UPDATE:
Apparently these three open houses were mentioned by the Seattle Times over the weekend, neighborhood blogs, KIRO TV amd radio, KING TV and KOMO TV. Not to leave out Don Ward of Seattle Weekly, who also talked them up:
Fifty staff members from City Hall, Police and Fire Departments, Metro and Seattle City Light stood idly around for 90 minutes, confering in small groups and glancing at watches while individual residents meekly made their circuit around the community center gym. The scene was somewhat reminiscent of a career fair at high school.
and:
Mayor Nickels – assuming the politician-listening-to-constituents-stance – chatted amicably with all the citizens (as well as a trio of kids going to swimming practice at nearby Green Lake Pool) and solemnly ruminated afterwards about understanding their concerns regarding garbage service and clearing roadways.
ORIGINAL POST:
Angry columnists and talk radio hosts blew their tops at Mayor Greg Nickels and the city’s response to Snowpacolypse 2008. In response to their response, the mayor and others attended meeting throughout the city to take your feedback.
SEATTLE – Mayor Greg Nickels invites Seattle residents to talk with him, department heads and city staff about their winter-storm experiences. The input is being gathered as part of a citywide performance review of emergency snow operations.
Three meetings are planned and residents are invited to attend any or all:
Tuesday, Jan. 13, 6:30 to 8 p.m., at the Green Lake Community Center,
7201 E. Green Lake Dr. N.Wednesday, Jan. 14, 6:30 to 8 p.m., at the Garfield Community Center,
2323 E. Cherry St.Thursday, Jan. 15, 6:30 to 8 p.m., at the Southwest Community Center,
2801 S.W. Thistle St.The sessions will offer residents an informal opportunity to talk one-on-one with the mayor and meet with staff from transportation, utilities and other departments.
From what I’ve been told, a grand total of fifteen people showed up to the first event at the Green Lake Community Center. Maybe Seattle folks are just passive-aggressive, and are taking it out on our mayor by ignoring him. Or maybe Seattle folks aren’t really all that pissed off.
Bad politicians everywhere have long benefited from the fact that while the public isn’t necessarily stupid, we have the collective attention span of a gnat.
I wasn’t. It was just snow and ice. It melted. Use the sense God gave a bug and don’t go down steep hills when they have ice and don’t try to drive like you have clear pavement. It’s not that hard. At least for non angry columnists and talk radio hosts.
… or, people don’t like to go to dog and pony shows.
Maybe the 206er-hating schmuck from Yelm showed up.
Or maybe Seattle folks aren’t really all that pissed off.
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Or maybe, just maybe . . . they had no idea the meetings were scheduled because 99.99% of people don’t regularly check the city Web site for the Mayor’s events:
http://www.seattle.gov/
If there was some other, far more effective, way the city used to get the word out, I’d love to know about it.
Hey, the worse off the streets are the better excuse you have to tell the boss you’re snowed in…
So can one of you amen-commenters tell me what Will’s conclusion is? Is he saying that Seattle residents must think the city did a great job during the snow storm because not many people showed up to these meetings?
Is he saying that Seattle residents must think the city did a great job during the snow storm because not many people showed up to these meetings?
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His conclusion is inane since it ignores the simple fact that very, very few people would have been aware of the meetings if the city relied solely on its Web site to get the word out. If you went to a busy downtown corner and polled a hundred people as they scooted by, I suspect the reaction would be almost universal: “What meetings?” In fact, I bet if you went to city hall and conducted the same poll the response wouldn’t be much better.
This all, of course, raises the intriguing question of why the city didn’t do a much better job of getting the word out, something the Mayor is very good at when it’s truly beneficial to his political welfare: simple ineptness (believable) or cynical politics (also believable)?
I think it has more to do with the fact that most folks I speak with just don’t think the Mayor will listen or understand.
I’m pretty sure we all think he’s an idiot jackass and we’ll be sending him a message with our 2009 ballots.
We’re also passive aggressive :)
@7,
Sure Troll, he thinks you are a goat fucker.
So what Will? I’m the only one who wrote about the fact that no one showed up to these meetings, and you don’t even link to my article?
Come on now. Honor among thieves…
There was next to zero info put out about these meetings.
I mean someone couldn’t be bothered to send a press release out and maybe notify the various neighborhod councils and neighborhood chambers?
I just asked a neighbor who is extremely active with various neighborhood groups and who actually hunts down stuff like this. She had no idea these meetings were happening.
The City of Seattle did put together a press release which was sent out.
http://www.cityofseattle.net/n.....38;Dept=40
We had something at the Weekly. KOMO 4 news had a report as did KING 5.
If you are complaining, ask why the Times didn’t bother to cover the thing.
@13
Then again maybe we DO have the attention span of a gnat.
Would it have killed them to have the one north-end meeting in Queen Anne? Just, you know, to hint that they know Queen Anne and Magnolia actually ARE still part of the city? We didn’t see busses for over a week, nor plows for several days, even on alleged ‘primary’ snow removal streets.
Instead, we only got a meeting in Green Lake, which I only found out about the day after it was held. I’m not amused.
The City of Seattle did put together a press release which was sent out.
http://www.cityofseattle.net/n.....38;Dept=40
We had something at the Weekly. KOMO 4 news had a report as did KING 5.
If you are complaining, ask why the Times didn’t bother to cover the thing.
——————–
The city’s press release – you have the incorrect one – is here:
http://www.seattle.gov/news/de.....38;Dept=40
It was issued at 5pm on Friday, Jan 9, just 4 days before the first meeting on Tue, Jan 13. That is not nearly enough time to get the word out, especially with a weekend in between and people distracted by other things. We watch King 5 news most evenings, but didn’t catch the story. For that matter, I couldn’t find it on the King 5 Web site with Google. You say the Weekly covered it, but that was coverage of the open houses – the events themselves – and not an announcement, correct? In any event, the Weekly’s audience is relatively small, so a case of too little, too late.
Again, the sparse showing was because very few people knew. Don’t believe me: take a poll downtown on a busy street corner.
Incidentally, it’s unfortunate the city wasted the time of so many of their own employees at these affairs. As the Weekly wrote:
“Fifty staff members from City Hall, Police and Fire Departments, Metro and Seattle City Light stood idly around for 90 minutes, confering in small groups and glancing at watches while individual residents meekly made their circuit around the community center gym. The scene was somewhat reminiscent of a career fair at high school.”
I only hope they weren’t working on OUR time. All in all . . . poor planning.
Much ado about nothing.
Only a few whiny, self centered idiots were angry. Snow happens, sometimes it happens a lot — so we should gear the snow budgets for the next 10 years because some blogger-in-pajamas who never leave their apartment can be happy their side street was cleared in record time?
But shrill malcontents must be appeased. Policy is changed even if no one knows if it’s any better.
Switch from sand to salt (which must be purchased in advance, not in the middle of a blizzard), w/o any cost comparison in short terms or long term (effect on roads) or any real facts about which is environmentally better?
& how much other social services get cut to keep these hysterics down?