Ex-Official Says Seattle Stopped Listening

"While other cities try to emulate Seattle by encouraging neighborhood involvement, the former director of Seattle's Department of Neighborhoods said last week that the Emerald City has moved away from the very strategies that made it a global model."

"'Neighbors getting involved with each other and with city processes is a movement everywhere, but it seems like Seattle is going backwards,' Jim Diers said, in town between international and domestic speaking gigs about improving city planning."

"'Cities all over the world want to do things the Seattle way. I wish our city did.'"

"Diers in the late 1990s oversaw the development and implementation of 38 neighborhood plans -- and as many parks, beautification, community, street improvement, and other civic projects as funding allowed."