Brooklyn Neighborhood

16 responses so far ↓

• 1 Trevor // May 28, 2008 at 11:48 pm

  I attended my first meeting tonight. Thank you to True Brew for my bagel. A lot of talk about tranportation infrastructure tonight but not much about social issues affecting us here. Some of us are struggling, yet we still hope the millions we spend on million dollar bridges will trickle down to us. Let’s stop painting bicycling lanes all over Portland. We only need two modest bicycle boulevards (Clinton & 16th), the intersection of which will become the center of an organic bicycle revolution.

• 2 Lance Lindahl, BAC Chair // May 29, 2008 at 10:24 am

  Hi Trevor,

  Thank you for taking the time to attend our May General Meeting. You are absoloutely right, transportation infrastructure is not the only issue that we need to be looking at and working on.

  The Brooklyn Board has worked on two social issues in the past couple of years. The first one was partnering with JOIN to assist the homeless. While other neighborhood associations continue to fight the location of homeless services in their area, we worked with the City and with JOIN to expand their job skills training program.

  We have also worked with residents and other advocates to maintain public school facilites in our area. Portland Public Schools has tried to close Grout Elementary and move Winterhaven Elementary to the suburbs. Both of these efforts were stopped, but there is still much work to do to make sure that area children have convenient access to a quality education.

  Please let us know if there are other social issues that we shoud be tackling. Our influence is limited, but we do what we can with what we have.

• 3 Marie // Jun 1, 2008 at 11:55 am

  Trevor,
  Reading your response, could you tell us what specific social issues here in Brooklyn concern you?

• 4 Trevor // Jun 2, 2008 at 11:09 pm

  I appreciate your feedback. This is a good looking website and I hope it becomes a useful tool for the people in our neighborhood. I will tell others about it.

  Besides the basic needs of food and shelter, there is one need often forgotten – community (being a part of something greater than one’s self).

  We have a homeless population not because we don’t spend enough on affordable housing but because they have been excluded from community. We have directionless youth not because of the lack of funds for schools but because they have been excluded from community.

  If we want to see Brooklyn become a real community then we must enfranchise all residents. All must have an equal vote.

  BAC board membership should be open to anyone who can get the endorsement of another resident.

  The weight of a board member’s vote should equal the number of endorsements, and a resident should be able to switch his/her endorsement at any time.

  This arrangement would certainly boost resident morale and encourage community participation.

• 5 Adam // Jun 3, 2008 at 9:39 am

  Hi Trevor, First off let me thank you for taking advantage of, and spurring, the new site’s potential for dialogue.

  BAC Board membership is open to anyone who lives, works or owns property in the neighborhood. If you wish to see the BAC bylaws go to;
  PAGES>BROOKLYN RESOURCES>scroll down to BROOKLYN ACTION CORPS BYLAWS (pdf doc)

  The board worked pretty hard to open up the process to everyone who might remotely have a stake in the neighborhood. The only real requisite is that you need to show enough interest to show up to meetings and actively participate. Additionally, any major votes we have will be open to the entire “membership” (a fancy way to say neighborhood) so we don’t need to worry about endorsements… it’s a direct democracy.

  Finally, with respect to homeless issues in our community. Just yesterday I was working with JOIN (a Brooklyn based advocacy non-profit that works to house the homeless… also on the resources page) to win a grant that would allow us to continue helping their clients develop job skills while interacting and supporting the neighborhood’s graffiti fighting efforts. In fact, at the neighborhood cleanup this Saturday JOIN clients will be working alongside resident volunteers to help neighbors cleanup Brooklyn. You won’t find a more concentrated effort by many neighborhoods to INCLUDE the homeless in their community.

  I hope this addresses some of your concerns and if not… keep ‘em coming. We changed the website to that neighbors like you could contribute to the discourse and your feedback is really valuable. Take care.

• 6 Kip Larson // Jun 4, 2008 at 8:17 am

  I would just like to chime in here and share a little bit about my experience with the Brooklyn Action Corps: I served as the BAC Secretary and Treasurer for the few years that I lived in the Neighborhood and can claim without any hesitation that the current leadership team is absolutely, possibly at the risk of being exlusively, engaged in supporting and increasing the social welfare of the Neighborhood.

  Essentially, that is what the BAC is about. From time to time there is more attention spent on certain issues simply because democracy is at the root of the BAC framework. There are Board members and general members who have their view on how best to improve the social welfare of the Neighborhood; as their specific ideas and actions come to a confluence, we get results.

  Participation is the building block of volunteer groups but to grow and break boundaries, it requires heart. These folks have all of the above ‘top-of-mind” and as you continue to participate in and explore this group, you will find that there is some real depth of consideration for the needs and dreams of the Brooklyn Neighborhood members.

• 7 Lance Lindahl, BAC Chair // Jun 5, 2008 at 10:12 am

  And to bring things full circle, my interest in the introduction of light rail to the area is based strongly on how this will effect the social and economic dynamics of the neighborhood.

  This project will have a profound impact on how Brooklyn evolves in the years to come. Although no homes will be directly displaced by the project, the predicted wave of redevelopment is almost certain to cause the eventual displacement of many of our lower and middle income residents. Direct action will have to be taken to ensure that these people have a viable optiion to remain in the area.

  Should Brooklyn focus on commercial, industrial, or residential development? Can we continue to handle a mix of all of these? How will the neighborhood function when gas hits $5.00 a gallon or $10.00 a gallon? And most importantly, how will these issues effect the social and economic well being of the residents that are here today?

• 8 Trevor // Jun 7, 2008 at 12:57 pm

  I don’t think showing up at a general meeting should be a requisite. Some people – homeless, youth, parents, etc. – don’t have time or would rather entrust this to a representative.

  The bylaws say that there should be no voting by proxy and the board will be limited to 11 persons. This doesn’t sound like direct democracy. Of course, it is difficult to have all members gather together for a vote. That is why direct representation was invented. http://www.directrep.org/

  Why is participation not greater? Yes, growth requires passion (or “heart”, as Kip says), but it also requires a fair set of rules.

  We have homelessness not because we lack volunteers.

• 9 Adam // Jun 7, 2008 at 2:19 pm

  It would be wonderful if we could vote by proxy, however the BAC has no way to conduct a proxy vote in a verifiable and affordable way.

  One of the reasons for creating this blog as our main website was to be able to reach out to the neighbors who can’t make meetings. It’s about the best we can do.

• 10 Trevor // Jun 8, 2008 at 9:13 am

  Representatives would simply obtain signatures and proof of residency from members who wanted to vote by proxy. There would be no cost, just the time representatives spend going door-to-door soliciting votes.

  This would certainly get the community engaged!

• 11 Lance // Jun 9, 2008 at 8:40 am

  I know of another group of people that would enjoy the benefits of a proxy vote.

  Large employers in the neighborhood, like PGE and Wayne-Dalton Industries could have their lawyers gather signatures from their hundreds of employees during the work day.

  This way they could tilt any neighborhood vote as they see fit without having to participate in the deliberation and debate that would happen at the actual meeting.

• 12 Trevor // Jun 9, 2008 at 8:57 pm

  Lance,
  According to the bylaws, it appears that non-resident employees are allowed to vote. This is a loophole that needs to be closed.

  Direct Representation means that citizens individually choose their representatives in a legislature instead of choosing them collectively in an election. It guarantees that everyone has a voice in government, and that everyone’s vote has an effect. It makes government more stable, more accountable to the people, and less corrupt.
  http://www.directrep.org

• 13 Adam // Jun 10, 2008 at 6:28 am

  That is not a loophole. We intentionally placed that in the bylaws to be more inclusive of Brooklyn’s stake holders. 60% of our residents are renters, should they have more say than the long time employees of local businesses who volunteer their time and resources to Brooklyn? The folks at JOIN have been great partners in helping to clean our neighborhood and work with our transient population. One of JOIN’s employees just volunteered at his 3rd Neighborhood Cleanup, he also leads the Graffiti Removal Team from JOIN. Why would we exclude these people who have worked so hard to improve Brooklyn?
  It doesn’t make sense to lock valuable members out simply to change the way we vote. The Brooklyn Action Corps is about inclusion. You are absolutely right that our current voting method isn’t ideal. There is no perfect solution; direct representation is a good idea but it doesn’t fit Brooklyn right now.
  This website should give you some comfort that we are trying to broaden our ability to reach out to Brooklyn beyond meetings.
  Your input is really appreciated.

• 14 Trevor // Jun 10, 2008 at 10:01 pm

  Why doesn’t direct representation doesn’t fit Brooklyn right now?

  Are you concerned that some stakeholders would exercise too much or not enough influence?

• 15 Adam // Jun 11, 2008 at 5:14 am

  As Lance said before, direct representation would allow large companies to organize in ways that your average neighbor couldn’t dream of. They could skew representation without ever taking part in the deliberations involved with our meetings.

  The only way to overcome that problem would be to cut off our local employees from membership. We’re not going to be excluding anyone in order to shoehorn a different voting system in.

• 16 Trevor // Jun 11, 2008 at 6:23 am

  So do we allow employees to organize or not?

  The wonderful thing about direct representation is that it does not require your average neighbor to be organized. They can lend their vote to a representative. (And withdraw their vote and vote directly whenever the representative goes astray.)

  Direct representation overcomes the logistical problems of direct democracy.

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