It ain’t rocket science.
lead·er·ship
ˈlēdərˌSHip
noun
1.
the action of leading a group of people or an organization.
“different styles of leadership”
synonyms: guidance, direction, control, management, superintendence, supervision
Everything about the current farmers market expansion discussion is spasmodic and misdirected. It came surreptitiously from the crypt to the Board of Works last fall …
Budgetary back alley to the Farmers Market? Let’s face the music and dance.
… and managed to arouse in council person John Gonder and a handful of others that singular quality always guaranteed to arouse suspicion and bile amongst the fogies — namely, daring to think outside the box — and in turn, this provocation sent the oft-indemnified farmers market queenpin into a tizzy …
The farmers market discussion to too important to be left to the Marktmeister alone.
… leading us now to yet another repulsive example of Develop New Albany’s amazing inability (read: unwillingness) to decide what “non-political” really means, and to apply the definition with consistency. Spin the wheel again, Vanna.
So, I decided to give them a dose of their own shamelessly propagandistic medicine.
Yo, DNA: Here are some examples of OUR propaganda. You can have the hearts. We’ll take the minds.
Then it occurred to me that perhaps the farmers location matters more in proximity to the Marktmeister’s own building than the city as a whole.
Maybe the city could buy indoor space for the Winter Farmers Market. Would $108K do it?
Not really; I’d been holding on to that one for a while.
Back to the tip-off: Leadership.
Is City Hall exercising any of it as this annoying spectacle unfolds?
Or is the general idea to allow otherwise well-meaning people to metaphorically bash each other’s brains in (speak for yourself), until none are left standing … to demand a Speck study for the street grid but reject an economic development strategy for downtown … to just stand there and be non-participatory?
One more time: The city needs to be stirred from its present somnolent resting place and take a share of the farmers market issue back into its possession. It is city property, and it consequently “belongs” to us all. What this looks like at present is a transparent payback to Develop New Albany’s self-interested cadres, but the farmers market is far more important than just that, and its future needs to be studied with the city’s active, directed, interested participation — not the bizarrely detached passivity it has displayed thus far.
