If we learned anything during James Norman's tenure in Ramsey, it was that manipulative game playing is the easiest way to engender strong lasting distrust.
Some are slow learners, or unaware of information gaps they should know about and cover by communicating - and the City website is for that function. Or perhaps others have learned little and still want to do things the hard way, the duplicitous way, wasting people's time while misinforming or inadequately informing us. And not trusting us beyond a feeling of dealing with emotion-led savages that have to be parented or shepherded, from the council table or other official venues.
We the people ... paternalized and fed distortion or having key data withheld.
Article 1, Section 1 of the Minnesota Constitution teaches differently, but some either resist the idea, or are unaware of it binding even appointees to seven-county-wide seats of power:
Government is instituted for the security, benefit and protection of the people, in whom all political power is inherent, together with the right to alter, modify or reform government whenever required by the public good.
Case in point, the Comp Plan "citizen involvement" process was handled exactly and inexcusably in an information-starved way. For what reason(s), I can only speculate. Consultants should be changed. They were part of the flawed process.
Many, myself included, asked during the citizen-input sessions of the 2008 Comp Plan process the simple question, "What does the 800 pound gorilla that grasps anywhere it wants to, say it wants?"
Some, of course, phrased it differently: "What are the parameters Met. Council expects of Ramsey, their quotas and priorities, we'd best know that, if this process is to be most helpful and productive," is how more delicate people phrased it. But the message was the same. And the question was asked, multiple times, by multiple persons in ways it would be hard to honestly misunderstand.
The question clearly went to staff - repeatedly - to the consultant - repeatedly.
Phil Carlson even had a power point presentation for us. Like the guy from Chicago but with somewhat less condescension, it was: Nice dog. Nice pony. Allusions and suggestions. Steering more than informing. Then there is this
Met. Council double speak, fluff without substance:
Cotton candy can give you a bellyache.
The simple fact is, all the while there was a 27 page document with a precise answer, or enough of the answer that it should have been not only produced, but featured on the City of Ramsey website. And that should have happened with a public meeting at council also held back in 2005 when it would have made more of a difference. Within sixty days following issuance of the item. We were mushroomed instead. September of 2005 was Norman-time, but that's not an excuse but an explanation. It has remained a suppressed item, not seeing the sunshine of public awareness by publication by Ramsey, at any time since its creation.
Unless it gets pulled by Met Council, and if so I can email copies,
it is presently online here, stating at the start (p.3 of 27 pages):
System statement review process.
If your community disagrees with elements of this system statement, or has any questions about this system statement, we urge you to contact your sector representative, Ann Braden, 651 602-1705, to review and discuss potential issues or concerns.
The Council and local units and districts have historically resolved questions about forecasts and other components of the system statement through discussions.
Request for hearing.
If a local governmental unit or school district and the Council are unable to resolve disagreements over the content of a system statement, the unit or district may by resolution request that a hearing be conducted by the Council’s Land Use Advisory Committee or by the state Office of Administrative Hearings for the purpose of considering amendments to the system statement. According to Minnesota Statutes section 473.857, the request shall be made by the local unit or district within 60 days after receipt of the system statement. If no request for a hearing is received by the Council within 60 days, the statement becomes final.
System statement issue date:
The official date of the issuance of this system statement is September 12, 2005.
And, for those curious and suspicious of suppression by and among consenting individuals, one piece of evidence is that those sitting on the appellate agency body, its "Land Use Advisory Committee," per Met Council's website,
here, include
"David Elvig, Elected official, Ramsey." You'd expect in the normal course of things, Land Use Advisory appointees would be kept informed about developments known by Met Council to affect their local governmental unit.
So, we the citizens never knew squat, nobody told us nothing, so to speak; but who was in the loop while we were conciously being kept out of the loop? Was it ever on a council agenda? If so, that's news to me. Was it ever prominently featured as "news" on the City website? If so, that's news to me. Child car seat stuff, I have seen that in Ramsey Resident and on the website, but news of what the 800 pound gorilla is up to, from the gorilla tenders and other insiders, strangely was absent and still is.
There probably is some explanation. Perhaps all on the "Land Use Advisory Council," and their in-laws, were happy and satisfied knowing whatever they knew, and also wholly happy and satisfied with our citizens' state of knowledge.
Did the Ramsey City Council know of this, and when did they know it? Individually by scuttlebutt, and officially, by agenda and publication?
With statutes cited and legal rights at stake, presumably the item was reviewed in a timely way by the city attorney. That's the normal course of things, when municipal legal rights are at stake. What duties about citizen notice would have been discussed with the city attorney? Who said what?
More good questions for a new industrious council to delve into. Closed session is available for discussing past attorney-client consultation. And if memories do not remain sharp, that in itself is pertinent information.
Here are opening three page screen-shots of the Ramsey "System Statement" (assigned quota figures and all, click to enlarge and read):
Please finish the post, then go back to the link, download and save the document, and study it carefully. It is worth the time. Again,
the link is here. Every page is informative. Then: Raise your hand, student, if you've ever seen a page of that hummer before. David Jeffrey, the one council incumbent standing now for reelection, he's the one whose hand I'd like shown, up or down; in the loop, outside the loop? Good question? Sure.
And Ward 4 voters deserve to know, don't they? The others are lame ducks, or not on council in 2005, except for the Davids, Jeffrey and Elvig. So, who knew what, and discussed what, when, with whom, and what decisions were reached?
The key document, the innocuously named "System Statement," charts, tables, pretty multi-colored maps and all was withheld, totally, from its inception in Sept. 2005, until a chance discovery yesterday,
not on Ramsey's website, but on Met. Council's. Any bets whether it was put up there during the sixty days following its creation? I will give 5:1 odds it was not. Any takers? Sixty days came, sixty days went, deemed acceptance followed by law from our community's silence. But we were never told ...
Tough luck, Ben Dover. You were out of the loop.
That's
not our problem, on the "Land Use Advisory Committee." Not Met. Council's worry.
Not any individual appointed Met Council member's worry there, whoever she might be. Things worked swell, apparently, from that perspective.
The document doubtlessly in a timely fashion passed into and/or through James Norman's hands. Details have not been published about the history of the item, its passage among Ramsey officialdom's hands.
We await news of all that. A new council might quiz staff. And, consider, where is James Norman these days? And by exactly what steps and with what help has he landed in his present employment activities, and what's it pay? All good questions. Has he landed a transportation-transit related job? Has he had any particular help in getting it? I truly doubt folks from Lodi had much concern for helping him land gently. Who did? Whose agenda(s) had he served? With whom had he accumulated favors?
All good questions. A new council might pursue such inquiry, perhaps as in the past, unanimously intent on a single course of action. Without dissent. Or split, with a split council vote a good thing, a promising thing, not bad.
Some things are shameful. Those in authority knowing of the item, and keeping it from the citizens should be voted out, recalled, and/or fired, if they in fact even knew of it. Some on council probably did have express knowledge. Others, possibly not. But keeping us, the people, in the dark over it was malfeasance, misfeasance, nonfeasance, and cause for recall - a recall for those we cannot now simply vote out, this November.
Sunshine is the only disinfectant, not merely the best.
And we, the citizens were indefensibly kept wholly in the dark by city government, on an ongoing and obviously intentional basis. Intentional on the part of those with knowledge. It would surprise me if the center of the council table were out of the loop.
Go back above and reread Minnesota Constitution, opening of the Bill of Rights. Complying with that can be real and sincere, it can be arrogantly ignored [can you say "James Norman"], or we can be given all show, no substance, from government, despite the mandate.
That last option probably is the most insulting. It wastes our time. The appearance, the illusion, is most vexing.
There is more. What are you going to drink, on the way to 2030? Will there be a multimillion dollar treatment future, for Ben Dover, the Ramsey taxpayer? When "consulted" about our 2008 Comp Plan thinking, what information about water issues were we given; what info was Kathy Tingelstad given, water-wise, when she showed up to hear about water resources, wetlands concerns, drought planning, and all those Norway pines along Ramsey Blvd. where the ditching for running the sewer pipe to the Bauer Gun Club and the Peterson cornfield projects messed up the equilibrated existing water table levels? We were not shown any of this water-related presentation, which includes these screenshots, and if Rep. Tingelstad was shown it, it was not in any session where Ben Dover was invited:
Now, a big disclaimer - I got those power point items again, from Met Council's website,
here, not from Ramsey's. If anyone knows of their being published on the Ramsey website, please add a comment to this post saying so, or email me. My presumption is we were kept in the dark on these details. Brian Olson would not make such a decision as his first choice, as best as I can read the man. With me he always has been straightforward when in a position where it would have been just as easy, or easier, to obfuscate. But this question of where's the water to come from, how serious is the situation, it is input for before citizens take a lot of their time to discuss resources and planning thoughts. It is a horse to be put before the cart.
