The city of Birmingham dedicated $275,000 to sidewalk improvement in their 2023 budget, but City Councilor Valerie Abbott recently told the Lede that it wasn’t nearly enough.

“The sidewalks are just a disaster on the Southside,” Abbott said of her own District 3. “I can’t even imagine how the city doesn’t get routinely sued for people falling on the sidewalks and injuring themselves. I ended up in the emergency room from falling on a city sidewalk and bashing my head in once.”

District 3 resident Renae Rainier said she has been waiting a year for the city to fulfill its promise to fix sidewalks on her street.

“Last summer someone from the city came out and actually walked the sidewalks with me and said yeah, we’ve got this money, there’s different phases. You’re in phase two, that’s supposed to start next summer,” she said. “And he made notes and told me yeah, you’re on the list, it’s going to happen. And then it just never happened.”

Rainier added that every time she’s tried to call the city for an update on the project, no one can tell her anything.