Directed by the president of the League city dog park association, city council member and council liaison to the parks board, the parks board voted to send a request for funding of a city dog park to our council. Ignoring a parks survey done by the city to set priorities as well as ignoring a phone survey taken only a few days ago that stated that out of 4873 Phone calls made to residence of Leaguer city, 1751 we hang up, 83 were wrong numbers or fax machines and only 201 voted for the park while 2778 voted against the park, the parks board rubberstamped the request. The total amount is not known but I have a spread sheet that says the total cost of phase 1 and 2 will be 377,000 dollars.
It is a disappointment that Council member Baron, who is the president of the League city dog park association, city council member and council liaison to the parks board, has made this a political pet pork barrel project for the chosen few that we must all pay for. Ethically, he should not be involved in this project as he is the president of the dog park association and his organization will directly benefit from it. All that talk about ethics during the campaign and all the citizens get is another special interest project.
45 comments:
But there are still 6 other Council Members that have to weigh in on this, is that correct?
You are correct. I am sure they will do what is best for our city and its citizens.
I could easily be swayed as to the value of almost ANY park. Especially when the cash is sitting in the bank and waiting to be used. However, when the people have so clearly said NO they don't want the cash spent that way, I hope and pray that the council will listen.
I echo what I said elsewhere. The park board needs to be disolved and reformed with all new appointments. This is an abject failure to represent the people's will.
I wish I could post on this, but [SIC] I am out of touch with the will of the people, per CDF.
You are hardly in the same position of glaring conflict of interest that Neil is up to his eyeballs in, so your recusing yourself does not serve as a place holder for him doing so, and is not helpful. It sure sounds noble though, so I'll buy you a beer for that.
It is quite fascinating that the Chester L. Davis Sports Complex costing millions of dollars for a single use facility (For Organized Sports) was built, but it sits idle during most of the Daytime Hours and requires constant maintenance annually in the thousands of Dollars, but it can not be used to allow dogs to run freely off-leash, when the Sports Complex is not in use.
When people complain about single use parks, as this caters exclusively to organized sports, that many people of League City no longer or have ever participate in, seems a waste of money if it is not in constant use 80% of the normal operating hours.
Good point Fubar... We should market that park better for daytime events and tournaments etc.
Here's what I have emailed to council. (Chris M. please delete my previous post.)
----------------------------------------------------------
To the honorable Mayor and Council of League City,
Soon the recommendation from the Parks Board to proceed with the Dog Park will come before you officially. I am writing to remind you that though the Parks Board makes recommendations, you and you alone are the representative of the people and the people’s will.
The people’s will has been expressed clearly and though 10% of League City may want this park, some where between 60% to 90% do not want this park. The city survey and the phone surveys which have been conducted and which could easily be repeated demonstrate these numbers clearly.
This is not a matter of spending money on something that is wanted but not pressing. This is a matter of something overwhelmingly opposed by the people.
Further this is not a matter of vital city services, the responsible provision of which may overrule any dynamic or static opinion of the people. This is an item of optional purpose to which the people have clearly demonstrated their opposition.
So, I abjure you to do away with any further arguments of merit as you note that the people who own the positions you hold have spoken clearly and that any further persuasion on the matter should be taken up with the people. Please vote “no” on this expenditure that the people of League City so thoroughly and clearly oppose.
If you ever need to contact me on this matter or any other where I may assist you in your service of League City, my phone number is xxxxxxxxxx.
Respectfully,
Chris Stevens
918 Almond Pointe
League City, Texas 77573
Yeah, what he said!
Something seems definitely wrong here.
If the property having a value of $232,000.00 and was used to pay for Park Dedication Fees by Centerpointe, then spending an additional 194,000.00 to improve the property so LC Residents can now make function use of the property, how does that make the project cost $377K. I do not understand. Please explain
The property has been sitting idle for several years, not being maintained by anyone, probably unknown to most LC Residents and now by spending $194K to improve the same property so people can enjoy it, seems worth the money to have picnic tables and a legal play area for dogs and the entire family within the LC Community, in a secluded area that is well shaded.
Since each and every member of the Parks Board is appointed by the Mayor and approved by City Council, that you should take your concerns to the City Council to voice your complaints that the board should be disolved. At least there, it will have meaning.
http://www.leaguecity.com/index.aspx?nid=479
I think that you may have it wrong. I believe that monies are paid in lieu of dedicating park land. If the required amount of property is not dedicated for parks, a per lot fee is assessed, not vice versa.
Chris, your writing is very eloquent. However, I question the veracity some of the statistics you are using.
Fubar: I get $426K, not $377. Council meets are the place to take citizen concerns, yes, but not the only place. Parks board meets are also required to be open to the public, and residents' three-minutes of concerns are solicited, same as at council. When those concerns are summarily dismissed without due course, we must ask if the board is functioning in proper manner. What we just saw was a board with a predisposed agenda and its mind made up before the meeting even started. The skunk's rationale, shared by the board majority, was an insult to any intelligent person.
Mr. Moretto:
Since you only listen to your rhetoric and opinions of persons who agree with you, I can understand how you derive your opinion. You have predetermined ideas who and how people are in their particular situation and dismiss all others.
However, there is generally more than one side to every coin. The larger picture is, I have heard about a petition that was circulated promoting an effort to have people place their signatures onto a paper, which I presumed that would be handed over to the Parks Board and/or City Council. I have also heard there are several hundred signatures on it supporting the Dog Park. I have no first hand knowledge if the survey exists. But, if the survey does exist, then it would negate an anonymous electronic telephone survey where people are only rendering an opinion electronically. It could have been a child on the other end of the survey, no way of knowing since all they had to do was to push one of 3 numbers on a key pad. And if people are willing to sign a petition, then there is certainly support for the Dog Park that you and others are unwilling to accept.
You have no way of knowing what the Parks Board has heard over the last several weeks and over the last several years. The Parks Board voted unanimously on 11/7/07 for the Newport Site for the Dog Park, did you voice you opinion opposing that as a possible site for a Dog Park? The Parks Board may have heard from others how they desired to have a Dog Park in LC, you just do not know the facts that they know. They may have heard via email or by letter or by phone call, you just do not know, all you know is what you want to hear.
What is this skunk's rationale, shared by the board majority, was an insult to any intelligent person? Another survey conducted by someone else other than you that supports the position of a Dog Park, that you must give demeaning names to!
Yes the numbers add up to over $400,000.00, but in the text of the original question it stated a sum of $377,000.00 for 2 phases of the proposal, but did not elaborate. The proposal that City Council voted upon in October 2008, only had one phase costing $194,178.00. That is where I do not understand about 2 phases costing $377,000.00, when what was stated at City Council by the Director of Parks. It did mention the term Phase 1, but I never heard what Phase 2 would consist of. In the June 2009 Council Meeting during the question and answer period with Councilman Phalen, it was mentioned that a phase 2 existed, but there was no plans to bring that proposal forward, which would require a separate vote by city council, and it had no costing to it.
When you dismiss apartment dwellers, you are very dismissive of many people of League City, which makes me further understand your position. When starting out on my own, I had no large savings given to me by my parents or that was left to me or willed to me, all I could afford was an apartment. After I accumulated some wealth, I purchased a Condo and lived there for several years accumulating more wealth, and when I had enough savings for a house, I bought a house. To be so dismissive and to categorize peoples situation as transient, speaks volumes about you as a person.
Different segments of the populations vote differently and Democrats vote differently than Republicans. Different ethnic groups vote differently and so forth and so forth. To be so dismissive of apartment dwellers is not very friendly towards your for fellow human being.
Have a wonderful day today.
Thanks Marc.
Tommy Cones et. al. doubted the public numbers too.
Fubar: You offer yet more junk science, like we didn't get enough Wednesday. A poll held at the proposed location of a dog park, or in front of Petco, targets yet another demographic group not representative of the whole or average.
You pooh-pooh an electronic poll, yet you probably vote electronically at the polls nowadays. We all do. Get over it.
Like you, I spent many years as an apartment dweller too, and in no way mean to smear those folks (or trailer dwellers or anyone else). I merely present the fact that there is glaring difference in that demographic group's views on "free" pork barrel services.
Meanwhile, Bark (aka Fred) is busy on the other blog claiming that his objective is "grass roots" citizen support, and then proceeds to twist all kinds of junk science into the appearance of such support.
Next, you excuse parks board secrecy and dysfunction on grounds they may have "inside" information that I am not privy to. Well, Wednesday was the time to present it if they did!
I don't just listen to people who agree with me. I have listened to the voices of all the people on this issue, while others have manufactured one junk science poll after another to twist the inconvenient FACT that WE don't want no stinking dog park.
If I don't always listen to you, maybe it's because you say stupid things like Ds and Rs vote differently. No they don't. They couldn't if they wanted to, because their candidates aren't different!
I'm also getting a little sick of these comparisons between a dog park and some other kind of imaginary straw man park or project, or between a dog park and land left unused because it's worthless for anything in the world besides a DOG park, or parks money forfeited if not used for a DOG park. It's not about any of those hostage dreamings. It's about one thing only: A dog park, or NO dog park, and what all the people said about it, period.
Mr. Moratto,
Enough of this binary thinking: "A dog park, or NO dog park." Tearing down something without offering a viable alternative is destructive, not constructive. Also, this "straw man park or project" you vaguely refer to happens to have a real live $40 million dollar precedent in League City. My softball playing daughter doesn't get to play at Big League Dreams - or should I say "Field of Dreams" - whose lights I can see from my driveway. You have the intelligence to do better than your last post.
Thank you for the moving and heartfelt (I'm sure) rebuttal, hinged upon more blather about something else not related to a dog park. Pffft.
There is an interesting paragraph in the League City Parks and Open Space Master Plan concerning the survey.
Page 30 1st full Paragraph I quote.
“It is important to note that the survey respondents are a self-selected sample (i.e. they were not randomly chosen), and therefore the survey’s results cannot be directly applied to all City residents. Instead, the survey must be treated like the comments received at a public meeting, where those who attend generally have a significant interest in the topic discussion. The survey data accurately reflects the concerns of those residents who had sufficient interest in the parks and open space to voice their preference through the survey.”
It would appear the statement “therefore the survey’s results cannot be directly applied to all City residents” is not the will of the people as some would have everyone believe and the results are not “randomly chosen”.
Fine FUBU. There are two ways we can take a very accurate survey.
1) We can auto dial with a mahine. It would take a week or so.
2) We let council approve the park and then the council people who vote for can get kicked out of office at the next election for ignoring the will of the people.
In other words, the respondents were more likely to be the people who gave a damn (one way or the other) about a dog park (as opposed to the people who trashed the mailing, hung up the phone or otherwise didn't give a flip what goes on in the city or with their/our tax dollars).
Thanks for explaining.
Mr. Moratto,
Your continual inability to grasp the big picture about municipal projects makes it hard to take you seriously. The DOWN WITH >whatever< rant encourages knee jerk reactions and solves nothing. Connect the dots. It's not rocket science, as Mr. Stevens would say.
As comedian Ron White says:
"YOU CAN'T FIX STUPID"
One can educate the ignorant, but you are wasting your time, to train the stupid.
My handle "FUBAR SNAFU" is an appropriate acronym when dealing with STUPID!
A survey that says upfront “the survey’s results cannot be directly applied to all City residents” and still certain person’s use the survey as “Stone Tablets” stating it is "The Will of The People", are just fooling themselves.
All should know “The squeaky wheel gets the grease!”
Okay, Chuck. Whatever you say. Walk me through this, okay?
Column A: (.) The people.
Column B: (.)Dog Park. (.)No dog park.
Connect (.)dot in Column A with ONE (.)dot in Column B.
Have I got it now?
Of course I'm being facetious and simplistic. But the point is that there is a "main" thing and then there are all those "other" things. We need to keep our eye on the main thing and not be distracted by the other things. The other things must be moved around to accommodate the main thing, or else the tail is wagging the dog. If you're going to pay undeserved attention to other things (too many of them irrelevant distractions), don't drag me in with you.
Dog park, yes or no? The will of the people trumps all the other things, and it really is just that simple.
"The larger picture is, I have heard about a petition that was circulated promoting an effort to have people place their signatures onto a paper, which I presumed that would be handed over to the Parks Board and/or City Council. I have also heard there are several hundred signatures on it supporting the Dog Park"
Petition passed around at Petco. This petition didn't offer choices and force people to actually think about what they're giving up. Such petitions are only good for toilet paper
"Also, this "straw man park or project" you vaguely refer to happens to have a real live $40 million dollar precedent in League City. My softball playing daughter doesn't get to play at Big League Dreams - or should I say "Field of Dreams" - "
Bad precident is never a valid reason to make bad decision.
“It is important to note that the survey respondents are a self-selected sample (i.e. they were not randomly chosen), and therefore the survey’s results cannot be directly applied to all City residents."
What this means is that only those who cared to respond actually did (which is true of all surveys). The consultants were simply covering their butts with their statement because they didn't do a further assessment of those surveyed in order to establish a valid error rate. The survey went out randomly, folks responded. So give it an error rate of 10% instead of the 3% that surveys are typically conducted to. The dog park still lost big time.
and Stupid is building a park that beyond just "not a priority" for the people but most people in League City are opposed to spending ANY resources on building a single use Dog Park.
Why is that not obvious and what does it take to make it obvious? Anybody? Is there anything that can be done to convince you that this park shouldn't be built because the PEOPLE want it not to be built.
Oh, no, not another poll
Some drunk at the bar the other night kept blabbering at me about a bunch of nothing, maybe because nobody else would listen to him. I wondered if he might be one of the people on this blog, and was about to excuse myself and leave when he said something about being a systems and statistical analyst.
That sure got my undivided attention. I sat back down and asked "Really?" and offered to buy him his next round, not that he looked like he needed another one.
I just happened to still have the recent electronic data survey sheet about the dog park in my pocket, so I pulled it out and unfolded it. "Take a look at this," I said, and I also told him that the parks board had pulled a rabbit out of their hat and turned the 6.5% "yes" votes into nearly as many as the "no" votes, making the poll appear (to idiots, at least) inconclusive. After I explained how one of their polecats did that, I had to get the guy some napkins.
When he'd finished spewing ale through his nose and laughing, he said it sounded like classic skunk logic if he'd ever heard it. Funny he should use that word, I thought, and asked him if there was an "acceptable" way that I might turn that same 6.5% into a zero. "Not unless you're a skunk," the guy laughed.
"Why do you keep saying that?" I asked. "Never mind. Just give me your professional opinion about what the non-votes could mean."
"Well, there are lots of less odiferous conclusions one may draw," he told me. "So lay one on me," I said.
"Okay, the most likely and the safest assumption would be that since everybody called was a voter here, the ones who didn't vote because they weren't reached would have voted the same way as those who did. So you'd get 237 instead of 201 'yes' votes, and 4493 instead of 2778 'no' votes."
"That's not helpful," I said. "It's still 6.5% and 93.5%. It's the percentages I want to screw up, not the numbers. Do you actually get paid to do this stuff?"
"I got you to buy me this beer, didn't I?," he said with a smirk. I shook my head and left.
Mr. Moratto,
Goading me into answering an oversimplified question reeks of the "junk science" polls you rail against. Do I smell dog poop here, or is it just hypocrisy?
From one of my 2006 articles about personal investment strategies:
"Don't get stuck in the typical American rut of "binary thinking"--gold/paper, inflation/deflation, buy/sell, happy/panic, good/bad, home team/visitors, cold/hot, north/south, us/them, yes/no, black/white, left/right. As there are more points of view in 3-dimensional space that just two, you need to rise above lazy mindedness."
Avoiding binary thinking applies both to portfolio management and to municipal projects.
Why are you trying to make me argue all that, Chuck? It's not about municipal or even parks projects. It's about one specific project, the title of this thread, and nothing else.
Everything else is diversion and distraction meant to confuse. We are seeing the dog park reinvented and remanufactured in countless forms, versions, makes, models and packagings, and polls about it reinterpreted, so its architects can sell one of them if not another.
But a dog park by any name is still a dog park, and we still ain't buyin'.
Hopefully, it will die a proper death tomorrow, and its authors will come down off their high horse and start talking about something reasonable. Just because we don't want a dog-only park doesn't mean we're close-minded to everything else. Talk to us about better accommodations for dogs at one or more existing parks, or something like that.
Mr. Moratto,
In contrast to what you say, it is NOT about one specific project. If you don't want $200k on the dog park, then what do you want to spend this dedicated park fee money on? Can't be drain pipes or ditches! I'll blow away that foolishness on Tuesday.
OK, since you don't want to be open minded enough to bite on what I'm saying about "binary thinking", I guess I'll have to take the lead on an issue in which I don't have a vested interest. Give me $200k plus another $50k and I'll incorporate the dog park into the adjacent retention pond, thereby adding an increment of flood safety for the Centerpoint residents. Give me another $200k from the park fund, and I'll turn Newport Park into greenspace with multiple practice soccer fields that doubles as a retention pond so that the down-flow residents in the Landing won't get their homes flooded. I have heard precious little from snarling dog park opponents on a viable use of that park money.
By the way, League City Council did indeed rise above "binary thinking" when they recently approved a developer's special use permit with multiple stipulations beyond what planning and zoning approved. They did NOT rant YEAH SUP! or HELL NO SUP! Council has shown it can think outside the box. I demand consistent resourcefulness by our municipal project decision makers.
Okay, Marc, er, I mean Chuck:
It's clear to see that your money is burning a hole in your pocket. Except that it's not just your money.
If we haven't rushed to make a list of things to spend it on, could it be, El Guapo, that we don't necessarily want to spend it so fast?
The League City parks network encompasses many projects with ongoing needs and costs that we haven't even begun to address, plus new ones on the horizon. The money in question is available to any of them, not just a single hair-brained dog-only park that was only recently dreamed up. If that money could be spent on the latter scheme, it can also be spent on lots of others. And we can get to that. But first -- I say first, we kill the dog park. Everything else comes after.
Signed,
Snarling Dog Park Opponent
Mr. Moratto,
Quien es "el guapo"? Claro que no es yo. I've been chewed up so much on this dog park issue, there's no way I'm handsome (anymore).
BTW, I am in agreement with Marc purely by coincidence. I've bit him hard (figuratively) on other recent issues as the phantom "drainage district" and the city manager form of municipal government.
There you go again with more misinformation on the dog park. It is not a "park that was only recently dreamed up." Almost 2 years ago, the dog park was first approved:
http://www.leaguecity.com/Archive.aspx?ADID=1440
In municipal governance terms, 2 years is an eternity.
Also, city council already approved funds for this project, now the money could be revoked. So, what would you do with the $200k? Referring to those ethereal "other projects" is just a cop out. So exactly what would you do with the money that would have been spent on the dog park? This isn't the first time I've thrown you a bone, but will you bite?
Signed,
Cat and Cat Owner Enjoying but Not Losing Sleep over This Issue
Sounds like good use of City funds.
Parks has already spent $15K clearing the land plus hundreds of man-hours from engineering just to have this project cancelled.
Chuck,
Apparently you haven't read the posts on Marc's blogs where other suggestions have been made.
"Parks has already spent $15K clearing the land plus hundreds of man-hours from engineering just to have this project cancelled."
So by that same logic we should keep on funneling money into BLM.
I just love the way some people think - NOT
Chuck, I can see how much it's killing you to look at that money sitting there unspent. But $200K is not going to buy that dog park, any more so than the first $15K did.
The $15K wasn't misspent, though. That improvement would be needed regardless of what we do with the parcel.
It was a different council, a spending one that I suppose you had to love, that approved the dog project. Why can't a more responsible council put the brakes on this mistake before it's made? We are not close to deadline on allocating the money so that it best serves the most people, so quit rushing it.
That is correct. And I have seen no evidence that if we spend the other $200,000 that the first $15,000 will magically reappear in our fund account.
Let me break it down:
$2,000,000-$15,000 equals $1,985,000
Now, there is no conceivable math formula that I know from my 10 1/2 years of public education where by we can subtract MORE money from the difference to resultingly INCREASE our balance back to $2,000,000. The $15,000 is just gone.
I'm not saying the balance ever was $2,000,000, I'm just using a nice round starting point.
You wouldn't guess, but there are people who read the blog who never say anything, though I invite them too. They give me their thoughts off-record when they see me around town.
We wondered if the nightmare would ever end. A big thanks and salute to our fine city council for listening to the people and laying it to rest last night.
Throughout this dog people park fight, I came to learn something about these dog people park pushers. They are a different breed altogether from ordinary folks whose world doesn't revolve around the dog people park life. It's a whole lifestyle with them, and they won't excuse anyone for not getting on their bandwagon. Here's one who typified:
A particularly obnoxious guy who said his name was Swerdlin got in Barbara Meeks' face, and tried to get in anybody else's who would listen. She politely told him where she stood, but he was there at council meet (from out of town, as I found almost all the voceriferous dog people park pushers to be) for only one reason -- to argue, and to hard-sell.
It was shameful and outrageous, though unsurprising, of Mister Conflict of Interest Baron not to recuse himself. Ms Sanborn just got her second strike too; one more, and I'll be supporting anybody who runs against her next time.
The pushers just didn't get it. Their arrogance toward the 90% majority only turned ordinary people off and closed doors to dialogue.
Lots of dog park opponents have dogs, and are not opposed to a dog park idea, just this one. We were willing to meet these rabid, disruptive interventionists half-way. But there is no half-way with these single minded, one-dimentional dog people park pushers. So let's remember them if and when the day comes for us to sit down and talk about more accommodations for dogs, and make sure that we don't give them a seat at our table.
Tim: Putting a vote in referendum to the people is an idea we could use more often, but not when there's such a clear consensus as there was here.
It's just a shame that we let a tiny bunch of loudmouths make a bigger issue out of this than it really was.
Mr. Moratto,
So you'll be supporting ANYBODY who runs against Ms. Sanborn next election? Even me? WOOF WOOF! Oops, sorry, I'll be campaigning for her next time just like I did last time. Or would you rather vote in one of the most name-recognized developers in town, or one of his pliant candidates?
Signed, Never Been and Never Will Go to a Dog Park
In this corner, Neil Baron, council person, in this corner, Neil haters, and an assortment of fiscal and social conservatives. Gentlmen come out fighting, Bonk-Pow-Slam-kaboom-kapow------THUMP!
The loser-League City,,,, still standing, Don't spend my money, I hate government, don't tread on me, taxes are for other people, ultra fiscal conservatives.
Careful, Marc. You're talking about the guys who stand behind you in line and make sure you don't get pick-pocketed.
Chuck, every election is a new ball game. Depends on who the challenger will be. If it's a "lesser of two evils" deal, which is more and more common these days, I often don't vote at all.
But if I come out against your candidate, you'll know who I stand for (and against). I've never been a weenie about things like that.
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