To the editor:

I’ve lived in the Oread Neighborhood for 20 years and have been active with the Oread Neighborhood Association on and off for those 20 years. Sidewalks have always been a big concern of the neighborhood.

At one point, an ONA member spent over 100 hours on a survey and detailed map of all the neighborhood sidewalks in various conditions.

The city has never been much help in getting sidewalks repaired. All we ever needed was to have the city follow the city code and cite poor walks and have property owners do the repairs. More than once, I’ve seen over $100,000 put into a house, but when the project is all done, the sidewalk is still not to code. The city has never had much interest in enforcing the city code of our walkways.

Here it is, the year 2009, and we have a wizard behind the curtain on top of the hill. The city is now in a big rush to build a yellow brick road to their front door from downtown.

All Dorothy needs is the city to enforce the city code on sidewalks and keep the streetlights working. Then people can choose any route they wish to downtown from the KU hill.

We don’t need an expensive pathway that is out of character and of little use for the neighborhood. All Dorothy needs is to be able to walk around the neighborhood on walkways that have been there for over 100 years.