Public Participation policy for the Alameda County Urban Runoff Program
To: Jack A. Lindley Water Resources Manager
From: L A Wood, October 19, 1992

Dear Mr. Lindley:

On September 22nd, I attended the scheduled Management Committee meeting with the encouragement of yourself and several others in the Alameda County runoff program. As you will recall, my concerns with the Management Committee focused on the issue of public participation and related policy development. (Please refer to Management Committee Agenda Sept. 22nd, Items 3, 4 and 5.)

I came to your meeting as an acknowledged "interested member of the public" with the hopes of addressing your management group. I assumed that there would be time for me to speak, either in the context of current policy considerations or in some form of public comment at the beginning of your deliberations. Neither of these situations occurred, so I sat quietly for nearly two hours and then watched as you closed the meeting. Only through the attention drawn by others did you even acknowledge my presence. It was in this context, during the fading moments after the regular meeting, that I attempted to speak. My public and personal response to this process was one of anger and frustration.

In our initial conversation, you repeated a statement about the fact that all program policy decisions are made by the Management Committee and that this committee was the appropriate public forum to express all my concerns. I recognize that September's meeting represented the first scheduled time for any public comment on the policymaking process in the ACURCWP. I also recognize that with a simple agenda change, this committee has postponed any public comment to any program policy development and public participation in this particular process.

As a member of the public, I find it a bit disconcerting that Alameda County's program would spend so much time developing a public participation policy. This seems a little like reinventing the wheel. I came to your meeting with several expectations. First and foremost, I assumed that an open comment period would be provided to the public at the beginning of the meeting. There was none. This would have guaranteed me some forum in which to speak, especially when committee agendas and subsequent discussions are subject to being postponed.

The most effective time for public comment is at the time of actual policy deliberations. This allows for constructive public input to CURRENT policy considerations and affords a more critical level of public participation.

To develop separate policies for public participation for each subcommittee is less than desirable for the public. Multiple public participation policies confuse the process of public participation. The program appears to have been carried away with the idea of policy development in this area. I see this policy development process for public participation to be divisive, and calculated to postpone or slow public access. A clear and singular standard is essential, along with its immediate implementation.

The issue of public participation is not unlike many of the other policy deliberations undertaken by the program. There is no time frame or statutory requirements for this area of policy development and implementation. Given this, I expect the program's participation policy to develop slowly and to remain restrictive.

Finally (so you might remember), in June of this year, a small group of neighbors in West Berkeley and a video entitled "Portal to the Bay" challenged the policy development for the ACURCWP surrounding municipal disposal and program implementation. This did cause changes to the program's policies. Now the issue is public participation and Alameda County's runoff program is giving final consideration to its public access policy. Today, there is no group or video to influence the program's public participation policy development. As reported by the Policy Level Subcommittee, "the only comment received was from a citizen named L A Wood." This has caused a postponement of recommendations from the subcommittee. Both of these public actions speak well of the need and the impact of public participation in the ACURCWP.

cc: Tom Bates, Assemblyman, District 12, Mayor Hancock, City of Berkeley, James Dillard, Clean Stormwater Project Manager, Berkeley, Robert Marek, Assistant Public Works Engineer, Berkeley Diane Heinze, Eisenburg, Olivieri, & Associates