Re: Re: [event] Urban Governance and the Citizen

I’d love to fill you in, the event was videoed though and worth a look if it gets posted up. I’ll talk to David about youtubing some highlights.

in short my various memories of the conference (my fairly light-hearted and flippant version of events – it was actually very interesting event) forgive the writing style, just a brain-dump.

Aarhus convention is 10 years old. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aarhus_Convention Iceland, Switzerland (legal problem with Canton’s) and Ireland only signatories that have not transposed it into law (although we have access to information on environment legislation)

John Gormley: Will be ratifying/transposing Aarhus. Don’t know when as I have to convince the other ministers. Will have a mayor for dublin, I promised it, don’t know when . Banks are bad, mmmkay.

Svend Auken
Amenable fella, memories of Aarhus, his home town. Put it into law, then had to change more laws, so could be good thing to be last country. Not a nimby law. Good benefits, information, consultation, participation, access to justice.

Michael Ewing
Excellent overview. ratified by 41 countries. Gives the citizen rights & infomation. Not just access to info if you request it, but the principles of transparency. 3 legged stool – information, participation in decision making and access to justice. In addition anyone can request a compliance review by international body if country does not follow it.

Conor Skehan
Lashed Govt out of it. Entertaining as ever.

Gabriel Metcalf – SPUR
Missed most of this through having a ‘fight the power’ discussion outside with a councillor and fellow traveller …what I saw was good though, and balanced in some of the drawbacks of citizen participation in decisionmaking

Dermot “I don’t know what a tracker is” Lacey 😀 (only kidding dermot) – he admitted that he did not know that Part 8 planning could not be appealed. Refreshingly honest is Dermot. Rebutted comments in press about too many councillors. Lowest level of local representation in europe. More power needed in local govt. Govt owes DCC millions in rent. Committed to mayor being elected.

John Tierney
“…ility …ation …ility …tation” pick your prefix, mix and match, create presentation.
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
how to say nothing in 2000 words…

Best part was the mix of people attending, good to have conversations with DCC/Councillors/Activists/Planners/Architects etc..

More of this sort of thing,