After “Limit Your Efforts”: Which Meeting Is the Right One?

The point

Being told to attend meetings is not the same as having a workable way to be heard. Residents should not have to untangle committees, councils, and agencies just to learn where an issue belongs and who is responsible for the answer. But most importantly, which committee is pushing an agenda without the residents knowledge.

In 2021, Len Crosby directed my KMPO questions away from individual chamber committee members and toward public meetings. His urban renewal agency biography now calls him an advocate of transparency. The missing piece is not another invitation to attend. It is an explained route from a resident’s concern to an accountable response.^1,2

What the email asked

On September 23, 2021, Crosby emailed me, copying Glenn Miles of the Kootenai Metropolitan Planning Organization. He signed as Managing Member of Financial & Real Estate Consulting, LLC, and asked me not to use the chamber’s Public Policy Committee for KMPO infrastructure discussions. He invited me to join a chamber and participate as a member, then distinguished that forum from public meetings:²

He then wrote, "[i]n the future, please limit your efforts to these avenues, and do not involve or copy the individual members of the Joint Chamber Public Policy Committee," adding he made the same request of Miles.²

I was not the one to add the chamber to the email thread. I replied that afternoon saying, “[r]egardless of whether or not I join a chamber of commerce, I will continue to interact with the email thread that I imagine you are referencing.“²

Transparency, and who decides

The Post Falls Urban Renewal Agency’s commission page, retrieved October 24, 2026, lists Crosby as treasurer, appointed January 2014, with a term ending December 2027. It also lists his Joint Chamber Public Policy Committee service and states:¹

Open full size(1040 x 336 px) View full size : Len Crosby’s urban renewal agency biography, retrieved October 24, 2026, showing his treasurer title and the transparency statement quoted below.

Crosby chairs Finance & Policy, which oversees investments, financing proposals, and allocation of tax increments. The full commission makes final decisions. Regular commission meetings are on the third Thursday; committees meet as their chairs determine (as of this writing).¹

A meeting date and a committee description do not explain how a resident gets an issue considered. Asking residents not to copy committee members also narrows the route offered in the email. The question is whether that version of transparency gives residents a usable way to be heard.

Why the forum matters to taxpayers

The money crosses several institutions. A resident concerned about taxes, public services, or roads faces different decision-makers—not one clear public doorway.

The reported urban renewal recipients include the city, county, Kootenai Fire & Rescue, North Idaho College, and local schools, not just road agencies.⁴

A meeting calendar is not a path to being heard

KMPO’s November 12, 2020 agenda allowed three minutes for non-agenda public comments. That is a dated example, not a statement of today’s rules or a procedure for getting an issue onto the agenda.⁵

Crosby’s email names KMPO, county, and city meetings. It does not provide a practical guide answering three basic questions: Where does this concern belong? How can it get onto an agenda? How will the resident learn what was done with it? Permission to attend does not answer any of them.²

The public should not have to map the committees to find a voice. Public bodies should publish a clear route and actions taken:

1. Step 1 The Decision Maker Identify the specific body or official with final authority over the issue.
2. Step 2 Contact Information Provide direct, accessible contact channels for the decision maker.
3. Step 3 Agenda Request Process Publish clear, step-by-step instructions for submitting an agenda item.
4. Step 4 Expected Timelines State expected review intervals and notice deadlines for submitted requests.
5. Step 5 Comment Considerations Define how public testimony and written input are evaluated and recorded.
6. Step 6 An Accountable Response Deliver a formal, documented response explaining the committee’s reasoning.

Until that route is clear, “stay involved” leaves the hardest work with the resident. That is the problem; it is not a simple checklist residents have failed to follow.

Sources