Urban Renewal Agencies, as provided for by State and Federal law, are institutionalized crony-capitalism and the problems with them are complicated and insidious. The Kootenai Journal recently posted an article that identifies specific problems with Hayden's Urban Renewal District (HURA) and opposes its expansion. We agree that URAs have serious problems, and it is not our intention to contradict those who oppose any expansion of HURA territory. However, in this article are taking the view…

Immediately before a new Board of Trustees for NIC was elected November 2022, the ISBE appointed Board hired a new President and provided him with an employment contract that made him almost impossible to replace. The bylaws of the College clearly state that the College President is accountable to the trustees, but since he can defy them at every turn and the board is not able to replace him, months of chaos has ensued. Six months later, the out-going board of the Community Library Network ma…

Ever since slow-growth candidates, Luke Somer and Tom Shafer, announced that they were running for Hayden Mayor and City Council, Councilman Ed DePriest has been ardently defending the status quo, and lambasting anyone who criticizes the current leadership. He appears to have unleashed another barrage of evasions and misinformation in a CDA Press Editorial. According to DePriest, the City Council has already reigned in density, so there is no cause for concern about future growth. Hayden r…

Save Hadyen endorses Luke Sommer for Mayor, and Tom Shafer for City Council Seat #3. They will represent Hayden residents, not Special Interests. Time to Face Up to Problems Over two years ago, city officials made damaging and unpopular changes to Hayden's Comprehensive Plan. Once residents learned of the plan, most were opposed and they quickly made their criticisms known. But Instead of responding to real complaints, city leaders misrepresented the plans intent, made minor changes, and …

This is the second part of an article that discusses zoning and land use issues facing Hayden. The first part: Turbo Charging Multi-Family Housing, covered problems with Mixed Use Zoning and the Future Land Use Map. Densifying Single Family Neighborhoods Pro-growth Hayden planners spent most of 2022 rezoning hundreds of parcels from Hayden’s former Residential multi-family (R-MF) zone, to a new, similar Mixed Residential (MR) zone. There are some significant differences the two zone types, …

Ever since Hayden's enacted its disastrous 2040 Comprehensive Plan in 2021, there has been a conflict between residents who want to return as much as possible to the former Land Use Map and Zoning Regulations, and city officials who prefer to make minimal changes. What is the best way forward? Save Hayden has been investigating housing issues for two years and we've summarized some of our findings in this two-part article. The first part, Turbo Charging Multi-family Housing, covers changes…

This is a list of all of the Minutes of Hayden’s Planning and Zoning Meetings during the five years between 2019 and 2023. It has been provided for people who would like to research the record of Alan Davis as a member of Hayden's Planning and Zoning commission for themselves. A link to the complete minutes of each meeting can be seen by clicking on the meeting date. Any comments Davis made and his voting record can found by searching the minutes. We compiled this list of Hayden P & Z mee…

The most important part of this article is a list of links to all 25 Planning and Zoning meetings minutes (2019 to 2021) that concern development of Hayden's 2040 Comprehensive Plan. The reason these P & Z minutes are important is because they are the best insight that the public has, as to how the 2040 Comp Plan was developed, and how the changes to the city's zoning code came about. The Planning process was guided by just a few city employees, most of whom no longer work for the city. And…

January 10th was a good day for Hayden residents who are concerned about out-of-control growth.  The City Council meeting was well attended, public commentary was exceptional, and Hayden's leaders made crucial decisions that bode well for the future.   And best of all, area residents who testified at the Public Hearing for the Kerr Zone Map Amendment achieved a critical, and somewhat unexpected success. 

After six months of consideration, a compromise has been reached regarding Hayden's Standards of Approval for Zone Map Amendments.   We were hoping that the older Standards could be restored in full—since the 2016 Standards were easier to understand and more favorable to existing residents.  This didn’t happen, but the City Council did vote to restore one of the seven original standards.   This is not the best possible resolution, but it is a very significant improvement. 

What the City Council had previously suggested was a survey that would give meaningful insights into problems with "growth", and specifically, citizen dissatisfaction with the existing 2040 Comp Plan.  A generic "citzen engagement" survey, intended to help city government manage "Smart Growth" is not what is needed.

PROBLEMS WITH HAYDEN'S STANDARDS OF APPROVAL The following letter was sent to the Hayden City Council in response to a memo that was written by city officials attempting to Justify the 2021 updates to Hayden's Standards of Approval. As in previous cases where city officials have defended changes to Zoning Regulations that blatantly favor developers, the legal reasoning is poor. This refutation makes clear that the persons who crafted the 2021 Standards of Approval were not objectively servin…

Save Hayden's October Newsletter addresses the following topics:  1) The November ballot measure to raise property taxes 2) Problems with Hayden's funding priorities and  3) A fix for the MR multi-family zoning code, 4) Status of the "Standards of Approval" workshop, 5) The City Attorney's defense of the MR zone code. 

Just in 2023,  Hayden’s is planning to spend over $20 Million on infrastructure; mostly roads and sewers to facilitate future growth.   That is more than $1000 per resident of Hayden or almost $3000 per househould.  And this is just for 2023.  The Capital Improvement plan shown is part of a five year plan to spend nearly $50 Million dollars on infrastructure upgrades.

If this memo strikes you as badly reasoned, bear in mind, that it was never intended to be presented in a court of law, or to be subject to any critical review.   Its sole purpose was to provide cover for P & Z commissioners and other city officials who are already on board with the plan to densify Hayden, intend to vote in favor of the rezone.