While I totally agree that a person has to be retired, unemployed, a business owner or paid by a non-profit to have the time to participate a lot in community work, and agree that day time meetings are not accessible to anyone with a real job, EastPAC is not really part of the neighborhood council structure, and is not 'the problem' here. I rarely have attended their meetings, but helped put the word out in Madison Valley using NextDoor and emails, so the 'working Moms' were definitely included. What topped the list here was the endlessly re-appearing graffiti and break-ins.

However, this info could have been ascertained from a review of police reports. Granted, there are communities that under-report. But, my worry about basing a plan on these kinds of surveys is that what people worry about the most might not be what are objectively the largest problems.

Hate to say it, but there are some in the n'hood that mostly worry about the 'thuggish' looking young people who live down the street. A few years ago some newer residents who openly went after a couple of long-term extended families to try and get them out of the n'hood by any means necessary. Besides ranting on blogs, there were constant calls to the cops about 'sketchy looking people', complaints filed with DPD over things like weeds, etc. Ironically, it was at an EastPAC sponsored community safety meeting where people had to 'get real' face to face and a lot of that stuff got addressed.

"Designing a city in silos—not holistically—is preposterous and shortsighted as needs change, and it fuels a boiling resentment among stakeholders that their work has been ignored."
This coming from the same paper that lauded the urban planning behind the Beacon Hill and Othello light rail stations? Is designing a city in silos only bad when The Stranger doesn't like the result? Or has The Stranger finally finished pulling its complete 180 and now opposes all neighborhood plans?

Amusing and horrifying to see people totally disengaged other then when presented with a ballot (at which point they avidly study The Stranger), don't even know their neighbors, have no clue about their local government and all of the stuff being worked on, who then when something happens to them or they see something relevant, sit on the sidelines and snipe.

Guess they are all just visitors to this place.