I once heard Mitchell Silver, the former president of the
American Planning Association, say something I believe to be very very
true. Silver said that every planning
meeting, regardless of what community it’s in, takes place in a room filled
with 65 year olds, and their answer to every question is “No”. He went on "That's no way to plan."
Indeed, and what he noted about America more generally is true
in Cambridge too. A cynical pol walks
into that room, reads it correctly and exploits it. An unsuccessful pol (quod
vide) simply gets fed up with the feeling of entitled opposition and grows
dismissive of it.
It’s the odd but all too common scenario that exactly the
wrong people are in the room shaping the discussion, guiding the outcomes. None of the huge investment in Cambridge
right now is happening because of the AARP generation. None of it.
That they should be the tastemakers is an awful paradox that needs to be
upended. This latest local election is a
reflection of the start of that. The
greatest political revolution waiting to happen in Cambridge is the
generational one.