If A Statue Snored, Would Anyone Hear It?

 

 

The Board of Alderman Meeting of October 23, 2013 (click here) was uneventful on the surface, but if you watched closely, reading between the lines, you'll see a few interesting discussions. Mayor Nickolas Guccione set a record last night, one he should take great pride in—he sure hasn't done anything else positive in his first year and-and-a-half as mayor. He actually adjourned the meeting before 11:00 PM, of course, there were only five bills & resolution on the agenda (two of which were removed), and a half-dozen reports and discussion items. If the Aldermen hadn't gone into an hour-long executive session, they could have been out the door shortly before 8:30 PM.

 

I thought "(ID # 4850) Discuss to Set an End Time to Board of Aldermen Meetings" held promise, but the confrontation I expected didn't materialize. The board came to a consensus to end the board meetings by 10:30 PM. I'm not sure Guccione can pull it off, especially given his total lack of skills in running meetings. He suggested cutting off audience speakers at five minutes but I think he'll get pressure from the aldermen to have it reduced to a three minute cut-off time. He then said, "I don't want to cut people off, but I'm going to do it. We'll see how long he can live with that idea.

 

I'm not going to be able to get away without saying something about my other alderman, Michael Hays. Trying very hard not to use language that my young readers might find offensive, I'll give it my best shot at getting through my dissertation.

 

Every one knows the story about Hays, how a politically motivated Alderman Cheryl Kross flipped on her vote to let Guccione appoint him, and how Guccione and Hays campaigned on the questionable use of the city logo during Hays' election, that he won by eight measly votes. Well, last evening during Hays' alderman report, he stated, "In the spirit of shortening the meetings, I have nothing to report." My God! In the year he's been sitting in his office, the only time I ever heard him say anything during his report, other than one time when he supported the Junior D.A.R.E. program was, "I have nothing to report." Michael Hays is the most useless, do-nothing alderman to ever represent Ward 3 and that's saying something, because his chair was occupied by none other than Nickolas Guccione for five-and-a-half years. We might as well have a stone statue of an alderman in Hays' seat, we'd get as much out of it as we get now, and statues don't snore.

 

There's more: Two weeks ago, a young couple came before the Board of Aldermen telling them of how it is necessary for them to fence their corner lot so their handicapped child would have a safe place to play. Unfortunately, their fence does not comply with City codes and they will have to obtain a variance from the Board of Adjustment prior to building, so they have asked the city to waive the fee for them. From what I've been told, the fee could be anywhere from $100 to $500. On board with this idea was Guccione, who naturally looks for votes any place he can find them. To put Guccione's thinking in perspective, you must remember how he pardoned a convenience store owner from having to pay a fine of less than $100 for not filing for his liquor license on time. This guy will buy votes from anyone using taxpayer dollars. If he were smarter, he'd just issue an executive order to allow the petitioner to build their fence without going through the process. Anyway, the issue came to a vote of the aldermen and up popped Hays hand to vote "Yes," every other alderman voted "No," except for the again vacationing Sonya Shryock. It is my feeling that Kross would have voted with Hays if Shryock had been there to vote with her. Kross is not going to go out on a limb to vote on a Guccione issue if she sees it won't pass, and without her sock-puppet there, it wasn't going to pass. Ward 3 residents should be outraged at the lack of representation they receive from Micheal Hays.

 

As we all know, the ultra-conservative tea-partier, Cheryl Kross, is a penny pincher, as I've stated before, she'd jump over gate to keep from wearing out the hinges. Unfortunately for her constituents of Ward 1, she's tossed out her core values because of her petty hatred of Board President, Rick Stokes, and is now spending at a rate fast enough to qualify for honorary membership in Guccione's Socialist Club. I'll elaborate on this subject next time.