Flutterby™! : Interesting discussion at Know Before

Interesting discussion at Know Before You Grow last night, we had a speaker fall through, so we did kind of an open mic night thing, and... it's a strong reminder that Nextdoor (and, to different extents Facebook and the other social media sites) amplify outrage, and externalize the costs of their profits on to the city staff and elected officials, and the rest of us who try to bring reason into the discussion.

It was also a reminder that Petaluma desperately needs a local paper that can help address some of the misinformation flying around. The Grand Jury report on the M Group, if anything, suggests that the incentives are for the outsourced Planning Department to create opportunities for too much public engagement, to bill developers for interminable public meetings and additional public input.

The fact that Petaluma has been experiencing its slowest growth since the Great Depression reinforces that this may be a problem.

It's further a reminder that historical perspective is useful. Before the event, Charlene and I happened to be leafing through Adair Heig's "History of Petaluma: A California River Town" and ran across this picture of downtown in the early '60s. It's amazing how, even in this fairly tight crop, several of those buildings aren't there any more, replaced with parking lots and ugly '70s single story bank buildings.

Even with the Urban Growth Boundary, as the city has sprawled out we've lost downtown.