HomeMy WebLinkAbout5a_Public Comments_Additional MaterialsAs to its content, a fair portion of the bill relates to the “kick-off meeting.” I’m not sure the
Committee or public has ever been fully apprised of what happened at that non-public meeting
between the consultant and staff, and what decisions were made there.
Item III.c. Review Kearns & West Invoice for September 2019
Of the tasks listed on page 2, the “internal summary and debrief for City and Kearns & West
staff” of the September 12 and 25 Committee meetings is intriguing. I thought this was
supposed to be a transparent process. Are there non-public summaries of what occurred that
differ from what the Committee and public see?
I am also uncertain what “Review of comments from Steering Committee member [singular] and
response development” means. Has Kearns and West been using their contract to provide
private responses to concerns raised by individual Committee members that are not shared with
the rest of the Committee and the public? If so, that seems a misuse of public resources to me.
Item V.a. October 26 Community Fair Event Recap and Engagement
Updates
What Mayor Dixon described at the November 5 City Council meeting as a “soft launch” has
been announced in the City Manager’s November 1 The Week in Review as a “Success!” with
over 400 people attending. I was only able to attend the first 90 minutes, and thought the
attendance was sparse and may have included a large component of family members of the
participating employees and organizations, as well as curious library-goers.
I will be curious to see both what input was obtained and how many new people interested in
continuing participation in the update process were recruited.
As to the remainder to the engagement, the only item on the Newport, Together website that
appears to have any activity (perhaps from the Launch Event??) is the interactive map, whose
purpose (and usefulness) is not entirely clear to me. It would make some sense to see a map
displaying the geographic demographics of the subset of people responding to a particular
survey. But I don’t understand the significance of displaying the demographics of random
people.
Item V.b. Upcoming Council District Workshops
I would have hoped to see a description of the proposed content and format of the workshops,
but I see none.
As to the flyer, a revised version was distributed at the November 5 City Council meeting and
announced by the Mayor, and the dates and locations have appeared for some days on the
City’s online calendar, and were finally added (on November 6) to the Newport, Together
website, so it seems a bit late to change, but as to the already announced locations, why is the
General Plan Update Steering Committee - November 6, 2019
Items No. III(a)(b)(c) and V(a)(b)(c) 2 Additional Materials Received