One City, Not Always Pretty

[XLFD]

Since Fifth Ward Councilor Wallace Cain has taken to local media of late after the last two meetings (here and here) to take note of someone he calls the city's "disruptor" (by context, he refers to this humble website administrator/creator), I felt that I should take up the gauntlet and respond in the same venue.  The following letter to the editor was printed in today's Ludington Daily News on page 5, affixed with my Christian name:

At the last two Ludington City Council meetings, I have sat quietly by while Councilor Wallace Cain expounded for nearly 16 minutes on two related topics, then shared those speeches with local media.  In those speeches he first declares that one voice does not define Ludington, then tries to do just that by himself in his second effort, titled "A Tale of Two Cities", suggesting I perceptually live in a wholly different city than he does.  Let me assure him, we live in just one city and that I have never tried to define Ludington.  

What I try to do is promote government transparency, fight corruption wherever it's found, and hold officials and their official policy to the high standards we deserve as citizens of this one city.  While I would hope, like he does, that city hall and I have the same objectives, I must respectfully disagree with what he and his peers have done over the last two years in particular.  Allow me to briefly offer an example using another well-known Dickensian classic, rather than one set in the French Revolution where there wasn't a lot of appreciation for city leaders or respect for the integrity of their heads.  

Last summer, I pled my case in front of the city council at two meetings for them to not raise taxes on citizens within a year of them suffering crippling inflation at 9% that we all felt.  I was like the men asking for donations at the beginning of "A Christmas Carol": "We should make some slight provision for the Poor and Destitute, who suffer greatly at the present time." 

Tax rates reduced by Headlee that guaranteed the city's taxes would rise level with inflation, were raised back up to their maximums by council discretion, netting about $300,000 extra for city coffers, $300,000 less for the poor and destitute citizens, all without discussion, without any nay votes from the Scrooge and Marley council, and without even a "Bah Humbug" thrown in to emphasize their contempt for the surplus population.  Loosely quoting Marley's ghost the council needs frequent reminders that the common welfare is their business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, are, all, their business.  

Ebenezer Scrooge would have been miserable for the rest of his life and eternally damned if not for the four ghosts reminding him of his greed and lack of compassion.  Without the reasoned dissent I and other well-intentioned citizens bring to meetings, is there any doubt that the city would suffer similar fates as the bitter fruit of their corrupted seeds?  I would rather risk getting called out publicly and assigned a less than complimentary name across the media by the least ethical of their bloodline than allow them to waste our money and trample over our rights as they are prone to do with 'city hall groupthink' when unhindered by the voice of any normal citizen with a fresh and better perspective.  

To that end, I fully stand behind every adjective, simile, metaphor, etc. that I have ever used to describe officials' actions and policies as constructive criticism meant for them to take a more honorable and saner course of action, and I shall only redouble my efforts when I see them taking effect.  As they are now, for otherwise why would Wallace Cain feel the need to create 16 minutes of prose and a fictional shiny city on the lakeshore?

[Freedom Seeker]

Good job X, in defending yourself against the unscrupulous scrooge. I only wish that you would have contined more specifically how the city of Ludington is building their own wages/benefits and catering to the tourists, while taking away from the full-time residents with higher taxes, water, fees, fewer services.

The first few lines of "What I try to do is promote government transparency, fight corruption wherever it's found, and hold officials and their official policy to the high standards we deserve as citizens of this one city ...." excited my attention ... hope you would expound those realities.

The truth, by your selfless efforts and personal monies, seems to be meeting minds with the grassroots--whom those city "elites" really should serve.  That is hard to do when they are paying themselves so much more compared to the average Ludington salary.

I hope Cain is banished to the Land of Nod (which can mean outside of paridise) because his contempt of those he serves and his arrogance are not characteristics of a true public servant and should not be tolerated.

[XLFD]

I wished I could have expounded more on what all of the core issues were, but I didn't want to fall into the trap Wally did and make a long list of stuff that detracts from the point and reads more like a release from the local Convention & Visitors Bureau.  I stuck to what I have had practice with, a three or more minute oral presentation that sets the record straight about city hall orthodoxy and why it fails the people.  

Would I have liked to expand my efforts towards showing I was an agent of government transparency and accountability?  Certainly, but I thought the example dealing with the council's readiness to raise taxes without a reason while the people are suffering is the easiest one to understand without a lot of other background from this site, as many COLDNews readers are.  I considered the audience and moved to educate and entertain at the same time.  

Wally Cain's ancestors during the French Revolution would have probably curried favor with nobility and accepted Marie Antoinette's answer to the person who told her that the people had no bread to eat.  

[Willy]

Well done X. You presented yourself as the person trying to bring transparency and honesty back to City Hall, while Cain's only defense of his unethical actions is to blame someone else. You pointed out on several occasions what misdeeds were performed by the City Council which you backed up with facts. Cain and the other troglodytes sat there and complained about you, the person shining the light on their abuse of power. Instead of simply explaining why they did what they did and presenting evidence that they were doing what the people wanted, they attacked you using Cain as their sock puppet. Jeeze Wally can't you be just a little bit honest with the citizens who elected you instead of acting like a character out of a Looney Tunes production.

https://ludingtoncitizen.ning.com/photo/citizen-cain?context=user

[XLFD]

Cain is just another Fuddy duddy trying his hardest to put out the torch that burns his troglodyte eyes and singes the stocking of his puppet master.