Greenway complaints aired from councilman’s home

Grant Keehn, Walhalla councilman, invited reporters and others to his N. Poplar home for an afternoon news conference to expound on why he believes four of his colleagues made a wrongheaded decision Tuesday to fund a greenway through the city.  Keehn and colleague Tyler Jordan led the news conference to explain why, in their view, committing hundreds of thousands of dollars to a greenway is burden on the poor.  In Tuesday’s 4-3 vote, the council, Keehn said, designated $626 thousand toward a connection from the mountain north of the city into the corporate limits.  Keehn and Jordan concede the recreation advantages, along with the potential for economic enhancements from Stumphouse Mountain trail visitors who dine, shop, and stay downtown.  But the $626 thousand, they maintain, is better applied for basic city services–most pressing, they say, the replacement of worn out trash trucks and the increasing costs of water and sewer.  A third councilman who voted no, David Underwood, attended yesterday’s news conference, but was not an active participant.