The East&West Garden situation: a personal outlook on recent past, clammy present and a possible “brighter” future. With few proposals.

Executive summary:

The past: Fed up of seeing the gardens unkempt and my sight of the west garden diminishing behind a growing green wall I approached the member of the tuincommissie, informally at first, and, after one year of trying to have a meaningful reply, or a commitment of sorts or even an indication of future actions, I decided to dig deeper into the matter. Together with others I engaged Otto & Renet (and the rest of the bestuur later) only to find out that:

1. Maintenance nearby our houses have not been performed because they were too busy: there are 86 houses, which means hundreds of issues, thousands even but hey! There is always time for ice cream! “Gezelligheid first”!
2. The Tuinvisie has (largely) not been implemented because either considered only a “guideline”, whatever that means in their interpretation, or because they were too busy and hey! They are only volunteering for the job, so they do not “have” to do it, it’s basically on a “time permitting” basis. How do you say “accountability” in Dutch? More on that later.
3. Otto and Renet have all the power because they are part of the bestuurscommissie, their “mandate” is like the yellow “S” on the blue costume. So they are a “vrijwilliger baas”, if you’d like. Which is an interesting concept, very modern! All the fun and zero responsibilities. I’d say they are ready for Bruxelles! Or, at the least, for the Tweede Kamer, hopefully the one in Amsterdam.
4. After much pressure (and emails, and meetings) we got a timeline for performing maintenance on our patch, suddenly in a way very strictly adhering to the Tuinvisie, which was passed onto the executive arm (Otto & Renet being the “brain” of the operation, mind you).
5. Such executive arm, namely mvr. Welna Buwalda, who gets 10,000 euros a year for garden maintenance, nixes the request claiming that it is not germane to her job description (!!!).
6. We’ll have to wait until someone else is called to do the job but wait! An ALV has been requested because it’s easy to say “planned maintenance”, but why is the Generally Assembly of the UN not being involved? And the WWF? And the National Geographic? Disney Channel, maybe??? So it seems our patch will go unmaintained until further communication from the powers that be, unless… The present: Unless it is not going to happen. Not a chance. I am announcing, with and through this, that I am going to perform, by myself or with whomever would like to join me, gardening on the contended patch during one of the following days. It would be an act of civil disobedience if “obedience” was due, which is not the case. I state my right to it and the wrongdoing of Otto & Renet, with the lassez-faire of the rest of the bestuurscommissie. To the (civil) court the last word?

For the future: for me it is unacceptable that the bestuurscommissie could even think to interpret their mandate as broadly as they like, let’s get back on earth. Let’s discuss and vote and put into the “statute” that the tuincommissie EVERY YEAR, will have to:-enquire ALL and EACH of the 86 houses about their wishes for the gardens for the coming year, and yes: I do include also who rent, it is the civil and decent thing to do, they do not live elsewhere. -draw a list of proposal for actions for the twelve months to follow, – discuss it back and fore with each and all the bewoners while defining the details (who’s going to do it, when and how much will it cost) and PUT EVERY PROPOSAL TO VOTE before the end of the year. And let’s put it in the statute for real, this time! Also about that I’ll write some more later. This is the job, according to me, not scooping frozen bolletjes. Which is perfectly fine, “once the job is finished”. Not before. It’s quite a task, but it shouldn’t come as a surprise, for those who know the meaning of “work”. I reckon this planning phase to be a six-months job, starting in June they should be done before December. Obviously not all the desiderata will be translated into pruning, planting, trimming etc. But they ALL will have to be considered and VOTED, and those ones which are backed by a majority of votes will be implemented, no further discussion and no appeal. (And we do not need even a formal ALV to do all this as there are other voting and polling methods. For me even online is very fine. But, if it comes to an ALV just for that, well, there are worse things in life)This is because there are people who simply do not give a pimple about gardening! It is just not their thing. But STILL want to have a well-groomed garden, and they understand, being older than 9 years old, that it is either going to be supported by an adequate budget or it will not happen. On the other side, I bet there are many among us who will be happy to get their hands dirty no matter what, they don’t really care about the garden design or if it’s a boletus edulis or an Amanita muscaria* they are picking under the klimboom! As long as they are in the garden, they are happy, which I can relate to. So I do believe there will be a lot of “free workforce” happy to help but the design will have to be commonly discussed, chosen and voted before to be approved and put into action. I believe it will take a couple of years to get this to march smoothly and at tempo but we have the Tuinvisie to support us along the road until we get there. And, somewhat like today, it will be a “hybrid” workforce taking care materially of it, a combination of hoveniersbedrijf for the big jobs (or whatever we pay them for) and communal gardening for the easier part, there it will be not even need to “adopt” a patch, they are *already* ours! And we will have a clear vision of what is going to happen with them, with all of us being part of the action, either in the gardens among the bushes or simply as VOTING (and paying) bystanders, both groups having EQUAL rights when it comes to decide the design of the gardens. “Participation” does not mean “representation”. TAXATION does, and as long as we pay our part of the service costs every month, and we have the right to vote, we have the right to be part of the decisions until we do not, by VOTE, written and recorded, delegate otherwise! About accountability: we could think to hire, and pay, someone external to be in charge of our plans and desire for the gardens, no excuses like “we do it in the evening, we have kids, we have a job, we have a life, the car broke down, there was a earthquake, flood, LOCUSTS!” Let us have someone who is FULLY RESPONSIBLE for the job at hand, and less finicky about their job description. Otherwise it has to be clear that, whomever will take the job of taking care of the garden is not there to fulfill his or her lifelong dream to be a garden designer, that position is already taken, by 86 other people. They will be there to be the “gardeners”, and only that. Chief gardeners, head gardeners, lead gardeners, if you like, but… You got the idea. Also, an external company and a voting process WILL avoid further friction among tuinwijkzuiders. The job is a hefty one, let us state it once and for all, and let us weed out those who believe it can be done in their “spare time”.  You have to have a lot of commitment, and time, and patience, and energy, and full availability to each and everyone, not only to those you “like”. Folks, this is just the beginning of the discussion, please contribute, it is YOUR garden also, and you pay for its maintenance, every month! And if your vote does not count for the garden, it will not count for other matters which might be more dear to you, defend your right to be counted and to count in the Tuinwijkzuid community, where there’ll be either democracy (and a fair and square one!) or, hear hear, it will the War of the Roses all over again. In fact, it might be already happening.

Juicy “postscripts” to follow soon. A copy of this post is available here