'I totally agree that there are risks and unknowns when a contractor is
given a scope of work and a limited budget. Of course! But that's not
what I was asking. I was trying to respond to your statement that we
should look at the website if we want to know a) the specifics of what
is being done, and b) what the process was that led to that scope of work.
I tried to repeat my specific questions a number of times to emphasize
that I think that it's fair to ask for specific answers to these
questions. But instead of responding, it seems like you changed your
stance from "you're not paying attention" to "it's impossible to know
what is actually going to be done". '
Josh,
It's important that you know some history of this Penn takeover to
understand the obfuscation and outright lies you are getting now.
This plan to redesign Clark Park surfaced about 8 years ago. Hundreds
of people from the community showed up at public meetings and rejected
every bit of the redesign. The community loudly rejected the secret
closed process called the master plan steering committee. (For this
secret committee, Penn hand picked its corporate buddies and the leaders
of the FOCP club. They refused transparency, inclusion of park users,
and inclusion of respected members of the community).
Penn delayed the redesign all these years in order to circumvent the
will of the community. FOCP and UCD do not have broad public support
for wiping out the trees or any other part of this project. In fact,
the vast majority of the community is against its elements, such as
replacing the trees and the high maintenance fountain.
There has been no public process over these years and no way for
people to ask questions or voice concerns among their neighbors. We
have been consistently told that if any citizen wants to participate,
they must give Tony West and Brian Siano 20 dollars (membership dues)
and then you can give your suggestions to them privately. We are to
then shut up and believe that Siano, Chance and West will express your
views to the Penn power brokers
The Clark Park Partnership has refused to give the time, date and
location of their secret meetings just as the FOCP "planning committee"
did since the plan was rejected 7 years ago. The few presentations
which FOCP calls public meetings do not allow time for public input. (I
tried to make a 1 minute statement at these dog and pony shows, three
years in a row, to object to the closed exclusive process. Each time I
was silenced.)
It's a tight little catch-22. They tell everybody that they were too
lazy and disinterested to give their hard working volunteers $20, and
consequently don't know what they are talking about. But they refuse to
allow anyone to look at the secret plans or attend their secret meetings.
I saved the e-mail evidence showing that the Clark Park Partnership
meetings are completely closed to the public.
Penn Real Estate wants a complete redesign of the park to support its
real estate goals and to support its false history of this neighborhood.
They see dollar signs on a map and don't care one bit about the
community which existed here. The Department of Recreation has betrayed
the people of this neighborhood and Philadelphia taxpayers due to a
process called an iron triangle.
Briefly, its initially easier for the Recreation staff to turn over
the park to UCD and betray the people of Philadelphia. They get to show
up for photo ops and don't have to serve the interests of the public.
Certainly, the individual Rec. employees don't realize that eventually
the department of recreation will be abolished, as facilities are
privatized in gentrified neighborhoods, and abandoned in poor neighborhoods.
Josh, as people on this list serv understand, it is futile to
communicate with West and Siano like mature adults communicate. If you
point out fallacious arguments and lies, they will get nasty and spread
lies about you.
As I wrote to Aaron, only a lawsuit against the Department of Recreation
for privatizing the park can stop Penn now.
Sincerely,
Glenn
On 9/8/2010 2:10 AM, Brian Siano wrote:
Josh, I've sent email to the person handling our website, asking if we
can set up a better-organized page about the Park A project. I'll
bring it up at our next board meeting later this month.
The fact is that the FOCP's a volunteer organization, and we're only
as good as our free time and energies permit. We've done a lot to
publicize the project. We've had public meetings, made videos of those
meetings available on the site, run articles in our newsletter, had
articles in the UC Review, and we've tried to be out in the park every
Summer Saturday with a map of the park plan. We've even made the full
Revitalization Plan available as a PDF on our website.
As for the plans and your questions, I'll try to answer as best I can.
About two years ago, I took a break from the FOCP, so my info may be a
little outdated. We did a _lot_ of groundwork on this. We consulted
with the major stakeholder groups (the chess players, the Farmer's
Market, the Uhuru flea markets) about park use. We conducted surveys
of what people wanted in the park-- people wanted more green space,
for example. We ran designs past the community in those public
meetings. There was a _major_ revision requested by the city's Arts
Council-- and it was a revision that really improved the plan, IMO.
But working with Bryan Haines, we developed a plan that reflected the
use of the park, made some changes that were needed, and seemed to
satisfy the neighbors who attended the public meetings about this plan.
Now, I know that this may not be as much information as you desire.
But you're asking for about four years' worth of work that's pretty
much _done_.
At this point, the plan was out of _our_ hands, and became a project
between Bryan Haines and the Department of Recreation, who are the
real owners of the park. Now, the city has its own concerns-- they
wanted changes in the electrical system, for example, and they have
certain requirements about things like handicapped accessibility and
the distances between trees and paths, and the project had to be
within a certain budget, and...
I have not seen the "final plans." I have seen an overall map that the
city provided to prospective contractors when the job went out to bid.
I can say that the plans that the city developed were not appreciably
different from what we developed with Bryan Haines-- the very map
we've had on display at the Farmer's Market and on our website. The
paths were the same, the trees chosen for removal were the same (maybe
some changes there). Bryan's going to be involved with the
contractors as they work as well.
In summary: The plans were developed by the community through the
FOCP; the architect is a member of the community, and will continue to
supervise the project; and even though the city could override _all_
of our work, because it's their park, they didn't change the plans
that much.
I may have to apologize for Tony's intemperate comment about "Johnny
come latelies." He really shouldn't have said that. But I can
understand his frustration on this point. As I've described above,
we've spent years working on this and engaging the community as best
we can. As any activist knows, peoples' interest in an issue comes and
goes. (For example, people wanted more membership meetings. So we held
them... until attendance dwindled. So we have fewer membership
meetings.) But when a major event happens, suddenly people need to
know _everything_, right _now_. If we can't satisfy this need, we're
accused of bad faith or unprofessionalism. Obviously, we can't simply
decide to _not_ make up for lost opportunities... but it's hard to
avoid thinking, "If these people care so much, and are telling us how
to do things, then why haven't they gotten involved _before_?"
On 9/8/2010 12:48 AM, Josh Marcus wrote:
Tony,
I totally agree that there are risks and unknowns when a contractor
is given a scope of work and a limited budget. Of course! But
that's not what I was asking. I was trying to respond to your
statement that we should look at the website if we want to know a)
the specifics of what is being done, and b) what the process was that
led to that scope of work.
I tried to repeat my specific questions a number of times to
emphasize that I think that it's fair to ask for specific answers to
these questions. But instead of responding, it seems like you
changed your stance from "you're not paying attention" to "it's
impossible to know what is actually going to be done". I've never
seen any public statement from you or FoCP that would lead me to
believe that there isn't a public plan or that it is unreasonable to
expect that there would be a public plan -- I only brought up the
website as a source of information because you directed the author of
a previous message to the website, and criticized him for not "paying
attention" to the details that had been posted.
I repeated my questions a number of times to try and emphasize them,
and to emphasize that these specific questions deserve answers. You
didn't answer them. I am disappointed -- do you recognize that you
didn't answer my questions, and instead just asserted that it is an
"inherently fluid" process? I am honestly not trying to argue here,
just trying to clarify what are the pieces of information that
neighbors are missing and try and clarify why that missing
information might lead people to concern. I'm not looking for a
rhetorical argument, but was instead looking for the basic facts of
the situation. I'm glad to hear that you trust the contractor.
Here are my questions, repeated:
1) If FoCP has not reviewed or commented on the plans being
implemented, please let us know. If it is a mistake to think that
the FoCP is not very involved in the process, or if you're not free
to speak freely about what's going on, that would be a good thing to
make clear.
2) Have you have seen the plans being implemented? Specifically, are
the specific plans being implemented by the contractor public or have
they been reviewed by anyone outside of the city? If the contractor
has broad free-reign over the implementation and priority (as you
seem to suggest), does the community or FoCP have any input into the
process? If not, are you concerned?
3) Are those plans public? If not, why not? If so, where can we see
them?
4) How do the plans being implemented differ from the plans that have
been discussed in public in the past?
5) What is the process that led to the current plan? What role did
the public process play?
--j
No virus found in this incoming message.
Checked by AVG - www.avg.com
Version: 9.0.851 / Virus Database: 271.1.1/3121 - Release Date: 09/08/10
02:07:00
