Thursday, April 5, 2007 | 6:23 PM

Meeting had everything but coffee

Filed under: development, meetings, oakwood

They should have cracked open that concession stand Monday night for the marathon meeting of the planning commission.

Emotions ran high, but in light of what happened at the Detroit School Board meeting last night, it could have been worse (of course, the planning commission vote satisfied the crowd— we don’t know what could have happened otherwise).

Both events, to varying degrees, show that the emotion and behavior of an audience can sometimes overshadow the issue at hand. That’s too bad, because the anti-Oakwood-picking-that-location people made some eloquent and impassioned speeches.

And it’s almost always the case, when the crowd gets so large, that people forget there’s a process that needs to take place, as with every project brought to the commission. Canton’s had a few controversial cases in recent years: namely, IKEA and the potential sale of Fellows Creek. Some one always criticizes the board for even considering the subject of controversy.

The commission listened to both sides and decided the existing PDD was binding and the proposed changes too different from residents’ fair expectations. Some residents complained they had to go through the trouble of protesting—but ask the township not even consider a shiny new hospital? That would be a questionable decision anywhere, not to mention image-conscious Canton.

Comments | Syndication