I have previously argued that Prospect Park's current reallocation of funds from housing to educational and social programs violates both the spirit and the intent of state law. Mr. Luce has provided a clear and strong rebuttal to PPERRIA's ex-president's contention that such allocations are legal. I firmly believe that the courts will agree once the NRP's policies are challenged in court.
But it is not the legal technicalities that cause me concern here, it is fundamental issues of ethics, fairness, and justice, and this reallocation process in Prospect Park helps demonstrates why the NRP is indeed a very bad thing. I think that most of us would agree that lobbyists and special interest groups often has a negative impact on governmental processes. What is really insidious about the NRP process is that it eliminates the middleman (our government representatives) and allows special interest groups to directly allocate tax revenues. Take for instance the current Prospect Park Reallocation. A number of groups with specific interests sought funds and by lobbying people of like minds to attend the meeting they were able to dominate which proposals were considered and which were not. This is in contrast to representative democracies where ideally our elected officials try to balance the needs and conflicting concerns of their constituents. What I find most distressing about this process is that my neighbors care little what means they use as long as their ends are achieved. I find this kind of "My Piece of the Pie Politics" to be particularly distasteful. The fact that the NRP pits neighbor against neighbor and brings manipulative politics out of city hall and into our communities is one of the factors that contributes to making the NRP a very bad thing. It might be different if the NRP had some standardized process to insure that meetings were conducted in a fair and reasonable manner, but when rules change dynamically from meeting to meeting to benefit special interests little fairness exists. Ultimately, the NRP structure insures that small cliques dominate neighborhood decisions, and the voices of individual residents are drown out in the rush to grab as much pork as possible. Michael Atherton Prospect Park TEMPORARY REMINDER: 1. Send all posts in plain-text format. 2. Cut as much of the post you're responding to as possible. ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
