Leaky Pen -- My Observations on District Five History and Experiences I originally wrote this as publicity for the annual meeting of Payne/Phalen District Five Council. Since that is scheduled for tomorrow and has not been used there, I will put it here for the benefit of our readers. For those who do not know me, I have been on the Board of the Payne/Phalen District Five Planning Council for the last eight years and for a total of about twenty years altogether, was president 1984-86, 1988 and am now serving as its vice-president.-- RS I guess because I have been observing the organization for about a quarter of a century and have served on its board for many of them, I have been asked to write a few paragraphs, identifying some of the things the Payne/Phalen District Five Planning Council has accomplished. The accomplishments are hard to quantify and hard to evaluate. Everything which is done is done through cooperation -- cooperation with each other and with others. Sometime it gets hard to identify specific accomplishments and sometimes it seems unseemly to blow our own horns too loudly when we are part of some greater orchestra. But we really do need to note some of the things in which our District Council has been involved. Some of our accomplishments are visible and big and directly affect many. When you look on the south side of Lake Phalen where Gillette Hospital used to be, you see green space, a seniors' apartment building, and the Humanities Commission building which serves as a reminder of the site's former use. You do not see late 1970's townhouse buildings on every buildable space. When you travel on Maryland Avenue, you see a roadway which does not extend all the way to the sidewalks, leaving neighbors at least a semblance of a residential character around their abodes. When you cross the Payne Avenue Bridge you are crossing a structure which we [at least at the time] thought much more aesthetically-pleasing than the structure proposed. And when you look over the bridge you can see the Phalen Boulevard, a project we were pushing even before it was cool to do so. When you go into the neighborhood immediately south of the Bruce Vento school you still see 100+ houses which some were suggesting be leveled. We have worked with Ramsey County to improve water quality in Lake Phalen. Changes are coming about on Railroad Island following the adoption of the Railroad Island Small Area Plan in which we were deeply involved. The Arlington Hills Library is still standing and open as a library. By operating neighborhood cleanups once or twice a year for the last 16 years we have taken an awful lot of stuff out of the area. Other achievements are less visible or smaller and directly affect fewer. The site of Bradley Terrace Apartments was at least twice previously suggested as the site of more dense and environmentally more dubious projects which we helped never come about. There is no unsecured building to house the undiagnosed mentally ill [before a judge would rule on whether they should be sent to St. Peter or not] on Greenbrier Street. There are many duplexes which have not been crammed onto lots too small to contain them. Many block clubs have been established and/or maintained by the work of District Council staff and volunteers. Many things are unseen and even unknown. We don't know how many dubious building or traffic management proposals never came about or were significantly modified before anybody saw them because we were here. We don't know how many crimes did not take place because of block clubs we helped establish or maintain or hardware we helped distribute. But perhaps the most important thing we have accomplished is not in how something was built or not built or in any of the things I have mentioned. Perhaps the most important thing is that the District Council is something which is available to all and is something in which all those who participate, whether on the board, on committees, or in its activities get to work together, to understand more of the people who make up our community and get together to better improve themselves and their communities. We continue to welcome all of our neighbors to help us as we work on our various community matters. Ray Sammons |
| Response[s] below |