How’s WABA Doing?

[Tim Kelley]

WABA staff read the forum on a daily basis! What would you like to know?

[planetmike]

It is not about knowing. This thread is about collecting opinions from WABA members and Forum members about how WABA is performing from their perspective.

[gregbilling]

Hello all forum members!

One of the joys of being a moderator of the Washington Area Bicycling Forums is an email in my inbox for every single post. I don’t often reply because of the numbers of posts in a given day but I am listening. When serious advocacy issues arise, they are brought up in staff meetings or meetings with the Executive Director. We are trying hard to communicate the big advocacy issues and the progress being made on them. However, there are definitely challenges with the ever-changing status on certain issues or the discretion / privacy requested by officials as we work with them on large initiatives. That being said, I would be interested in hearing your feedback about how WABA is doing. We are hosting a Regional Call to Action Summit on November 3rd in Arlington — Please come!

As part of the summit, we will be hosting local stakeholder meetings in the six jurisdictions we represent. Please come and help shape advocacy goals for the next five years. If you can’t make it, submit your feedback via email at advocacy@waba.org.

9/13 – Prince George’s Co. – Greenbelt Library Aud., 6pm to 8pm
9/20 – Montgomery Co. – Kensington Park Comm. Library, 6pm to 8pm
9/27 – Arlington Co. – Shirlington Branch Library, 6:30pm to 8:30pm
10/4 – Alexandria – Nannie J Lee Rec. Center, 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm
10/11 – District of Columbia – Benning Library, 6:30pm to 8:30pm
10/17 – Fairfax Co. – Patrick Henry Library, Vienna, VA, 6pm to 8pm

11/3 – Regional Call to Action Summit – Arlington, VA – 8:30 am to 4:30 pm

Please RSVP for the local meetings and the regional summit at waba.org/events/summit.php

Thanks all!

[americancyclo]

Are the meetings going to be region specific? I ride through Arlington quite a bit even though I live in Fairfax county. Just curious as to whether different challenges and opportunities will be addressed according to location.

[gregbilling]

Great question! At each local meeting we’ll be discussion two things: 1) What are the local advocacy priorities? 2) What are the regional advocacy priorities?

So, Arlington issues will be discussed at the Arlington meeting. However, there will probably be discussion of how Arlington interfaces with DC, Fairfax and Alexandria at those local meetings. There are lots of moving parts with a lot input from advocacy/advisory groups, community members, business owners, advocates, WABA members, etc. that will go into putting a regional advocacy priority plan together. We want to make sure everyone gets a chance to be heard!

Greg

[americancyclo]

Thanks for the quick answer Greg! I miss seeing y’all around. Haven’t been to the WABA office in ages, but I’ll do my best to get to at least one of these meetings!

-Shawn

[Greenbelt]

Will miss the Greenbelt meeting sadly, will be on vacation. But anything you can to do light a fire under our local officials — who seem to mean well, but haven’t taken a lot of leadership lately in my opinion despite some low-hanging fruit opportunities — would be welcome. Would it make sense to inform local officials of the meeting?

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