How about disband the planning commission? It’s not needed.
Why does a town that small need 7 planning commissioners?
http://www.lovelafayette.org/home/showdocument?id=1387
It appears they were all making over $100K/yr with the planning director making even more.
What were the conflicts of interest that forced resignations?
Probably connections to housing industry? Several might be builders or developers. Government all degenerates to corrupted cohorts. And corruption is not even a concern, the real concern is over regulation to the point that business is getting killed altogether.
It’s better to disband planning commission and simplify the government.
“When I went through the minutes, I found examples where two and three of the agenda items were presented by firms of the commissioners,” Lafayette resident Scott Summer told the City Council. “It’s a big problem.”
There been a lot of trust issues and transparency issues,” neighbor Cheryl McDonald testified at the meeting, although she did not provide any particular examples. McDonald called the anti-conflict of interest law “a healing motion.”
I bet that commission was costing the city $2M/yr with the benefit and pension packages. All so developers could pat each other on the back and approve each others’ projects. Imagine the waste like that at the federal level.
Not developers but an architect (at least in one case). It seems there is a group called “Save Lafayette” opposed to some proposed projects in their town.
July 31, 2017: Two of the largest projects pending before the City – the 99 unit Woodbury condominium project (one of the largest in Lafayette history) and the proposed rezoning of 5.75 acres for the development of a major cancer counseling office next to the Reservoir – are being represented by the firms of Tom Chastain, an architect who sits on the Lafayette Planning Commission, and Bob Cleaver, an architect who is also chair of the Lafayette Design Review Commission.
So it doesn’t always help to have insiders working for you. The planning department can only serve nimbies.
I doubt planning commissioners were paid much…certainly not $100k a year
Monthly salaries are on the link I posted. It gives a range.
Those are planners. They are full time city employees. Planning Commissioners are normally just volunteers. Make like $500/meeting… 12 meetings a year.
So there’s even more people involved in planning for a tiny town? Wow.
Yes planning is an expensive wasteful endeavor. Woodside has 4 planners and over 30 employees with only 5000 citizens. Government is an extremely expensive waste of time and money. In the 60s Woodside had 4 employees. The mayor, one building inspector, the clerk and one cop.
Big government eats its citizens alive and no one can even notice the blood. Once people get used to blood sucking by government, they will panic when planning commissioners quit. No big deal, shit down planning committee and let them do their own yard work. The city will be much better.
SF planning commission has made SF a world class filth
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