The Good, The Bad and the Really, Really Ugly

By Ron West   - May 24th , 2004

 

This column is about what the newcomers to the NRH City Council experienced at their very first meeting as elected members of the council.  As the title indicates, there was good associated with this Council meeting, there was bad and there were some downright ugly things that happened – by design.

 

First, let’s talk about the bad.  Would you believe that the newly elected members of the council were forced to sit in the audience in the pre-council meeting and were not allowed to discuss or question any item on the agenda for the council meeting that was to follow?  I thought that had to be a mistake – but it actually happened.   This step of exclusion must have come from the city leadership.  Could it be that this is just the first effort of our mayor to run over the newest members of the council? 

 

Of course, when the mayor has 5 unilateral votes in his pocket, he can cram anything down the throats of the challengers can’t he?

 

Next, the really, really ugly.  I have to give credit to our mayor for this one  – it is nearly brilliant.  During the election, all of the challengers focused on the parking ordinances that take away private property rights and on a freeze of the taxes for the seniors and disabled in our city.  Prior to the election, the mayor and council were asked repeatedly to place the senior freeze on the agenda for discussion.  As you are aware, those efforts were stonewalled and the freeze was never discussed.   During the election, the incumbents steadfastly campaigned on the fact that they couldn’t or wouldn’t do anything about the freeze until after all the special sessions dealing with school finance reform were finished.  Well – the special session is over but another is in the works.

 

Now, by a brilliant idea, the mayor and council have come up with a “plan” as one more ploy to fool the seniors.  They believe that if they can get this issue to a vote of the general public – such as the Presidential Election in November – that they can create enough class warfare between the young and the old to get it voted down once and for all.    Now carry this idea into the above pre-council meeting thinking that if they put it on the agenda to set an election date in November 2004, they automatically put the new members of the council between a rock and a hard place.  If the challengers vote against it, they can advertise that they are the supporters of the seniors and not the challengers as in the campaign.  If it is voted down as they wish, they win both times.   If the new council members vote for it, then they have deserted their “fight” to freeze taxes for the next taxable year.  If it was approved in November, we believe that it would have to be deferred to the 2006 taxable year.  To make it worse, the challengers don’t even get to talk about it in pre-council.  I hope the incumbents don’t break their arms patting themselves on their collective backs.

 

The good – well we must assume that the “incumbents” actually heard the voters during this election just passed.  The fact that they are at least giving the people the right to vote for something they have already voted on – just to make sure the incumbents understand – is good of a sort.  The real good is that the next Pre-council meeting there will be two new voices to be heard.  The real good is that at the next council meeting, fresh new voices of the people will be heard.  The good is that the seniors are not dumb.  By November 2004, they will have had time to learn how they were lied to and their vote stolen by deception and misinformation in the election just passed.  I believe they will let the remaining incumbents know that we do not have a class warfare type of city and that the Senior Freeze will not only pass, but will send a very clear message that the voters of NRH are just not going to accept the closed, devious, disrespectful council of the past.  Good is that prior to November 2004, the council will have passed yet another budget point and unless there is a dramatic change in the voting of some of the council members, we will see yet one more year of dramatic spending increases without tax relief for anyone.

 

Stay tuned to LNO for the reports and antics in NRH.  The incumbents have a spokesperson in Mr. Ken Sapp to present their views.  I will continue to try to interpret their actions and present the opposition view point.   From now to May 2005 ought to be a really interesting time in our city.