Tonight was the first public preview of a little thing called GreenPlan Philadelphia, which is nothing less than a 20 year plan to create, preserve, and enhance the open spaces in the city. The GreenPlan team draws from about a dozen city agencies (from Water to Health to Commerce) under the direction of the City Managing Director's Office. Their remit is to create a comprehensive blueprint for sustainable open space.

The first phase has been to set up the project team and begin gathering information, recording an inventory of the city's existing natural resources and cataloguing some 200 open-space plans already on the cards. The second phase is a series of public meetings over the next 3 months to collect input from neighbourhood groups, CDCs, and the public at large. During 2007 a draft plan will be put together and opened for more public comment, and the final plan will be complete by Dec 2007.

It seems pretty wide ranging - looking at current and future demographic trends; taking consideration of watershed issues, health issues, transportation issues; impact analyses on crime, the environment, the economy; and much more. The plan will include specific projects to be undertaken, and will also create a review process for future proposals to guide the decision making process. The goal is to institutionalize the GreenPlan into the core mission of every city department and agency - which is why it's being led by the Managing Director rather than the planning commission or recreation department.

Website is www.greenplanphiladelphia.com

Community meetings schedule http://www.greenplanphiladelphia.com/community_meetings

Above is a description of the plan and process as best I understand it from tonight's forum. Now for a couple of editorial comments.

The whole thing seems to be driven by career civil servants rather than the politicians or their appointees, and timed to hand the next mayor a fait accompli next December. I can't decide if that's good or bad - I'm happy to see it happening, and it's certainly a way to force the issue onto the political agenda, but if it's really going to be a fundamental shift in how all city departments deal with open space and environmental issues, a policy shift like that should really come from the elected representatives. The bureaucracy is supposed to carry out policies initiated by the elected politicians, it's not supposed to just dream up new things and run with them because it wants to. BUT - politicians have a bad habit of paying lip service to the environment during election campaigns, then doing nothing positive about it after they get into office - so I'm glad to see the civil service take the lead.

Anyway the political issue is a minor point. The main thing is, for the first time since 1960 Philadelphia is actually embarking on a city plan. And I think this is the right approach - nail down a plan about open space first, then create a zoning plan that develops the built environment in concord with the open space plan.

It sounds like the GreenPlan will be a fairly comprehensive environmental plan for the city, not just a pretty map of where parks and playgrounds should be located. Certainly they are considering a whole range of environmental issues, and they're putting some dollars and sense into it as well - cost/benefit analyses attempting to quantify the results. The cost of creating and maintaining green space needs to be seen as an economic as well as a social investment, and this GreenPlan is taking that view.

Anyway - nuff from me.

It was interesting to say the least. I did take a look.

And don't discount the work and input of Civil Servants, especially the mid-level ones. They are ones that actually have reached a level of proficiency at their work and may even still care about what they do. It is usually the appointees above them that lack...insight, creativity, thought--you name it. They were appointees, not necessarily there because they know what they're doing. The really low levels employees are those that you see in lines and answering phones, and they are a surly useless lot. At least the ones I have had to deal with. And seriously, are you expecting innovative thought from most politicians?

Just my naive beliefs about how government is supposed to work... where the elected leaders actually run the Government, not just the "administration" whatever that means...

I do have great respect for civil servants (I was on the path to becoming one myself, once). The senior ones who have risen on their merits are the best advisors an elected leader could have, far better than a bunch of patronage appointment cronies. It's just that, in my hypothetical fantasyland of textbook democracy, the elected leader should be deciding policy direction whilst the professional bureaucrats figure out a way to carry it out. (and there shouldn't be any unelected political appointees getting in the way)

Luckily in this case, with a lame duck politician serving out his last year and innovation in the doldrums, the professionals have got together to do what needs to be done. Kudos to them.