Nickel Ass, Nickels and Dimes Taxpayers

Last nights Board of Aldermen Meeting of February 13th lasted until fifteen minutes of midnight. It ranks right up there in the top ten most boring meetings I've ever attended. With all that was on the agenda I expected fireworks somewhere and it finally came in the last hour. You had to know what you were looking for or the untrained eye might have missed the fun, and naturally it was with our easy target; Mayor Nickolas Guccione. I'm sure some of you think I'm picking on him but he does so many incredibly unethical things I can't ignore it.

The Wentzvillian posted Put Up Or Shut Up on January 29th where I explained that Mayor Guccione was fed up with all "the misinformation out there on the blog" and how Newstime was going to be publishing weekly again and would have a reporter at the meetings to correct the misinformation. What he didn't say was that he was the reporter and the City publicist was being paid $45 per hour to write and submit the articles at his direction.

It started during "Item XVI, Information/Discussion, No. 2. (ID #4358) Communications Manager Position" The discussion was about hiring a Communications / Marketing manager at $70,000 per year who would be responsible for all of the press releases and writing of The Vision Newsletter, among other things. Essentially, the contract of our publicist, Laura Pendino of Five Star Publishing Co. would be terminated and everything would then be funneled through the new Communications Manager.

The Aldermen questioned, who oversees press releases now and the mayor said "no one, each department calls Laura Pendino with the information and she writes it and sends it to the news services." It was defined that a press release is giving notice of an event or other important information necessary for the public. He knows that his Newstime articles do not qualify as press releases and should not be paid for by the taxpayers but he couldn't help himself, the blog made him do it. I can always tell when Guccione is getting uncomfortable, he backs his chair away from the Dias, crouches down with his head in one hand and glares at the speaker until he blows.

Finally, Mayor Guccione pulls his chair back up to the Dias and spouts, "There's a lot of misinformation out there in the blog ... I don't know if you read it," (He's claimed many times that he doesn't read The Wentzvillian but something's driving him crazy. Hmmm, maybe he doesn't read it, maybe someone reads it to him), but I digress. He just admitted that he is not sending out pubic information press releases, he is responding to The Wentzvillian using his weekly article that we (the taxpayers) pay for. Guccione's hate for The Wentzvillian and his personal politics is costing the taxpayers $45 per hour. The mayor has been told over and over by the City Attorney and the Board not to respond to the media but he's got a hard-on for The Wentzvillian and it's author, he doesn't care how much it costs the taxpayers to correct "the misinformation in the blog."

It's out there now, Guccione made a fool of himself again and he just keeps screwing up the job of mayor. I wish he'd put as much effort into being mayor as he does trying to stop this blog. Einstein defined insanity: "Doing the same thing over and over expecting different results." Mayor Guccione is like the poor coyote who keeps trying to catch the Road Runner, it's fun to watch him dropping a piano on himself or blowing himself up but it's unfortunate that Wentzville has to pay his tab. The question remains; When will the Board of Aldermen stop his spiteful spending and unethical behavior?