Besides an absent mayor and supplemental appropriations coming out of our ears at the city council meeting tonight, the council asked planning staff why they are continuing to tell applicants not to show up until 2nd reading.
We have suspected for awhile they were doing this and the council has nicely asked them to stop doing it, privately, that all changed tonight.
A planning staffer, Fletcher, that is a little green while addressing councilors, admitted tonight that he told the applicants to not bother showing up to the meeting until 2nd reading when the county commission will also be attendance (has to do with joint jurisdiction).
That was a mistake. Some councilors were very perturbed about it. Fletcher’s boss(?) Sam from Planning tried to deflect what Fletcher admitted claiming that since the county commission was not there, there was no point for the applicants to attend.
Wrong person to defend the position. Sam has dropped the ball so many times when it comes to open meetings and posting agendas incorrectly he is the last person to talk about open public meetings and when it is proper to attend them.
Councilor Starr wasn’t having it, telling the mayor and planning staff that they are on notice and they better not get caught doing it again (even though they will probably do it again tomorrow with zero consequences).
I often tell people, show up to the 1st reading, you get 3 minutes to dissent and you never know, you may bring up something the council will consider between the 1st and 2nd readings that will benefit your position.
It is pretty obvious planning staff is dong this ON PURPOSE! The city is ran by an authoritarian regime that must squash all dissent and I have no doubt this directive came from the corner office, or whatever playground he is doing jumping jacks on that day.
Exactly, this was a very interesting dialogue between both Councilor Starr and even Richard Merkouris voiced his displeasure. The “Government” should not be telling anyone to do or not do anything that may or may not go against it’s interest. This is like the Attorney General, Secretary of State, or even members of the L.R.C interfereing, and getting in the way of public initiatives and resolutions being petitioned to go on a public ballot. You do NOT want the “Govenrment” itself blocking anyone from petitioning, or voicing their opinion.
The City Council is gonna have to take drastic action if this interference continues, this is not necessary a Mayor or City Council issue, however, they are the “watchdogs” of who oversee our “City Beaucracy” of Public Officials, Officers, Agents, City Staff, Corporate Partners. and if this so called “beaucracy” is telling people to NOT show up, it is now seen as an interference in the due process of proposing initiatives.
This should be seen as a final warning made by the City Council itself, and if it continues, then Section 30.014 must be amended to put some enforcement in the procedure of announcing and bringing forward “Agenda”.
And if the Council dont do it, then the “Voters” must petition to let the ‘voters’ change city ordinance.
I once had someone from planning tell me how the planning commission vote would go and that I shouldn’t bother trying to protest it. But then I let them know about my own “Manhattan Project” and their attitude changed, and they then apparently informed the applicants there would be a protest, and what it was, and that it would be best for them to drop their application.
What was it about, you ask? Well, my neighbors, at the time, wanted to set up a preschool which would need the neighborhood to sign off on, they got enough signatures, but their setting was very commercial in nature in a residential setting, which upset me. So, I put my brain to work and let planning know that if they okayed the preschool they would be okaying a preschool just a couple hundred feet from a known documented sexual predator down the street, and that I would let the press know about this, if they okayed it. Well, it was then amazing how the planning department’s attitude changed about inevitability and the planning commission. Let me just say that the MAD theory works, but you just need to let the other side know that you, too, have a nuclear capability. 😉
( and Woodstock adds: “Wow, VSG, you were kinda like Truman at Potsdam with the Planning Department as Uncle Joe Stain, huh?”…. “But ins’t that also another example of Planning telling you what the PC was going to do?… )
VSG’s experience also further explains why Kim Jong Un is trying to build the bomb instead just staying in a family-run business like say, dry cleaning.
Key word here is ‘Authoritarian’. The council can complain but they’re puppets that must seem important and show some make believe action. However, the mayor decides everything. If you’re a mayor’s insider, you’re in. Maybe not at a council meeting but when he uses his ‘Bag of Tricks’.
Why would one want to be on the council? The Charter makes you insignificant. If you want your picture taken with dictator mayor, show up at a political rally and make a 4 figure donation like the rest of us.
“‘Beaucracy’?”…. “Is that a word?”….. “If you break that word down, however, it infers some sort of dandy government”…. (…. “Actually, I’m surprised Joe didn’t use that instead of Bidenomics”…. )) #GoingPalinOnUs
But the bottom line is this, IF you place something on the agenda, you show up yourself and present it, and speak on it, IF you are against it, it is YOUR responsibility to show up and speak up on it. IF you rely on the govt officials to tell you want to do, when their job is ONLY to give advice, and to make sure the ordinance is being followed. IF you dont show up, its on you, not theirs.
JEckhoff is ultimately responsible for City Planning and was AWOL from the meeting when Councilor Starr was attempting to draw forward accountability on this issue.