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Resident urges city to restore roadside pull‑over used for wheelchair access on West 10th Street
Summary
At the La Porte Board of Public Works meeting, resident Leslie Calvert asked the city to address a curb/sidewalk change that removed a pull‑over she uses to load and unload her wife, who uses a wheelchair. Staff said a code‑enforcement officer inspected the car and that the city had apologized and would follow up.
Leslie Calvert told the La Porte Board of Public Works on Feb. 25 that construction of a new sidewalk outside her home on West 10th Street removed a flat pull‑over she uses to deploy a wheelchair ramp for her wife.
Calvert said the area in front of her house at 1104 West 10th Street had been usable for years as a place to stop without blocking traffic, but that the new sidewalk raised the grade “almost 4 feet” and left the sloped grass unmowable and unsafe for stopping. “My wife happens to be in a wheelchair and is a stroke victim, and so, for the last 14 years, I’ve been taking care of her and using this pullover spot … to load and unload my wife safely, not interfering with street traffic,” Calvert said.
Calvert told the board she has received code‑enforcement notices and said the post office now delivers to her driveway because mail carriers cannot safely stop on the rebuilt strip. She asked whether she would receive an apology letter for the code‑enforcement contact and the change that removed the pull‑over.
City legal staff and code enforcement addressed Calvert during the meeting. Nick Otis, the city’s legal representative, said he had spoken with Calvert by phone the previous day and apologized to her about the inspection that she described; Otis said the city would withdraw the code enforcement issue he had discussed with her. Calvert also said she had been told she could no longer park in front or to the side of her house; meeting participants noted those parking rules and code notices were the subject of the city’s enforcement process.
City staff did not promise changes to the sidewalk or to reestablish the pull‑over during the public comment period; instead, staff indicated they had apologized for the way the code‑enforcement contact was handled and said they would follow up. The board’s discussion moved on to agenda business after Calvert’s three‑minute public comment.
Calvert’s statement and staff responses were made during the public‑comment portion of the Board of Public Works meeting and were not presented as formal actions or binding directives. The board did not vote on changes to the sidewalk, curb, or parking policy during the meeting.
