Discussions on the merits of NRP seem to inevitably gravitate towards how NRP dollars are being spent, and how the money is being managed. To me, these questions miss even more fundamental questions about how successful is NRP: How many people is NRP involving in improving their neighborhoods and taking on community issues? How much is NRP resulting in local government being more responsive and effective in addressing neighborhood needs and priorities? NRP was not designed to simply be a neighborhood shopping spree. NRP was designed to get more people involved in their community, and reforming government to more effectively meet community resident's needs. The NRP money was just supposed to be "glue" money helping to achieve these larger objectives. Here is my case for why the ultimate success of NRP rests in how effectively it engages thousands of people in improving their neighborhoods: In Minneapolis, we are fortunate to have city workers who are, overall, professional, hard-working, and committed. Part-time neighborhood volunteers, no matter how committed and intelligent, will never, on average, be as professionally competent as the downtown city staff. If resources and decision-making are transferred from downtown to the neighborhoods, the only justification for me is that the neighborhoods are doing such a good job at outreach and involvement that they know better than downtown what are the needs of the community, and can better direct those resources. I know of a number of examples where NRP was a catalyst for residents working together to deal with neighborhood issues and concerns. Here are two examples. ROAR's campaign to stop the dewatering of the airport. Light Rail Transit. Community groups got hundreds of people to come to meetings and state what they wanted from LRT, and what they didn't want. These were not NRP initiative, and in one case the leading organization wasn't even a neighborhood group. But NRP made these efforts possible, by being the catalyst to increase resident's capacity to take on neighborhood issues. These are only two examples of NRP being an essential catalyst to increasing the capacity of neighborhoods to deal with issues and getting hundreds of people involved. Admittedly, the track record is not without blemish, and I have seen cases such as these: A half dozen people deciding how to spend hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars. Major issues arising in neighborhoods, with many residents expressing concerns, and the neighborhood organization refusing to do anything, with the justification that it is too busy administering its NRP plan. But I think that it is clear that hundreds, even thousands of people are involved at the community level that would not have been without NRP. I hope this is built on in phase II In short, when discussing the merits of NRP, let's talk about how many people are involved in improving their neighborhoods, and what these volunteers have achieved, and not just what accounting practices are being used. --------------------------------------------------------- On a personal note: Yesterday I was driving westbound on I-94, when my jaw dropped to the floorboards. I could not believe what I was seeing. I was in shock because I saw the two campaign busses for Joe Clark (no relation) whizzing by me on my left. Who is Joe Clark? What office is he campaigning for? Why is he campaigning at the END of November, in the middle of the thanksgiving holiday weekend? Isn't he just a little confused? Not at all. Joe Clark is the Progressive Conservative candidate for prime minister of Canada. Canada is holding its national elections Monday. Joe Clark is also a former prime minister of Canada. I looked up his campaign schedule. The busses were racing to a campaign stop in Winnipeg. Having Joe Clark driving through Minneapolis Minnesota on Saturday is like having Al Gore meandering through Halifax Nova Scotia two days before the American election. Writing from the only neighborhood named after Bob Cooper, Jay Clark [EMAIL PROTECTED] 612-625-2513
