
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, July 19, 1990                   TAG: 9007190532
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-14   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

NEIGHBORHOODS GETTING AWAY FROM CITY HALL

DURING his campaign this spring to return to office after a two-year hiatus, Roanoke City Councilman James Harvey trotted out an old war horse of an issue: Council should resume scheduling some meetings in neighborhoods away from the Municipal Building.

It's to Harvey's credit that he hasn't stop riding his proposal just because the election's over. And the destination - to put (or keep, depending on your point of view) council in close touch with citizens - is worthwhile. Still, this nag is getting a little tired.

During much of the '80s, council annually held four of its regular sessions during the fall and winter outside City Hall. One session was held in each of the city's four quadrants.

There's a lot of gimmickry in that model. The format is artificial, arbitrary; there ought to be better ways to get at what Harvey's trying to accomplish.

Problem No. 1 is that the quadrant system doesn't correspond very well to Roanoke's mosaic of neighborhoods.

To ask council to meet at least once each year in each neighborhood of the city is to ask too much. But council could meet, say, eight or nine times a year with different clusters of two or three neighborhoods.

Problem No. 2 is that regular meetings of council are not particularly well-suited to the task.

Much of council's business is routine, and of interest only to municipal-government junkies. Other business can arise that, while important, has no particular relationship to the neighborhood where the meeting is held. And if an issue arises of urgency to a neighborhood - flooding, say, along Peters Creek - rest assured that Roanokers know how to find their way to council's chambers in the Municipal Building.

But special meetings of council, devoted exclusively to the concerns of the neighborhoods where they're held, might attract greater interest. How formal such meetings should be is the sort of thing that probably would have to be determined by trial and error. In some neighborhoods, residents might be more comfortable with a casual approach; in other neighborhoods, setting agendas in advance might draw more participants.

It would take work on council's part. Instead of simply changing locales for meetings that would be held anyway, council would have to schedule extra meetings.

But when they were candidates, council members were willing to spend time in Roanoke's neighborhoods in search of votes. In office, they should be just as eager to spend time in Roanoke's neighborhoods in search of, and to listen to, the citizens' voices.

by CNB