I think, as is often the case, Mario's got a good point. I can't remember who said it first (it might have been sharrieff) that ultimately UCD is accountable to it's funders. At the moment, that's not "us". I agree that if "we" want to control the direction of UCD, then "we" need to be the ones paying for it. Otherwise it's like complaining to the guy sweeping your street for free that you'd rather he painted your house. UCD's a democracy of it's funders, it's just a question if we want to pony up what it takes to be part of the shareholders club. Had the NID passed, we would have gotten oversight of UCD through our councilwoman, who would have been able to keep the NID from renewing if she didn't like the way it was run. As it is, we have no oversight apart from complaining to one another on this list, which is probably a lot like barking into the wind.
When you're paying the guy, you get to tell the guy what to do. -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mario Giorno Sent: Tuesday, June 26, 2007 12:05 PM To: univcity@list.purple.com Subject: Re: [UC] UCD Related Folks, I think Brian is on to something here. The NID is a hard thing to implement, because it supposed to be funded by a base annual income taken from the citizens in is geography, ie the surcharge that the city government would collect from us each year and give to the UCD. If the UCD needed more money above and beyond the surcharge monies then they could float a bond and collect extra donations to make up the difference of the operating costs. This is in fact what Lewis Wendell and the UCD steering committee have proposed. Argumentatively, it isn't just Lewis Wendell that's failng here, it's the very idea of a NID in general amongst many of the citizens in UC. We want more transparent accountability on the part of the UCD staff and steering committee. We want UC residents partly in control of the UCD to make sure that it's doing the people's bidding, not just the high rollers' (UPenn, Drexel, the Cira Center, Campus Apartments, etc.) bidding. Ideally this is actually what happens with NIDs and they are in fact a good thing. But because UPenn and its partners came at the idea backwards by creating the organization first without legally creating it as a NID by getting community approval, they have doomed themselves and us to this constant bickering about how to use this useful organization and how to fund it. This should have been clearly defined before the UCD was created. But here we are. We must take the UCD for what is is. We may never truly come together under a generalissimo UCD director, but that's hardly a problem. If UCD stayed as it is now getting funded by local businesses and citizens by choice rather than by surcharge, it could still survive on more meager means, it would simply provide less service. The question we need to ask is, is this a better idea than sucking it and giving some percentage of our real estate tax to UCD each year so that it can do every and anything we want it to do? Do we still want to take the recommendation of Wendell and the UCD steering committee to only take 12% of the annual RE tax from those with 4 or more bedroom units on the property? Do we want every landowner to maybe pay 6% of their annual RE tax instead so that everyone has skin in the game and can vote to restrain or enbolden specific UCD practices or works. Brian's right. This will only work if we will it to work. Lewis Wendell will do all that he can to keep UCD afloat and hopefully efficient and productive, but he and th rest of the UCD can't do it without our support. Eventually we as a community will have to make a deliberate attempt to uphold UCD or destroy it. Whatever democratic dialogue has been exchanged on this list for the past 2 years about what to do with UCD will become purely academic unless we the citizens of UC either shit or get off the pot. We need to reconsider the UCD NID plan. If changes need to be made, then we need to tell UCD what those specific legal and/or financial changes are and come to a compromise. If Lewis Wendell and his staff are out there and reading this post, please believe that you will have to give the local community the control it wants over everyday practices of UCD, if not day-to-day decisions. A charter that contains language from community member input will need to be discussed. While there are standard legal guidelines for NIDs in most every state, there is also the ability for each individual NID to create special stipulations and agreements that are specific to the community or neighborhood it serves and represents. I'm sure there is some compromise solution that can be worked out that will satisfy the majority of the UC landowning population as well as the current major UCD benefactors on the steering committee. I suggest that UC residents on this list post the one major concession or stipulation that you want UCD to honor, if we allow it to become a NID representing our neighborhood. One item of compromise above all others that you personally would require of the UCD. Send it to the listserv and after enough of the items are posted, then we can how rational and doable they really are from both our perspective and UCD's perspective. Mario Giorno 36 S. 48th Street Philadelphia, PA 19139 ---- You are receiving this because you are subscribed to the list named "UnivCity." To unsubscribe or for archive information, see <http://www.purple.com/list.html>.
