I received the following email in response to yesterdays post about Greensboro’s boards and commissions,
“When I served on a commission one of the frustrations was that we would work hard to come to what we thought was an appropriate solution only to have the City Council members overturn what we’d done. It is the attitude of the Council that makes the work difficult and unfulfilling.”
Just wanted to share.
{ 6 comments }
Ryan
I have served on the Minimum Standars Housing Board for about 5 years. The N&R article made a point that so many people serving on city boards were connected to the real estate industry, Two things, Wouldn’t anyone serving on this board, or at least half of the members, be expected to know something about building? Secondly, that too many people are connected to real estate implies that we would compromize our integrity to favor our friends.
I/we serve the citizens of Greensboro. Not special interest groups. I invite Ms
Lehmert to look into the many, many cases we have heard and find one single case where we favored anyone. Frankly I resent the N&R including our board in the article. Other than in the opening , she didn’t mention us again.
Thanks and good luck in your City Council Race.
Wayne,
I’m not going to speak for the N&R, but I do think it is important to have certain sectors represented, but they should not be an overwhelming majority. I serve on the Board of Adjustments, also mentioned in the article, and can confirm that we need to have a better mix.
To say the least, I think the appointment process def. needs to be tweaked. Thanks so much for taking the time to leave a comment.
Ryan
Ideally every Council Person should be able to appoint to every board. However, I think more importantly, the emphasis should be placed on qualifications. For instance, on a plumbing board, shouldn’t all of the boards members have some understanding of plumbing?
Wayne,
Lets assume there is a three person plumbing board (per your example), I’d hope the board would be made up as follows: one plumber, one landlord and one home owner. The mix is important to ensure all viewpoints are taken into consideration.
Ryan
O.K., Should one be black, one white and one female? And who would be the plumber? My point Ryan, qualifications should trump. It would be almost impossible to satisfy all requirements in all districts.
The boards are loaded with real estate people, But i would think the proportion of people working in some related field to real estate would be high, maybe 40 per cent.
They need to be diverse, I’ll leave it at that. The problem isn’t just having, for example, three lawyers on a single Board. It’s when those lawyers all work for the same firm or have ties that require them to opt out of a particular case. It happens, and can be avoided. Again, my focus is revamping the appointment process.
Ryan
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