City of Sisters should poll on ideas

The City of Sisters' increasing interest in community input is tremendously encouraging, but before they jump into action on the narrow list of community suggestions gathered at the February "summit," I suggest they tidy up the process that was used that night and poll the community as a whole.

At the economic summit, the audience was asked to verbally make proposals to replace the unpopular amphitheater plan. Each idea was written on a separate poster and the audience was then given stickers to place on their favorites. The fly in the ointment was that similar ideas were presented multiple times (worded slightly differently), and repetitious posters were scattered on opposite sides of the auditorium. The faulty procedure passed over several bright ideas, and many participants were confused and aware that the votes were skewed.

To avoid getting off on the wrong foot, I suggest the City condense and clarify all of the ideas presented, then give the entire community a chance to respond by mail.

Because the "summit" meeting was responding to backlash over the amphitheater, it seemed to focus primarily on big-bucks infrastructure projects. However some simple, low-cost, tourist-attracting ideas were also presented, but will likely be lost and forgotten. One was the creation of some traditionally well-attended Nordic events during the dead winter months, another was high-visibility banners letting drive-by traffic know of upcoming and current events.

Even though the bigger projects got more votes, I'd like to see these proposals on the questionnaire as well, perhaps in a section designed to build support teams amongst businesses and sports enthusiasts.

My own business relies on tourism, and the council seems entirely focused on it, but in light of the recent dilemma over falling school enrollment, I think we all know Sisters needs more than tourism to thrive.

At least two of the overlooked proposals could well help, the first of which would easily have made the top-four list, but the vote was split by duplicated posters.

The proposal focused on building a modern Internet technology-friendly environment designed to attract self-employed entrepreneurs and small business who rely heavily on the Internet.

These jobs are often portable, well-paying, and many can be performed from home, attracting semi-retired specialists to young professionals with families.

It's the wave of the future and seems well worth considering!

Another idea relates to the recent "what to do about Adams Avenue." Alternative forms of housing have become a national trend amongst environmentally interested older population and young families. A proposal was made to turn part of Adams into a model "street of dreams" for small, state-of-the-art, sustainable and affordable live-work spaces in order to attract startup businesses and young families. The City could support the concept through re-zoning for smaller lot size or cluster-housing, tax and SDC incentives and assistance with state and federal alternative-energy grants.

Our premium real estate prices have always been a deterrent to young families, and statistics show we will only become more stratified in the future. Creating a specially designed neighborhood could provide an alternative and put us on the map for more than our natural beauty, while attracting new residents and visitors, as well as forward-thinking architects, contractors and energy businesses.

Though building low-income apartments for service-sector wage-earners is still needed, unless we want to become exclusively a retirement community for the wealthy, we need to focus on diversifying our population and finding ways to attract clean business as well as young professional families who can support themselves from home.

In my opinion, our City fathers should review and condense all the bright ideas presented at the summit and allow the entire community a voice in what proposals to concentrate on.