The Observation Deck

I read on another thread that there's going to be a meeting where we, the citizens of Lakewood, can get together and assess which of a handful of buildings we all value. We'll "break into groups" and look at different buildings, and try to develop, what? Criteria? For what we value?

The information about when and where this meeting is, and what it's about, seems important, yet was not important enough to submit to the only community newspaper we have. So if you don't get around online you won't even know about it. Whereas if it was in the paper, you could read about it upon leaving the grocery store, sitting down at a restaurant or a cafe, in line at the super market, at the Y, at City Hall while you wait to pay your traffic ticket, at the Chamber of Commerce or maybe at the library.

I've lived here now for more than 15 years and I don't get Lakewood's romance with re-inventing the wheel. Some buildings should start out, by ANYBODY’S standards, higher than others on a value chart. An architectural board of review could point to architectural value, a historical society, to historical value.

For example, is the very first school in Lakewood valuable? The one that was only K thru 12 school when the city was called "Rockport"? Would the City, the School Board, the Historical Society weigh in and say, "Hey, that's a real piece of Lakewood history"? Look at the age and architecture of the building! Look at its history!! No. The building I'm referring to currently houses the School Board and the District's administration offices. It is Lakewood's original school. There is more history to learn and value there than any other building in town. And yet when it was packaged and put on the chopping block with the school across the parking lot, the 1969 version of Grant school, as a potential space to tear down and sell for private development, not a word was spoken about it having any value at all to Lakewood’s citizens or to the citizens of the future.

What would that criteria be? Is there ANY WAY to determine value? Many would say sure.

But with a community meeting, breaking down into groups, whoever is in that room that night will get to be The Truth or at least, "What Lakewood Wants!" I don't mean to sound cynical. I think Dru Siley is impressive and I think Mike Summers has been an attentive mayor thus far...

I'm just a veteran of a committee where "the community" came up with "standards" or criteria, and when they didn't match what a certain part of the community had in mind, everything decided in our "small groups" got tossed out.

Lakewood had a community forum where people in small groups decided that what was valuable in terms of where we put our schools was that kids could easily walk to them. Lakewood has no buses. It has always had neighborhood schools, let's keep schools close to where people live. The first value. The second one? That we make sure that every school offers the same standard of education. Very simple.

And yet criterium number one was tossed out with no reason given. After more than a hundred people, mostly moms and dads, spent more than a year and a half "meeting" about it, while the people in charge got on with their agenda which had nothing to do with what was being talked about in the committees.

It was a way to keep everybody occupied, and everybody feeling like what they had to say was valuable when in the end, the very conclusions the committee reached were kept from the community and a plan that had nothing to do with what the community decided they valued when they "broke into small groups" at all was "chosen".

I know that builders and architects can describe which buildings are valuable structurally. For example, many people would like to refurbish the Hilliard theater but experts say that it would literally require millions, it's in such decayed shape. So this expert opinion would have some bearing on our evaluation of this site. We already know this. Is a small committee going to have to hunt down another building expert to hear about that decision again? Will there be any proposals made by anybody who knows anything? In the School Renovation committee I was on, one of the groups tossed the architect's evaluation of school buildings right out the window. Because they didn't like it. Not one of them had any kind of education about building structure, and yet they were the "Building Committee." It was pitiful.

I have to do my community a service and warn them. Warn you. It may be the only value that there was to enduring that year and a half of being in a committee for nothing. So here I am. "Lakewood Style" is to have committees to keep people busy while other people work behind the scenes getting exactly what they want, with no publicity or communication with the public whatsoever.

Thealexa Becker has been very vocal about thinking the Detroit Theater is ugly, and she doesn't value the experience of being able to walk to a theater, or having a small functioning hometown theater where all of these people have memories of their first dates, or the first time they took their first child to the movies, etc.. She doesn't mind driving to the Westwood Town Center, or to the Capitol. I value the experience I had at the Detroit theater quite a bit. I loved being able to walk to the theater with my small children, and during the times we were a one car family, with daddy off at band rehearsal, we could still get out and have some fun and talk about the movie all the way home, while we got the exercise of walking the short distance to our house. I don't think the theater is ugly, but more importantly, I would love to study other cities that have adopted their hometown theaters in the 21st century and have made them work, usually with some kind of combination use that included the theater as a theater but put it to use in different ways at different times. (Free family movies on Sunday mornings, sponsored by local churches. Free educational movies and classes for kids in the summers and on Saturday mornings. Meeting space for moms and caretakers while kids are in those movies, etc.)

There are successful models out there. They could be studied. They should be studied, so decisions are based on more than Thealexa's or my opinion. Look at what has been done. Look at how it works. Instead of having a group at a table who, at the end of two hours, all VOTES! Based on nothing but their personal opinions, which are based on who is there... and that becomes the Truth in Lakewood. What we all want!

I apologize to those of you that feel that I sound like a broken record, but it's possible that the only value that there is to spending more than a year and a half of my life on a fake committee, is to share the experience with others.

Of course I value community input and I think that its inclusion is essential to well run government. At the same time, there comes a point when the government is actually renouncing its responsibility in favor of a public relations effort to make citizens feel like they are involved and that their opinions are valuable. Up to a point, our opinions are valuable. Beyond that? We need architects, building quality assessments, historical experts, and for God's sake, some city planning, looking at, and assessing what the needs of the people who live in the city actually are, and what they could be, looking into the future. In times of extremely limited resources, this is crucial.

in other words, and again, A PLAN.

Wow it's gotten late.

I applaud the mayor and the council for including the citizens of Lakewood in their thought process, at the same time, they have a responsibility as maybe not our elected officials, but definitely our representatives if our tax dollars are the indicators, to do their jobs, and look at the big picture, FOR US. We're busy. We weren't elected, and aren't paid, to run or plan cities. So a better plan is to have these situations studied by experts who HAVE THE TIME, AND THE ABILITY who
could then present us with some options, after which maybe we break into committees and maybe not.

I know that with resources as limited as they are right now, it's very possible to make the wrong decisions. We need real criteria assessing where we are, what we need and where we're going, and we can't come up with that in small groups at tables, in two hours, and then vote. It's ridiculous. Maybe as a group we could decide on criteria the city should use, from a community point of view.... but that was already tried in the Phase 3 Committee with the School Board and they tossed out every single thing the community asked for.

Okay time for bed.

Again, please forgive me if you've heard me say this before, but we have to do better. This is an amazing city, the fact that as an inner ring suburb of Cleveland, it has survived in such a good and healthy state up til now is a testament to many many things being done right.

WHAT ARE THEY? LET'S KEEP DOING THOSE THINGS. Can we decide it in groups at the library after dinner? I don't think so, as much as I applaud the efforts of the city to keep us all in the loop.

Goodnight.

Betsy Voinovich

The community newspaper should be responsible enough to send someone to the meeting to cover the event. Stop your whining about being excluded. It is like going to court mandated Alcoholic Anonymous sessions when you get convicted of operating a vehicle under the influence. If you do not go, you violate your probation and are punished further.

If the community newspaper does not have a representative at these meetings, it loses out. Plain and simple.

Frank Branchick wrote:If the community newspaper does not have a representative at these meetings, it loses out. Plain and simple.

Frank

I would agree.

But the story does not really end there and nothing is as black and white as that.

But in this simple generalization, you would be right.


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Hi Frank,

I'm not really whining about that. There will be plenty of people at the meeting who will cover it for the Lakewood Observer.

I'm not even whining about there being a meeting, as I said, I think it's good that the City is acknowledging the community's frustration over the City's overall lack of vision in terms of preserving buildings in Lakewood.

And I even think this meeting might be a good first step.

What I'm whining about, though I guess I would prefer the word "warning" is that these kinds of community meetings take the place of the City doing its job in terms of adequately coming up with a real vision and a real plan based on actual facts about where the city is, and how it can move forward. We have a Planning Department that gets paid to do that very hard work, and maybe what we're seeing is the first steps of exactly that.

And, I'll say it once again, it felt like that at the beginning of the Phase 3 committee too, that the School Board actually wanted to know how the community felt, and what residents felt should be done, and it turned out that in actual fact, the School Board did not want to know that, and had no intention of acting on the actual results that came out of that committee.

So I AM whining about that, for sure. I once calculated the number of Lakewood citizens' hours wasted on that committee. Over a hundred people, every other week, for two hours for more than a year---

I'm warning my fellow citizens not to get sucked into working really hard to forge a vision, devoting your free time to studying real data etc, work that people in the Administration are paid to do with your tax dollars. And in fact, this might not be what the City is asking. The City might be trying to launch into doing that hard work, by taking a detailed look at what concerned Lakewood citizens think about the situation before the City dives into it.

And in fact I'm sure the announcement of this meeting will be in the Lakewood Observer so that as many people as possible have a chance to know about and attend the meeting.

You and I are in complete agreement on the idea that it's "tricky."


Betsy Voinovich

I think all of us would be happy with a plan.

At this point, who cares where it comes from.

City Hall, Planning, Finance, Parks need our help let's jump in.

I would say Lakewood residents would value a plan.


I would say look at the recent successes of LakewoodAlive, Mike Summers and Suzanne
Metelko. Their hard work, ideas, and can do attitude, delivered on The University of Akron
coming to Lakewood and bringing Lakewood a host of diversified classes that will attract
thousands of students to the downtown area. Solid ideas from outside government in its
traditional sense. The influx of students as has been pointed out will make life more
profitable for all downtown merchants.

Yeah at this point, who cares where the plan comes from.

However, I think this story might fall into our discussion of news coverage as well.




FWIW


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I too was initiated into civic involvement on the Lakewood City Schools Phase III Committee. I understand Betsy's warning and sympathize with any whining. It was a brutal and unnecessary waste of citizens' time.

Fortunately, my observations and experiences with city officials gathering citizen input seem genuine and efficient. Unfortunately, the resulting plans just gather dust as Lakewood seems unable to secure funding.

I checked the City of Lakewood's calendar looking for the details of this upcoming meeting. I found nothing there. Are you sure this is a public event?

I would love to attend and encourage others to do the same if it is an open process.

Details anyone?

Betsy Voinovich wrote:
Thealexa Becker has been very vocal about thinking the Detroit Theater is ugly, and she doesn't value the experience of being able to walk to a theater, or having a small functioning hometown theater where all of these people have memories of their first dates, or the first time they took their first child to the movies, etc.. She doesn't mind driving to the Westwood Town Center, or to the Capitol. I value the experience I had at the Detroit theater quite a bit. I loved being able to walk to the theater with my small children, and during the times we were a one car family, with daddy off at band rehearsal, we could still get out and have some fun and talk about the movie all the way home, while we got the exercise of walking the short distance to our house. I don't think the theater is ugly, but more importantly, I would love to study other cities that have adopted their hometown theaters in the 21st century and have made them work, usually with some kind of combination use that included the theater as a theater but put it to use in different ways at different times. (Free family movies on Sunday mornings, sponsored by local churches. Free educational movies and classes for kids in the summers and on Saturday mornings. Meeting space for moms and caretakers while kids are in those movies, etc.)

Interesting post, but I got hung up on the part where you specifically mentioned me and then got my point of view wrong.

No, I don't really like how the Detroit theater looks. And additionally I don't like how people are complaining about the abscence of a theater they didn't patronize. If they did, then the theater wouldn't be going out of business. The issue is a moot point so people need to really let it go now and move on to something else that is important.

But I DID patronize the theater. I go to the other theaters because, well, they are open, and they play movies the Detroit doesn't that I want to see.

So in summation, I DID value having a hometown theater. I wish it had been better and stayed open. I wish it would not be implied otherwise in this thread.

Betsy Voinovich wrote:Lakewood had a community forum where people in small groups decided that what was valuable in terms of where we put our schools was that kids could easily walk to them. Lakewood has no buses. It has always had neighborhood schools, let's keep schools close to where people live. The first value. The second one? That we make sure that every school offers the same standard of education. Very simple.

The Phase III meetings were dog and pony show without the dog. The decision was made to close Grant before the first meeting was held. Having the meetings just to give people a sense of involvement was probably good politics. Putting them through a charade was certainly bad form.

The Detroit Theater just couldn't complete. Once the (closed) Capital Theater was given millions in government money for renovatin the (open) Detroit Theater was destined to be closed.

If you read between the lines you can see that: The McDonalds will be built pretty much as McDonalds wants it to be built. If the City was serious about stopping it Council would be having its second reading of the proposed change in buiding codes. No drive trhough no McDonalds.

Thealexa got it right when she pointed out that the people of Lakewood have to patronize Lakewood business if they want Lakewood business...off to Jammy Buggers or Baggers or whatever.

My understanding is that citizen advisory committees are formed to give opinions, not to make decisions. I expect the decision maker, the elected decision maker, to listen to opinions, but I don't expect the persons I have elected to be a rubber stamp to implement the advise of the unelected advisory committee. It is certainly conceivable that the recommendations of a citizen advisory commission could be nonsensible per se; or that the decision maker has access to other information that argues against the recommendations of the unelected advisory committee.

Some of us should realize that, unless we stand for election, we do not represent the citizens of Lakewood; we represent only ourselves. If you want to represent the citizens of Lakewood, and make decisions for us, run for office. But spare us the endless whining about how you were taken advantage of.

I, for one, do not think we need a plan. Any plan ties you to current conditions, and takes away the flexibility needed to manage in a constantly changing world. If you really want a plan, you could probably recycle one of the Soviet Union's infamous plans, but you would probably not appreciate the results of implementing those plans, a dysfunctional and oppressive system. A plan makes about as much sense as the proposed balanced budget amendment.

And the main point it, not every Lakewood establishment is worth supporting just because it's in Lakewood. A business, even a local one, needs to differentiate itself and earn the business of every person that goes in there. Local businesses do not get a free pass just because they're local.

I'm sorry, but the Detroit theater was dirty, small, had horrible sound, and didn't really seem like a place I would want to go on a regular basis. Maybe when the movies cost $1, but certainly didn't give the experience that commanded the prices that other theaters get.

Bill can beat the dead horse of the Capital Theater for example, but I guarantee you that didn't kill the Detroit. The Detroit Theater killed the Detroit Theater.

On another note, memories of a place or experience do not automatically equate to something being historical or needing statutory protection. There needs to be something more concrete than that otherwise we might as just name the whole darn town historical and forget about even doing street repairs because I might have some good memory about a time I it a pothole on Madison.

I'm not saying memories aren't important, but it continues to rear its ugly head in confusing the situation between what actually makes something historically worth preserving and something that just reminds of happy memories.

They just got down gutting my old church to tear it down to build a CVS. I guarantee you there are a lot of good memories including weddings, funerals, confirmations, baptisms and all kinds of fellowship over the 100 years that building was there. Yet it kills me that there is much less outcry for that than a rundown theater. Help me understand the difference if we're judging historic worth on number of good memories?

Betsy Voinovich wrote:The information about when and where this meeting is, and what it's about, seems important, yet was not important enough to submit to the only community newspaper we have. So if you don't get around online you won't even know about it. Whereas if it was in the paper, you could read about it upon leaving the grocery store, sitting down at a restaurant or a cafe, in line at the super market, at the Y, at City Hall while you wait to pay your traffic ticket, at the Chamber of Commerce or maybe at the library.

FWIW, most people have access to the Internet so I think the fear of it not being in a printed local paper that not everyone reads anyway isn't really a big issue. Also, are we sure the online places that picked this up were told about if from the city or did they just find out about it on their own? Are you implying the city purposely avoided telling the LO but told everyone else? I'd love to hear more about that if it's true, because in my mind, that would be the true issue, not necessarily which medium is propagating the story.

The thing that I don't understand is why it's not listed on the city's website? To me that's the more concerning piece. why isn't the city making this information more public on the own site?

Bryan Schwegler wrote:

Betsy Voinovich wrote:The information about when and where this meeting is, and what it's about, seems important, yet was not important enough to submit to the only community newspaper we have. So if you don't get around online you won't even know about it. Whereas if it was in the paper, you could read about it upon leaving the grocery store, sitting down at a restaurant or a cafe, in line at the super market, at the Y, at City Hall while you wait to pay your traffic ticket, at the Chamber of Commerce or maybe at the library.

FWIW, most people have access to the Internet so I think the fear of it not being in a printed local paper that not everyone reads anyway isn't really a big issue. Also, are we sure the online places that picked this up were told about if from the city or did they just find out about it on their own? Are you implying the city purposely avoided telling the LO but told everyone else? I'd love to hear more about that if it's true, because in my mind, that would be the true issue, not necessarily which medium is propagating the story.

The thing that I don't understand is why it's not listed on the city's website? To me that's the more concerning piece. why isn't the city making this information more public on the own site?

Brian

I agree about the city's website. It is troubling that that, and more is not there. Why can't
we see CitiStat numbers quarterly? Want to see something interesting, Check out Westlake.
Council video taped from multiple angels, streamed, nearly every document presented
also online even if it comes out of the audience.

However, I have found people in the computer world to be slightly myopic when it comes
to daily computer use. And someone like you, that is probably the most savvy online
user and abuser I am sure cannot imagine life, or lives not online. Even in "wealthier
suburbs" there is still a digital divide. With smart phones, it is shrinking, but less and
less is actually being digested through those phones.

Where we have papers, daily computer access it ranges from 10% - 85%. Will papers
disappear, possibly.


FWIW

http://articles.cnn.com/2010-03-01/tech ... _s=PM:TECH

And for what it's worth, I have even newer numbers from Forrester and Gartner showing the trend is even higher now.

I'm not saying it should only ever be posted online, but we shouldn't kid ourselves and act like since it was published online everyone will miss out on the news since it's not in the print Observer yet.

Bryan Schwegler wrote:I'm not saying it should only ever be posted online, but we shouldn't kid ourselves and act like since it was published online everyone will miss out on the news since it's not in the print Observer yet.

Bryan

I am not, nor have ever been that delusional.

AND, we are talking two completely different animals here.

Animal A - Who access a computer daily? Lakewood around 70%, East Cleveland 10%,
Parma 61%. In these very same cities, the Observer can only touch some of them.
This is why any single plan, in 2011 borders on absurd. Now in Solon, it hits 92% from
what we have seen. Which brings us to the second question...

Animal B - What do they do when they get online?

But of course you know this because you are damn good at your job.

Papers do have a finite future, of that we can be sure.

Or can we?



.

Jim O'Bryan wrote:Papers do have a finite future, of that we can be sure.

Or can we?

Oh I don't necessarily think they do have a finite future, there most likely will always be a place for them, even if that place may have them looking quite different than they do today. Well at least until we all have chips implanted in our heads and the news is directly sent to our brains.

I think we're in complete agreement that multiple channel distribution is usually the best way to get out news that appeals to a broad audience. Nobody could ever argue with that. I just often see a lot of "us vs them" sometimes when it comes to other outlets getting a story first. Maybe there's more machinations behind the scenes and I just don't see it so there's more to the story. I mean maybe Colin at Patch is actually the devil and pays bribes to the Mayor for secret tips, I don't know. But ultimately, this is a town of 50,000 there's more than enough room for several different news organizations with different points of view and strengths.

The Observer is great because it's very broad and it has tons of community/citizen involvement all focused by a highly dedicated and talented editorial staff. Patch is great for a straight online news publication with a much tighter focus on news. And yes, even the Plain Dealer has its good points.

I mean who wants a world where only one point of view or news organization is dominant? I know I certainly don't, even if that outlet were the Observer.