A number of commenters on the Rhino Times website have questioned the necessity of hiring an out-of-state consultant to run last week’s two-day City Council retreat.
From the photo above, those commenters and others can see how wrong they were about the need to hire an out-of-state consultant to ensure the City Council stayed on task and didn’t waste its time on frivolous endeavors.
Above is the final work product of the two-day retreat.
On Thursday, Feb. 2, city councilmembers were aided by artists and art students in order to have a final work product to prove they had spent their time considering how to solve the major issues facing the city, such as a lack of housing and an increasing vacancy rate in the Greensboro Police Department.
Before the agenda for the two-day meeting was available, the Rhino Times noted that when outside facilitators run these retreats, colored dots are often used to express the vision of the City Council.
But the facilitator, Rachel Yost of the Southeastern Institute of Research Inc. (SIR) in Richmond, Virginia, did all those past facilitators one better. Rather than using colored dots to indicate councilmember’s approval of some measure, under Yost’s direction each councilmember was assigned an artist and worked with that artist to put their vision for the future of Greensboro on paper.
On Friday, Feb. 3, each city councilmember was asked to come to the front and explain their personal work of art. Although the councilmembers complied, was there really any need? Anyone can look at these works of art and know exactly what the Greensboro City Council is planning to do in the next year.
One of the purposes of the annual two-day retreat is to give the city manager direction regarding the City Council’s priorities in the upcoming budget.
In the past, the city manager has had to page through stacks of notes to make certain all of the council priorities are included in the proposed budget he presents in May.
But this year, because of the foresight of the facilitator, all City Manager Tai Jaiyeoba has to do is pull up a photo of this panel of artwork and the direction of the City Council is crystal clear.
Whoever said that the two-day retreats were a waste of time should be eating their words now that they have seen what the City Council accomplished in its two all-day sessions.
Despite rumors to the contrary, these works of art will not be auctioned off to the highest bidder.
WTF? Why didn’t they just paint a $ sign? When I think it couldn’t get worse.
GPD lost 3 sex perv employees in a week. Maybe since council has so much free time they can start doing background checks.
I can’t quite make out the potholes, piles of dead bodies, or rows of smooshed up wet leaves clogging the gutters. That’s impressionism for you I guess.
Exactly what I thought.
I was expecting stick figures of robberies, murders, looting, burning storefronts and the like. At least something creative like Stanley Kubrick’s “REDRUM” in The Shining. Instead, it is clear that our so called leaders see sunshine & rainbows when they walk by bloodstained alleys and feces in the streets. Lookout Portland, Greensboro has a vision! Having several children of my own, I must say that I have seen better works of art inside of a diaper.
Little Hunter Biden wannabees???
…lame analysis of making something that responds to issues….so typically dismissive of creative thinking.
(yes, I am a retired professor of design who believes in the power of creative thinking and the actualization of that thinking…how dare I?)
It’s no wonder you support preschool art projects by grown adults on the backs of people who actually work for a living. You’ve never had to build or contribute anything of value either. Sad.
your tax dollars at work! tis easier to spend other people’s money!
Mr Hammer, I gave up on Greensboro, preschool art projects by adults who should apparently be institutionalized based on the retreat output, right along with you.
I knew the huge increase in our property taxes would be wisely spent. Question: Is it even possible to eliminate ranked-choice elections? I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m certainly tired of seeing the same people sitting on the City Council year after year after year.
They govern worse than they paint.
Term Limits.
Best article in The Rhino for ages !
Thank you – I laughed my ass off.
I’m still amazed that these clowns not only participated in such nonsense, they were dumb enough to pay untold dollars for it. It reminds me of something my father has said on a few occasions over the years: “Did you feel anything hit you in the back of the head when you left there?” My reply would always be “no, why?” To which he would always say “that was your change.” Well, Greensboro, I think it’s time someone asked the same of you who voted for this clown show.
They weren’t even humiliated enough to refuse to do the exercise.
Dang I’m sure I could have gotten a better facilitator at my local biker watering hole my buddies are some of the most clever and creative people you could ever meet. It would definitely have been cheaper it would only have cost the council a round of drinks for the house.
This is what the Greensboro councilmembers came up with to represent their vision of Greensboro. I’ll bet there are some homeless people in town that could have come up with something better. This is not art. This looks as though they see chaos in the future for Greensboro.
Thanks Rino for showing off more incompetence of Greensboro’s “leadership council”.