Once upon a time, no so very long ago, in a nearby state building, there was a Citizens' Board that governed the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency. It last met in 2015, because the legislative session that year, in a fit of pique, eliminated the board. This session, the legislature has begun to rectify its misjudgment. If you're interested in more background about how and why the agency and its board were established, read Grant Merritt's Iron and Water. To gain insight into why the board was eliminated, and should be reestablished, read this article from MinnPost.
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| The Laurentian may no longer be Minnesota's most significant divide
Photo by J. Harrington
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The point we want to focus on today is our hope that we are learning that how we make decisions can be, and often is, as important as the decisions themselves. Legislators are, in our opinion, too susceptible to lobbying by special interests that can also make noteworthy campaign contributions. Appointed citizen board members, not so much. Citizen boards offer another benefit that can be of immense benefit: they don't caucus by political party, so they can work hard to look at facts instead of ideology as they make their decisions.
With some members from rural Minnesota, and others from the major urban centers in the state, we would once again have dialogue that crosses an urban / rural divide. Then, professional staff can focus on fact-gathering and analyses, and board members can concentrate on the balancing act. We need much more of that kind of activity to restore a semblance of civility to our democracy. As we understand it, today a legislative committee in the Minnesota House approved a bill bringing back the MPCA Citizens' Board. We hope the entire legislature enacts the bill and Governor Walz signs it as furtherance of the #OneMinnesota vision. We need legitimate forums, other than predominantly political ones, in which we can discuss and try to resolve increasingly thorny issues with which our society and state will be faced. In fact, we'd really like to see the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources restructured and placed under the guidance of a citizens board. Democracy, to be healthy, depends on decentralized decision-making. Else we move toward a monarchy or a dictatorship. If you don't believe us, just ask Ed Abbey and the members of the Monkey Wrench Gang.
To the Oracle at Delphi
Great Oracle, why are you staring at me, do I baffle you, do I make you despair? I, Americus, the American, wrought from the dark in my mother long ago, from the dark of ancient Europa-- Why are you staring at me now in the dusk of our civilization-- Why are you staring at me as if I were America itself the new Empire vaster than any in ancient days with its electronic highways carrying its corporate monoculture around the world And English the Latin of our days-- Great Oracle, sleeping through the centuries, Awaken now at last And tell us how to save us from ourselves and how to survive our own rulers who would make a plutocracy of our democracy in the Great Divide between the rich and the poor in whom Walt Whitman heard America singing O long-silent Sybil, you of the winged dreams, Speak out from your temple of light as the serious constellations with Greek names still stare down on us as a lighthouse moves its megaphone over the sea Speak out and shine upon us the sea-light of Greece the diamond light of Greece Far-seeing Sybil, forever hidden, Come out of your cave at last And speak to us in the poet’s voice the voice of the fourth person singular the voice of the inscrutable future the voice of the people mixed with a wild soft laughter-- And give us new dreams to dream, Give us new myths to live by!Read at Delphi, Greece, on March 21, 2001 at the UNESCO World Poetry Day
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