A Vision for Lake Forest - Better Planning

Yesterday we continued the discussion of my vision for Lake Forest, talking about ways to make government more responsive. Today’s topic is Better Planning and tomorrow we’ll look at Better Decision making.

Here are some suggestions to make the planning process more successful.

APPOINT QUALIFIED PEOPLE

Unfortunately in recent years there has been a rush to put friends and campaign workers on City Commissions, instead of people who are better qualified. The results have been disastrous. On the Planning Commission, for example, they’ve had more appeals, more overturned decisions, more postponed issues, and more cancelled meetings than ever before.

Not only has the process become mired down, many of the decisions are highly questionable, and in some cases, downright dangerous.

Click here for my latest article on this topic

GET THE UNIVERSITIES/COLLEGES INVOLVED

When I was a University Professor I had many opportunities to set up joint ventures with local agencies, providing a great place where my students could function in real world settings. The advantage to the real world setting is that enthusiastic and talented students get to work on their problems for free, and they get access to University brain power to help solve their challenges.

We desperately need that kind of program at the City, and there are many local Colleges and Universities that would jump at the chance of being able to collaborate with us.

END THE INFLUENCE OF SPECIAL INTERESTS

Special interests have been trying to dictate City policy ever since the City was first incorporated. The most egregious example was the Brookfield/Trumark scandal in 2013 that caused more than 4,000 people to sign a petition against the Council’s actions.

We need to put a stop to special interests trying to run our City. We need a law that forbids any person or company with business interests from contributing to the campaigns of Council members.

Click here for my latest article on this topic.

BE PROACTIVE, NOT REACTIVE

City Council candidate Col. Tom Cagley was a Military Intelligence Officer and over a 30 year career had the opportunity to work on many projects. One of his major criticisms of the current Council and Planning Commission is that they are reactive, not proactive. That means there’s nary a thought as to what will happen down the road. For example, we know that the City has a traffic problem so how on Earth did the previous Planning Commission and City Council agree to add 42,000+ new vehicles on our roads every day. Now the City is trying to scramble and solve the coming traffic tsunami. It’s obvious that foreward planning in the first place would have alerted the City that adding more homes should be done in a much slower manner than is happening. Of course, that wouldn’t please the developers who stand to make billions in profits from accelerated home developments, but it does make sense if you’re concerned with our quality of life.

Click here for my latest article on this subject

Tomorrow we’ll look at the decision making process itself.

About Jim Gardner

Dr. Jim Gardner is the editor of CITY WATCH on The Patch and a contributing editor to OC Politics and Voice of OC. He is running for City Council in Lake Forest. You can check him out on LinkedIn and/or Facebook.