Letter to my city planning commission

Just thought I would post this for kicks...the man sat in front of us and made it quite clear that he had no obligation to hear anything we had to say to him...then or ever! Hmmmm....in a public office?

"I am writing with regards to the meeting I attended two Thursdays ago, in which the proposal for the new junior high was presented by the school district.

I was concerned that you, also a citizen of my town, would feel so threatened by the peers of your community that– despite the council of your fellow commissioners– would first, take the opportunity to arrogantly throw your authority around; second, grudgingly allow for public comment once it had been established that public comment could in fact be heard; and third, reinstate your authority following the time for public comment, even going so far as to deliberately diminish the issues that were brought up by the public.

In light of this behavior, I would like to take a few moments to address my concerns.
First, any position in healthy government, whether appointed or otherwise, is responsible ultimately to those their decisions impact; even in a monarchy. (The root of the work "king" itself denotes "servant", interestingly enough.) Perhaps there is such thing as a "natural aristocracy", as Plato and Jefferson propose, and as you seemed to believe, with your superior air. However, reading further into their works, it is clearly established that is not something an individual gains by appointment; rather something they exhibit through their deportment.

I have no doubt that you feel that you have state statutes as well as local statutes to validate the autonomy of the decisions of the council. However, the manner of your delivery reflected one of defensiveness with an intent to belittle those who had expressed an interest in the proceedings by their attendance. Perhaps you were just having a bad day.

I don’t think any of us in attendance thought that we would be able to have any type of voting power in that situation. We simply wanted to make sure all of the facts had been addressed and considered. Any good leader recognizes that they by themselves do not have the ability to consider any situation from every angle, and welcomes others who feel that they might have information to help them make a more educated decision. I appreciated the reminder given to "the public" to not simply restate the concerns already mentioned and waste the council’s time, and thought "the public" did an admirable job considering the obviously grudging consent to speak you gave them.

When your fellow commissioner asked what venue the concerned public had to voice their concerns to you, you gave no email, no recommendation to contact you or the council at a different time: you simply reinstated your right to not have to listen to anyone outside of the commission. This reflects a disturbingly narrow-minded mentality. Your defensiveness was further established when there was actually time set aside for public comment within the agenda of the meeting; yet no indication was made of this open forum at the time referred to above in this paragraph.

May I make a recommendation? If you would seek to perpetuate your role in any type of leadership position, perhaps you could benefit by the reading and application of some books designed to help in situations such as these: "Leadership and Self-Deception" by the Arbinger Institute, Covey’s "Seven Habits of Highly Effective people" (with special consideration to the sections on "synergy" and "interdependence"), and "How to Win Friends and Influence People" by Carnegie.

Any healthy government should seek for the good of both the individual as well as the community. Of course this is a delicate balance between extreme socialism (exclusive good of the community) verses extreme capitalism (exclusive good of the individual). In this situation, I appreciate the intent of the council that was demonstrated to both seek the good of the community in establishing a junior high in west Kaysville as well as consider the impact on the local population. I would simply ask you to reflect upon your behavior towards your peers here in your community. No official in our government is so far removed from the people that they are not ultimately accountable to them.

I thank you for your time and consideration.