Thursday, November 08, 2007

What we could've had, and what we got

As George Dilgard puts his left hand on the Bible and takes the oath of office next Monday, he should be thanking the Good Lord for the cold November drizzle that helped keep 19 voters from the polls Tuesday, and kept Shelli Weisberg from claiming his spot on the City Commission.

The differences between Dilgard and Weisberg are striking, and the effect on the commission of having Dilgard seated, and not Weisberg, will be significant.

Had Weisberg gained a seat, she would have likely contributed to a reasonably consistent majority voting bloc with Tom McDaniel, Scott Moore and Gordon Rinschler. This group probably would have advanced such worthwhile initiatives as the Bates Street extension, and welcomed the kind of public/private partnerships that such a project would have entailed.

Their leadership woulda, coulda been something exciting.

Dilgard, on the other hand, joins only Don Carney in a small voting bloc that is likely to be against any kind of creative development ideas. As the standard-bearers of the Anti movement, they will be vying with McDaniel, Moore and Rinschler for the swing votes of Rackeline Hoff and Stuart Sherman.

Hoff and Sherman are unpredictable. Dilgard is not. As a Planning Board member, he was frequently the "1" in 6-1 and 5-1 votes, and rarely gave up even after losing his cases so miserably. That's because he knew when the Planning Board ceded the last word to the commission, and when it did, he invariably took his cases, privately, to Carney, who would continue to advance them, often with success, on the commission.

Dilgard's disregard for the opinions of staff and a majority of Planning Board members, along with his propensity for behind-the-scenes dealing, is likely to carry over to his work on the commission. The former will be on display for all to see (expect him to disregard not only the planning people, but other advisory boards and staff members as well); the latter will, as always, be hidden from public view.

We sometimes ridicule Hoff and Sherman for waffling. But often, it arises from genuine and noble desires to deliberate in public with open minds. In contrast, Dilgard and Carney deliberate in private and come to the table with anything but open minds. As not a few students of government will assert, that's no way to run a democracy.

For her part, Weisberg, a veteran of many boards, wanted desperately to bring discipline to the commission, a desire shared by Rinschler. Together, they might have had a shot at getting the commission to act like something other than a bunch of amateurs. Alone, Rinschler will have a tough time of it. So if you watch commission meetings and were hoping you could soon stop banging your head against the wall, prepare yourself for more than a few more headaches.

The best outcome of the election, of course, was the drubbing of Seth Chafetz. Be thankful that his bizarre smile and non sequiturs won't be part of the political landscape for some time.

It's too bad, though, that voters decided to trade two women -- Julie Plotnik and Dianne McKeon, who chose not to seek re-election-- for two more men. The upside: with all those women and Chafetz out of the way, it should be fun watching the testosterone fly.