Editorial Opinion By Cindy Cotte Griffiths: Questions Arise About The APFO Committee
Dec 17, 2010 8:40 - 5 Comments
Posted by: Cindy Cotte Griffiths
Department: Editorial Opinion,Opinion
Tags: affordable housing, APFO, by Cindy Cotte Griffiths, Opinion
Department: Editorial Opinion,Opinion
Tags: affordable housing, APFO, by Cindy Cotte Griffiths, Opinion
APFO Committee Members present during the Planning Commission Appointments On Wednesday.
If you want to find out who was appointed to the Rockville Planning Commissions Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance (APFO) Advisory Committee, you need to listen to the video from the Wednesday, December 15, 2010 meeting. The list of who will be appointed was not on the Agenda for the meeting nor has it been posted anywhere on the City’s website.
Surprisingly, before the nine members were appointed on Wednesday night, an article was published in Wednesday’s edition of The Gazette and it appeared online with the lede:
The Rockville Planning Commission had tasked nine people with reviewing one of its most controversial zoning ordinances.
The members of the Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance Committee will officially be announced at the Planning Commission’s meeting today. The list includes business, non-profit and neighborhood representatives.
(The grammatical error is The Gazette’s, not mine.) The article includes the names of who will be appointed later in the day.
During Wednesday’s meeting, Planning Commission David Hill admitted to providing the information about the appointments to The Gazette on Monday so that they could publish in their paper version on Wednesday. He also emailed the information to the Mayor and Council on Monday.
So my first question is, why does The Gazette get such privilege over all the other news providers?
My second question is, why can’t I find the names of who was appointed anywhere except for this news article? The names are still not on the Planning Commission section of the City’s website. Why weren’t they included on the Agenda for Wednesday’s meeting if they were sent to a news outlet on Monday? Shouldn’t the citizens have the information first – before a newspaper?
After repeated attempts throughout the years, The Gazette still does not deliver to my house. Many of my neighbors in apartments don’t get it either. This obviously is not the way to communicate with residents.
I hope The Gazette spelled their names correctly because I have no way of officially knowing:
Jason Anthony
Temperance Blalock
Denis Cain
Julie Carr
Sean Hart
Soo Lee-Cho
Charles Littlefield
Roald Schrack
Eric Segal
During Citizen’s Forum at Monday night’s Mayor and Council meeting, Beryl Feinberg spoke about her application for the APFO Committee. She said that no one who applied was ever contacted or interviewed about their application. She was only contacted to be told she was not selected. She knew that there would be seven (7) male and three (3) female members chosen, including one reserve. Since Rockville’s population is roughly 50-50 male-female, she didn’t think the Committee was inclusive or reflective of our population.
Councilmember John Britton responded by asking for copies of the resumes and applications of all the applicants knowing that it is privileged information. Due to Ms. Feinberg’s remarks, he was curious about the ethnic, gender and geographic breakdown.
Councilmember Piotr Gajewski used his response to Citizen’s Forum to explain his position on the Committee:
I’m sure you’re not going to be the last to complain about the composition of this Committee which is the problem I have with the forming of this Committee to begin with. APFO is arguably one of the most inflammatory issues that our City will be facing. I think it should be faced by elected officials at the very least it should be faced by officials appointed by elected officials.
Mayor Phyllis Marcuccio reminded everyone that it was within the privilege of the Planning Commission to appoint a subcommittee. The Mayor and Council had absolutely no input. The Planning Commission will eventually make recommendations to the Mayor and Council for a decision. She added:
I think it’s a process that maybe is flawed in some ways. I don’t think that anyone had the intention of slighting a soul. I think they were just looking for more help and this was one way to do it. Sometimes when you mean to do well, you do poorly. Let’s hope it results in something we can positively use.
I’ve been told that originally only 11 people applied for the 9 positions which is why the deadline was extended and about 21 applications were eventually received.
Regardless of these concerns, the Planning Commission seems pleased with their selections.
During Wednesday night’s meeting the Planning Commission decided the Advisory Committee’s start date will be January 2, 2011 and they must report to the Planning Commission by their first meeting in July.
Commissioner John Tyner reminded the representatives that their first chore is to elect a Chair to keep the meetings moving on schedule.
Offering all the Commissioners as a resource, Tracy Pakulniewicz advised the Task Force that they can contact them with questions in addition to asking City staff because “it is a pretty hefty task that you’re being charged with and we want to make sure you have all the information, all of the insight you need to effectively and efficiently do your job.”
Mr. Tyner added “You won’t be left hanging out in the breeze. That’s for sure.”
“The Rockville Planning Commission had tasked nine people with reviewing one of its most controversial zoning ordinances.
The members of the Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance Committee will officially be announced at the Planning Commission’s meeting today. The list includes business, non-profit and neighborhood representatives.
(The grammatical error is The Gazette’s, not mine.)”
if you are referring to the last sentence, ‘the list includes….representatives,” there is no grammar error that i see.
i’m a reporter. if a reporter asks for information that is known by city or other elective officials, there’s no legal right of a public body to withhold it. however, if there’s no general news release, it’s up to the reporter to ask and obtain the information. a citizen has the same right.
that said, it should have been on the planning commission agenda, which is posted before the meeting.
in reference to council britton’s actions, i have a problem with any city official reviewing the applications if those who applied expected the information would not be made public.
were the same concerns ms. feinerg raised about this taskforce also raised by her or anyone else about the makeup of the communications task force? my recollection was that it was 100% loaded up with people who are opposed to the current city management and had an agenda to achieve. i don’t recall any objections of this sort.
i hope the meeting dates and times of this taskforce will be made public in advance so that other rockville citizens may attend. i share councilmember gajewski’s concerns 100%, which is why i did not apply to this body.
First sentence.
I’ll try to clarify the sequence of events, at least from my perspective:
There was no “interview”, so I heard nothing between the time I sent in my application and the time I received confirmation.
On Saturday 12/4/2010 I received a phone call from David Hill informing me that my application to be on the committee was accepted. He would not tell me the names of the other members of the committee, since he said that they were still being notified. He told me that the membership announcement would be made at the Planning Commission meeting on December 15, and invited me to show up at that time. I asked him whether this was a “secret”, and he said no, that I could certainly tell people.
On Monday 12/13 I watched the Mayor and Council meeting online, and was quite surprised to see Ms. Feinberg speak at Citizens’ Forum about the membership of the committee, since I was not aware that this was public knowledge at that time. There had been nothing posted on the city’s website about this, and I assumed that it would not be publicized until Wednesday. I then did a Google search and discovered the Gazette’s online article, which surprised me because the Gazette usually releases articles on Wednesdays.
I attended the Planning Commission meeting on Wednesday 12/15, and the committee and its members were announced by the Planning Commission as an agenda item. The list of members was not posted on the Planning Commission’s website prior to the 12/15 meeting.
I don’t understand why Ms. Feinberg was so upset about the membership of the committee that she felt compelled to bring up the issue at Mayor and Council’s Citizen Forum (which wasn’t necessarily the appropriate venue), but then did not in turn show up at the Planning Commission meeting to voice her objections. I also don’t understand how Ms. Feinberg got the list of committee members well in advance of the Monday evening meeting.
Theresa Defino wrote:
“in reference to council britton’s actions, i have a problem with any city official reviewing the applications if those who applied expected the information would not be made public.”
I don’t know why any applicant to a board, commission or task force would expect their statement of interest or resume to not be made public. It is the practice of the City to in fact attach such information to agendas when appointments to boards and commissions are made, and the information was posted for all volunteers for the Budget and Communication task forces. To the best of my knowledge, anything of this nature, short of an application for employment, is part of the public record.
Ms. Defino also wrote:
“were the same concerns ms. feinerg raised about this taskforce also raised by her or anyone else about the makeup of the communications task force? my recollection was that it was 100% loaded up with people who are opposed to the current city management and had an agenda to achieve. i don’t recall any objections of this sort.”
This kind of rhetoric is not only without merit, it is insulting to every one of the 14 or so volunteers who gave freely of their time to work with other citizens, city staff and council members in an effort to improve communications between the City and its’ residents. For most of the volunteers, it was their first time getting involved with a civic activity where they thought they could make a contribution.
On a personal note, I was one of the original 12 to be appointed, but soon resigned after insinuations from some councilmembers and one or two residents that it smacked of cronyism. Really? A task force with a six month charter? With a mission to help residents become better informed citizens? That had nothing to do with policy? Really?
Many of the suggestions formulated by the task force were rolled out by the PIO before the body even had the opportunity to present the ideas. Their work, even just the fact the task force was in operation, led to many improvements in the quality, quantity and dissemination of information to the public.
I salute and thank those who step up and try to make our City a better place. I also think it would be appropriate for the several councilmembers who occasionally contribute to this blog to speak up in defense of these volunteers, unless they agree with you.
joe, do not twist my words or add your own meaning to what i said. also, do not insinuate that any council member who does not comment here “agrees” with me…agrees about what? that citizen service has no value?
i never said that. nor would i. it has great value and i do salute it.
nothing i said impugned work of the task force, nor the value of volunteer service in general. i didn’t know that you had resigned, and find your reasons curious.
i do know how much work you put into the golf advisory commitee it was greatly appreciated.
i stand by my characterization of the personal feelings of many of the members of the communications task force as being opposed to the current city administration. i have been in many, many meetings and heard the same criticisms over and over and i have also followed the attacks on the current city manager by the mayor and some members of the council, and their supporters. as you may recall, i testified against the creation of the task force during the Citizen’s Forum before any members were appointed. i felt it was unnecessary and that the city staff themselves could come up with many ideas to improve communication.
you did not address my main point, which is were objections raised by ms. feinberg about the sex of the APFO commitee ever raised about the task force or any other city body, and is there a certain male-female ratio that is required, or that exists on other similar committees or boards in the city?