Perspective and Focus, Dan Keys. It's the Medians.

Dan Keys and I have had this conversation many times.  Some of those times have been private, and some have been public, either in public meetings, on Nextdoor Biscayne Park, and even in comments to posts in this blog.  Dan remains intransigent on the matter, and he generally manages to find me, and the topic, more or less comfortable to dismiss.  So I thought maybe a more formal and stand-alone airing here might be deserved by the topic, and it might stimulate more thinking and even expression of opinion.

It should also be noted that one of Dan's complaints about management of this issue is that individual Village residents (I think of Harvey Bilt, Chester Morris, and whoever put the pandanus in the median at 10th Avenue and 115th  Street) sometimes get frustrated and simply take it upon themselves to make improvements.  Dan objects to acts like these.  But it seems he leaves Village residents who care about the medians, and their own properties, no other choice.

Dan will say in his defense that he doesn't act alone.  This is partially true.  He sometimes relies on some form of consensus from the Parks and Parkways Board, of which he is the Chair.  But he has managed this Board in a very particular way, trying (generally successfully) over time to extrude members he can't control. At other times, he simply does an end around the whole concept of the Board, and he "makes himself available" to be asked, such as by one or another Manager, to make a plan, which he does on his own.

Oddly enough, although Dan seems averse to having the input of other people in creating landscape designs, he has enjoyed success in getting many of us to help him with the actual installation of plants.  I wonder if this seems as much a one way street to Dan as it does to those of us who are happy to help, but feel shut out of the planning process.


Dan,

For some years now, you and I have been having an endless argument.  It's been endless because you won't do what I ask, and I won't stop asking.  The issue is the Village's medians, which I consider inadequately developed (and therefore not the aesthetic and functional features I think they should be).  You, on the other hand, have responded by identifying a variety of reasons the medians could not or should not be better developed.  Your reasons include things like cost, maintenance, selection of materials, and some more loosely related concerns.  But, as what I believe is an important, and possibly critically important, frame of reference, I don't believe you ever said we should not further develop the medians-- further than they are-- because you think they look very nice already, or as nice as they could or should look.  I have never been given reason to think you believe that, and I have never heard anyone else say they thought it, either.

I want to put you in mind of a few ways of looking at this matter, Dan.  About two years ago, you sent to all of the then Commissioners an e-mail.  You had gotten it from somewhere, and for whatever reason, you thought the Village, through its Commission, should be aware of it.  The e-mail was an educational one-- of sorts-- and it had to do with pruning trees.  If I remember correctly, it described five mistakes that should not be made in how trees are pruned and maintained.  As it turns out, Dan, I happened to be particularly interested in this e-mail from you.  At least, I was at the outset.  The fact is, I'm not an arborist, I've heard it makes a difference how trees are pruned, and it just so happened I actually wanted to know what was the proper approach to this task.  But I never found out.  All I learned, having read carefully what you sent, was how not to prune a tree.  Given a tree, and a chainsaw, I still didn't know what to do.  And I don't today.  Dan, you do versions of this a lot.  And every time you do it, in every setting in which you do it, it is as useless, and frustrating, as it was the day I didn't learn how properly to prune a tree.

Do you know the joke line, "the operation was a success, and the patient died?"  Consider all the reasons you always give as to why and where caution has to be taken, and caveats applied, to the project of median development and maintenance.  Being respectful of all those caveats is the operation.  Now, go look at the medians.  That's the patient.  You've been very, very careful, Dan.  You have cautioned the Village to avoid many traps and pitfalls.  You've urged us to save ourselves from many mistakes of many kinds in attending to our medians.  The result is medians that are awful, and in no way the credit they should be to a neighborhood that is uniquely endowed with medians.  Your operation is a success, Dan.  And the patient is dead.

In that connection, have you ever heard the aphorism "the best (or perfection) is the enemy of the good?"  In the interest of saving the Village from imperfections, you have left us with something that isn't good.  In fact, it's bad.  I'm quite sure you've heard the saying "cutting off one's nose to spite one's face."  That is what the Village has done, at your very strong and unwavering encouragement.

I'm going to ask you to reconsider, and think through the approach you have taken to the Village's medians.  Dan, you say you have some relevant training in this area, you had a career in something to do with landscaping or public works or something, and you have always encouraged the Village to rely on you, and to consider you some sort of expert, in matters related to this.  And the Village has accepted your offer.  You have even shown us partial versions of what you have suggested we could expect from your taste and judgment, by doing smaller scale designs for us, like of our southern 6th Avenue entry.  So the Village is even more inclined to assume you have special and applicable expertise and value.  If that's what you wanted us to think, you succeeded in getting us to think it.  So now, Dan, give us the help we really need from you.  And if you won't, then take personal responsibility for what our medians look like.

Fred