Public comments vital to public participation

Editor,

Over the last several years there has been a change at the Historic District Commission table and I would like to see it addressed. Bring back general public comments!

I would have gone to a commission meeting and mentioned it under “Public Comments” but they did away with public comments. Yes, you can make comments to a particular project but no general comments. For general public comments, they advise one to go to the city council table or attend any of their “once on a blue moon workshops.”

So how do I say to you that during a recent meeting, I was disappointed and disheartened with the commission’s discussion about their roles and responsibilities as it pertains to HDC?

Someone is talking in the background but clearly one hears Dee Bright say that illness is no reason not to maintain your property. Huh? (Illness and poverty are the two reasons that come to my mind.)

And more? Another commissioner, John Nuckolls, stated that one of the jobs of the commission is telling property owners who cannot maintain their property that the owners need to sell to someone who can maintain the property and move on. Oh, yes he did… use the words “move on.”

Only Glenna [Booth] tried to humanize the discussion.

Shame on the HDC for those who spoke and for those who sat by and said nothing about how can we help instead of how can we punish.

I hope the city council watches the meeting and takes appropriate action, like asking for a resignation or two. Watch the meeting yourselves. The last five minutes are all comments about how they see their domain.

I am hoping that many of these commissioners don’t know that some folks lived here before there was such a thing as the HDC. Do we toss these folks out?

As always, I ask who are we?

Pat Matsukis