Editor:
The gatekeepers of public engagement and citizen input are at it again. The city continues its plan to pay hand-selected groups of people to provide feedback on public programs and there is evidence that their input will be given enhanced weight. If you fall within one of these privileged groups, you will be paid up to $1,000 to engage. One thousand dollars. Director of Planning and Development. Susan McLaughlin, has stated that this process will be used in the Planning Department’s vision and plan for the next 20 years.
When a city seeks to make citywide policy, aren’t all the residents and voters together the best course for democracy and isn’t that preferable to paid community commentators?
Edmonds voted out our former mayor; voters said a lack of transparent public engagement was one big reason for that. Mike Rosen was elected to return a voice to all Edmonds residents.
One thing that stands out to me is that many of these prioritized groups, far from having limited participation in public debate, have many “activists” within their communities. This is a great thing! But then one wonders why some on city staff feel the need to pay them for their input?
You can find more information here. Also, for more background, see the Reader view, “Equitable Engagement Framework Not What it Purports to Be,” here.
If you also feel that this biased program should be eliminated, please contact Mayor Rosen at mike.rosen@edmondswa.gov. Mayor Rosen’s phone number is: 425-771-0246.
Lynne Chelius
Edmonds
What the hell this program needs to go away yesterday. I know it is common practice in bigger government that should go away too. Where do I sign up?
The paid community commentators Is a simple-minded approach to community engagement. The planning director works for the mayor and Mayor Rosen will be held accountable for this biased nonsense. Hopefully Mayor Rosen will move away from this Ill-conceived engagement from the previous administration’s artifact.
Should be soliciting involvement from entire represented community as a whole. Not targeted sub groups. And definitely not paid targeted subgroups. This is literally “paid to play”. (In my assessment.)
Edmonds does not have money to waste on community commentators nor their biased assessments.
Lynne, Thank you for bringing this program to our attention. I read through the City website referenced in your commentary. Among “requirements” to be picked for this group it states “Residency is not required”. This means included members of this group who aren’t citizens of Edmonds will have more influence on City decisions than the rest of us who just happen to live here. This opens the door for all kinds of outside activists to have sway on our government. This program needs to go away.
from to link within the article on Community Champions : “Champions must be at least 16 years old.
Residency is not a requirement, but participants should demonstrate a connection to Edmonds (i.e., work, attend school, or participate in activities in Edmonds) and their ability to engage with specific communities and assist in communicating. “
I think it is a good idea for Edmonds to actively recruit a wider group of community members as Edmonds develops its comprehensive plan. I do not see that other more traditional voices will not be included but that the city will be making efforts to reach a fully representative group for input. The money may encourage first time volunteers.
Edmonds is strengthened by making a comfortable place for full community participation . I can agree with requiring residency although wonder if that will give small business owners a voice.
If memory serves Ms. McLaughlin came out of the Seattle bureaucracy. Former Mayor Nelson loved the Seattle model of hyper-bureaucratic governance and we showed him the door after one term. IMHO, we should do same with any Edmonds bureaucrats with that pedigree and make it an automatic disqualified going forward.
While it does concern me that residency isn’t a requirement, I like this idea. The landing page for the project states the first goal as “Ensure that the underrepresented and historically marginalized communities have meaningful opportunities to participate in the development of the Comprehensive Plan.”, which I support.
And since they’re only going to accept 5 to 9 participants, at “up to $1,000”, based on the number of activities and outreach efforts with which they are able to engage, It appears to me to be very much worthwhile. From what I read, they’re not going to accept input from developers and the like, but instead, those already involved in giving a voice to the under privileged and marginalized.
If you want to learn more about this program, here is the link again: https://www.edmondswa.gov/cms/one.aspx?portalId=16495016&pageId=20013081
Thank you Lynne for your comments. McLaughlin needs to go. I’m tired of hearing her “reimagining” our streets. How about “imagining” our streets and sidewalks safe to walk on by all our citizens – children and seniors? Mayor Rosen identified himself as a “retired public affairs executive” in the last three weeks of the mayoral campaign. This experience and talents will serve him well as our mayor. He has no municipal or financial experience and so I hope he has a team of advisors on how to carry out his mayoral responsibilities. Our fiscal health has us near bankrupt and will take major work on Mayor Rosen’s part to correct. His political leanings are far left and has praised Seattle’s ex-mayor Jenny Durken’s policies. He certainly has a right to his opinions. However Edmond’s public safety, concern for crime, safe streets and sidewalks, water and sewer, our marsh, fiscal health have no political affiliation. I feel confident at this juncture that Mayor Rosen will do as he promised when running for mayor. He will do his best to represent everyone, Democrats, Republicans and Independents equally. This paid political commentary program has to go. It’s simple common sense.
In my “golden years” I’ve come to realize there are only two kinds of ideas available to us – good or bad; and lots of problems simply can’t be solved no matter what ideas are applied. “It’s just in fate’s hand” for lack of a better way to put it. (Stopping climate change, ending poverty, self medication of alcohol and drugs, and overpopulation of humans comes to my mind as being in this “fate’s hand” category). I’d put this local idea of paying people for their opinions based on who they are, or who they claim they are, as being in the really, really, bad idea category. Mayor Rosen was pretty quick to figure out the “hate portal” was a bad idea and I suspect he will grasp that paying people for their opinions, whether they are city citizens or not, about what streets should be for; is an equally self defeating effort that should be quashed ASAP. If for no other reason, it’s just because we can no longer afford such nonsense.
DEI paid for by Edmonds taxpayers. What a concept! This should have been packed up with Nelson’s other trash baggage when he scurried out the door of City Hall. Mayor Rosen: Please do it now. The silly season is over.
Thanks to Ms McCloud and Mr Good for your comments, which make sense to me.
Why such animosity to efforts at diversity, equity and inclusion? For one MENS contributor who once suggested bullets rather than tasers be employed by our police officers, because bullets are cheaper, I suggest the animosity is simply mean spiritedness. I believe that for men, especially white men, the animosity is due to the fear of becoming irrelevant. No doubt some suspicious views on DEI involve careful thought or a fear of change, which can be intimidating.
We have a new mayor. Give him a chance. Our city workers, from my interaction with them, are dedicated employees for the city residents.
MEN, blaming “white men” for something is just downright racist and sexist. Surprise you would print that. If I was to blame Black or Asian women for some for some grievance, I highly doubt you would print it because it would be so offensive. YOU can do better.
Mayor Rosen’s name has been invoked by several commenters. In the election campaign period, he seemed to be paying attention to comments here & letters to the Beacon. I’ll be interested to see if he responds to the exhortations to scrap this “paid” citizens program & does so.
Folks, I would add a reminder here. I have tried to the best of my ability to direct people to criticize programs or ideas rather than people. This is especially true when it comes to paid city staff. The buck stops with the elected official who oversees that person and directs their efforts. — Teresa
Fair enough, you’re the moderator of the comments section and make the rules. I would like to point out that paid staff work for the citizens of the town who are at the top of the pyramid hierarchy under our city’s charter, not paid staff.
And I would add we elect a mayor to manage those staff
I looked at the link provided, it seems the city is only looking for people that are part of organizations to represent the underserved, note these people are already paid. Why can’t people that are among those groups represent themselves? I signed up but since I am not a member of a organization that represents people that fall into my category I guess the rich will get richer. I encourage everyone who is not part of a organization that falls into one of the categories to apply so our government doesn’t make decisions based on activist input. Oh by the way I never said bullets were cheaper than tasers but I did say guns were cheaper. Not against less lethal but the cost is considerably greater than and it isn’t always effective putting officers and citizens at risk.
After the appointment of the ‘Blue Ribbon Committee’ earlier this week, it’s pretty obvious we DO need these types of programs in place to provide a little diversity of thought/age/gender/race/socioeconomic status. It’s an unfortunate truth that without some structure, those in power don’t always do the right thing and continue to draw input from a small group. Yet another reason we need to take a hard look at moving to districting for our city council positions – we need to spread out opportunities for representation.
I guess I’m just confused a little bit about where the buck is supposed to stop. I thought the idea is that the buck is supposed to stop with ALL the ACTUAL citizens who are supposedly at the top of the organization chart. It would be one thing if this policy of paying “minority persons,” (even if not city citizens in some cases), for their opinions came from our elected City Council Members, but that is not the case. This policy idea and the money to pay for it came from a mayor and apparently mostly from the input of his paid staff that he should do it or sanction it anyway. You have paid city staff making unilateral and at least somewhat arbitrary decisions about who gets paid and why. That does not seem to be a healthy or wise thing to allow in my view. I could be wrong, of course, but the issue does need to be addressed better by our elected Council and not just our elected Executive who is supposed to enforce policy – not make it.
Clinton I suggest you apply as a member of the senior community you have a valid argument for being a member of the committee. Let’s flood the applications with representative individuals so the city is forced to deny the activist organizations.
Mayor Rosen, Please don’t move forward with this pay-for-play scheme. All citizens of Edmonds should have an equal voice and considering our current budget concerns our city certainly cannot afford to pay for opinions. Yes, we have much diversity in Edmonds and, of course, we want to include all citizens of Edmonds, and only citizens of Edmonds, when gathering information, but the “E” needs to stand for Equality. Monetary compensation and disproportionate weight of comments of a special group of citizens accomplishes nothing. In my opinion, it will also alienate many citizens..
Helen, pay for play refers to when people pay to gain advantage or favor with elected officials, not when citizens are selected through a transparent process and compensated for their time. For instance, if someone donated the maximum amount to someone’s political campaign and then was appointed to a high level committee within the administration upon the election of that candidate – that is pay for play.
That sort of pay for play is very alienating.
All residents of Edmonds have a voice in the planning process. When it comes down to gaining community feedback for the Comprehensive Planning process, what’s being implemented is in fact a recognized American Planning Association (APA), International Association of Public Participation (IAP2), and MRSC Community Engagement Resource technique. All three are guiding resources that planning staff use in updating a Comp Plan. Could the city do more and improve upon with the 59 other techniques at their disposal to involve the community? Absolutely! Does the city have the time, money and resources to implement more techniques? There lies the challenging part. I would just say outside of time, money and resources to conduct the engagement level that the citizens of Edmonds expect, regardless of limitations, there are many avenues to voice one’s opinion or provide input. Attend a Board / Commission meeting, attend a Council meeting, write to the Boards and Commissions, write to the planning staff, write to Council. There are many ways and yes they do have an impact.
Thank you for pointing out that there are many avenues and venues to voice one’s opinion or provide input as a local citizen. Wow, 59 other techniques to involve the community, who would have thought? One problem with the
Equitable Engagement Framework, Associations aside, Is that it’s politically questionable. Adding politically questionable techniques to the Comprehensive Planning process will taint it which would be unfortunate considering the human resources, time, and money spent on it.
Jeremy, the fact that three professional planning associations advocate paying shy people or reticent people (for lack of a better way to describe them ) for their opinions about planning; makes it a great idea to go ahead and do so? You have a lot more faith in the professionalism of these “professionals” than I do. Let’s pay a guy living in a tent, hidden in the park, for his opinion of what our parks and streets should be used for because that might be really useful information in making our planning decisions. Is this what Planners learn in Planning School and then take to their professional associations? Should we be impressed by this? Personally, I think not.
I serve on one of the city’s committees as a volunteer. What’s being asked for the champions project is definitely above and beyond what I’d be comfortable doing as a volunteer. I can understand why compensation is being offered!
This isn’t much different from the Blue Ribbon panel, where people were selected without public input, yet the same people who is praising Mayor Rosen for that panel (with a paid consultant) are arguing against this. Make it make sense.
Let’s give Mayor Rosen credit for selecting panel members based on their skills and not the political party they are associated with.
Virginia, there is a huge difference here. The guy the Mayor is paying the 10K to has a known track record of helping other cities do a much better job of managing the resources they have available. Mr Rosen’s approach to doing this Blue Ribbon panel would not have been my approach, nor do I advocate keeping a system that allows him to do this, but it’s the system we have to work with. Our City Council has chosen to give our Mayors a good deal of executive power and up to 100K in spending for things like this and it would be naive to think Mayor Rosen will not take advantage of those things in a manner he thinks will work. It just seems a little early for folks like us to be knocking him down for trying.
Let’s not confuse the blue ribbon panel with the city search for activist organizations looking for a extra thousand dollars to push their propaganda.
Lynne- you provided a link to your editorial in 2022 that criticized the equitable engagement framework. but you did not mention in this week’s editorial whether that consulting firm named PRR is the same PRR firm that Mayor Rosen worked for and was one of the managing principals. Please confirm.
thank you