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~~"~' <br />THE T IN Lr~KES A U b` iJ i 1-1TE99 <br />J~TLY ~ 6, 2007 <br />BY AL SANDS <br />The proposed "UPDATE" of the Twin Lakes AUAR illustrates how a document <br />is inherently inaccurate and dysfunctional when it is prepared by a dysfunctional <br />government. <br />The first indication of a dysfunctional government is when you freeze out the <br />citizens in the decision making process. Note that staff wants the Council, alone, to <br />review and then declare the document "complete and accurate " by August 13th, and then <br />distribute it to the reviewing agencies, without any citizen involvement. Not until August <br />20th, after the Council has rubber stamped the staffs proposed AUAR, and declared it a <br />"done deal" and sent it off to the reviewing agencies, would any public comment be <br />introduced. This is a dysfunctional process, revealing the staff's fear of public <br />interference in their plans. Local government thrives on openness, not secret dealings <br />setting up done deals before the public is allowed "in". <br />The second indication of a dysfunctional governnment is the staff and Council's <br />apparent determination to prepare a new AUAR based on fantasy scenarios dreamed up <br />by staff, instead of any citizen or commission interaction, and ram it through quickly. <br />This is in stark contrast to the first AUAR study, then coupled with_preparation of the <br />existing Comprehensive Plan for Twin Lakes, which took several years and much citizen <br />and commission input before final approval by staff and Council. Please note that in <br />2001, the comprehensive plan and the AUAR were joint projects done simultaneously, so <br />there was no "disconnect" between the comprehensive plan and the AUAR that exists <br />today. All this is in spite of legal advice emanating from the failed Twin Lakes proposal <br />that it is probably best to not go into a new AUAR at this time. See my note 2 attached. <br />Finally, the document itself is riddled with untruths and misrepresentations as to <br />the true nature of the present, existing situation. The most glaring examples are: <br />(1) Table 6.1 (page 10). That table purports to show existing land uses. Since <br />the collapse of the Twin Lakes LLC proposal, most of this land should be classified as <br />vacant- developable. Yet staff continues to pretend that this is still a functioning <br />commercial district of heavy and light industrial use. Not True. This is a serious <br />misrepresentation of the existing land uses, and needs to be corrected. <br />(2) The very next paragraph declares that all three development scenarios are <br />consistent with the existing comprehensive plan. This is simply not true. The AUAR <br />continues this deception on page 11 (second paragraph}, where staff states that "the 2001 <br />Master Plan includes "four future land use plans", Options 2,3,and 4. This is an <br />intentional outright misrepresentation, the product of wishful thinking instead of a careful <br />review of the actual Twin Lakes Master Plan. See Note 1 attached which details the <br />