I have to agree with Lisa McDonald & Annie Young here: the park board, and Don Sigglekow, worked very hard to solicit proposals, sending out requests-for-proposals, doorknocking on some companies, and working overtime to get DQ to produce $200,000 for the parks. I think it�s a bad rap that this was a deal done between government and corporation in the dead of night; it was a tough nut that the park board staff worked hard to crack.
(Personal opinion: assuming the exterior signage would be nixed, I would much rather have DQ�s $200,000 available for all the kids of Minneapolis than a few jobs, if that, for a local vendor. Maybe Jon Erwin and Annie Young can make this a win-win for kids and business; I hope so. I�m more muddled on the health issue - it would be nice to offer people a healthy choice but I don�t think we can exclude bad-for-you, since it seems to go with summer for many.) The more profound point that Lisa made was that there needed to be more public temperature-taking before this thing snowballed. In a way, this is a bigger version of the debate Tim Bonham and Michael Atherton are having over what�s �important� enough for a neighborhood board to do widespread notification. It�s a judgment call, but I don�t see the Park Board outreach being consistent or effective. It�s one reason that even though Annie and I may disagree about DQ, I appreciate her using the list to get the word out and Jon Erwin adding his insights and positive feedback. Note to other commissioners: we�re an open forum, so you can campaign here, too! I had a chance to talk to a fellow journalist today about whether the DQ pullback represented �government by email� and whether there was something alarming about that. I made Annie�s point that I don�t think all the emails came from list members. As for Minneapolis-Issues, I told him that I�ve never claimed this is a representative group, but it is a big and � for most political debating circles � pretty diverse. We are one data point in a sea of data points. Although I have done no surveys, I�ve always suspected we skew Caucasian and southwest Minneapolis. But you know what? Voters aren�t perfectly representative of the general public either. And since 70 percent of Americans now have internet access, the gap between net users and �the public� narrows every day. Certainly, a public official should follow no one religiously, including the collective will of this list. At the same time, I�d hope there�s enough depth here in our �24-hour-a-day-letters-to-the-editor� that our influence wouldn�t just be a matter of numbers or convenient reading but the quality of our opinions. Anyway, I never thought I�d see the day when big-time members of our community would ask if the list has become TOO influential. Personally, I don�t think so, but just as I created the list hoping it would be a watchdog on the media and politicians, it�s perfectly appropriate that those institutions serve as a watchdog on us. David Brauer King Field � Ward 10 -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] On Behalf Of Lisa McDonald Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2002 5:35 PM To: deanc; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [Mpls] Re: Park Board Decision on DQ I really have gotten a kick out of this whole DQ issue. First of all Don Sigggelkow is one of the best budget people we had at the city before he went to the Park Board. He talked to me almost two years ago about looking for new sources of revenue for the Park Board, including outside food vendors;�because unless you want to continue to raise taxes you are going to have to learn to run a more efficient operation and/or find money elsewhere. � I find it hard to believe that some of the Park commissioners� (not the new ones) weren't aware of this proposal. � _________________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest option, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
