Mount Pleasant DC Forum

[jack]

The March monthly meeting will begin at 7:00 pm, Tuesday, March 1, at La Casa Community Center, 3166 Mount Pleasant Street. Preliminary agenda:

(times approximate):

7:00 Call to order
7:05 Status of 1D02, 1D06 vacancies
7:15 Approval of previous meeting minutes

7:20 Treasurer’s report
7:30 Community Concerns
8:00 Commissioner Reports:
Open Resource Web Site (Gregg, Rich)
Long Range Planning (Gregg, Wayne)
Open Forums (Gregg)
Focus Forums (Gregg)
9:00 Unfinished Business:
ABRA hearing on single sales


9:30 New Business
Scheduling of April meeting and 1D06 special election
Business cards

10:00 Adjournment

[jack]

At the March meeting, the ANC passed this resolution, initiating a series of community "Focus Forums" to consider specific topics. It should be noted that the first Forum, planned for March 21, has been postponed indefinitely, for lack of time for adequate planning and organization.
-- Jack

ANC1D resolves to hold a series of Focus Forums, starting with a Forum on March 21st 2005 on Public Security, and another on April 11th 2005 on Public Space in Mount Pleasant.

This ANC is inviting civic associations and service organizations to cosponsor these Forums on the basis that the primary function is to support greater communication and understanding of different interests and arguments within our neighborhood. Thus, conduct should model how we can learn to learn together, as well to explore our alternative policy options.

Each Forum will include consideration of two or three topics, each starting with short presentations, followed by an opportunity for participants to make a short statement of question or commentary, with the time dividable so that there can be follow up. In the interests of open, fair, and balanced discussion, distribution of time will give substantial preference to the presentation of alternative views, and then to understanding the reasoning behind those views.

The three topics for the Focus Forum on Public Security will include:
First, policing policy and possibilities for improvements.
Second, public health, including substance abuse and access to care.
And third, emergency services, including how we can survive rare but terrible events.

Why

Our intent is to encourage discussion of issues of common concern within and among the various neighborhood groups, and to explore how as a whole neighborhood we can engage our different approaches in constructive dialog.

[jack]

At the March meeting, the ANC passed this resolution, calling for a bench and some shelter from the weather at the bus stop on Irving Street just south of the Kenyon/Adams Mill intersection. -- Jack

Resolved, that ANC 1D requests the District Department of Transportation to provide a bench, and some measure of weather protection, for the bus stop on Irving Street just south of the Kenyon Street intersection.

Why

A major deterrent to the use of public transit is the discomfort of standing at a bus stop, exposed to the weather. The bus stop at Irving and Kenyon is fully exposed to rain, snow, and wind, with not even a nearby building doorway for shelter.

This bus stop is especially useful to the residents of Harvard Towers, many of whom are elderly and/or disabled, and who have no choice but to take public transit. Being elderly, and commonly in poor health, they cannot tolerate extended exposure to rain or cold, yet this location offers them no shelter, and no place even to sit while awaiting the bus.

The current arrangement threatens the health, and perhaps the lives, of almost two hundred residents of Harvard Towers, not to mention the many other residents nearby.

ANC1D recognizes that the location presents special difficulties, being too small to accommodate a standard bus shelter. Nonetheless, given the special needs and susceptibility to illness of the Harvard Towers residents, a special effort is warranted that would provide a bench, and some protection against raw weather.