Happy New Year everyone! It is 2016 and that means local elections come November. We will soon be bombarded by ads and election signs for council races. But equally important are elections for our local advisory neighborhood commissioners (ANCs). Our neighborhood is split between Wards 4 and 5. I live in Ward 5, so I stay more attuned to what is happening in ANC 5A. My commissioner on ANC 5A is Frank Wilds, who represents single member district (SMD) 5A01. It is not a secret that Commissioner Wilds does not actually want to be commissioner. He says he ran because no one else would. So this is a call for residents in ANC 5A01 in particular, but also residents in other SMDs, to start thinking about representing our great community on ANC 5A. 

Having a really good, well-functioning ANC can do wonders for a neighborhood, especially one like ours that is seeing so much development. Generally, I think most of the ANC 5A commissioners are good people. They are nice and usually professional. Invited guests often remark that ANC 5A meetings are well-run and they seem surprised by how civil residents are to guests. We usually do not have any raised voices, at least not by residents.

My main issue with ANC 5A–a longstanding one–is the seeming lack of concern about transparency. Simple things like updating the ANC 5A website with meeting notices and official ANC documents like minutes, resolutions, and letters on behalf of the commission, are not being done. It would be great for the commissioners to recognize that the SMD boundaries are artificial lines that straddle neighborhoods and that the actions of one commissioner who represents one SMD can affect residents of other SMDs because those residents actually live in the same neighborhood. That is really all I expect of my commissioners. I recognize that these elected officials are not compensated and people have limited time, so I do not expect all that much of them. I go back and forth on whether I think commissioners should be paid. Sometimes I think that if they were paid, then they would do things like update the website, provide meaningful notice of ANC meetings or projects in the neighborhood that warrant community input, rather than having us operate in an information vacuum, or be a little more proactive about representing residents. But we also have elected and nonelected officials who are compensated to represent our interests and respond to our concerns, who are sometimes responsive and sometimes not. All that to say, there is an opportunity on ANC 5A for someone or someones to make a difference, especially when it comes to making ANC 5A a bit more transparent and improving coordination between commissioners across SMD boundary lines.

Over the next several months, I will repeat the entreaty to residents to throw their hat in the ring to represent the neighborhood on ANC 5A. It does not matter how long anyone has lived in the neighborhood. We need a voice. I hope some of you will consider serving.