My first city committee...and the real reason why I quit

When I first started considering running for some sort of office, I started this blog and I also filled out an application to be considered for one of the city’s committees - specifically, since I’m committed to finding a safe solution to the number of at-risk pedestrians on my road, I chose the Pedestrian, Hiking, and Biking Committee. I went before City Council to explain why I wanted to be on it and was accepted. 

And I was really excited about it, too. At my first meeting, I was so happy to discover that my established, senior committee members were kind, welcoming, wonderful people. The meetings weren’t at the most convenient time for me, but I was always happy when I attended. The committee was very supportive of my pet priority, which would be some sort of pedestrian solution on Swan Lake Avenue in Belfast. However, I began to feel like I couldn’t make much of an impact, despite the moral support of the committee members. City Council, it seemed, had been happy to spend $10K to have a traffic analysis done of my road...but  were also happy with no solution being forthcoming. And my committee didn’t really have any power to push for a solution. So while I truly admired their commitment to making Belfast more pedestrian and cyclist friendly, I quickly realized they didn’t have the ability - despite the desire - to push for extending that friendliness to Ward 5. Swan Lake Avenue’s pedestrian problems were simply too big.

I also began to understand that if I wanted concrete solutions, I needed a backend understanding of the bigger picture of everything from the city’s budget to what needs might be neglected in any of the five wards. I needed to understand what other challenges the city was facing in order to be able to more effectively lobby for the east side.

To do that, I really needed to collect my thoughts and mental resources and prepare to run for City Council. And between that realization and the feeling that I was spending two hours once a month feeling politely useless, I just...let it go. Onward with my quest toward usefulness!