The city decided to redo the sidewalks. We got notified by a sidewalk full of “no parking” signs. The signs were put on the odd side of the street with the next day’s date through that Friday, with a note that there is no parking on the even side of the street. On the even side of the street, there were some more signs telling us not to park within twenty feet an address on the even side.

I called the number on the signs, asking for clarification. The work was going to be done on the odd side of the street and they were going to send someone over to fix the signs. Great.

After they changed the signs, I went outside to see what was done. They changed the signs, but this time, it showed addresses two blocks over, and the signs in front of the house on the even side of the street had been spaced out all along the block, instead of just in front of the one house that needed attention.

I saw two of my neighbors outside looking at the signs. They gathered up the signs on the even side of the street and put them near the house where the address was noted.

The day that they were supposed to start the work, no one showed up. They came and changed the signs to reflect the correct addresses. The next day, they did the work on the house on the even side of the street, but nothing on the odd side.

Four days later, the signs were changed to tell us to not park on the odd side of the street for another week. Great. I called again to find out when they were planning on starting. “Whenever we get someone out there.”

It took another 3 weeks of not parking on the odd side of the street before they began the sidewalk work. The work itself took one afternoon and the next morning. Then a few of the parking spots were blocked off to allow for cement drying. The signs were not removed for another week, and only after my neighbors went and moved all of the signs in front of the original house on the even side of the street.

Now, if we could only get someone out to deal with the tree that is now falling over because they cut the roots when they redid the sidewalks. Three neighbors have already called about it, and all the city has done is put caution tape around it. It takes a village, but apparently not a city, to get things done.