Comprehensive Plan
Diversity, Inclusiveness, Welcoming,
Community…
We have lived in
Wilmette for almost 50 years. For the
most part, we have been happy here.
Property taxes are about to drive us out of here. Property taxes are absurd. It is the one tax that is not tied to a
person’s ability to pay the tax.
When I hear of comprehensive
plans, specifically government plans, I become very wary.
Why?
Comprehensive plans
are large plans that have many parts to them.
It is hard enough to get people to agree on small plans, but comprehensive
plans inevitably include controversial things that either they hope you don’t
notice, or you are forced to accept to get the things you do want.
Those are false
choices that have no place in government initiatives. Honest, responsible government would identify
particular issues and seek input and discussion. But it would not bunch a lot of disparate policies
together as one package that require accepting or rejecting the whole thing at
once.
Our Constitution
says that government, our government, exists to unite our people and to ensure
domestic tranquility. It is not the
place of government to try to shape the people or the community to attain
preconceived ideals that it decides on.
I am not even
talking yet about the plan itself. I am
talking about the nature of government comprehensive plans.
A comprehensive plan
is saying that there are so many things wrong with something that we need to
overhaul it from top to bottom. I submit
that Wilmette is a good community as it is and does not need the government to
remake it into something different. If
the Village keeps the cost of living here as low as possible and still provides
the usual services that we have come to expect, then it has done its job.
Now to specifics.
I am curious about
the choice and wording of these goals.
Diversity and
inclusion? Did you forget equity, or did
you omit it intentionally? The only time
those words are used, equity is like the third leg on the political stool.
Two comments on
diversity.
The very idea of
diversity denotes a simplistic and faulty view of people.
Every person is
unique. We should never assume that we
understand anybody, because we have classified them by race, gender identity,
religion, or whatever parameters are important to you. Every person has their own story, their own
perspective, their own worldview, even though they may all be of the same race
and gender and whatever.
To say that we are
not a diverse community, because we have too few people of a different demographic
is misleading, wrongheaded, and very shortsighted. Isn’t that stereotyping, which we’re not supposed to do, assuming that
everybody of the same demographic is vastly similar, and people of another demographic
are so different that justice and life demand that we spread all these various
demographics throughout all of society for our necessary enrichment and social
justice?
Secondly, people have
always formed their closest ties with people they have the most in common with. They seek out people with the same interests,
the same beliefs, the same lifestyles. People
they are most different from make for an interesting conversation or two, but
it hardly fosters committed friendships and relationships.
I fail to see the
value of a goal of diversity. Diversity
is more likely to divide people than to unite them. How are people who are diverse supposed to be
united, or isn’t that a worthy goal?
What holds us together, what binds us to each other, if we are so different
from each other?
Our nation is built
about the idea of unity: the UNITED States, e pluribus UNUM. When people focus on diversity, they are
accentuating our differences and making those difference the paramount factor
in the relationship. That is not going
to unite us, and that is what we need most today in our society, not more
division. We need to find what we have
in common and not how we are different.
Then you speak of
inclusion.
Does Wilmette have a
problem with exclusion? And I don’t mean
a hundred years ago, or even 50.
Who are you thinking
of that we are not including? And what
does it mean to include them?
From my observations,
when people talk about inclusion, they mean people who for various reasons have
beliefs or practices or cultures that people have generally found unsettling in
some ways. They are not unsettling,
because they are different, but because they require everybody else to conform
to some new way of looking at things.
Inclusion as used today
always means a forced acceptance of ideas, beliefs, and behaviors that one
would generally have questions about, but any criticism, questioning, even
discussion of these matters is now forbidden. That is not America.
Nobody
cares who moves in next door. Unless they
have loud parties late into the night.
They figure it’s a married couple with kids, financially stable, responsible,
good job, probably educated.
When
I say they don’t care, I don’t mean that they are unfriendly or different to
them. I mean they will accept them, as
long as they are good neighbors. Not too
loud, not messy, don’t let things get rundown.
There
is one exception. What I call subsidized
housing. When the government either directly
or indirectly creates situations where people who cannot afford to buy a house
in Wilmette are able to live there. Then
we no longer have those general assurances that these people are responsible, educated
people with a good work ethic.
We both
came from Chicago. Both of us grew up
there. I worked most of my life in
Chicago. Neither of us would want to
move back there. No, it’s not the
demographics but the crime. Which coincidentally
increased as the demographics changed. And
those changes were mostly driven by government pushing diversity rather than
natural migration.
People
don’t buy houses because the neighbors have regular block parties or there are welcoming
committees for potential home buyers. They just want a safe neighborhood with
low taxes and good schools. If they meet
their neighbors, that’s fine. But if not,
that’s OK too.
You
want a comprehensive plan as if there are major problems that need
addressing. I don’t see that, and I feel
the solutions that you will propose to reshape our community will not be in
everyone’s interests. I fear in your attempt
to make a better Wilmette you will incentivize people to move out, so you can
get others more to your liking. Again,
that’s not America. It’s not government’s
role to run people’s lives or to tell them how to live.
What does it mean to build community?
I think you’re asking: what can the
government of Wilmette do to promote more neighborliness among its residents?
I definitely don’t think it should
create a program or an office that requires tax dollars. The basic need would be some way to facilitate
people getting to know their neighbors better.
I’m sure block parties are helpful, but it takes somebody to organize
them.
If you enlisted volunteers who could,
say, plan a block party. i.e. do all the
logistics.
Set up vendors, provide a template
for any person to use to have a block party.
Then you let everybody know that you have made putting on block parties
as easy as possible. You have done 90%
of the work for us, and it’s only a matter of somebody deciding to do it. You could make Wilmette the town for block
parties.
You could have volunteers who go to
the houses of people who have just moved in and provide them with brochures,
coupons to local businesses, important phone numbers, political information,
representatives, etc. You could even perhaps
try to get a volunteer for every block who could, I don’t know, lead the way
somehow. I don’t think we should give them
titles like Block Captain. This person
would have constant contact from the Village on things that might make life better
in some way.
You could ask local businesses to provide
discounts or coupons to new residents.
You could funnel to them name and addresses of new people if they want
to contact them in some way.
What is our role as individuals?
It’s almost all individuals. We are the ones who have to do the talking,
the taking of the time to share our lives.
We have to be willing to make the effort.
Maybe you can have volunteers who
would meet regularly to think about stuff like this.
How can Wilmette
foster a real sense of belonging such that anyone can feel welcome and thrive?
Things like this can
work both ways. Most people I think just
want to be left alone. Yes, be friendly
to people, but they want their space.
Some people would want added attention, but I think would rather not.
Thank you
