City Council Meeting 9-24-2012: Psycho Stares, Crocodile Tears, and the Usual

[XLFD]

It was a rather eventful night at the Ludington City Council on 9-24-2012.  The usual opening occurred followed by the public comment period.  Bob Hannah, whose name is composed of two palindromes, started off (2:30 into the video, below) by venting that I like to spend  the taxpayers money, he then stated I haven't paid off a judgment to John Shay from this last lawsuit, which is pretty difficult when the judgment won by the City (not Mr. Shay) hasn't even been given to me yet from the court.  He then states my current lawsuit will cost the City between $50,000 - $100,000 (apparently, he has a crystal ball to see my victory and my judgment-- yet he does not comment on why I would win what he later calls a frivolous lawsuit). 

He continues defining my lawsuit as part of a vendetta against the City, which again presumes the City has wronged me, as such is the nature of vendettas.  Bob continues with noting that even now I do not stop at stop signs on my bicycle, a fact, and yet I still maintain as long as I follow the rules of the right of way, I am within the laws of Michigan.  He finishes:  "If he has the money to hire a lawyer for a frivolous lawsuit, then he has enough to pay the full amount of FOIA."  

Pretty profound coming from a City of Ludington loyalist.  I found out later, Bob is a current member of the Ludington Fire Department, Mayor Henderson's and Councilor Tykoski's fellow firefighter, who joined two months after I resigned.  He's where he's at from my bicycle riding, ironically enough.

Attorney Jeff Nellis then spoke about his candidacy for Probate Judge.  As most judicial candidates, he had to comment on bland stuff like his experience and family life.  My favorite, C. Dale Bannon, then spoke about how difficult it has been to get the City/MDOT to change the signs referring to Stearn's Park as "City Park".  Then it was my turn at the 7:00 mark:

"At the end of last meeting of this austere body, the City Manager commented on the local circuit

court finding in favor of the City for nearly $700 and dismissing two citizens' FOIA appeal. Until I

see a final judgment from that court, I won't comment on that aspect. But what he didn't bother to

tell you was the particulars of that lawsuit and what happened to get two citizens to that point. Here is a timeline and some facts, and the City has their opportunity at the end of the meeting for their rebuttal, if they deem to do so.

On September 7, 2011 we made a FOIA request asking for business records between the City and

Nick Tykoski's businesses. Six days later, John Shay gave a response that did not comply with

FOIA rules. He did not grant the request, deny the request, partially grant and deny the request, or

postpone the request. As such he violated the act.

After trying to get a lawful response from him again, we appealed to this body. The mayor sent a

certified letter to my ally inviting her to the meeting on September 27, 2011, but a request by me to also attend that meeting was denied by John Shay. You see, in his capacity as City Manager he has that right under the Workplace Safety Policy, a constitutionally illegal policy that will cost the City Manager (and unfortunately, our City's taxpayers) a lot of time and money to revoke and address injuries that it caused.

We sent our appeal rationale to each councilor, but neither of us showed up at the meeting, where

our FOIA appeal was taken off the agenda, never to be considered by this Council. The council

shirked their responsibility to hold a FOIA appeal. This was not surprising from the same City

Council that decided it had the right to bar citizens from public places at a City Manager's whim,

including the only two Ludington public places that citizens could inspect FOIA responses.

After this outrage, we pursued a FOIA in the local court system. Here we were assigned Honorable

Judge Richard Cooper, who effectively blocked us from getting any response until after that

November's election, which was significant because we eventually received some records that were

unfavorable to those concerned with ethics by now-councilor Nick Tykoski. But ethics were far

from any public servants minds as we found out throughout our court process.

The City's law firm, Gockerman, Wilson, Saylor, etc. came forth on November 8th as the City's

counsel. Little did the plaintiffs know that this lawfirm also had Judge Cooper's son as an associate

until four months later when the Judge admitted it as an appearance of impropriety. Judges, court

administrators, and the City's lawfirm had a responsibility to admit such impropriety immediately by

the Canons of Judicial Conduct and the Rules of Professional Conduct, but it took them over four

months. We immediately disqualified the judge, and sent a complaint to the Michigan Judicial Tenure Commission.

During this time, we (and the court) received from the City, certified by the City Manager with an

affidavit, a set of public records that supposedly fulfilled our FOIA request. This was four months

into the process, and the records included only ones that we received through two previous

requests, the vast majority were not even applicable to our request under appeal, and said our lawsuit was moot. We knew from previous requests, there were many records not included. We made special requests for those records we knew of.

Amazingly, after City Attorney Saylor and City Manager Shay had seen these new FOIA requests,

they found the records we asked for a half year previously and and some more records that they had withheld, what they would say they 'overlooked'. This is why they would later also claim our lawsuit was moot, even after they perjured themselves and would not get us the full records until 6 months after we asked for them. The new judge, also on the 51st Circuit Court, agreed with them. So although we spent $210 on Court costs, received fraudulent records and perjured statements, and wasted countless hours trying to go through the legal hoops to get this 30 pages of non-exempt

public records we should have been given a year ago, our side is told our point is moot and we owe

the City money for other records we have never seen. You can conclude what you might about the

court processes here in Mason County, I know how we feel about it..."

That's where I was cut off, having expended my five minutes plus about a half minute.  Next days City of Ludington Daily News' (COLDNews) Kevin Barnishevowicz had this to say about my assertions:  "Rotta spoke for five minutes about the lawsuit he filed against the City and lost."   The 'news' that the Chief of the LFD said the usual disclaimer about my LFD shirt just after my speech merited more than twice the coverage by the COLDNews.  By the way, a loss in a local seemingly-dysfunctional trial court is just a setback, not a loss.  In my book of justice.

 

Speaking of which, Jeff Nellis, Probate Judge candidate, snuck out shortly after this without comment about my judicial references.  But I did promise you some other things:

 

Psycho Stares 

 

While City Attorney Richard Wilson was droning on about how everyone who attended the closed session was aware of what was going to be discussed at the closed meeting on 8-27-2012, (and neglecting to note that the Open Meetings Act requires that general information to be shared with those not attending from the public, before they move to go into closed session) John Shay began fixing his gaze at me.  It was a bit unsettling, particularly since I think he has done quite a bit to justify me taking out a "Letter of Trespass" on him, notwithstanding the four counts in my lawsuit that apply to him.

 

 

Take a look at John Shay's gaze as Wilson lulls you in the background, starting at 42:45 and extending all the way to 45:15, (two and a half minutes) focussing on the podium area, where I was perched at that time in case a question was asked of me regarding my FOIA appeal.  Off-camera, I myself was generally focused on Wilson, who was the only person talking, but I could not help but notice this fixed gaze, which would make a normal person feel nervous. 

 

Particularly, if that normal person had the MCSO serve the fixed-starer a Federal Court suit earlier that day, and even more particularly when one realizes that this man has ultimate control over the Ludington Police Department, and has utilized them against this normal person before.  They all carry guns; I don't.

 

Crocodile Tears

 

At 49:00 in, Gary Castonia says:  "When I first ran for office I knew I would be scrutinized and I'd be held accountable for any statements I made.  But the only way I can say this now is by quoting Mr. Rotta, I'm absolutely disgusted that you dragged my family, my grandson (breaks down), and my wife, and her business into this.  And I want the whole city to know how you treat people.  And the last comment I want to make is:  People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw rocks." 

 

The rock-lobber strikes again, according to Gary.  He refers to this thread  karma-castonia  which relates court news placed out by the Mason County Press and the COLDNews, and I believe that 'glass house' comment should be reviewed by the senior Castonia.  During his long career as a law officer, I am sure he bagged his share of marijuana-possessors, and thought he was doing society a favor.  Now that his grandson is nabbed, and the irony of the situation is pointed out, he goes into pitied victim-mode. 

But this isn't why he won't get any sympathy from me for his theatrics, because I do think it is a tragedy that his grandson may now find himself with this charge plaguing him through his career.  What he will get is these questions:  Where was your empathy, Gary, when you passed the Workplace Safety Policy and effectively criminalized me in the eyes of my fellow citizens with the COLDNews when I hadn't done anything?  Why don't you have any empathy towards the emotional distress you have helped caused in others by your reluctance to do anything about this unconstitutional legislation?  And why is re-publishing factual information about this event in the Torch any worse than those other news groups doing the same, and why am I being held accountable for raising real concerns regarding kids that may have been exposed to illegal drugs at your wife's daycare facility?

Because, remember, the reason you said you voted against the Ludington MM ordinance was because you thought the Federal government drug policy was dominant, which made such possession illegal, no exceptions.  Do you honestly feel the same way now that it's your own flesh and blood, possessing it for non-medicinal purposes, getting the rap?  

 

Yes, there were other things that happened this night, including some weird accusations made by LFD personnel off-camera, but if time permits I will cover those later.  The quest for justice, freedom, and information goes on... 

[Eye On Ludington]

XLFD, Thank you for the encouragement. I have barely experiemented with three of online free forums and have not really given any of them more than half an hour of my time. They remain in the construction stage and will likely stay that way forever. So you need not be concerned about what I do with my own time.

I did not decide until this morning to try the NING platform's 30-day free trial. I admit it is not much to begin with but it is a start.

 

http://eyeonludington.ning.com/

[Eye On Ludington]

CLFD, please take a look and join if you want. It is not much but I hope to improve it to include topics of all sorts relative to the area in which we live, work, and play. First I want to get it looking good with wall paper and buttons and different stuff. Feel free to join whenever you have the time. I will be inviting others soon.

[Jane]

hayzues H rice, how many people don't know the difference between a blog, a forum and a social media network. for thosE of you who can't seem to get the difference, NING sites are social  networks, that can have BLOG"S, and FORUMS and VIDEO and CHAT and pictures and each person has there own page where they can put a BLOG, and lots of CONTENT. So if ya'll want to get into semantic please know what your talking about. But if you want to generalize, call the part we are typing to each other in a forum or bulletin board or message board, as that is the same as the old fashioned (if we consider 10-20 years ago old) Bulletin Board of which proboards and vbulletin and many other formats are,which is where you post a topic and then other reply underneath it, see google and search forums, then blogs, big difference. If you want to blog go to Xanga or wordpress etc...

But if you want to call it a blog, fine, but it is not an accurate definition so quit acting like it actually means something or just call it a [website where people can state pinions and talkt to each other and type and................................................and on and on)

[Jane]

and btw (means By The Way) I believe proboards and some of the others are adding more ability to post content beyond just the message board area these days

[Jane]

take a breath, and spell-check before posting!

[XLFD]

Often I will call the Ludington Torch a blog or watchblog just for convenience and to cut down on syllables, but yes, this is technically a social networking site, which is actually abbreviated as a N-ing or Ning site, where we technically have a lot more to offer than just a true blog. 

[AQUAMAN]

Here is another suggestion for EyE to pledge to, "the right to speak freely, and the duty to do so responsibly", it's the Torch motto/mission statement. Not simply a "sounding board to bash other local individuals" with differing opinions. I really doubt this motto will be followed in any degree of certainty by the new forum. It starts with 2 threads, both counterattacking the Torch threads and it's members. That's not exactly objective nor of interest for most people wanting to join imo. The Torch, imo, was created to help local citizens get news that will never be printed by the LDN, nor be recognized nor admitted to by too many in the good ole boy club downtown. To evoke the thought process, uncover important facts, stimulate response and opinions, and find the truths of our little berg in W. Michigan. Then let the pieces of the puzzle fall where they may. You may not like the Truths as presented in this forum, so, instead of just bashing to disagree and support your buds at city hall, back those attacks with facts and information that supports your side. That's the essence of the Torch, and I truly think, that it's over your head for comprehension. Building a new talk forum with a foundation of vengeful and hateful reasons is doomed for failure.

[Eye On Ludington]

Aquaman, Thank you for your continued interest in my posts.

[AQUAMAN]

EyE, make sure your readers/participants will get to speak "freely", as that is the essence of the Torchers, with total freedom and liberties, as expoused by our Constitution, NOT that of "communism and socialism". And for the record, I'm not really interested in your vain posts, as much as your liberal positions that you post and now claim as good. It's not in my cookbook at all sir, and should be deleted from yours as well, imho. Your decide in the end, right?

[Eye On Ludington]

Aquaman, Thank you for your continued interest in my posts. Please feel free to visit the new Eye On Ludington website, and stay tuned to it for future commentary about your own "vain posts".

Good day sir!

[AQUAMAN]

Sure got a short fuse now, dontcha EyE? A great administrator and creator of a forum needs to have patience, intelligence, and understanding of life and people....still think you qualify? Paul Harvey......good day!

[masonco]

Eye...

Why are you threatening and mocking the people here? Actually I'm starting to wonder if you are John Shay and/or Heather. How sad you can not provide facts to back up your accusations.

Also remember that once you post or create a site you are responsible for anything that might look like slander or defamation of character. It is sure looking like that is what you plan to do with creating your new site. OH and don't forget NING has rules and regulations too.