- Outright - steal the ballot box.
- High-Tech - rigging the voting machines
- Low-Tech - hanging chads and erasures
- Bribery - rigging the election officials
- Tricky Dick - political tricks, lies, bussing in the homeless...
- Subversion - insiders working against the issue or candidate
If the public's will cannot be expressed through their elected officials because of outside forces working against them, then the people's rights to self-governance are suppressed. If there are people who feel entitled to make decisions for the public and in spite of their interests as directed through their elected officials, it is tyranny.
It appears there has been a subversion of the democratic process in Lake Oswego. Recent events have called into question how well citizens are being represented when our City Council's directives may have been deliberately hijacked.
The issue is quite simple. During the mayoral terms of Judie Hammerstad and Jack Hoffman (12 years total), Lake Oswego was laying the regularory and physical groudwork for a "smart growth" city. The previous councils' concept of what "village" means has become clear with the Wizer Block development proposal, and a large segment of the public has shown that they clearly dislike the path the old council was on. The grandoise Foothills development, the streetcar to Portland and the proposed whale-like Wizer Block development are symbols of what was going wrong in Lake Oswego and why a new slate of Councilors and Mayor were elected - to put the brakes on out-of-control spending and urbanizing development. This is Lake Oswego, not Portland, and not Metro's plaything.
The Comprehensive Plan - The Mother of all battlegrounds. It is the legal document that will guide land use planning for years to come. Whoever wins this battle will seal the fate of the city, because once its charm is gone, its gone forever. Will it be low and slow, or packed and stacked? A small town, or just another train stop on the way to somewhere else, but with lots of trees?
There will be a Planning Commission Public Hearing
on Monday night, January 12, at 6:30 pm,
in the City Council Chambers at City Hall.
The Monday Planning Commission hearing will cover the full Comp Plan. Yes, that one. The one that has been kicked around a thousand times, is shattered and bruised and probably should die - but people keep dragging it back. I shouldn't have to tell you how important it is to keep coming, keep writing, and keep letting the city council and planning commission members know what you think.
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