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Today, I appeared before Raleigh City Council on the requests and petitions of citizens agenda. My request was to extend the 2030 Comprehensive Plan Draft comment date by 30 days. My full request is below for your viewing pleasure. On the surface, I was unsuccessful in achieving the goal, that’s if you’re looking at the 4-4 vote (5 votes are needed to pass a motion).The Council did not extend the Comprehensive Plan Comment period today, with Mayor Meeker, Mary-Anne Baldwin, Philip Isley, and James West voting against the extension. However, Mitch Silver suggested that the Limehouse Portal commenting feature be extended through February. The Council agreed with this suggestion even though the motion did not pass. As I understand this, citizens will be able to submit comments through the Limehouse portal until the end of February 2009.
This comes at a slight costs. Planning Director Silver explained to me over email that, “All comments received after 2/1 will be collated by element and submitted to the City Council and Planning Commission. The comments will also be made available to the public. A summary of these post 2/1 comments will be presented at the March Public Hearing.”
Talking points for today’s request:
First, I would like to commend the Planning Department staff; Mitch Silver, Ken Bowers, and many others, for the tremendous job and effort put into creating the Draft Comprehensive Plan. It’s truly outstanding and overwhelming.
Like many other active citizens in this city, there is a sense of ownership because we’ve been actively participating in the process. We are taking time to review the plan because it outlines the future growth and conservation of Raleigh. But we need more time to contribute our feedback.
We are here today, requesting to extend the 2030 Draft Comprehensive Plan comment period, by 30 days. We believe the timeline set for this project will not suffer greatly, if at all, if you will afford us the extra time to review a plan that will impact our city and our lives.
Let me be clear, we are not here to ask you to modify the proposed schedule set forth by the Planning Department. Instead, we wish to maintain the timeline to adopt the plan but extend the public comment period to maximize citizen involvement.
We believe affording this extension will reduce the commentary during the public hearing because it provides more time to analyze the plan. It will allow time for special interest groups and board / commissions to participate and review the draft.
Time lost
- Delay from the original timeline which caused a delay for the draft availability
- Involvement during the month of December was low due to the holidays
- Technical issues with Limehouse portal are causing some delays in citizen input (Planning has been proactive, helpful, and prompt.)
- Unavailable public documentation, such as the Small Area Plan matrix / gap analysis
- Even is this were available today, 10 days would not be enough time to sift-through and comprehend
- Size of plan requires more time to analyze and digest the amount of information about our cities future
Focus Groups
- Neighborhood leaders from District D are leading focus groups
- Focus group participants not limited to District D
- Arts and Culture, Environmental Protection, Parks and Greenways, Transportation Systems, and Urban Form, Land Use, & Historic Preservation
- Citizens in Raleigh are interested and want to leverage the focus group model
- Just shy of 300 comments on the portal. This is a good start, but might be disappointing.
As you consider this extension and think about how to move forward, we think the best way for citizens to be informed is to get the CAC’s involved. It’s important that we leverage the CAC structure as a key way to address citizens. Even though there are a variety of public opportunities to participate, it’s typically one-to-one interactions. We believe a group of neighbors having a conversation with a planner could be extremely beneficial. This could occur during the month of February with an emphasis on maintaining the adoption timeline and gathering citizen input.
Talk about citizen involvement & conversations with Dr. West.
- Citizens are volunteering their time, expertise, and passion — you as our elected officials should value this participation and provide the extension today.
Thank You!!!
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About: Jason: I'm a neighborhood advocate. I started off by getting involved in the Pleasant Ridge & Ramsgate Community Watch program and helped grow that organization. I saw an opportunity to unite other neighborhoods in our area with the Lineberry Alliance. I became chair of Raleigh's South West Citizen Advisory Council (SWCAC) in April 2010 along with vice chair Anthony McLeod and second vice chair Mary Belle Pate. I work with other neighborhood leaders in District D alongside City Councilor Thomas Crowder, on the District D Neighborhood Alliance (DDNA). I've completed Raleigh Neighborhood College (Spring 2005) and Leadership North Carolina (May 2007). In 2009, I lead a group of neighborhood volunteers to review Raleigh's 2030 Comprehensive Plan. I have a genuine interest in strong communities, fostering diversity, understanding the issues, and being transparent in my work. You can follow me on Twitter: @jhibbets |
Additional Review of the request: http://www.raleighpublicrecord.org/?p=620
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[...] Lineberry Alliance Blogs The latest from South West Raleigh « Council Declines 2030 Comment Extension 4-4 [...]
[...] I formally requested a 30-day extension for public comments on the 2030 Draft Comprehensive Plan. It was denied by a 4-4 vote, with Mayor Meeker and three other councilors refusing to recognize the … The N&O failed to cover this matter and instead elected to write about dog [...]
[...] into their review, we felt that we needed more time to thoroughly review the plan. In January 2009, I requested a comment extension from City Council that was denied in a 4-4 vote. Again, the N&O failed to pick up this story, as well as publish my letter to the [...]