**************************************
From:
Anthony West <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
/This morning, long before Melani went off to Bark in the Park,
thousands of volunteers walked across that same ground. They were part
of a 3-Day Walk from New York to Washington to raise funds to fight
breast cancer. They were volunteers soliciting voluntary contributions,
much as hundreds of millions of Americans have done for centuries. Large
donors, small donors ... both are part of the mix.
But the money they raise won't be spent on volunteer healers,
researchers and construction workers selected at random from among
"stakeholders" (breast cancer patients). It will be used to paid
credentialed, paid workers in relevant fields to do a professional job.
For "donors" read Penn (large) and Melani (small). For "paid workers"
read UCD. For "stakeholders" read businesses in this community. Now we
are comparing apples with apples.
Breast cancer research and treatment has public effects -- voluntary
organizations having public effects. This is more than common in our
society; it's universal. Since we never read complaints about this
process on this list in any other subject aside from neighborhood
groups, it's a safe bet none of the complainers take their own
complaints seriously. They are polemical rhetoric with no meaningful
applications in society as a whole.
One can have a UCD without a BID. In fact, that's what we do have. What
we have now, is a system whereby voluntary donors address widespread
community concerns ("clean and safe" and "business marketing", in SSD
terms) by creating an institution that can tackle them with paid
specialists instead of with random volunteers drawn from among the
stakeholders.
These tasks may or may not be well done and individuals may or may not
want them done in the first place. But those who tackle these concerns
in this way have no need of a "public mandate" or a "public process"
(although it might be wise for them to seek one) in order to seek "power
over the public", whether in the form of combatting public diseases or
picking up public trash. Each of us has a right to seek that sort of
"power over the public." I have a right to sweep the sidewalk in front
of my neighbor's house if he doesn't object; if he maintains it poorly,
I'll do it anyway and the government will back me up.
A BID is exactly where this institution would become fully and directly
public. It is a qualitatively different creature from a private body
that inspires it. To be successful -- even to succeed at coming into
being -- it needs widespread advance buy-in by those it would assess.
-- Tony West
I think you (and melani) are missing the point that al and
I and others have been making (and yes, sorry about all this
tin-can-and-string mode of communicating, hope it gets
straightened out):
volunteering, like being an anabaptist, isn't wrong in and
of itself. it's when it has enforcable public impacts (such
as taxing people, or overriding property rights to satisfy
historic tastes, or dedicating land from a public park to
the exclusive use of parakeet owners, or re-zoning to put a
tattoo parlor in someone's neighborhood) that their actions
become subject to public scrutiny, public process, public
will. it may be that no one will subject their actions to
public scrutiny, public process, public will, but when they
do, in our public sphere, it becomes a public question. and
when it comes to public questions, being a neighbor
stakeholder trumps being an anabaptist stakeholder every day
of the week, no matter how nice anabaptists are, how nice
their deeds are, how many anabaptists there are, how assured
anabaptists are of a place in heaven.**
our government ensures that every neighbor is an equal
stakeholder, even while not forbidding anabaptists from
doing their thing. but it does not require anyone to be an
anabaptist to be an equal stakeholder, nor does it grant
that anabaptists' interests come first.
I believe that as neighbors we have proven that we know how
to volunteer, anabaptists and non-anabaptists alike, before
there ever was a ucd. and we have proven that we are willing
and capable of volunteering -- anabaptists and
non-anabaptists alike -- without our volunteerism being
enforced by ucd's top-down plan to tax us. I believe that is
especially true now that we've seen so much well publicized
evidence about what a strong, viable, capable neighborhood
we are. I believe it's time to tell penn and ucd that it's
been a nice 10 years, that we'll take it from here.
meanwhile, I believe we can begin working together to
strengthen and re-invigorate our relationships as public
stakeholders. will you and sharreiff consider al's
suggestion of having a spot at the upcoming mayorial forum?
will you and sharreiff consider distributing a copy of the
petition to this list?
..................
UNIVERSITY*CITOYEN
[aka laserbeam®]
[aka ray]
SERIAL LIAR. CALL FOR RATES.
"It is very clear on this listserve who
these people are. Ray has admitted being
connected to this forger." -- Tony West
"Ray's falsehoods are more sophisticated,
more believable" -- Tony West
- - - - -
** because I keep harping on this, I'm giving the
impression that I never join organizations or volunteer,
that I'm dead set against joining organizations or
volunteering. that is false; I do volunteer, as an
individual and as part of several groups. I just don't
choose to talk about it here, nor do I require others to do
so; my neighbor is no less a stakeholder than I. .
also, to clarify, I'm not opposed to community
organizations per se. before there was a ucd, community
organizations worked for many people. those with common
interests joined, they did their projects, and their effects
on the public were benign. however, now that ucd has
co-opted these organizations and added its clout, they and
their agendas have become much less benign, with far more
consequential public impacts -- but, significantly, without
the development of concommitant public mechanisms needed to
accommodate and ensure public process. this is why community
organizations are challenged today, and why stakeholders --
old-timers and especially newcomers -- can get confused
about criticism of these organizations.
----
You are receiving this because you are subscribed to the
list named "UnivCity." To unsubscribe or for archive information, see
<http://www.purple.com/list.html>.
