Wednesday, November 4, 2009

So That's Why

Today at our meeting, we had a citizen stand up at the public communication portion of the meeting and ask that the Commission essentially find a way to tape the pre and post commission meetings as she so rightly indicated that that is when most of the real work gets done. Just so you'll know, our officially taped meeting began at noon, the public communication is at the end of the agenda and we got to it at around 12:02pm. We spent the previous 1 1/2 hours talking about the five year work plan and a few other items.

Once the "public" finished her "communication" the meeting was adjourned without any discussion of what she had asked. Apparently public communication only goes one way - from the public into the ether. Will we ever tape these meetings, will we even discuss taping the meetings? If I had to bet real money, I'd say no because.....

We adjourned from that meeting into a post commission meeting where we discussed Ada County Commissioner Sharon Ullman's blog posting of October 29, 2009 "Say It Ain't So, ACHD". From the tenor of the discussion, one would think Commissioner Ullman advocated drinking the blood of children under the age of 2. What she did instead was report on a Valley Ride Transit employee bringing to the VRT Board of Directors what she (the VRT employee) felt was a demand by ACHD's attorney to force VRT to spend money on ADA requirements.

If you read the blog entry, you'll see it was first straight reporting of what happened at a public meeting and second her opinion that the project was not cost effective.

The real issue of ADA compliance is a moot one, since things have been worked out between ACHD and VRT. No, what the commission discussed was how awful Commissioner Ullman was to even report this. She should have come to the ACHD President if she had any concerns. She shouldn't (and I guess by extension anyone who blogs, even or especially yours truly) even blog because one would surmise from the tone that it's irresponsible to report on what happens in public meetings and besides she didn't have all the facts. She attacked a staff member and that is just out of bounds. She went behind ACHD's back and spoke to ADA activists who work with ACHD and that makes ACHD look bad.

Let this be a lesson to anyone who says anything bad about ACHD.

Really the whole thing was stunning.

PS Commissioner Ullman, strong letter to follow.

2 Comments:

At November 4, 2009 at 6:23 PM , Blogger Eric said...

I do appreciate the openness that you and Sharon both exhibit. I don't always agree, but by God I know where you both stand.

 
At November 4, 2009 at 6:51 PM , Blogger Sara said...

Thanks. You know it's the public and the taxpayers that are really losing out when they don't know what's happening. The media certainly doesn't cover ACHD meetings, or any other government meeting for that matter. And if you had the source material to go to, anybody could judge for themselves whether hyperbole was being committed or not.

 

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