing is downtown
(27:06):
Reno and once these problemsget unraveled, it is almost
impossible to back up.
So proactive, thoughtfulleadership makes all the
difference in the world.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
It is necessary and when we talk about different
voices at the table we have tohave different voices at that
table too.
And I'd be remiss if I didn'ttalk about the.
Boise Rescue Mission and whatthey do with only donations.
They don't take any governmentfunding.
And you see, when people areable to truly change their lives
, which is so hard, it'smiraculous, it really is.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
Yeah, what Reverend Bill does I?
Speaker 2 (27:41):
mean angel.
It's unbelievable.
Yeah, he's an angel.
Speaker 1 (27:44):
Great.
So there's some good news.
There is good news, housing.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
Yeah, housing is tough.
I mean, you know people talk tome about, oh, we want more
single-family homes and I tellthem I do too.
Land is expensive.
Yeah, Land's expensive.
One of the things that I thinkit's important for us to do, and
the zoning code attempts to dothis.
There's parts that we need torefine, but just really let the
(28:12):
market be more of the driverthan the government.
When you have government that'stelling you you should do
things and you should do thisway, and it's artificially
raising costs, that will end uphurting people who are trying to
get into homes.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
I agree with you, and we were huge supporters of the
New Zola Code change.
I think it needed to happen.
I think it was a long longoverdue Way, overdue Way overdue
, a really hard thing.
So many unintended things aboutit, though, that are now, and
now you're living withgovernment saying, okay, how do
we clean up the stuff we have?
(28:44):
And it's hard.
So let me give you an examplethis electronic vehicle thing.
So new zoning code, you have tohave a parking garage.
Great Parking garages now areabout $45,000 to $50,000 a stall
.
Think about that for a minute$45,000 to $50,000 a stall.
(29:06):
And now, because electronicvehicles are required, that's
not the worst part.
(29:29):
That's not the worst part Now,because they catch on fire.
So then the fire departmentmakes you have a half a stall
per electronic vehicle stall incase the car catches on fire.
So for every electronic vehicleyou put, it's $75,000 a stall,
just like that.
And now the city is saying, hey, we want 20%.
Then the other thing Lucy, noone uses these things.
Speaker 2 (29:46):
No no.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
Like real practical when you leave our building
today.
We have a stack of them overhere.
There's no one parking in them.
Every one of our buildings noone parks in them.
Downtown we own three garages.
No one uses them.
If you have one, you plug in atnight at your home.
But I use it as an example ofbecause I think it's a real kind
(30:08):
of crystal clear example, reallife example of how government
is saying, hey, here are thethings we want, but then on the
other hand they just almostcan't get out of the way of
themselves with really badpolicy that they don't even
realize.
You just jacked the price of aparking stall up by 50% and
(30:28):
there's no way to get out of it.
Then if you want to reduce it,you have to go do a CUP and you
have to go in and, and, and nowit's three more months.
It's just.
It's.
It's just one example.
On a zoning code, that that,but.
But I don't know how it everchanges, because I don't think
that.
I think what happens is like Idon't think they're bad people,
but they're just saying, oh yeah, we, we want this, so we're
(30:50):
going to force this and you'regoing to like it and it makes
sense because we're saving theenvironment by doing it.
You're not saving theenvironment, first of all.
I mean I think there's enoughstuff.
I mean, if they ever trulylooked at what it costs to
create these batteries right nowand and what we're actually
doing, no one's using them andthey don't ask the people that
actually have the parking stallsto say, hey, are anyone using
(31:12):
these things?
And then, on top top of it,after all of that, there's no
one to listen to you on costs,right?
You're just saying so anyway, Ijust Well, amen, and this came
up with the county.
Speaker 2 (31:31):
I don't know how much you followed that.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
I've followed it all because it'll kill a project.
This is not hyperbole here,Because the zoning code forces
you how many stalls you have.
Then they force you to have oneand a half per each EV and
they're taking the cost.
It just kills projects.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
And this is why it's really important that people
talk about this, because we canfix it.
I always say, you know, it'snot the 10 commandments, we can
fix it.
Speaker 1 (32:02):
But can you?
Because I think the legislaturepassed a bill that says that
the cities can't require EVs andthen the city of Boise just
basically said hey, screw you,we're going to do it anyway.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
Well, I mean, this is something I think would be good
to come for a vote so thatpeople know Because, to your
point, every one of these thingsthe government demands
increases a cost, and I amconcerned that this is another
example where philosophy gets inthe way of good, old-fashioned
common sense.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
I'm going to be quiet .
You got me in a little soapboxhere, okay, but we said land's
too expensive, yeah, so we can'tsprawl.
So first of all, here's kind ofthe world according to
Boiseites we can't sprawl, we'regoing up, we're not going to go
use farmland, we're not goingto sprawl, we're going to do all
.
So I get that part.
(32:51):
Forget that sprawl is happeningand Forget that sprawl is
happening and it will alwayshappen, and it will always
happen.
And so my argument is if thecity of Boise is not going to
manage housing, then the valleywill manage housing.
And that's what's happening.
The county is doing it, theother cities are doing it and,
honestly, there ought to be afield trip required just to go
(33:12):
see what's going on.
It's crazy, what's going on.
So sprawl is happening.
But then you go back to thecity of Boise who's saying, hey,
we need more homes and we needhomes that people can afford.
That comes out of the lips,right, but now it's got to be
structured.
So there's lands too expensive.
So we want to make it easierfor you guys to do vertical
construction, all types, but nowwe're going to put parking
(33:34):
requirements on you that don'tmake any sense.
I mean, you see what I'm saying, like, like it, just the amount
of it's like, do you really?
Do you really think that?
Because if you really thoughtthat, you probably wouldn't be
doing what you're doing on yourpolicy.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
You're right and the reality is is that Boise can
have its rules, but that doesn'tmean that other people aren't
going to go other places, so itwill exasperate the problem.
I think there's a lot thatBoise can do.
We're going to have to go up,but I also think you're going to
have to go out.
I mean, there's entire land bymicron that you can develop
(34:14):
Southeast Boise.
The sewer moratorium was abeater thing.
Can we get over that?
Can we talk about that?
I think we have to.
There's a lot of things that wecan do that, I think, kind of
make people shudder a little bit, but they have to be talked
about.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
Well, I think they have to be talked about, because
or you can't say we wantaffordable housing, yeah because
you can't get it.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
You can't do both Because the math doesn't work.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
You can't do both things.
You can say we're going to havehighly regulated, highly
government-subscribed housingthat's going to fit this box and
it's going to be expensive inBoise.
You can say that.
But you can't say we're goingto try to be helpful to reduce
housing costs.
You can't do it.
Speaker 2 (34:58):
No, the math doesn't work.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
No.
Speaker 2 (34:59):
And the only way you get affordability is you take
tax dollars to do it, whichmeans you're taxing other people
for it.
That's what makes it affordable.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
Which to me is the greatest irony of all ironies.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
All of it, yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
Listen, we're in a friendly spot today because
we're a free market.
Yes friendly spot today becausewe're a free market.
Yes, like conservative people.
But when you go now, you'regoing to like well, now we're
just going to take governmentsubsidy and subsidize the house.
Think about this loop We've nowmade housing more expensive
because of our policy and nowwe're going to go get government
housing subsidies so that wecan afford You're not affording
(35:34):
anything.
Then the government getsinvolved.
Every time the government getsinvolved, it gets out of whack
the whole system.
Now you're subsidizing thingsthat are only making everything
more expensive.
So housing's one.
I don't know what happens, butwhat we should be doing of all
our local governments is sayingwe need to reduce regulation, we
(35:56):
need to improve.
Let the free market get allhousing types out there.
Apartments condominiums starterhomes, medium homes.
Lots of variety, lots of variety, and only if we do, only if we
do.
The other example I'll use iseven if you go around Idaho.
It was fun going around Idahowhen I ran for governor because
(36:16):
you can go around Idaho and findthe places that are most
liberal and most restricted.
This is eight years ago.
And now look at the cost.
I mean you know those.
Go to Teton County, go toBlaine County, go to Boise, like
everywhere you go that is mostregulated, is most costly, it
(36:39):
just is, and that always goestogether.
And yet it always.
Then it's those same placestrying to figure out workforce
housing, trying to figure outhousing costs, when it's like
actually you kind of created theproblem you're having.
Speaker 2 (36:50):
Yes, yeah, you have just described the loop of which
I live.
You have just described theloop of which I live, and then
you have others that would sayyou know, the pinnacle of us, of
our responsibility, is theenvironment.
So we have to have these EVspots.
Speaker 1 (37:09):
And so I'm not.
I don't believe that, but I'mjust saying that's kind of.
So let's talk about two thingscan be mutually true.
I mean, I think that that Iwould argue okay, how is you
killing a project in downtownBoise really going to change the
environment globally?
And if they really look back atthe data behind all this, I
(37:32):
think it's not a hill to die on.
I don't think it's a hill todie on.
Speaker 2 (37:37):
Let me give you an example, and I know that you I'm
sure you watch all the citycouncil meetings because,
they're scintillating.
But there was one a couple ofweeks ago where Starbucks is
putting in a drive-through bythe airport and they wanted more
parking spaces and the citycouncil denied them those
parking spaces because ofclimate change.
(37:57):
That was the reasoning.
So of course I voted no.
I was like, no, they need theirparking spaces, but that kind
of attitude of like, at allcosts we are going to force this
philosophy, even when itdoesn't make sense that doesn't
even make sense.
Speaker 1 (38:11):
No, it doesn't.
We were in there.
We're doing a building forquality electric out in what's
called Pleasant Valley 520.
It's out at the corner ofOrchard, where Orchard turns
into Lake Hazel.
It's out in the middle ofnowhere and in order to improve
their flow of their internalsite on their 10 acres they
wanted to have parking on oneside of the building so that
(38:33):
their trucks could come in forsafety.
It required a six-month CUP.
It was hotly debated, and I'mthinking, months CUP.
It was hotly debated and I'mthinking what has this world
become when a Idaho businesstaking their own dollars and
building their place out in themiddle of nowhere, and we're
arguing over where?
(38:53):
And, by the way, safety.
At some point somebody wouldsay, okay, is this better for
these big trucks to not be here?
But but it was it we.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
I don't know well, you experienced it, and that's
when.
That's when common sense hashas just been, has left the
building, and so I don't thinkit matters oh, I think it
matters I don't know, I I getpretty discouraged.
Speaker 1 (39:15):
I get pretty discouraged because I think, I
think, oh man, these peoplesometimes don't really
understand the way businessworks and the way dollars flow
and the way people take risk.
Speaker 2 (39:26):
They may not, but that's why it's really important
that we have this dialogue,because otherwise it won't
change, and so I'm an optimisteternally.
But if we don't learn aboutthese things, we can't fix them,
and so that's why it's reallyimportant.
Speaker 1 (39:42):
Let me ask you a question.
Uh-huh, this is serious.
If you look at the new zoningcode rewrite it went through and
it had a lot of you knowliterally good reasons why it
went through.
And then there's just it'snormal when you do something
this big to have some cleanup Isthere, is there like a
committee, Because some of thisis so predictable, Lucy.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Yes, well, there needs to be more.
Speaker 1 (40:00):
Some of this, you could go oh, that doesn't make
sense.
That doesn't make sense.
Why do we have to wait forcitizens to get like like it's
whack-a-mole right?
They just said boom, boom, boom, boom, boom until someone
finally is like I'm going to dosomething about this.
Why can't calmer heads?
Speaker 2 (40:17):
go in and say this is therapy for me.
I'm feeling very therapeutic.
I feel like I need to give youmy 25 copay.
I really do, because I I wasjust constantly saying we were
supposed to review this.
We were supposed to review thisand it's not just I don't want
typos, yeah, I.
I don't want a typo review, Iwant a real review and we need
to do better.
And I think that there is aview that if you, if you go too,
(40:41):
the whole thing will fall apart, and I don't believe that I
don't believe that.
But I think that there is thisnatural criticism.
Oh no, and I think we have tobecause it will affect our
economy for years to come.
And here's my nightmare.
My nightmare is that Boisebecomes old and tired and 10
Mile becomes the center of thevalley.
Speaker 1 (41:04):
The irony of all ironies that you've said earlier
is that will happen and youknow who's getting also very
aggressive is the county.
Yes, yeah, I mean becausethey're just saying, hey, we'll
approve these subdivisions then.
Speaker 2 (41:15):
So to me it is imperative to the future of
Boise because what will happenis Boisians will pay more taxes
because we're not growing likeeveryone else.
We take all of the impact, butwe're not growing like Meridian
or Star.
And then people are like I'mnot going to deal with downtown
Boise, it's not worth it, andthey will go other places and we
will suffer.
Speaker 1 (41:37):
And pricing.
It'll just get really, really.
It's going to get reallyexpensive, super elite.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
Yes, and it's going to get really expensive super
elite.
Speaker 1 (41:42):
Yes, and it's going to drive out families.
Yes, and that's what'shappening and that's not what
Boise should be.
But it's the North End.
Speaker 2 (41:51):
Well, there is a reality there.
Speaker 1 (41:53):
I mean that's and I think there's people from the
North End that would just saythat's what we should be.
Speaker 2 (41:59):
There definitely are, which I think is one of the
reasons it's so good that wehave districts.
You know when my husband and Imoved to the Valley.
We lived in Nampa and we got ourfirst little starter home.
We were so excited, we loved it.
We were in a great littlesubdivision with lots of young
families you know we're all incombat zone with little kids and
that commute over time justbecame so hard and we were
(42:23):
spending so much money and wejust looked how close can we get
to our jobs.
And we ended up in West Boiseand we've been there ever since
and we love it and it is ourlittle pocket of paradise.
But it is a different pocket ofparadise than the North End.
Speaker 1 (42:37):
And it has a different-.
Hey, listen, I'm not sayinganything negative about the
North End I and it has adifferent.
Speaker 2 (42:42):
Hey, listen, I'm not saying anything negative about
the North End, I'm just sayingit's super expensive.
It's crazy expensive.
Speaker 1 (42:44):
I mean, it's just you , you, you, you know.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
It's beautiful but very expensive.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
Yeah, it's just, it's just different.
It's not.
You're not going to get afriend, a family, friendly,
young, it's just, it's just not.
And so I think that you canlook around the country at
cities that have done what Boiseis doing and you're going to
have an elite, expensive, notgrowing place and then you're
going to have costs, right, Ithink Skip just put up his
(43:09):
building, his apartment building, right, that's beautiful and
you're going to have maybe somethings happen like that, but
like buildings that people canafford, it's just going to be
hard.
And I do think I want to hearone other thing you said I think
the valley is dynamic A lot ofways.
This happened in Salt Lake, youdon't have to go too far to see
what happened to Salt Lake Cityproper.
(43:31):
Yes same and you can lookeverywhere around it.
And luckily you do have superdynamic.
Speaker 2 (43:38):
You have dynamic community in Garden City Garden.
Speaker 1 (43:41):
City is doing incredible things.
You've got Garden City.
I saw Mary Evans is going torun again.
But you got Garden City, yougot CUNA, where?
Speaker 2 (43:48):
I am, you got, star you got.
Speaker 1 (43:48):
Middleton, you got Meridian, you got Nampa, you got
Caldwell, you got cities thatare just like saying, hey, we'll
figure this out for ourfamilies, and you got the county
the one catch.
Oh, one other thing I was goingto say is I don't think the one
thing that the city, um, Ithink this is pretty profound.
(44:09):
I'm gonna tell you this I thinkfor a long time, the one, the
one thing that allowed cities toto um, to dominate discussions
on development, largedevelopments, was sewer.
Really, it's been sewer andwater, but sewer was the biggie
right.
Speaker 2 (44:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (44:22):
And now with technology, you're going to have
these dynamic for $5 millionyou can put in a sewer treatment
plant and self do it withinyour thing for about $5 million
for about 500 homes.
And that's a game changer.
Because I think what's going tohappen is you're going to see
(44:44):
that stranglehold on, hey, we'regoing to, and then there's all
the other services that comealong with it.
I mean it's not easy, but it isgoing to force decisions to be
made especially.
Speaker 2 (44:55):
I'm thinking of South Boise.
Yeah, and they have to be made,and this is where we need some
new thinking, because if Boisecontinues to put its feet in the
cement, the county will approvethings and we will get all of
the impact and none of the fees.
And so we have to think biggerthan this.
(45:15):
And if you're a free marketperson, the more homes you have,
the price goes down.
Speaker 1 (45:25):
And I believe it.
Let's talk about some morestuff that's going great,
because I think there are somany Parks, libraries, I mean,
think of the other wonderfulthings that the city has done
and doing, and by the way,there's a lot of wonderful
things.
Speaker 2 (45:44):
I think we're just experiencing growth that's
causing some reallyuncomfortable conversations.
I think what makes a city andyou think about wherever you go,
it's the parks and the art,that is what, and the landscape.
That is what changes your feelabout a city, and it's something
that we need more of and weneed to preserve.
And it's something that we needmore of and we need to preserve
.
And we have a goal for a10-minute walk to a park, which
(46:05):
is a phenomenal goal because wewant to preserve some of these
open spaces.
That's where people gather andpeople need to gather.
And art is an important piecetoo, because that's why people
travel all around the world isto see different art, because it
represents your story, andwe're very lucky because the
river is our biggest art.
(46:26):
We've got the river and we'vegot the foothills, so we have
that already.
But these other services thataren't as visible but very
important are, I think, whatmake a city, and part of it is
libraries.
So consider this 25 years ago,boise had one library and one at
the mall, like a little outletstore at the mall, and now we
(46:50):
have several libraries and we'retrying to look at how we get
more.
And this is an incrediblyimportant issue for my district
because we're in this donut hole.
So you know, probably the veinof this conversation has been
speak up, get involved.
And the reason we are havingthis conversation in West Boise
about libraries is because ofone guy who looked at the map
(47:12):
and said we're in a donut hole.
And why do I have to drive toEagle or Garden City for a
library when I'm in Boise?
Mark Salisbury, he hassingle-handedly driven this
conversation.
I had lunch with him January of2022.
That's how long we've beenworking on this.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
So those are the kind of things the city has to
invest in, because we needparity in services, because if
people start thinking that, ifyou only Can you maybe hit the
importance of libraries asgathering places and just like I
mean, I think for, uh, we'lljust, I'll let you take swing at
this well, every source ofresearch will show you that the
most rewarding thing in yourlife is your relationships.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
And where do you go to meet people?
Yeah, and we have lots of newpeople, and if they don't have a
structured social circlethrough church or clubs or their
neighborhood, where do they goand how do they feel like they
can meet people?
And libraries are manyuniversities all around our city
and they're a place to gather.
They're a place for you know,places for people to come,
(48:17):
places for people to think,places for people to learn, and
I think that the most importantthing that we can do as a city
other than police and fire,because they help drive
individual change and ourlibraries do incredible things
you probably wouldn't want toknow that they do.
Speaker 1 (48:36):
So much community outreach and community
involvement in programs.
Much community outreach andcommunity involvement in
programs.
As you have this age oftechnology, it's also super cool
to me, so awesome that we canhold onto this thing that still
allows you to interact withpeople.
My daughter, we have threegrandkids and they go to the
library every week.
They go every week, sometimestwice a week and my grandkids
(48:59):
just love it.
And they go in and there's thestorytime programming, there's
the interactive things thathappen, and they go to different
libraries.
They live in South Meridian butthey go to different ones and
it's like part of their routineand I just love that part of it.
Speaker 2 (49:14):
But it is a fabric of our community and I'm so glad
that we're investing in thatpart of how people interact in
(49:35):
the community and a place at themall.
And you think about now you'vegot Bound Crossing and Hillcrest
and Collister and hopefully onein West Boise very soon.
Those are the things thatreally feed a neighborhood, and
I went to many, many of thelistening sessions on the
library and what people keptsaying is we like the staff here
(49:57):
, they know our names, they'revery helpful and that this is
our place to go, where we canlearn.
And you know it is a 21stcentury world.
Hey look, I use AI.
You know I use all of thatstuff, but there is something
meaningful about a library thatwe do need to hold on to.
Speaker 1 (50:19):
Wow, this went really really really fast.
Speaker 2 (50:22):
Thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (50:24):
There's so much we can talk about Thank you for,
well, one of the most importantthings.
So a little bit of background.
4th of July parade yes, Nearand dear to your heart.
Speaker 2 (50:33):
Very dear.
Speaker 1 (50:34):
Luckily we've been able to be some big supporters.
Speaker 2 (50:37):
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1 (50:37):
Thank you.
This is our second year kind ofgetting that what it is, but
with our, with our country, withthe two 50 coming up.
I wanted you to speak on thisbecause this is your passion and
I wanted this forum to telleveryone out there listening
about it.
Speaker 2 (50:49):
Well, I am unapologetically patriotic and I
think we have a miracle of acountry and we need to celebrate
it.
So there's lots of ways to dothat, and the first thing is,
you know, we've got 4th of Julycoming up and we've got a parade
in downtown Boise, our capitalcity.
But this year is also going tokick off something that I want
every Idahoan to know about, andthat's this 250th anniversary
(51:11):
of our country.
So think about that.
So, if you just do the math, ifyou're 50, you have been alive
for one fifthfifth of thiscountry.
Speaker 1 (51:21):
Amazing, isn't it to think about it that way Of the
country.
Speaker 2 (51:26):
This is a very young country with lots of
possibilities, and this is ourtime to celebrate.
This is our time to look to thefuture.
There's going to be so manyevents.
If you want to be part of it,you can Google Idaho, America,
250 Ambassadors.
You can sign up.
They'll give you all the thingsPaul Revere has already come.
There's going to be so many funthings that we can really take
(51:46):
upon and just enjoy this momentbecause it is historical.
And I've got to give one moreplug.
So I've been trying to become amember of the Daughters of the
American Revolution and it hasbeen fascinating to find where
my ancestors have gone and wherethey've served and when you
look at the courage that peoplehad.
I mean I was reading last nightabout one of my ancestors who
(52:08):
was in the middle of nowhere,New Hampshire, who basically,
when the declaration came out,people signed their own
declaration, said we're out,we're Americans.
That takes courage and we needto bottle that up and move it
forward, and the best way to doit is to look at what's happened
in the past, take those lessonsand move forward.
Speaker 1 (52:29):
Hey, Matthew, can you pull this up?
So if anyone wants moreinformation on this 4th of July
parade first, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (52:36):
So see, this is when I Idaho 4th.
Oh see, this is going to be sadwhen I don't know.
Speaker 1 (52:43):
We'll get there.
We'll get there.
Boise 4thcom.
Yes, so it's Boise 4thcom.
Speaker 2 (52:51):
It's, there's a veterans breakfast.
I mean there's even going to bea pet parade, Come on.
Speaker 1 (52:59):
And then the vice AMSOs and then there's the
actual parade route.
So fantastic website, yes,gives you all the details how
you can participate.
If you've got a company thatwants to participate, this is a
big deal.
Thank you for doing this.
This is like.
This is like so amazing andsuch a part, like you think, of
the next generation teachingthem about patriotism in our
country.
Speaker 2 (53:16):
This is awesome, so that's that this is childhood
memories.
Speaker 1 (53:19):
This is memories.
Speaker 2 (53:20):
And then if you go to Idaho, 250, america, 250.
Yep.
Speaker 1 (53:30):
There, you go there, we go, so this one, just so this
this, this URL isamericatw50idahogov.
Speaker 2 (53:37):
Yeah, and you can sign up to be an ambassador.
Julie Ellsworth, the statetreasurer, is really leading
this.
So many incredible things Bepart of this.
Speaker 1 (53:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (53:48):
This is history.
You're living it.
Speaker 1 (53:50):
So there's the countdown to the celebration.
We'll go up a little bit,Matthew.
It's 402 days, 21 hours, 11minutes, 14 seconds 17 seconds.
This is great, we had to hitthis and it was on my list, so
well, yeah, Anything elseanything else we missed?
Speaker 2 (54:07):
We have five more minutes.
Anything else that you want tosay?
Or?
Yeah, I think it's easy to bediscouraged in the political
environment and I often jokethat I have the serenity prayer
because there's lots of things Icould get upset about,
especially nationally.
We have an opportunity here togovern ourselves.
Yeah, and people are busy.
(54:29):
They're running businesses,they're raising families, all
the things that we expect peopleto do and we want them to do,
and we want people to be their,you know, be their best, live
their best lives, so to speak.
People can change the system.
Their voices are massivelyimportant and when people stop
(54:54):
thinking that we will no longerhave a government run by people
and so, as frustrated as peopleget and there is a notion in
politics that if you get tiredand you leave the building, then
other people win and it's true.
I always say if you leave thearena, you've lost the game, and
(55:18):
sometimes you might need to gosit in the stands for a while
and then you can get back on thefield.
But we have to stay involvedabout what we care about,
because these things, the thingsthat we've created, didn't
happen by accident.
Someone's blood, sweat, tears,ideas made this valley.
So how do we keep it and keepmoving forward?
We only do that with the peoplethat are here now doing the
(55:39):
work for the people that willcome tomorrow.
So, keep at it.
Speaker 1 (55:43):
I love it.
I love your optimism.
I love the way you interact.
I love the fact that we haveyou know.
You can say what you want aboutour city.
Like Jimmy Colin Jordan,they're great people.
They're passionate about theirthings, mayor McLean, and I
think of all the good workthat's happening right now.
(56:04):
I'm really proud of the wayit's happening.
And listen, these challengesare great challenges to have.
The fact that we're talkingabout all these things that are
challenging and hard for cities.
It's because we have such agreat place.
Everyone wants to live here.
So thank you for your efforts,thank you for your service.
It is a calling in a lot ofways, the number of hours you
(56:25):
put into this.
Speaker 2 (56:26):
Yes, there's a lot.
Speaker 1 (56:27):
And without very many thank yous.
So, on behalf of us and ourlisteners, thank you, Lucy for
what?
You do for your service.
Tell your family thanks forletting you go put up with it.
Speaker 2 (56:38):
They do bear a brunt of many, many monologues at home
.
Speaker 1 (56:44):
Yeah, they're there when you get home, right?
Speaker 2 (56:48):
Well, thank you and thanks for the opportunity to
talk about these things, because, you know, a bumper sticker
world won't get us this kind ofmovement and, again, if we don't
talk about it, it won't change.
Speaker 1 (57:01):
So thank you for the venue.
It's the hard work Well.
Appreciate you very much.
Thank you for your friendshipand for all you do for our state
and our people.
Speaker 2 (57:08):
I love Boise.
Thank you.
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