If I am, you’re welcome 😁. I agree to disagree as to Patrick’s intentions. He is a charitable person and wants to do good things. It’s not like he started a thread trying to start an organization that paves singetrack with concrete (alright that didn’t even make sense) . He does more trail work for Jorba than most people here and NICA and other mountain biking events and races. I don’t think anyone here is going to NOT join Jorba because they also decide to volunteer for example in a soup kitchen once a year. There is a different section for non bike related topics. Only a suggestion, maybe move the thread to that section?
Let me dig deeper - I think with
@Patrick it is death by a thousand cuts. So, no people are not going to bypass JORBA because of people volunteering at a soup kitchen - but what Patrick missed was his position as a core MTBNJ figure should be to promote JORBA and its functions - not divert people power to other areas not related to JORBA. Are you aware of the other options JORBA works with beyond trails work, like Trips for Kids? Further - with his position at MTBNJ a lot of his content diverts people AWAY from cycling.
For those that say
@Patrick is not a figurehead of the site - my argument is this - if you have the power to ban or “Discourage” users as well as the keys to write code for the site - you are a figure head here. In addition he is the primary moderator - with
@Norm stepping in at times.
I believe
@Patrick 100% has good intentions, but prior management had these and tools that were a bit more polished. I have touched on this in the Six Mile thread - but my thoughts are something like this - his help (at times) is akin to a charity finding a person with a drafty cold house that can no longer afford to heat it - the people ban together and insulate the home to keep the person warm - only they use asbestos and the person gets cancer and dies some years later.
The interiors are there - but I sadly say I don’t think the experience is. It appears that rather than seek professional Guidance on things he is unsure of behind closed doors he constantly needs to keep things public - for me it appears to be a “look at me” approach. Whether it is or not, it allows critics of our hobby content to show other land users we should not be stewards of the trail - when he wants to operate an excavator in the creek at six mile this was a solid example of this - that is a DEP issue. The budget for some of this and who he thought pays for it was laughable as well.
As for doing the most work for anyone in JORBA/ Trail work - I disagree. What I see is it seems he is the person who just wants to let everyone know the work he did. There are plenty of people that quietly put in a lot of time. Not sure if he is politicking for something here - and that may be part of my pushback. Some of this has made it to trails I work on and that makes me want to burry my heals and say - “hold on a second”. I am not sure the Spread of
@Patrick is a good thing for JORBA.
It seems he wants to grab the wheel and lead the community, but if I get in a car and someone is driving me somewhere I get nervous when the driver turns around and asks - how do we get there and how do you operate this thing?
