I oftentimes find myself wondering – why do I bother to do this? Here I’ve been complaining about lack of Sunshine Downtown, and I have to ask – would anybody read the minutes of meetings if they were posted? Who besides me and the gals over at Truth Matters Chico are even worried about the minutes?
Then I found this petition set up online by Jessica Allen, who I assume put up the website “Save Chico Now.” It’s been signed by 50 people, all of whom seem to agree with me that we need to get those minutes posted in a timely fashion. Good Gawd Maude – I agree with David Guzzetti! I hope that gives him indigestion.
The efforts seems to have fizzled a little, but not before Allen got 50 signatures. That’s more people than I would have believed were interested.
I wrote a letter to the Enterprise Record, sent it yesterday, but I’m running it here below because I don’t know when Editor will post it. I had to resend my last letter, which is pretty common. If you don’t get a response, resend your letters, and include dlittle@chicoer.com in the ‘to’ bar. He will usually send a little response – “thankyou, it’s in the cue” – if you don’t get that, resend. As much as we detest each others guts, I still have some modicum of respect for Little’s integrity – the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles; moral uprightness. Just because I disagree with the guy doesn’t mean I don’t respect him somewhat – I have yet to catch him in a lie, so I’m hanging in there. I also believe he hates liars, and wouldn’t intentionally lie. You can’t call a person a liar for their beliefs.
I would say same about Stephanie Taber. I don’t agree with her right now, but I don’t doubt her integrity. Sure, she can be wrong, and stubborn, and misled – who can’t? I challenge any of you to be right all the time, don’t make a mistake, don’t misstep – cause Macky’s back in town, Dear, and his teeth are shinin’ white.
I have finally come to doubt a couple of other people’s integrity – Brian Nakamura and Debbie Presson. I tried to believe the best about them, but given their actions, I feel like an idiot for trusting them. I believe these people will tell the public anything to get their way. Or not tell, as in this case of holding up the minutes for months on end, losing memos and documents, refusing to serve information requests. If you are friendly with her, Presson has all the time in the world to yak face about personal stuff – ask Sean Morgan – but now suddenly she doesn’t have the time to honor information requests from the public? Doesn’t have time to post minutes for any meeting after April? I think this lady makes too much money to tell us she doesn’t have time to do her job. Maybe she should take some of that $135,000 a year salary (plus benefits and pension) and hire herself a staff?
Here’s my letter to the Enterprise Record. I wish some of the people on that petition would write letters too.
Chico City Clerk Debbie Presson says she struggles up to five hours transcribing minutes for one hour’s video tape of a city council meeting, citing a November 2000 council action approving “‘action-only’ minutes, with staff to provide summary detail when needed.” This is why minutes are six months behind.
Chico Taxpayers Association 