‘Leprechauns’ move road, need culvert

When a person or group of people kills another person, they can be charged with murder in this country. When one person kills multiple people over a period of time, we call them a “serial killer.” Although it has not been well publicized, there is a serial killer at large in the Matanuska valley.

In most cases the residents of an area of in which a serial killer is on the loose would be demanding that the killer be caught. Politicians would be trying to calm the public, and the media would be issuing warnings on how to stay safe. But none of this has happened in the face of this serial killer.

In fact, quite the opposite is true in this case. With the exception of the Frontiersman, the media has been silent. The public seems not to care, and worst of all the politicians and the bureaucrats of the Matanuska valley are making excuses for the killer, blaming the victims instead. A rational person would ask why would the media be silent and the public indifferent. I don’t have an answer for that.

But as for why the borough politicians and bureaucrats don’t seem to care, the answer is simple. They are the ones sponsoring the deaths. They kill by doing nothing for the people who can’t get emergency services because the roads are impassable for emergency service vehicles such as ambulances and fire trucks.

It is not from ignorance as several articles have been printed in the Frontiersman, nor is it a case of impossibility.

In the case of Pike Avenue the borough bureaucrats said it was just too hard for them to negotiate moving 20 feet of road off of private property so the road could be open on both ends. Last week the Pike Avenue Leprechauns (I call them that because I was told it was illegal by borough law to work on street and I don’t want anybody to have legal trouble) took out their heavy equipment and moved the road. This excuse for the borough to do something about the road doesn’t exist anymore.

As for homes that may or may not be on the easement (that is unknown because to my knowledge the borough has never surveyed the road) in either case when Bob Walden paved Bear Street he moved the street more than 30 feet off center to go around an electric pole. In fact, he was so adamant about moving the road over he had the contractor dig a 6-foot vertical gravel wall straight down on my property line. In view of this, I’m sure he could go around a house with little trouble.

As for the 10-foot wide, 1-foot deep creek — that could be conquered with a culvert just as it is where it goes under Bogard Road. I feel very sure that if a culvert suddenly appeared at the creek the Pike Avenue Leprechauns would position and fill in around the culvert.

Maybe one could fall off a truck or just get lost, but somehow that too is probably too hard for the borough to arrange. It wasn’t too hard for the borough to put a stop light up for the residents of Equestrian Acres when they complained they were having trouble getting onto the Palmer-Wasilla Highway. There were no deaths there — to my knowledge — nor did any homes burn down. It wasn’t too hard to put in a double lane divided highway from the Parks to Palmer Fishhook or extending Bogard from Palmer north to wherever it will eventually end.

I’m sure these negotiations involved dealing with dozens if not a hundred or more property owners. But widening a gravel road and putting in a culvert on a road that is less than a mile long is just too hard for the borough bureaucrats. Or is it just a lack of interest?

They pick the winners and losers for emergency services. I wonder what would happen if they decided that it is just too hard to have emergency services for the entire borough, or maybe just the area that you live in?

Mike Blodgett lives on Pike Avenue.