There are only a few days left to send in comments about the Goals the city should have for the next four years. They are posted on the city web site: www.ci.minneapolis.mn.us and comments can be sent to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
A very large missing piece is the relationship of the city and neighborhood organizations and organizing as a way to achieve these goals.
While the goals state: to include the community, strengthen the community....
There is no Goal that states that neighborhoods will be empowered to design or help plan what happens in neighborhoods.
The last goal states:
Strengthen City government and enhance community engagement. The City will...
Involve the community in appropriate points of the City's decision making process.
"in appropriate points"? What does that mean?
A top down hierarchy with a controlling concern with its own authority would phrase that sentence in that way.
I think the real goal is: to involve the community in the City's decision making process.
We need to have a goal of continuing neighborhood and community infrastructure that enhance citizen participation.
We need real support for real programs like NRP rather than lipservice to "engagement "or "we value the voices of our community."
I would also like to see the social and economic importance of the Mississippi River somehow included in the goals.
Thanks,
Scott Vreeland, The Seward Neighborhood
