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Ask The Mayor: Hamilton On Armored Vehicle, Road Construction

The public comment tally on the armored vehicle, road construction detours, Trades District groundbreaking ceremonies and short term rental legislation.

On this week's installment of Ask The Mayor, Bloomington's John Hamilton addresses these issues and more. Listen to the full conversation with Indiana Newsdesk anchor Joe Hren by clicking on the play button above, or read some of the questions and answers below. A portion of this segment airs 6:45 and 8:45 a.m. Wednesday on WFIU.

This conversation has been edited for clarity and conciseness.

Hren: We're getting to the end of public comment over the city's purchase of an armored vehicle, any updates to share with us?

Hamilton: Not really. We had a number of public meetings, we're taking public comment through the end of this week. We're getting different views. Then later this month we expect to announce the direction forward and it's been a good process, a lot of interest. It's been a traditional and classic Bloomington process and that's the way democracy works.

Hren: I have an email from Eli. He writes, in the interest of "Transparency Tuesday," as the Office of the Mayor's Facebook page calls it, I'm wondering when we can expect to see a cancellation on this Lenco BEARCAT purchase. The entire process of its acquisition has put a black eye on the administration's transparency, and it represents a breach of trust for our police department and the mayor's office. It takes more than armor to protect our police.

Hamilton: I'll take that as a comment that's one way on that decision. It's absolutely true. Public safety is much bigger than any tool, any one policy. I'm really proud of the history in Bloomington on working with community engagement, community policing. Our police force is trained four times more than the state requires.

Public safety is a very broad issue and every mayor talks about public safety. This issue on how to equip your police force is going to generate discussion and some people have views different ways, but we'll move forward with it pretty shortly.

Hren: I know we've talked a lot about those against the armored vehicle, but there are reasons for having one. One in particular is for the safety of those who are putting themselves in harms way… are you hearing from both sides?

"The comments are actually running, a majority in favor of the armored vehicle replacement."

Hamilton: We certainly are. Both at the public meetings and comments, our comments are actually running a majority in favor of the armored vehicle replacement. Every year, mayors gather around the country. Every year since I've been mayor, a mayor stands up and talks about what just happened. The most recent year, it was the mayor of Las Vegas and next year I expect Parkland. So it's certainly an issue to make sure our residents are safe.

There's no perfect solution to these things, I wish we lived in a world with fewer guns.

Hren: There's concern over all the road construction, I read where it took someone an hour to cross over 37 on Third Street. Second Street overpass is under construction, North Walnut is closed. I live south of Bloomington and took two detours almost wondering if I was making a circle back to where I started. Is there any kind of coordination to keep traffic moving?

Hamilton: It's going to be a difficult few weeks. The driving force of this is the delay of I-69. I-69 should have been done two years ago and while it was being built, the agreement was no overpasses next to each other would be restricted. The state took it over and in order to be complete by August, the state said we're throwing those agreements out the window.

Also, these projects are in working plans for years, so we have work all over that line up and bump up against them now so it's a hard summer.

We welcome people observing problems, we are working closely with the county and state to think about what can we do.

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