Das mayor, parking and parks

I may have already written this about the mayor, so please forgive me for any repetition.

I am still trying to get a handle on John Moak. I'm no longer in the position to engage him weekly in deep conversation about city issues, so the task is even more difficult at this point.

For more than 2 years, I watched the mayor being just the mayor, being chairman of the School Committee, being the mayor on the School Committee, and being (I think) just the average Joe.

He's a very courteous man - so much so that it stands out as almost freakish in this day and age. Even so much so that it seems to get in the way of just dispatching issues.

"It's a personnel matter," is about all he'll say about an employee or an appointee he has ousted or replaced.

His supporters adore him and his detractors despise him.

I, however, can't find what it is that motivates either group to its feelings.

Unlike Thatcher Kezer, the mayor of Amesbury, who at least gives the appearance of being an open book (you can tell after 10 minutes exactly where he's coming from), Moak's book is closed. He can be friendly without being warm, earnest without being forthcoming, and very amusing (as in, good sense of humor).

So someone said to me a while back that Moak thinks he knows what's best. Well, yeah, that's why he ran for mayor. And that's why there's a City Council system in place to stop him if he does not, in fact, know what's best.

(Then again, that's assuming the City Council does. Everyone is just doing their best.)

I know I've said this before - he inherited a big mess. The landfill, the budget woes, the senior center, the waterfront parking lots ... all issues from past administrations. In a way, he inherited the Waterfront West development (not that anyone could have stopped the majority property owner in the city selling it all to Stephen Karp).

So ... while I can't get a handle on him as a person, I know he is passionate about education and other youth-related issues and that he likes closed-door meetings and "social" gatherings with interested parties to whatever is going on around town.

It's my opinion (based on a sense I get) that he does not really want a parking garage at all; at least not one the city is responsible for. Does anyone think of the ramifications of a parking garage, as in upkeep and police patrols (they are hotbeds of criminal activity) alone?

I for one would prefer to NOT park my little Jetta in a parking garage, out of sight (not there's anything about it or in it worth stealing) and to have to possibly walk into a parking garage to retrieve it.

Look, we've got 2 perfectly good big parking lots that people want to turn into one big park, along with the smallish one that's already there. A park with multiple stages for concerts that aren't going to happen because no one will sponsor them, and possibly more playground equipment to maintain.

All owned by an entity that doesn't have any money and which could vote to dissolve itself at any time - and leave said park in the city's hands..

Does this make any sense at all, in these economic times? Many of the same people that want what, the 17th park/playground in this small city, object to spending $500,000 to revamp an existing historical park, Brown Square. (Well, actually, I think that's a lot, too, but it's what they got.)

Sure, the state has money ready to give the city to build a garage, but it doesn't end there. Will it pay for itself, or be another burden on the budget? All structures need routine maintenance and repairs, need to be lit, etc. In 5 years or less, the parking garage would be on the mayor's list of needed capital expenditures. You can count on it.

So rant on, fans of a waterfront park and "open space."

I like open space, too. I can think of a lot of existing places that have some: Maudslay State Park, Bartlet Mall, Moseley Woods, Atkinson Common, Cashman Park, the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge, Perkins Park, Woodman Park, March's Hill Park, Cushing Park (even with the senior center there), Old Town Hill (OK, it's in Newbury, but closer to me than some of these other places), Market Landing Park, Hale Park, Joppa Park ... whew! (All those in red are city-owned.)

That's quite a bit of open space for a city of about 17,000 people. That doesn't even include the saltwater marshes, which are part of the existing ecosystem of the area. And the river, which is technically open space.

I'm not even including the city-owned playgrounds. And most, if not all, of these open spaces are suffering from neglect. There's little that's less appealing to people than a shabby park.