Opinion: Let the citizens define Boulder’s future
Recently a friend told me that the Boulder city government is going to use “working groups” to provide input to its long term housing plan. “Working groups” are useful to design and implement programs. But for housing, working groups would be putting the cart before the horse. The first step, and it’s a big one, is to have a vision for the future of Boulder, one that addresses housing, but as a part of whole. And it needs to be a vision that has the support of the vast majority of Boulder citizens, not just of a few elected officials and city staffers. The “working group” concept came from a 2009 meeting of some 40 Boulderites who were not satisfied with the progress being made in the use of Boulder’s carbon tax, passed in 2006. The most important recommendation from the meeting was to form groups to work on specific aspects of the energy efficiency programs. These groups were to be open to whoever wanted to participate. The point was to include citizens who had expertise but not m