To the Editors:

How to Let Problems Continue to Get Worse:

1. Misdefine the issue.  Define the problem narrowly — define a symptom as the problem and argue that we need more of the symptom. (Examples: define it as “parking,” not as “transportation;” as “jobs,” not as “having what we want;” as “high healthcare costs,” not as “getting the healthcare we want,” etc.)

2a. Don’t stop the worst, most obvious wrongs. (Gripe a little (or a lot), but let the trees get cut to build parking lots, houses, bigbox stores, etc.)

2b. Focus on everything but the obvious wrong. (Promote bicycling, promote permeable paving, promote buffering landscaping, promote local farming, etc., but don’t actually stop the parking lots that trigger these discussions.)

2c. Promote more of the wrong thing in other places. (Suggest other locations for parking lots, building projects, factories, etc.)

3. Don’t get a communal process. (Talk with and about “higher-ups” as if they have the final say.)

4. Don’t brainstorm fundamental solutions.

If this is not the world that you want to be stuck in, then put the establishment of these two ideas on the agenda of your next regular staff meeting, faculty meeting, student senate meeting, city council meeting, etc.

1. Have a group veto process — that stops the worst, most obvious wrongs, no matter who approves them.  (Combine a simple system of representation, in which one person reports the opinions of the nine or ten people they represent (including split opinions, such as 5-4), with a simple e-mail vote tally system.)

2. Have open group meetings to plan group systems.  (For group transit systems, consider golf-cart style on-campus and in-town transport, and a large community vehicle fleet available for all kinds of out-of-town trips.  These cars will likely be safer on average, than individually owned cars, because they will receive constant professional maintenance.)

Summary: Purpose without due process is pointless; get group processes for group purposes.  Problems that are misdefined, and mishandled by inappropriate processes, do get worse.