City Council public forum last night 4/5

[Alexander Dupuy]

I just wanted to thank everybody who came to the council meeting last night, and especially those who spoke on the issue of our need for a playground downtown: Nora McDowell, Robert Hirsch, Erika Groff, Abby Lublin, Jim de Sève, Halil, Suljicic, Jeff Pirro, Russell Ziemba, Barry Goldman,  In addition to these ten (including myself) speakers, several others expressed their support while making comments on other issues.

We are planning to collate and prepare the collected petitions (Nora got a few more during this meeting) for the May meeting, and there are several people who could not make the meeting tonight who will speak during the public forum at that meeting.  Hopefully our informal contacts with council members will allow us to get a meeting with the city officials that would be doing the planning and coordination for any playground related work at Barker Park.  If so, we may be able to offer thanks to the city; if not, we will be there to insist that our demand for a playground be addressed.

We have also been in touch with some of the members of the Friends of Barker Park, and are exploring the possibility of using their 501(c)(3) non-profit for any fundraising that we may do - this is still in the very initial stages, and may not be a good match for us, but if it works, it would save us the effort of setting up a new non-profit organization.

@alex

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[Robert Hirsch]

Why was Doherty not there? Its strange because we are talking about something directly in his district. As I understand it, he has been to some of the playground meetings. Is that the case?  Is he supportive?

I'm still a little jolted by the councils decision not to let that guy speak. What if they get tired of hearing about a playground?

Sent from my garden gnome

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[Alexander Dupuy]

Robert Hirsch wrote:

> Why was Doherty not there? Its strange because we are talking about
> something directly in his district. As I understand it, he has been to
> some of the playground meetings. Is that the case? Is he supportive?

Bob Doherty is out of town this week - Lynn had advised us this was the
case beforehand (I think I mentioned it in some e-mails that were
circulated as well) so no surprise. We decided to go ahead with
speaking at last night's meeting anyhow, and to come back again in May
with more. Bob did attend the first meeting on March 3rd; I think he is
supportive but he is very new to Troy and its politics, so not
necessarily as effective as other supporters on the council - I have
been particularly impressed by Nina Nichols, who I didn't really know
anything about prior to the elections last year (Lynn was a known
quantity and is of course the most connected).

But these are only three of the council members, and the others all
represent districts not so close to downtown - we need to convince them
more than Doherty. The Parks & Rec committee consists of Gary Galuski
[D-6] chair, Kevin McGrath [D-1], Mark McGrath (no relation?) [R-2], Ken
Zalewski [D-5], and Nina Nichols [D-at-large] - and all of them were
present.

> I'm still a little jolted by the councils decision not to let that guy
> speak. What if they get tired of hearing about a playground?

There's a lot of politics involved in that (Jim Gordon ran for district
1 council seat against Kevin McGrath, look up those names on the net if
you want more details or start with
http://recordtalespin.blogspot.com/2012/02/kevin-mcgraths-secret-is-out-now-what.html),
but I think there was some general agreement that Jim Gordon should have
had his say - even Ken Zalewski spoke at the end of the public comment
period to say that he would have allowed Jim to speak last night.

As for getting tired enough of hearing about playgrounds, unless we
start insulting them I think it's unlikely they will change the rules to
silence us. Yours and others' response to their action were noted, I
think - we can see next month if Jim is back.

@alex

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