I see a bad MOON arising

When former Democratic Party campaign strategist Courtney Wheeler took over the Mayor's Office of Neighborhoods earlier this year, I predicted that MOON--which was originally created as a community-oriented advocate connecting people with Metro bureaucrats and municipal services to solve community problems--would become a campaign/marketing mechanism to sell the Mayor's brand to consumers (a.k.a., his constituents). While we have yet to see whether her work will assist future Dean campaigns for higher office, in the wake of what MOON has done so far, I have to say now that sometimes I really hate being right.

Ms. Wheeler cranked up MOON's social media soon after taking the wheel. Her office joined Twitter and created a PR engine sending out Mayor's Office releases to members of NextDoor (a private social networking site marketed to neighborhoods). While not a member of latter, I have been following @moon_nashville since its beginning. Its primary bent has little to do with troubleshooting and problem-solving at a community level. It has not really been focused on connecting people with Metro services.

The MOON Twitter stream devotes at least as much space if not more to the Mayor's appearances around town and his pet projects as it does to neighborhoods. Here is a sampling of tweets having nothing to do with neighborhoods:

 

MOON social media promote Hizzoner's appearances with celebrities like Jack White, Jimmy Fallon, Taylor Swift and Garrison Keillor. They hawk a new riverfront amphitheater and The Amp. They preach us up to lose weight, pick up litter, and then lose more weight.

In the meantime, the nods to neighborhoods are marginal at best. They are just as likely to virtually wink at the Chamber of Commerce. The few and infrequent statements about neighborhoods tend to be vacuous ones about how Mayor's Office officials had a "great time" meeting with neighbors of wherever they appeared next.

The Office of Neighborhoods' social media strategy seems oriented to neighborhoods in name only. Kind of what you would expect when a campaign strategist steers the ship.

(While I did not say much about Hizzoner's use of NextDoor in particular, if you are interested, you can find more on it over here after the jump).

Hate mail, part II

While perusing some public email records on the proposed Salemtown conservation overlay, I found a specifically unfavorable reference to me by former neighborhood association president, Molly McCluer, in a February 2013 message to Metro Council:

Since Mike Byrd has publicly complained about the lack of process, I feel it is fair to point out that he has had even more access than most, yet consistently failed to take advantage of any of these opportunities: he started the year on the SNNA Board but quit at the Feb. 2012 meeting, did not attend any further monthly meetings, attended 2 Metro public meetings but did not raise objections; did not join the NextDoor neighborhood website; and affirmatively refused to respond to the overlay opinion survey.

Well, I am honored to be considered deserving of a retort on this question in correspondence with elected officials. But all I had been doing until last February was expressing my opinion on a blog. I would think that Ms. McCluer, who had lobbied for the overlay from a position of power as SNNA head for a solid year, could have ignored me on the legislation, unless there were flaws in the proposal which were being exposed.

Nonetheless, Ms. McCluer spread some specious fabrications about me, which I have had to dispel even with some neighbors who asked about them. In the spirit of the idea that there are at least two sides to every story, and given that this story is about me, I have a different interpretation of what happened last year. Some of it is more about her than me.

I took a position on the executive committee in 2012 assuming things would go as they had the several other times I served in similar leadership positions. From our first meeting with Ms. McCluer as president, I quickly learned that things would be drastically different. She proposed a lot of extreme, unsanctioned changes for SNNA: stripping the by-laws down, extending the presidency and vice presidency to 2-year terms, cutting down the number of membership mtgs and relying exclusively on the executive committee, bringing in a horticulturalist to redesign all of the streetscape landscaping approved in an earlier block grant process, among other things. She got resistance from some of us on the committee, and then the membership (and the Metro Police community officer to an extent) shot down her plan to cut back the number of business meetings.

Ms. McCluer made it harder for members of the EC like me to have input and influence. When I volunteered to help write a survey she declined, saying that she wanted me to focus exclusively on being a Treasurer. But then she practically ordered me to reconvene the SNNA by-laws committee, (which had finished its work years ago) to approve the changes that she announced at the first EC meeting. She set EC meetings on days and times I could not meet without regard to my point that I was unavailable because of family commitments. That was the last straw. I resigned my EC position in February and announced it to the membership in a letter.

After the drama I did decide to take a short break from the association that I had served consistently and loyally since its founding in 2005 in order to spend more time with my family. As spring wound down a neighbor told me that Ms. McCluer attacked me in a membership meeting for blogging my personal opinions about a development. The SNNA secretary sent out minutes from the meeting with the negative spin. My active involvement in SNNA for 2012 ended there. I decided I would not leave myself open to future ambushes via the executive committee.

The only other point in Ms. McCluer's harangue to the council that deserves my attention is her point that I did not respond to the inappropriate survey. I did respond, and my responses appear under my name for anyone to read. That survey ended up having negligible impact on council action on the overlay. And it should have had no influence. It was slanted and ill-advised.

In 2013, things are different. There is a new president. The association voted to strike Ms. McCluer's attack on me from the May 2012 minutes. There are discussions about a neutral survey being written to gauge Salemtown opinions accurately. I have withdrawn my opposition to the overlay after some changes to the bill and a series of open community meetings. I am once again a dues-paying, participating member of SNNA. But I'm sure if they really wanted to, someone could spout some more one-sided fabrications about me in 2013, too. Hopefully, they continue to do so on the public record.

Update on Salemtown SP proposal

CM Erica Gilmore sponsored a second community meeting last week to get feedback from Salemtown residents and property owners on developer Mike Kenner's request to rezone several parcels on the northwest side of the neighborhood to a "specific plan" from "R6". If approved, the specific plan would allow him to build 24 detached cottages instead of 20 units, most of which would be attached duplexes.

The particular focus of the second meeting was Kenner's proposal to build a soundproofing wall along the section of I-65 ramp against which the properties abut. Kenner told the group that at this point the 6 ft wall could be made of either rusticated block or brick veneer, depending on what the group decided. He also showed the large metal letters that he would use to spell out "Salemtown" and discussed plans to acquire a small amount of TDOT land to allow the wall to curve with the contour of the freeway. He also announced plans to require the "Salemtown Cottages" homeowners association to take responsibility for the upkeep and maintenance of the wall and the landscaping around it.

There continued to be vigorous discussion of the plan, including opposition expressed from 2 or 3 long-time residents who do not like the density or Kenner's plan to market the development to younger "Millennials". At points the meeting teetered toward a gripe spiral of diversion and sidetracked issues that had nothing to do with the details of the proposal. Pastors from Salemtown's AME and Missionary Baptist congregations assisted the development team and CM Gilmore with keeping the meeting on track and keeping the proposal in perspective.

Once again, Salemtown Neighbors members were noticeably absent from the meeting. I counted 3, maybe 4, of us in attendance (among about 18-20 in the audience), which was still higher than the number of members attending CM Gilmore's first SP meeting 2 weeks ago. Do SNNA members only attend developers' meetings that are announced on Nextdoor? Isn't this a slight of CM Gilmore to attend a meeting that she did not call and then fail to attend two meetings that she did call? Do they understand that Kenner's proposal is facing some opposition from long-time neighbors who do not seem to share their vision? Do they know how the proposal has changed since their first Nextdoor meet-up? How does SNNA challenge the perception that the association favors white gentrifiers when its members stay away from predominately African American community meetings?

There seemed to be a consensus that brick veneer was not a practical idea for the wall. There also seemed to be agreement that Kenner should include affordable housing in his proposal. The developer agreed to explore the possibility of affordable housing at Salemtown cottages. For her part, CM Gilmore commented that the SP seemed a possibility if it included accommodations of a wall--which she pointed out that many residents had asked for for years--and a unit of affordable housing. Folks attending the meeting seemed to accept that without debate.

I told Mike Kenner that the most attractive part of the development to me was that it would be detached because the last thing we needed was to become a neighborhood of duplexes. But I also told him that I believed that the community was being entirely fair in asking for a wall and for a provision for affordability in the SP to at least strive for diversity. If the developer makes the reasonable changes that the community is asking for, then I can see myself supporting the SP.