A picture is worth a thousand words. This is the same fear uncertainty and doubt spread about other urban infrastructure plans the city has had in the past. I don’t think code next is perfect and in fact the latest drafts are pretty anti density. But I hate that these decisions are made on these knee jerk emotional reactions. If we do nothing else introducing some actual reason into the debate would be a breath of fresh air.
I completely agree, and as it so happens I’ve already been thinking about potential counterstrategies here. I think the simplest one would be to fight fire with fire, and establish a CodeNEXT-specific group — meaning city-wide, not just in Zilker — with the explicit intent of countering the propaganda Community Not Commodity is spreading. In effect it’d be somewhat akin to Politifact: every time they twist the truth to serve their anti-density agenda, the group could respond with the actual truth. The group could also coordinate plans to show up and present something at any city council meeting where CodeNEXT is on the agenda.
Anyway, I’m going to run the idea past a few folks. JP: since we already know a number of prominent anti-density advocates are FoZ members (though I don’t know if they’ve migrated to the new board yet), what are your thoughts on establishing a separate “channel” for this topic?
The Partner Page on that site seems to reflect a good mix of business interests and Neighborhood/Environmental interests.