Kling addresses community issues at District 4 town hall

Bill Kling is on a first name basis with his constituents. That’s the way it is when you’ve been holding down a seat on the Huntsville City Council forever. That’s a stretch, but he was first elected to the post in 1988.

“Kling,’’ however, is the way one of his neighbors refers to the distinguished gentleman who represents the city’s District 4. But the former newsman addressed each community member by name when they asked questions at a recent town hall at the Huntsville-Madison County Public Library downtown.

During the roughly one hour meeting, Kling addressed subjects important to those attending and took notes with a promise of finding an answer to questions that he had none for and getting back to them.

Kling gave an update on happenings within the district before taking questions. There were some obvious concerns raised regarding easing traffic flow (the city is investigating options), garbage pickup protocol and similar issues.

Meeting highlights:

Road work, repaving

Among the district’s streets that have received work or will soon are Holmes Ave. west of Memorial Parkway and west of Jordan Lane, Drake Ave., west of Whitesburg and east of the Parkway, and Mayfair and Holmes.

“We’ve got a couple significant road projects,’’ Kling said. “I mean, I like it when we get as much as possible done in neighborhood areas. I think that’s a good thing for neighborhoods.”

Street sweepers

Like resurfacing, keeping roads clean is another issue important to Kling.

“I kinda push on neighborhood streets, resurfacing, street sweeping and everything,’’ he said. “And there’s been more of that going and hopefully that trend is gonna be continuing. Stuff like that makes your neighborhood look better. I’ve been working to get community development to be a little bit more aggressive on doing some of their things.’’

Kling noted that there’s been an increase in citations issued for matters such as high grass. He’ll also continue to champion clean streets in his district.

“I should be kind of pushing on that,’’ he said. “Other council members sometimes push on different district specific projects that they have. Jennie Robinson, for example, is a big advocate for Ditto Landing development things that are happening on that, which is good.’’

Bike paths

One male constituent brought up a theme that has become nearly automatic at city meetings – bicycle travel. It’s sort of become a companion topic with increasing traffic. The man said he’d recently been hit by a car while riding his bicycle.

According to Kling, the city is working with a local group to find solutions. 

“We’ve been doing some things,’’ Kling said. “Huntsville is not a bicycle friendly city. We’re so spread out. We’re the 29th largest land area city in the country. We go into three counties. Our population would put us roughly about number 90.’’

Amphitheater

There has been talk of another possible music venue for the city with South Huntsville being mentioned. Not so fast, Kling said, and people in District 4 shouldn’t be alarmed. His vision is for a more intimate setting, not a full-sized venue like the Orion Amphitheater that has drawn complaints from the community about late night loud music.

“That has been talked about,’’ Kling said. “And there are a lot of people around Sherwood Park who would  tell you they’d be glad to have it. At one point, there was talk about having a, not an amphitheater, but some sort of a major outside stage like Butler Green at Campus 805. It’s basically almost like a gazebo with a place for someone with a guitar to play and stuff like that. But it’s not a theater type thing.’’