Opinion: Open processes make democracy work

When I first ran for Boulder City Council in 1985, I learned an important lesson by knocking on doors and talking to all sorts of Boulder citizens: Being on Council was not about me, or my opinions. It’s about representing the citizens of Boulder, like the ones that I met and talked to, and what they think and value. This was a very profound experience, and really changed the way I thought about the role.

Once on Council, I came to further appreciate the intelligence and interest of the citizens in what happens in Boulder. On any topic, there were always a few people in the meeting audience who knew more than any of us on Council. So when we established the Council agenda committee, one of our jobs was to invite those citizens to testify, so that we could ask them questions and learn what they knew. (Incidentally, this also saved time, because the mayor would ask others to not repeat what had already been said, but just say they agreed.)

Our Council debates were pretty freewheeling with not much held back. I was told that people watching generally had the sense that all sides were being fully represented. And they also felt like they were getting the full story. (That was in part because the agenda committee made sure that all questions councilmembers would likely ask were answered in the agenda material.) So when a decision was made, it was my experience that generally even those of us on the losing side felt like all the strategic issues were explored and everything relevant was at least raised.

Thus, I have found it very disturbing watching the process over the last few years. It seems that it has become about what councilmembers think, not about what the community values. The public processes are about form, not substance. Big strategic issues are glossed over or decided prematurely.

And councilmembers, for the most part, don’t seem to actively engage in making sure they get the best input from the citizens. From the citizens’ side it feels like our suggestions are a burden or obstacle rather than a benefit.

This failure was most apparent in two recent processes: the abandonment of the attempt to create a municipal utility and then jumping immediately to signing a new Xcel franchise, without consideration of simply pausing the muni process; and the decision to give up on 500-year flood protection for South Boulder and then negotiate an annexation deal with CU, while never really exploring a land swap or condemnation of the property.

By far the biggest obstacle to citizen involvement and trust has been the closed-door meetings, in which a committee of two councilmembers privately worked out the details with Xcel or CU, and the results were only revealed at the end. The underlying assumption for these meetings was that the strategic decisions were already made, when they should have been kept on the table. And Xcel and CU knew what was going on, but Boulder citizens did not. That inevitably led to unnecessary conflict and mistrust.

Worse, what came out of these meetings was very poorly done. We got essentially nothing of any financial value out of the Xcel franchise. The negotiating team failed to get Xcel to commit any money, so all expenditures will either have to be approved by the PUC and passed on to its ratepayers, or else we in Boulder will pay. Regarding CU South, the many problems with the inadequate “100-year” flood protection, annexation terms and allowed amount of development have already been well-documented.

The public meetings to get comments on the CU South Annexation Agreement were not structured constructively: There was no formal opportunity to discuss strategy; no one had any idea how far to push an issue, since the city/CU discussions were private; and comments were not organized topic by topic, but all mashed together.

But the real problem was that the strategic decisions were made without full public consideration of the alternatives. If the goal was to pause the muni process, that could have been done without immediately committing to a multiyear agreement with Xcel. And a land swap with CU — with or without the threat of condemnation — could have been worked out in months, not years, if some councilmembers had seen fit to ask knowledgeable citizens to help explore these angles. It is hoped the next Council will restore some of the openness and responsiveness that we so desperately need.

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