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| The New MWHI Webpage (text is from the media release) |
Revised: December 2018
By Sarah Owens and Michael Livingston
The Mid-Valley Homeless Initiative task force held its first meeting yesterday. The video is posted here.
Of the 20 members appointed, 16 were present. Absent: Gladys Blum, Kim Freeman, Patty Ignatowski, Shaney Starr.
The Statesman Journal headline reads "Homeless Initiative Members Press for Change." The article says "several members articulated that they hope this committee will be able to bring about real change."
This is very Salem: publicly hoping = pressing. The several members who spoke of the need for change were Warren Bednarz, Bruce Bailey, Chief Moore (better coordination) and Sheriff Myers ("the homeless don't belong in the criminal justice system, but that's where they end up").
But change is not what Co-Chair Carlson envisioned for the task force when she repeated earlier statements that she wanted the task force to come up with recommendations that would put "meat on the bones" of the 10-Year Plan.
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| Co-Chair Peterson Opened the Meeting |
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| Audience (partial) |
When it came his turn, Jon Reeves, Executive Director of the Mid-Willamette Community Action Agency, commented on the attendance, saying the interest in homelessness was rare and much needed if the initiative was to have any success.
Mayor Peterson remarked, "We are just beginning what will take a community focus."
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| Co-Chair Carlson Querys Task Force Panel |
Councilor Bednarz called a halt at 5:50. (Chair-for-the-meeting Peterson had left by then.) He wanted some "idea where we're headed", that it was 41 days until the next meeting, and he "wanted some action tonight", or "at least homework" for the task force members. He did not get either.
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| Councilor Bednarz |
Co-Chair Carlson assured him that she and her fellow Co-Chairs would be debriefing this meeting and planning future meetings, and would be happy to receive his input. She told the Statesman Journal that they might be able to start looking at recommendations by the third or fourth meeting.
A total of eight meetings remain within which the task force is scheduled to complete its work: March 29, May 2, June 6, July 20, September 19, October 17, November 17 and December 1.
A comment received shortly after publication by email (name withheld in the absence of permission to divulge):
ReplyDelete"You painted a very accurate, if depressing, picture of the meeting. I especially liked the "as the oxygen left the room" description. "Liked" as in I found it to be a succinct and pinpoint description, not "liked" as in approved of such a sad sad meeting. A little optimistic, though, and lacked sarcasm. My summary (by "anonymous") would have been something along the lines of:
Commissioner Carlson, via Mayor Peterson, her very own ventriloquist's dummy, brought the meeting to order. (A neat trick, but Commissioner Carlson's lips were moving the whole time.) The assembled group consisted of well-meaning folks who lack the knowledge or experience to be effective in their roles, and lacked any real guidance or idea of what they were doing and what the task force hoped to accomplish. The assembled group members did not have or reach a shared understanding of what the homeless population of Marion and Polk counties encompasses, what the "problem" is that they are trying to solve, or how their work will ultimately "solve" the "homeless" "problem."
Although many subject matter experts were in the room, and even assembled into panels and prepared to present a wealth of data to the members, the commissioner and mayor talked to each other throughout much of the panelists' presentations and cut the panels off without allowing all of the panelists to have a turn to speak because, having started the meeting late, there was not enough time to listen to everything they had to say. Not that more time would have made much difference - the panelists spoke mostly in unintelligible industry jargon (which few of the members appeared to understand but, nonetheless, barely questioned) four of the task force members missed the meeting entirely, Mayor Peterson left early, and the vast majority of those members present were so ill-prepared for the meeting that they did not have intelligent questions for the panelists or, with the exception of Councilman Bednarz, the wherewithal to question the direction the meeting was taking. And, when he did pose his questions, with only 10 minutes left of the meeting and nothing yet accomplished, his substantive questions went unanswered and the procedural ones received only the barest of Commissioner Carlson's condescending "assurances" that the other co-chairs and herself would address them privately when they met independently of the rest of the task force.
Again, however, not that it would have made much difference had the councilman's questions been taken seriously rather than dismissed out of hand. The task force failed to include anyone from the affected populations among its membership, failed to even identify among itself what the goal of the group was with respect to the "homeless" "problem," failed to discuss any of the information presented by the panelists, and walked away from the meeting without having been charged with any interim study or activities. What's more, Commissioner Carlson made it clear that the real work of the group and decisions about the direction the group will game, to the extent there will be any, will occur in privately held meetings among the four co-chairs, without input from or participation by the group as a whole.
In sum, to the observer, the meeting was poorly organized, poorly attended, poorly structured, had no shared goal, and, frankly, was a waste of time for all who attended. Not an auspicious beginning."