Princeton Environmental Commission defended

Grace Sinden of Princeton
    As a member for many years, through 2007, of the Princeton Environmental Commission, I was dismayed at the harsh tone in the Packet’s Feb. 17 column: “The unintended commission of news.” This criticism of the commission was likely based on a disconnect between the needs of its decision-making process on a complex land use issue and the needs of the newspaper in deadline reporting.
   If it appears to the Packet editor that there is stumbling on procedural or other aspects of this decision making, it is because there is a serious interest and responsibility to “get it right” requiring a lot of work, consultation and consensus by the Environmental Commission. The exigencies of operating a newspaper, especially at present, and with usual tight deadlines, is no easy task either. These two different responsibilities do not always mesh satisfactorily and with accuracy, thus the misleading impression of the front page headline of Feb. 6: “Bunn Drive plan gets environmental blessing.”
   What is lost here is the fact that the Environmental Commission and other municipal entities consist of volunteer citizens usually appointed for their backgrounds in their respective subjects. Many of these citizen volunteers have daytime employment and attend many night and other meetings, as well as spending a great deal of non-meeting time working in behalf of Princeton Borough and Township.
   I thank the volunteer citizens with a nod of appreciation also for the important role newspapers play in our complicated society.
Grace Sinden
Princeton