| REGISTER TO WIN | |
 |
One is to give people their due when they come to their senses and do the right thing.
So consider this a tentative hats-off to the Shawnee Mission School District, which I recently accused of being closed-minded for not using a greener approach to renovations at SM Northwest High School.
District officials deserved that slap. With little public input, they were going ahead with a plan that some said would damage the high school’s outdoor environmental lab.
But since controversy over the plan erupted last month, district officials have put on the brakes. They promised to listen to what critics had to say about plans to channel rainwater into the south end of the 18-acre outdoor environmental lab.
On Tuesday, they held that public meeting in the high school auditorium. It went on for more than two hours. I counted 135 occupied seats.
Then on Thursday, I checked with the project manager, Adam Sterns of Gould Evans Associates. And what he said convinced me that, after hearing what folks had to say, district officials are ready to cave — not the word they would use — to the demands of that pesky bunch of environmentalists I told you about last month.
“We’re hoping we can do it,” Sterns said of the alternate plan presented by lab supporters, including neighbors and current and former students.
According to Sterns, district officials “want us to look at the viability of all these options and see what they cost.”
And as they might not cost all that much (much of the plan involves merely moving the location of the detention basin the district wants), things look good.
I won’t go into all the arcane details. But besides the potentially happy ending, here’s what I like most about this story:
It shows the power that average people have to change public policy when they come loaded with convincing facts.
I’ve covered many a citizen revolt in the last 30 years. And all too often, I’ve found, people lose their fights with the powers that be because they are woefully unprepared for battle.
They don’t do their homework. Emotional rants rarely cut it with bureaucrats and policy makers.
They want options.
Sure enough, there were few heartfelt harangues at Tuesday’s meeting. Instead, speaker after speaker gave district officials and project managers a tutorial on green solutions to their stormwater problem.
Among the experts was environmental engineer David Dods, who teaches classes on building rain gardens. I know I’ve made light of rain gardens before, but he convinced me that they were a cheap and effective way of reducing some of the runoff at the high school.
Then there was Sheila Shockey, whose Lenexa consulting firm works with the Mid-America Regional Council on stormwater issues. Her grade-school son is headed to Northwest in a few years.
She warned the district that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers might get involved if someone (funny, she didn’t say who that might be) alerted the corps that the project might disturb an existing wetlands on the site.
That could then lead to project delays and added expense to the $22 million project, she said, as the feds are intent on preserving wetlands.
Other experts agreed that it would be wise to consider a proposal that Shockey, Dods and others had worked out with the help of Northwest High School students. One of those experts was a Burns & McDonnell environmental scientist, Dennis Haag, who literally helped write the book on stormwater management.
Which is to say school officials were outgunned. School board president Craig Denny assured everyone that no decision had been made yet.
But from Sterns, I get the impression that it’s mostly a matter of making the numbers work on the citizen proposal.
“They’re in a pickle, because they didn’t budget enough for their stormwater management in the first place,” Shockey said.
But look at it this way, she said.
The district won’t have trouble paying the bill for the alternative plan that she and others worked out.
Whether it was out of concern for the environmental lab, or the broader environment, they were glad to do it for free.
Join the discussion
Share your observations and experiences about news. Lively, open debate is the goal, but please refrain from personal attacks or comments that are racist, vulgar or otherwise inappropriate. If you see an inappropriate comment, please click the "Report as violation" link to notify a KansasCity.com editor. Thanks for your feedback.