It would appear that I am about to take on the impossible task of organizing my neighborhood in order to reduce the number of garbage trucks that use our alleys. In my particular alley, there are at least five of them. Nearby there are as many as eight with a total of 12 unique haulers in the area. Any child could see that this is crazy. In a five minute conversation, my sister pointed to a solution that keeps resurfacing, but never seems to get any traction.

"You're organizing what?"

"Trash haulers. I mean on my block I'm..."

"You're working for a garbage company now?"

"No. I'm trying to help my neighborhood reduce the number of haulers that use our alleys. Right now we have five."

"How does that make any sense?"

"It doesn't."

"Sounds like a waste of money."

"It is."

"In Boise the City takes care of it. Are you working for the City?"

"No. I'm... I'm volunteering... to... I'm... Here people can feel pretty strongly about... um...thier hauler. There are a lot of companies to support."

"Couldn't you just divide the City up where a different company handled certain areas?"

"There doesn't seem to be the political will to do that."

"Political will?"

"It's complicated?"

"Why is it complicated?"

"I'm about to find out."