Lubbock City Council is preparing to focus on key priorities for 2019, some of which are inherited from previous years. The outline of priorities consist of:
– Fiscal discipline
– Communication
– Community involvement
– Public safety
– Growth and development
– Economic development and redevelopment
For District 2 City Council Representative, Shelia Patterson Harris, she said she has honed in on key focuses to better the East Lubbock community.
“Lubbock is growing and with any growing city, you get everything that comes along with that and usually, most time, that’s some form of an increase in criminal activity or negative behavior,” Harris said. “Public safety is one that is a huge focus, not only just for me, but I think the other council members would agree with me to say that it’s a huge focus for us.”
It’s a challenge throughout the city, but Harris said there are steps being taken to address it.
“The creation of the substations and making it more accessible for citizens to engage with law enforcement, whenever there are issues or concerns or just developing those relationships, those are huge things for this city,” Harris said.
But she said she is also focused on the safety of citizens commuting in and out of East Lubbock, as there are several roads still unpaved.
“Making sure the citizens have a safe way to commute in and out of communities, on the roadways; paving unpaved streets is huge for me,” Harris said. “I have so many throughout my district, so we’re really focusing to try to tackle these things.”
With the implementation of a new community plan, Harris said, several of these issues will be addressed.
“We just finished the comprehensive plan, the 20-40 plan. And a part of that is, the recommendation there is to develop neighborhood plans,” Harris said.
Reginald Russell, local barber and resident of East Lubbock, said there seems to be a lot development happening on the west side and it is time for some development to happen on the eastern side of town, too.
“You know we’re a part of Lubbock to, we need a face-lift even on these older businesses,” Russell said. “You know we’ve been here for 58 years and we’ve never had a face-lift and it’s time, and I’m sure a lot of other businesses around here feel the same way.”
Harris said the efforts to make East Lubbock and the entire city of Lubbock a safe community is a continued goal for the City Council.