GREEN RIVER — Residents addressed the Green River City Council Tuesday night to express complaints regarding nuisance weeds around the city.

Green River resident Renae Cynova said that she and her husband have been maintaining the weeds growing in the right of way next to her house on Astle Avenue for several years because the city hasn’t been. She said Council Member George Jost told the Cynovas that he was going to email the appropriate people about their concern, and then they woke up the next day to find a nuisance citation warning on their door. The citation warning stated that they need to take care of the weeds. 

“My husband called Officer Fryer, advised him that this is not our job, he advised my husband to just take a mower to it and mow it down,” she told the Council. “Obviously, this is not sitting well with us. Where was the breakdown in communication from me complaining about the weeds to me getting a nuisance warning for it?” 

Cynova said that they bought their home on Astle Avenue in 2013, and that the city has only mowed the weeds one time that they know of.

“This is not our job. This is the city’s job. This is the street’s job. The city needs to step up, the streets crew needs to step up. And they need to do their job. If we didn’t mow these weeds, they would be six feet tall by now,” Cynova said.

“This is not our job. This is the city’s job. This is the street’s job. The city needs to step up, the streets crew needs to step up. And they need to do their job. If we didn’t mow these weeds, they would be six feet tall by now,” Cynova said.

The Cynovas said the weeds are a safety concern, as all it would take is one person to throw a cigarette into the weeds for it to start a fire that could put their house at risk of burning down.

“If that happens, you’re going to have an even bigger problem on your hands. I can promise you that,” she said. “The way we see it, the city has two options. Either step up, and take care of your weeds, because we’re done doing it. Or deed us over the land, and then once the land is ours we would be happy to take control of it and weed it. If neither of these happen, then maybe I should start calling the nuisance officer on the city, and giving you guys the tickets.”

Mary Williams, another Green River resident and Council Member Ron Williams’ wife, also made a complaint about the weeds around the city.

“My father-in-law was a city councilman for 12 years, and at no time has it ever been the citizens’ responsibility ever to take care of the right of ways, the ditches, or the alleyways in this city,” she said.

She also noted that the railroad is in poor condition, but she doubted that they got a citation like residents such as the Cynovas are getting. She said the sidewalks are also in bad shape, as her son often walks down E. 2nd S. Street and has fallen numerous times “and come home bloody.” She said she has called City Administrator Reed Clevenger about the sidewalk and that it sometimes takes two months for the city to address the issue, while other times it’s taken a week.

“This isn’t our problem,” she said in defense of the city residents. “We have our jobs, we work 40 hours a week. We have an income from the place we work for,” she said.

Williams also said that she didn’t want to hear the city use the excuse of budget restraints or not having enough employees, as she said during her job as a mail carrier she has seen a city employee drive up and down Uinta Drive and Flaming Gorge Way and never get out of his vehicle. Ron Williams also said that he has heard several complaints about the conditions of right of ways and sidewalks in the city.

“I’ve been dealing with this with Reed for going on over a month with memos after memos about the complaints, as you heard … I go to Smith’s and I get complaints left and right, and like they say, why is the railroad immune from this but we can cite citizens. And I can’t answer them … The city needs to step up,” he said.

He said that he worked as a city employee for 32 years and he probably worked an “honest four to five hours a day” during his eight hour shifts.

“There’s a lot of screwing off going on out there,” he said. “Reed needs to talk to his directors and say get it done. And you get it done. That’s what’s frustrating me right now. We’ve got to get a little aggressive, be more proactive instead of reactive. If we see problems, we gotta get on it before the citizens get on us.”

Council Member Gary Killpack said that this issue should be addressed in a workshop rather than in the regular council meeting. He said that the council meetings are meant to hear residents and then they can take concerns to a workshop at a later date. The Council plans to address this issue in a workshop in November.