Unidentified subject!

["William K. Medlin" <dev-plan@moscow.com>]

>Date: Wed, 3 May 2000 10:59:59 -0700
>To: WMSteed@aol.com
>From: "William K. Medlin" <dev-plan@moscow.com>
>Subject: Re: Newspaper Article
>Cc:
>Bcc:
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>
>>There was an interesting article in the Moscow Pullman Daily Effort this
>>afternoon (May 2, 2000).
>>
>>In the first part of the story, two council members call for "a more public
>>process" and to "open up" [the process] during the selection of a
>>replacement
>>for councilman Tony Johnson.  In  other city business reported in the same
>>article the City Council authorized the sale of $3 million of sewer revenue
>>bonds to begin the third phase of the upgrading of the waste water treatment
>>plant.
>>
>>More often than not, revenue bond issues such as this are authorized by
>>public vote; but in this case it had been previously decided by the City
>>Council to use judicial review, a bond issue ordered by a judge based on
>>usual and necessary activities of the city that precludes public input.
>>
>>The same two council members mentioned in the Tony Johnson replacement
>>remarks, Peg Hamlett and Linda Pall, both previously voted against a public
>>vote on the 1912 Building and went along with not having a more public
>>process on the sewer bonds.
>>
>>Interesting.
>>
>>"Public process" must depend on the outcomes you desire.  In the Johnson
>>case, they possibly wanted a different outcome; not the one decided by
>>representative government. In the sewer bond case and the 1912 Building
>>vote,
>>they probably did not dare let the public speak for fear of what they might
>>have said.
>>
>>Walter Steed
>
>Mr. Steed:  While your points are certainly germane to the issue of
>conducting the citiznes' business in as open a forum as possible and as
>provided by law, I think you're comparing incomparables. The exercise of
>gov't power delegated by the electorate extends to ALL matters coming
>before Council and, therefore, any means that circumvents the citizens'
>prerogative in favor of an executive official's prerogative, which is
>legal under our form of government, must raise  ethical as well as
>democratic questions and must relate to the motivations that led to such
>circumvention. That Hamlett and Pall chose another process than an "open
>forum" dealng with a single policy issue is a very different animal. In
>the Comstock administration, there has been a series of major policy
>decisions which circumvented public representation which leads many of us
>to question his use of arbitrary power in the interests of --- ?? This
>must be raised. Thanks for your opinions.  W. Ken Medlin
>