The following is an illustration of the communication and accountability problems that exist today with the Madison Park Community Council (MPCC).
I have been working the [No.] 11 East Madison bus issue since March 2015 with Metro [Transit]. My efforts have been to try to provide the best possible service to the residents of the Madison corridor from Madison Park to downtown, not just Madison Park. These efforts have included public meetings held in Madison Valley, as well as meetings and calls with Metro planners.
There have been four proposals, but only two were open for public discussion, the third had limited distribution and the last one is currently in the hands of the [Metropolitan King] County Council for review.
I spoke at the King County Council meetings on the impacts of the [No.] 11 route changes west of 19th Avenue East for seniors [and] handicapped [passengers] and no bus stop for the [Central] Co-op or Trader Joe’s. On Oct. 19, 2015, the King County [County] approved the Metro changes for March 2016.
There was a comment in the October Madison Park Times’ “Community Corner” column from the MPCC approving Metro’s [No.] 11 routing for March 2016: “We have also reached a compromise with Metro Transit over the re-routing of the No. 11 bus. Our consensus was that we wanted as little change to the current routing as possible; Metro’s bottom line was that it wanted the route to provide direct access to the new Sound Transit station on Capitol Hill. The new routing achieves both of these goals but will, unfortunately, add about five minutes’ travel time to the route.”
It was suggested by a former MPCC executive board member that I am promoting my own political agenda on Nextdoor in respect to transit and out-of-line critiquing the MPCC’s lack of consistency and lack of community input in agreeing with the latest Metro routing proposals to the [No.] 11 and connecting lines. He also stated that few residents of the area MPCC serves use the bus lines impacted by the latest Metro proposals, but those who do will have all connecting points necessary.
Is promoting safe, responsible connecting routes a political issue? Does anyone on the MPCC actually ride Metro? Metro seems very happy to have the MPCC’s concurrence on the August plan. Some members of the King County Council’s Transportation Committee were surprised by the recent letter from MPCC president because it was inconsistent with prior communications from him.
MPCC is an organization that should represent the interests and needs of Madison Park, Washington Park and Denny-Blaine. There are times when MPCC shouldn’t represent the interests of the neighborhood to the city or county without input from that community.
While there was input on two of the Metro plans at MPCC meetings, I am unaware of any MPCC forums discussing the last two Metro proposals. The [No.] 11 East Madison route is used by more people than those living east of Lake Washington Boulevard, and it is used to connect to other routes. MPCC should have first sought input from residents of Madison Park, Washington Park and Denny-Blaine.
MPCC is not using polling or social media (such as Nextdoor) to engage the community on issues. This is 2015, and MPCC’s reliance on a quarterly newsletter (Neighbor Connection) and a monthly Madison Park Times are good for information but not for timely discussions such as major transportation changes that impact the community.
I personally ran polls on Nextdoor to gauge the consensus of the users of the proposed [No.] routing and the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT). The sad part is that we had better communication five years ago, when we had an email Listserver for communication in the Park. To improve community engagement and communication with the community, MPCC needs to come into the 21st century and start utilizing email, online polling and social media.
The community council holds monthly meetings, with the announcements posted [at] the hardware store and other available space in the business area. These notices are devoid of any meeting agendas, as far as I know. Meeting minutes have not been posted since May 2015. The board is operating without a secretary, an officer required for most 501(c)3 nonprofits. Each issue of the Neighborhood Connection asks for a donation, and many of you have made generous donations to the council.… I believe the donors and the entire community deserve an accountably of these funds and expenditures.
The MPCC website is out-of-date. It does not list the current council officers, and it is promoting the 2013 Art Walk and events in May/June 2015. The MPCC website would better reflect the work of the council if it were maintained regularly.
The MPCC needs to reform itself and make the community part of the process and not continue to act as a club that meets with five to 10 people making decisions we only hear about after the fact! If this does not happen then we may have a repeat of Historic Madison Park and Friends of Madison Park that shook up the community eight years ago.
The best communication tool that we have today is Nextdoor, and it reaches over 1,800 people in the area covered by the council. This is a plea for MPCC to reach out to that community with tools that are available today, so that it can involve us, communicate with us and be accountable again!
We need to avoid a repeat of the recent Council’s Metro mistake. Please tell us what you think by holding a discussion on Nextdoor.
— Reg Newbeck, Madison Park