Today's Daily Bulletin (abbreviated version--what's with that--NO COMICS!!) has the legal ad for a change in the date of the public hearing on the environmental documents for the Lewis Homes Foothill/Towne project. The date of the hearing has been moved from May 19 to June 2. Public review of the environmental documents deadline is May 6.
Among the approvals being asked for are:
- Acquisition of the Property
- Site and elevation plans for the project
- Tentative parcel map
- Construction plans, and
- EMINENT DOMAIN
You can respond to the environmental documents to the city in writing by the May 6 date. If there is a legal challenge to the environmental issues, only those which have been brought up in the arguments during public comment will be allowed. If you're concerned about noise, traffic, or any other environmental issue, now is the time to respond.
This is all discretionary, so it will be heard by the city council on June 2. You can make arguments during that point to try and convince the council, who will vote on this important issue at that time.
This is the COATES issue!!!!
13 comments:
John, were you aware of the Special Meeting on 4/28/08 to hear a presentation on "transforming the City's commercial corridors." It was a joint meeting between the Council and Planning Commission @ Ganesha Community center.
Arrrggghhh...Why don't they post these events on the city calendar? I'm a newbie to city politics, but this cloak of secrecy is driving me crazy!
No Cloak of Secrecy here...
http://public-records.ci.pomona.ca.us/weblink7/Browse.aspx
It was all posted.
I gotta get to that meeting. I hope i get out of class early for that one. it's my last monday night class so i'll be at all the city council meetings after that. I hope this Coates issue goes over well. the people need to act on this.
I think that Laserfiche Weblink thing is great for keeping records but it's inefficient and also insufficient at getting key meeting dates across. I think all valid meeting dates should be listed on the homepage of the city's website. Preferably where all those lovely new buttons are (lol) where EVERYONE can see them. I think important dates should be forthrightly listed on the front page because how many people will even navigate the Weblink feature? I also would like to know if it's possible for that system to show the time and date something was uploaded into the system to clear up any disagreements as to when people were notified, let the record show, ANONYMOUS~!! lol.
Ed,
I was completely unaware of the meeting.
Because I'm such a pain in the back (or lower) I usually get mailed notification for anything having to do with Historic Preservation (oh, I did get a notification that the HPC meeting this month, scheduled for Wednesday, May 7 has been canceled to a lack of items for discussion). I get the monthly HPC agenda, but not the city council agenda (I look those up myself).
I'm sure that the city followed the Brown Act and posted the meeting. That means that it was posted on the bulletin board outside city council chambers and at the library, among some other places. So legally, I'm sure that they can make the argument that they were there. Unfortunately, this item evidently wasn't as important as the previous special joint meetings so no notices went out (Remember, the last one our mayor had notices sent out to selected areas north of the 10 Freeway and in Phillips Ranch).
It's an election year. We'll be electing a new mayor (candidates to be announced once the voters have determined if they want to move Norma Torres up to Sacramento) and council people in the first (George Hunter), fourth (Paula Lantz), and sixth (Stephen Atcheley) council districts. We need to impress on the candidates for these four offices (a clear majority of the council) that we need more openness in city government.
Garrett- If people are really interested, they will navigate a page fo info.
And the point I was trying to make with the laserfiche link is that the public notice goes on to state that the item was noticed in the Daily Bulletin, La Voz, Time Warner and posted at the City Hall, Council Chambers and at the GAnesha PArk Comm. Center. What else do you need? A homing pigeon to your doorstep?
-TS
There certainly are enough pigeons to go around. Perhaps you're on to something, that might benifit Pomona residents that do not know that the dates are posted in these places. I would hope it's a lot easier to enlighten whom is in charge of the website (who already is paid for the service) on the matter rather than sqaundering yet even more money on smart-pigeons. lol.
My personal opinion on the laserfiche is that searching for anything is like digging through a cluttered desk with a pile of files(thats saying anything is even in certain folders) looking for a single post-it. lol. As I expressed in my previous comment, Laserfiche is for record keeping...It should not serve the purpose of a Meeting Date Bulletin, a bulletin as such should be blunt in nature and not require much effort to notice. Does anyone disagree with that? lol.
By the way, if the dates are listed in all these places, what will it hurt to put them up directly on the homepage of the city website? It should only take a few minutes. lol.
TS,
The one place where I should have seen it, but it got past me was at the end of the previous agenda where it says that the meeting is being adjourned to . . . .
As a detailed reader of the legal ads in the DB I must say that if it was noticed there, I also missed that one (I have a feeling that what you saw was that the DB was "notfied" not that they had the info published, such notification goes out as press releases so the paper's can attend, and there is no guarantee that they'll run with the story).
Have you ever tried to watch the TimeWarner "local origination" channel? It covers Pomona, Claremont, Corona, etc. The bulletin board items are innocuous and there is no way to get to the information you want, you have to wait for it to come to you. I don't have hours of time to spend watching that kind of tripe (I spend it all on blogs--OK, so I need a life).
I've not been critical of the laser fische system thus far because I know that the city clerk has only just begun to use it and there are still kinks. As an example, the HPC notification is not on LF but is on the older page (having two different pages with the same information is VERY confusing). The LF system promises to increase the information we can get, which is great, but the city's webmasters need to understand how to create links that actually go where you expect them to (more on this later).
Anon, clearly I navigate the links otherwise I wouldn't have found the agenda. I would compare the city's website to a large building that you can't always find the front door. The material at this Special Meeting has long-term implications for the city of Pomona and would have justified more advertising. Just to emphasize my point, today's Daily Bulletin article on the Special Meeting even includes a comment or two on the need for public involvement.
We have a city calendar, why not use it? Tonight's City Council meeting isn't even posted, but somehow Claremont manages to post theirs. Why do only the minimum?
I have the same complaint about the City calendar Ed. I too wonder why HPC, PC and CC Meetings are not on that calendar. John- I now see your point. The problem with the City's website is that most of the content and usability is limited due to the fact that it is controlled by an outside firm to whom the City has contracted as Webmaster and designer. Its some company from upnorth I think. From what I hear-due to an antiquated contract and cost of revamping the website, the City is limited creatively to what they can do to the site, so Ive heard. Garrett, you still make no sense (no practicality in any of your past ideas either, you still must be a student or something in planning"digging through a clutered desk???").
_TS
TS (whoever you are)- I'm sorry you do not understand my comments, might I suggest reading them more thoroughly? They're all in plain legible English... lol. What does my education status have to do with the comments I am making? Please don't be intimidated that someone younger than yourself is just as or almost as intelligent as you are, with or without a college education (You must be an old coot, crotchetiness is not becoming of anyone). I'm almost positive you see someone young and you think to yourself- "They don't know a damn thing, how can they look and be so stupid?!". Do you not know? Freash minds have freash ideas... Get with this century. In my defense, you brought this on yourself. So, regardless of your actual age, you seem like every other aged grump. lol.
To everyone else- Please ignore how awful I am to the ELDERLY. lol.
Argh, cloak of secrecy or not, thanks to Ed for digging through all that to find the notice of the meeting! I'm delighted that the city clerk is putting stuff on-line, and that's a great first step. But hopefully it is only the first step.
You can't expect that "if people are really interested, they will..." If we're going to have meetings that are announced on the bulletin board at the library, they oughta go up on the web site as well (in a prominent place). That Laser Fiche site may be okay for archiving random data, but it's a terrible notification system.
TS, Thanks for the info on the website. I don't list criticizing the city as one of my favorite hobbies, but sometimes the frustration gets the better of me.
And as far as expressing opinions, bring them all on. My ideas never sound stupid when I'm only saying them to myself.
Will the city continue to get better if we don't throw the occasional jab? Maybe, or will we see the neighborhoods that throw the jabs continuing to improve, while those that sit silently won't. Being neighborhood- and district-independent, the website deserves a beefy dose of scrutiny. Or at least that's what I've been saying to myself.
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