Something's Missing

By Bruce Blair

Results Based Accountability (RBA) is a process used by thousands of communities and businesses to accurately, effectively assess, plan, and implement projects in response to the needs of a community. Some RBA ideas might be handy for Stockbridge to think about.

Example 1: How do we know affordable housing is needed here? We are one of the few towns already meeting state requirements. Who are the stakeholders? Identify and include them, especially the majority of people in town who are not following these issues right now. By the way, you go to them - not the other way around.

Example 2: Lots of data first, and no cherry-picking. Housing and jobs go together and are regional. Next door matters. How much new affordable housing has Great Barrington just added? How much will Lee be creating in their development? The Lenox numbers on their construction? What's the impact? These towns are not in compliance yet. But they have recent Master Plans. And recent data.

Example 3: Expand the sewer lines? Casual agendas make for flawed policy. Show us data. Prove it. Who would be better off? Who loses? Every big idea must answer questions.

Example 4: Most of the middle-class folks who once lived in Stockbridge worked in the mills or GE, other towns. Where will the new occupants earn a family's living wage? Don't jobs come before housing?

We need data to change zoning bylaws, a serious and difficult undertaking. The "green necklace" Olmstead-inspired zoning we have used for decades is a story of careful planning by accomplished town citizens.

In the parade of housing ideas that have sprung up in town lately, in the outcries of second homeowners, in the agendas of meetings at a time of year that is often used for reflecting and planning ahead, something is missing. I wonder if maybe we don't entirely understand what we are talking about right now. We know that people from the housing industry don't miss a trick. That's fine. But too many others are unaware.

What is the outcome we seek from all this activity? Where is the consensus? How will we know what success looks like? Its a big picture, like a vision, or ....

We could revise the 1996 Master Plan! We could ALL find ways to participate, All talk about the future, ask ALL the questions, survey EVERYONE. Maybe it's the vision that is missing.

Photo: Lionel Delevingne