Much planning is dispassionate. Citizens fill out the proper forms, pay the fees, meet the regulations, and receive approval from the planning staff or board. In our zeal to be objective and fair, it is easy to dismiss passion as an undesirable trait for planners and a suspect emotion for citizens.
To the contrary, passion is a powerful and admirable quality if it is not expressed in a hysterical or zealous, take-no-prisoners mode. It can be a positive model when you as a commissioner show a calm but passionate advocacy for the value of planning as a vital contribution to your community's present and future livability -- and when you recognize that citizens can also be rightfully passionate about their neighborhoods, the natural environment, schools, playing fields, or other matters of concern.
Empathizing with the passions of others may help inspire you and your fellow commissioners to deal constructively with controversy and find reasonable compromises.
Sometimes passion can cause you to be a loner. You may have patiently listened to all the arguments on a contentious issue, weighed the information, debated openly and fairly with your colleagues, and still reached a conclusion that is not supported by the majority on the planning board. This may not be a comfortable position and would be ineffective if you are too often on the losing side. However, if you can express that passionate disagreement with conviction while not disparaging those who have other points of view, you will engender respect, and may even win over some.
An effective planning board member realizes that passion can be one of the many effective tools that advance the cause in your community.
This is one of the last few weekly installments of PCJ columnist Elaine Cogan's 25 tips for planning commissioners from her excellent Now That You're on Board publication.
The complete attractively-designed, spiral-bound, Now That You're on Board publication is available for purchase and delivery by mail.













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