A Call To Action or The Wrong Number?
ByThere is a document I recently rediscovered buried deep within the city web site. Perhaps it was tucked away for safe keeping, hidden from the deteriorating light of day. Is there a curse associated with this document? Possessors of which will turn to stone? A pillar of salt?
Or that a local government will wander aimlessly in a planned community for 40 years?
That is hard to say, but what the City of DuPont Strategic Plan does offer is a blue print that was abandoned long ago. A secular scripture that is a relic of the past and dismissed long ago.
On one hand, how can you blame the city leaders for straying from the contents of this document. The Vision Statement curiously lacks vision.
Vision Statement: DuPont is a vital city known for its planned setting and hometown sense of community. The City successfully blends natural beauty with a rich northwest[sic] history.
Even if that statement was true it still misses the mark as far as vision is concerned. It reads more like it was lifted off of a mid to late 1990’s marketing brochure. More wishful thinking than a plan of action.
Equally muddled is the city’s Mission Statement. It also contains the nebulous, non-committal language that whoever is in charge at the moment can sculpt like a mound of clay.
Mission Statements: To provide the citizens of the City of DuPont a beautiful natural environment; high quality government services; progressive leadership and community inclusion.
The last part is particularly interesting in its weasely vagueness. Progressive? As in the Merriam Webster variety?
Main Entry: pro•gres•sive
Pronunciation: \pro-gre-siv\
Function: adjective
Date: circa 1612
1 a : of, relating to, or characterized by progress b : making use of or interested in new ideas, findings, or opportunities.
Up until this point progress in DuPont has been measured by building. The more permits issued meant that more people were moving in to create the neighborhoods. More neighborhoods meant more revenue and need for services.
Here comes the neighborhood.
And while DuPont was growing fast, it wasn’t growing that fast where some of the potential pitfalls that lay in wait could not have been adequately managed along the way. But here we are in nearly 2010 and the city continues to struggle with progressing down their path. Perhaps it is because this document that should serve as a roadmap has been folded up wrong and has slipped between the front seat and consol.
This brings us to the document’s Goals and Guidance Policies. It is the framework that is suppose to guide council through the budget process. But if you take a critical look at the document you begin to realize why it is now under the driver’s seat. Aside from the section of Budget (Goal Statement #3), there isn’t much use for it.
It is time for an overhaul on the DuPont Strategic Plan. The old playbook has left the city facing 4th and Long.
What makes this situation so vexing is not only do you need a reasonable playbook, you need a team that can execute to it.
One thing is certain, regardless of the cause, we have a city that is marching off in several directions. What the city needs more than anything; more than a perspective; more than more stable funding; more than community involvement; is the one thing that has lacked for years:
The city of DuPont needs a vision.
A single, unifying vision. Because without the vision there is nothing that can be measured against a success indicator.
Currently, we have a group working on preservation. A group working on tourism. A group working on keeping taxes low. A group trying to increase funding for facilities. A group that wants chocolate and a group that wants vanilla. A group that wants to please the businesses; a group that wants to please the military; and a group that wants to please the homeowners. Our city leadership is off in so many directions that their opposing directions all negate each other and they all stay firmly planted right where they have been since the notion of a vision statement was adopted: in City Hall bickering, infighting, and sabotaging one another.
This lack of vision and purpose has created a vacuum that is now filled by the city administrator and his staff. As much as we would like to criticize that, someone had to interpret that vision. It is just unfortunate for the citizens that it is now in the hands of the unelected leg of the stool.
You are sure to hear more about this flawed document now that the budget season is upon us. I am not so sure it matters anymore, this “this time we are serious” rhetoric. If you read this strategy you will find several pieces that have been either overlooked, wantonly disregarded, or contains such vague language that is rendered all but useless.
As the budget process chugs forward I will revisit this document and its goals, and you should too, in order to hold the mayor and council responsible for not living up to what they don’t say clearly what they plan to do.
Action without a Strategic Plan risks aimless and unfocused community development. It’s great that DuPont has a Strategic Plan, but is that all there is to it? If that’s it, that’s crazy.
A Strategic Plan without an Action Plan having measurable goals, a time frame to achieve those goals and assigned responsibility is pointless. Take Goal #5 – what the heck is that all about? Start with baby steps:
Goal:Level of Service
Action:Paint Curbs
Responsible Councilman: Coffee
Submit Action Plan: Fall 2009
Complete Goal: Spring 2010
etc.
The council is capable of implementing an action plan with concrete deadlines and assigned responsibilities – they’ve shown unprecedented focus in promoting Linda over Roger.
How about shifting that focus to serve the citizenry?
The council would bring the issue of policy up for discussion and a vote. Once it is determined that action is approved then the mayor hands it off to her staff to fulfill. In the case of the curbs it should have gone down like this:
Citizens reports issue to council
Council initiates investigation to staff with problem statement: Narrow streets create hazard for egress. Fire and PW to investigate and report back by XX date.
Mayor directs Staff based on problem statement.
Staff investigates and submits findings to council.
Council review report and set policy action
Mayor directs staff to complete task within the prescribed time and budget.
I think the breakdown in DuPont, at least in this case, is where council reviews initial report from staff. From that point they would begin their endless debate over what THEY wanted rather than hit the streets and get citizen input. If the went back to those raising the issue and said here is the proposed solution then we would not have signs and the curbs would be painted in accordance to the DMC.
Everyone wants to be a hero, no one is willing to roll up their sleeves and work with the public.
In the case of Hyland, it was easier to say yes to spending tens of thousands of dollars to reconfigure the street than it was to tell those citizens that the master plan was to build Loop Road to ease congestion from the top of HH and that they need to wait. As a result, their good intentions ended up hurting 10x the citizens because they over reacted and didn’t get everyone’s input (or have a vision of build out).
It is time for them to go.
Now I hear that Loop Road is YEARS away. Hyland was a huge mistake. You can take data from just about any street in Hoffman Hill and declare there is too much traffic on it. But the city changed everything without any concern of impact on the rest of the thousands who live in Hoffman Hill. Imagine how those who live on McNeil feel with the news that there is no push to open Loop Road. Now you see the same kind of micromanagement of the situation with the curbs.
Hyland is the most direct route off the hill (I live on Hoffman Hill) and was the only way around the steady stream of school buses that take the same route that morning commuters do at the same time. When that stupid rerouting went in was at a time when all of the construction trucks were also taking Hyland. I asked the public works director (now working elsewhere) why the city didn’t just ask Quadrant to tell their subcontractors that they cannot use Hyland for construction traffic. Instead we spent money on a really stupid solution. You’ve got to wonder how many people got stuck in the snow on those ugly yellow dividers. Now that the perimeter road is years off, why not reopen discussion about opening Mounts Road? We’ll be in a heap o’trouble with the next earthquake if the only way off the hill is McNeill.
If you have noticed, the curbs on McDonald still have not been painted. The signs are up but people are still parking in areas where the yellow paint has come off and has not been repainted. Painting the curb red would have been sufficient, no need for signs that cost $300 each. The council meeting tomorrow nite should be interesting!!!
Those curbs will never be repainted. I really like the no parking sign insalled so that the metal sign is covered by tree limbs. Tell me, how do you inforce that one?
Painting the curbs would require someone in City Hall to admit they were wrong. There is not a single person there who has the courage to admit that.
Have just found out that the mayor has made a decision not to paint the curbs even after the council voted to do so. Why do we have a city council at all? Westman voted against spending $300 per sign, his opinion didn’t matter.
And neither did the eight or so opinions of residents he went and talked to personally about the issue.
Palisade Res Statement so not true!!!!!!
The council did not vote to paint the curbes. They voted to install signs. You can search the minutes for that one. Westman did go around the neighborhood asking for input on the matter and presented it during the council meeting. But it didn’t matter. The Mayor derailed the conversation and asked for an informal vote…something she should not have done. This put council on record telling staff how to do their job.
The city leadership is running off in many directions, numb to our voices here in TV Land. We are often dismissed as kooks or crazy people who are out of touch with the vision. I agree the vision was conjured up by WRECO to sell homes.
Soon, they will have to listen, it is the truth.
The high point of the city council meeting was when the mayor and some of the council members bragged about the fact that 51% of the citizens that did the one sided piece of crap survey thought the city was headed in the the right direction. Most of the citizens of Dupont have given up dealing with these morons and their personal agendas and did’nt do the survey because it was a big waste of time!! So about 80% of the people have yet to speak we save our oppinions for voting time.