BOISE, Idaho — Mayor Lauren McLean’s transition team reports are creating some controversy online.
After winning the runoff mayoral election in December, McLean appointed community leaders to form committees to come up with ideas to help improve the city.
The topics ranged from affordable housing to improving air quality and public transportation. The community-sourced recommendations included ideas for creating a more equitable city, and the following report is now generating buzz on social media.
“When I began to set priorities that would guide our new administration’s early days in City Hall, I did so not just with our community in mind, but with our community,” the mayor said on the city’s website.
The transition reports were released by the city in mid-April. See the full report here.
“I’m releasing citizen-centered transition reports that focus on our collective vision of a “city for everyone,” the statement reads.
The recommendations from the committees are meant to help guide policy decisions through McLean's term of office.
Seventy-one citizens worked on developing the 350 recommendations, which cover a lot of topics, including:
- What the mayor's COVID-19 response should look like
- Increasing the minimum wage within the city
- Providing citywide free internet
- Offering free contraception, abortion and reproductive health care
- Establishing a sex education curriculum in the Boise School District from pre-k to 12th grade
The committee was co-chaired by Kelly Miller, the executive director for the Idaho Coalition Against Sexual and Domestic Violence, and Francisco Salinas, the director of Student Diversity and Inclusion at Boise State.
A city spokesperson said over the phone the ideas in the reports are wishes of the community, and they do not represent what the mayor is recommending at this time.
In fact, the city has not made any formal recommendations on what to adopt from the equitable transition report.
As it turns out, some of the wishes in the report simply aren’t feasible. For example, cities in Idaho don’t have the legal power to raise the minimum wage within city limits; that must be done statewide by the Idaho Legislature.
The city spokesperson said the mayor wasn’t available for comment on the reports Tuesday afternoon.
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