Vision 2030 concerns raised
Barbara Diamond
Some folks don’t see eye to eye with the City Council’s decision to
oversee the implementation of the Vision 2030 recommendations.
“Implementation needs a monitoring committee outside of the
council,” Jean Raun said Monday. “You don’t monitor your own
actions.”
Raun moderated a public meeting Saturday at the Unitarian
Universalist Fellowship that included residents who are interested in
participating in the implementation phase of the vision process. Some
of them expressed concern that the approved procedures will edge out
the general public and not get adequate city staff support. An
estimated 50 people attended, many of them familiar faces.
“We were not happy with the council’s decision, as we understood
it,” Raun said.
Saturday’s meeting was scheduled weeks before the City Council
voted 4-0 on March 4 to accept the Vision Committee report and put
itself in charge of the implementation process. The council also
decided to delegate the seven elements in the Vision 2030
recommendations to already existing groups, including
council-appointed boards, committees and commissions. Applications
for leadership roles will be reviewed by the council and selected at
a publicized meeting, date to be announced later.
“I definitely feel the council should be the oversight committee,”
Councilwoman Elizabeth Pearson said Tuesday. “It is our job to
prioritize projects and budget items for the city.
“The council needs to go through the city committees and
organizations to identify who could best implement each element of
the report and identify priorities for them.”
Pearson and Councilwoman Cheryl Kinsman sponsored the Vision 2030
hearing at the March 4 council meeting.
Councilman Steven Dicterow, who was absent from the meeting, said
last November that he had his own vision for implementation. He said
then that he could not vote to accept the Steering Committee’s report
or a proposal to refine and implement the report worked out by some
committee members and retiring Councilman Paul Freeman that was
presented to the council at the Nov. 19 meeting. Freeman withdrew his
proposal for lack of support.
“Some of the group that met Saturday felt that our meeting
prompted the council to finally take action, but I understand that
Elizabeth had been working with various groups for some time,” Raun
said.
A committee was appointed on Saturday to recommend some way to
establish an outside group to monitor the implementation process. The
ad hoc committee will include some former mayors who attended the
meeting. Raun will chair it.
“I would like wiser minds than mine to recognize that this is a
30-year process, not a particular council’s or a particular
committee’s,” Raun said. “We need to recognize that the vision will
change and there has to be a mechanism for that change. It will be
difficult to arrive at that structure.
John Thomas, one of the editors of the revised Steering Committee
report, said people at the meeting appreciated the efforts of Pearson
and Kinsman to get the report accepted by the council and for
recommending the entire report be posted on the city’s Web site.
However, he points out that the steering committee recommended an
independent implementation oversight committee.
“It would have the responsibility to report progress to the
council and to the public,” Thomas said Tuesday. “Its job should be
to simply say these action items are being accomplished, these are
not; not to evaluate the items.”
Some recommended actions will be accomplished without the city
being required to take a role or funding them, Thomas said. He
believes that it would be appropriate to include some of the action
items in the city’s general plan.
Former Mayor Ann Christoph said at the meeting that there should
be an official city process where projects are reviewed for
consistency with the vision report in the same manner that projects
are reviewed for consistency with the general plan.
She also believes that without public participation, “the city as
a whole will go its own way and visioning would be left as just an
interesting experience.”
Carolyn Wood, a member of the city’s Parking, Traffic and
Circulation Committee, also expressed frustration.
“Something funny is going on that I don’t understand,” Wood said
Monday night. “It’s different than anything I have ever felt before
in Laguna. The council is coming up with ideas and going with them
without looking at all the facts or the whole picture.”
Steering Committee member John Keith said it might be a little
late for the council to step in as the oversight committee.
“If they had been an active part of the visioning process, then
they would be qualified to continue in the spirit in which it was
headed,” Keith said.
“New faces and new ideas are in the vision report. Now, it can be
handed over to existing groups where it is appropriate and come back
to an oversight committee that understands the vision.
“The council isn’t qualified to do that, but that has never
stopped the council before.”
Mayor Toni Iseman seconded Keith’s comments.
“The magic of the visioning process was the emergence of new
voices and new faces from the community,” Iseman said Tuesday. “We
are narrowing the process and giving it back to the usual suspects.”
Iseman said she voted for Pearson’s motion because she supports
the visioning process, but would like to see a more inclusive
procedure for implementation.
Many of the usual suspects attended Saturday’s meeting.
“It has to be a partnership, but the implementation oversight
committee should be separate from the council,” said former Mayor
Wayne Peterson, who will serve on the ad hoc committee created
Saturday. “The committee could have council members on it, but it
should not be solely the council.
Peterson endorsed the participation of the Chamber of Commerce as
the lead organization for the Economic Sustainability element.
In her presentation to the council, Councilwoman Pearson suggested
that such groups as the Planning Commission, the Design Review Board,
the Heritage Committee, the Housing and Human Affairs, the Arts
Alliance and Ocean Blue as possible leadership organizations. She
proposed excluding political action committees from consideration for
a leadership role.
Village Laguna is the only community organization in town that is
an active political action committee.
Individuals and groups who would like to participate in the
implementation process may contact council members. For more
information, call 494-0704. Council members’ home telephone numbers
also are listed.
All the latest on Orange County from Orange County.
Get our free TimesOC newsletter.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Daily Pilot.