The scary thing about the NRP is that supporters claim that
it is "neighborhoods" that make decisions, when in fact
it is a small minority of people who "show up" and those
who show up may have no expertise that qualifies them
for making decisions allocating hundreds of thousands
of dollars. In fact, much of the time they may use no common sense, curiosity, or sense of responsibility at all and in reality, the only requirement is that they do indeed "show up." Which leaves the rest of us who are too busy
working and rising children at the mercy of their "decisions."
Like Jason Stone, the people I've met who worked on NRP projects in neighborhoods have been intelligent, informed and most of all, sincerely trying to do the right thing for the entire neighborhood. Likewise, the NRP effort I was involved with in the past also made tremendous efforts to reach all members of the neighborhood, literally sending questionnaires to every single resident identifiable. I still believe NRP is a great program, despite my disagreement with how my current neighborhood spends some of their NRP money.
Except for a hand full of urban planners and similar personnel with lots of experience, most of the city staff and all of the elected officials have no more claim to the "expertise that qualifies them for making decisions allocating hundreds of thousands [or millions] of dollars" than involved citizens.
Frankly, I find Atherton's remarks both insulting to the hard-working volunteers and inflammatory.
Chris Johnson Fulton
P.S. In a post a few days ago I referred to another list writer's confusing and vague message as "baffle gab" for which I apologize to the list. I meant to say the message was baffling, but have been since learned that is not the correct meaning of the phrase I used.
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