I didn’t know Community Gardens were controversial?

John Hult did a story about how to fight city hall. He called me about the story (I didn’t make it in) but I did say a good way would be to ‘Start a Blog’. I think I have gotten a lot of things changed in our community by blogging about them. It also would be nice to have someone else in town doing it.

Some of the other things are obvious, like lawyering up, which is expensive and you may not win. Would have liked to see more advice about how to fight them economically.

I got a good laugh out of what Erpenbach said when she was developing community gardens;

It’s also a useful strategy for starting something new. Councilor Michelle Erpenbach wasn’t a politician when she began asking the city to build community gardens.

She worked behind the scenes, talked to council members and drew supporters together before making the pitch. A strategy of “more flies with honey than vinegar” is a good way to start, Erpenbach said.

“I didn’t come in and start yelling at people and saying ‘we don’t have community gardens and by God we’d better have them right now!’” she said. “It helps, in anything, to use professionalism and build a relationship.”

I never remember much opposition, if any, to community gardens. And it certainly wasn’t controversial, it just made sense. But when it comes to crime, drugs, human trafficking and human, civil and property rights, a little shouting does help, just hope Michelle has removed her ear plugs, because she certainly doesn’t respond to emails or phone calls.