Sent July 17, 2020 to: Councilwoman Sawyer, Afor Chavez, DOTI Comm Engagement, Eileen Yazzie, DOTI, Samuel Piper, DOTI, Dana Hoffman, DOTI, Jennifer Hillhouse, DOTI, Christian Jimenez, Dir City Engagement, Tim O’Bryen, Auditor, Lori Weiser, Director, Denver Ethics
Mr. Pulsipher, other DOTI staff, Denver government officials and other stakeholders:
Unfortunately, the WDCA Board can not support DOTI’s plan to move ahead with the proposed meeting on July 21. It’s simply not in the best interest of our community to have a meeting where the vast majority of the community’s residents have been provided no meeting notice, and the select few that have received a meeting invitation were only given four (4) working days advance notice of the meeting. You only need to compare the outreach efforts for the original meeting date on June 30 and the proposed July 21 date to see why the planning and outreach effort for this meeting is inadequate and unprofessional.
June 30 Community Meeting – Postponed: Community Outreach
DOTI sent postcards to each household in the community, several weeks in advance of the meeting. DOTI also put up yard signs. Note that there are over 550 households in the Winston Downs RNO boundaries. We do not have a count of households in the South Hilltop Neighborhood Association boundaries, but we assume they also received notices in the mail.
July 21 Proposed “Community” Meeting – Community Outreach
DOTI sent out mailed notices to residents only along the affected corridor. Note that there are fewer than 40 households on the Virginia corridor in WDCA’s territory. This represents only 7%+/- of the more than 550 households in our community. It’s unknown if DOTI notified households along S. Niagara St. that would be affected by the new design; there are about 30 households on that leg of the proposed bike lane.
DOTI did not post flyers or yard signs for this meeting. DOTI sent emails only to its internal limited email distribution list and to those who registered for the June 30 meeting only four (4) working days before the July 21 meeting date. DOTI posted a meeting date and inaccurate call-in information on its website about the meeting (since the call-in information was not available until July 16, no call-in information could have been provided in that format). Realistically, this notice didn’t reach a significant number of residents and this passive effort cannot be considered a viable form of meeting notice.
DOTI Commitment v. Action
DOTI on multiple occasions throughout the bike lane planning process has indicated that it will hold a community-wide meeting to discuss the proposed project design. The July 21 meeting clearly does not meet that obligation. DOTI has made major changes to its proposed design and planning process. Our entire community deserves to have the opportunity to be informed and provide input on the new plan. The proposed meeting calls into question DOTI’s ability and intent to provide a credible outreach effort for this project.
We reiterate our request to postpone this meeting. If that is not feasible, DOTI must hold another meeting that reaches the community as a whole as DOTI has committed to do. It is clearly feasible to accommodate the scheduling needs of our community stakeholders and leaders and provide a reasonable 10 to 14-day notice to the entire WDCA and South Hilltop Neighborhood Association for this meeting. DOTI needs to provide a similar level of advance notice to all households in the affected neighborhoods as it did for the postponed June 30 meeting. We should not be penalized for DOTI’s poor planning. If DOTI cannot meet these obligations, this project must be cancelled in its entirety or postponed until DOTI can do so.
WDCA Partnering
WDCA is able and willing to support and even assist with publicizing a meeting date and format that adheres to basic professional and ethical standards. The meeting must be available to the entire community and adequate notice needs to be provided. We would like to remind DOTI of its ethical obligation to the members of the community, as indicated by Denver’s code of ethics:
CODE of ETHICS Sec. 2-51. Legislative intent. It is the intent of the city that its officers, officials, and employees adhere to high levels of ethical conduct, honesty, integrity and accountability, so that the public will have confidence that persons in positions of public responsibility are acting for the benefit of the public. Officers, officials, and employees should comply with both the letter and spirit of this ethics code and strive to avoid situations that create impropriety or the appearance of impropriety.
We are not confident at this time that DOTI is acting consistently with the principles outlined above. Our long-term interest and the safe and effective build-out of bicycle infrastructure are threatened when city agencies are not accountable for their actions.
Tim Rooney, President
WDCA