Ludington City Council Meeting April 23, 2018: A Host of Frauds

[XLFD]

The meeting of the Ludington City Council this Monday featured a host of issues that came before the council.  Before that meeting took place retired three-term city councilor opined in the newspaper of which he worked at for 42 years before 'retiring' in 1998 about three topics that were on the agenda. 

Out of respect for Mr. Peterson, we will focus on those three topics here after detailing what else transpired at the meeting where he had sat for 12 years (2000-2011) after his retirement, sometimes taking a break to voice his opinion in a newspaper that grew to reflect and protect city hall's interests more than its readers.  A position which has only grown worse since.  News fraud?

At this meeting the following things happened without significant controversy or with unanimous approval:

- the 2017 City Assessor report was given, where sales of parcels in the COL were strident

- a $1.2 million loan resolution for the new fire station was approved, without any significant comment about whether the downtown sale and construction was imminent.

- approved the waste contract amendment to preclude condo owners from paying twice for trash removal.

- allowed out-district properties to receive fire protection service from LPD for 1.15 mil rate

- offered up a monthly police and zoning report

- adopted an ordinance to give a minimum # of rooms for 'boutique hotels', likely in order to frustrate those who would claim a 1 or 2 unit building was this type of hotel.

- approved a host of recurring annual events for the chamber of commerce and other groups

- changed the Fifth Ward polling location from Lakeside Chapel on N Washington to the Lakeshore Resource Network on Tinkham

- adopted a proclamation to support the lemonade stands for childhood cancer campaign.

As for public and council discussion, Bruce Rendon got up before the council meeting (5:00 in) and told us that he was running for State Senate.  Chuck Sobanski (1:07:50 into video below) would get up during the second comment and remark that if the initial comment period is only on agenda items, then that should be enforced.  I have yet to see anybody announcing their candidacy follow that rule.

John Fellows would utter unqualified support for the proposed charter amendment, and Angela Serna, Fifth Ward candidate, would advocate for the Michigan Adventure Race event, which had a minor controversy considering whether they would approve of next year's date.  Deb Del Zoppo inquired as to whether the council would work on an ordinance allowing chickens in town, basing her argument on other cities in Michigan allowing the same.

A welcome announcement at the end of the meeting had Councilor Krauch announcing he wouldn't be running again for Fourth Ward representative, after the city clerk announced the filing deadline.  I can find no Fourth Warder that was saddened by the announcement and perhaps the three filing for his seat was an indication that his career in city politics was coming to an end.

Which leads us to Paul S Peterson's op-ed in the Monday COLDNews.  A retired journalist should know better than to comment on issues without knowing all the facts.  It not only weakens the argument significantly, but makes one wonder whether he is talking as a common citizen, a journalist, or a 12 year veteran of the city council.  Here is what he said, you will notice the newspaper still doesn't have an editor of any type noted in their space to the left, which used to figure up to three.

Issue One, Events Center:  We noted this development here.  Whereas I would agree with PSP that such a center could find a niche in our community, I fail to have the same optimism that such a facility would automatically be successful in landing enough events to justify and pay for its construction and maintenance in our market.  Especially with all of the potential event venues located in surrounding townships offering the same service, and not being self-sufficient with just  event-service.  

One could say the City of Ludington has no affordable fast food establishments in its boundaries for townsfolk to walk to, so why doesn't the local Burger King, already surrounded by multiple chain restaurants, move to the downtown where it would have a monopoly of fast, affordable food?   The same issues making that inadvisable in an overall cost analysis may be at play here, and when this comes before the Planning Commission, maybe we will learn enough to say it is well thought out.

Issue Two, City Manager contract change from one to three years:  PSP then advocates for the contract extension, saying that one year contracts lead to short-term thinking and difficulty in finding qualified candidates.  He then adds to these questionable arguments by saying Ludington lucked out in getting John Shay, and instantly loses all credibility. 

Any responsible city council, school board, university board of trustees, hospital board, county commission, etc., should have in their charter or by-laws that they evaluate the performance of their chief executive every year no matter how long the contract is for.  Such reviews are necessary to keep those executives in check, keep them honest, and perhaps even reward them if they are going above and beyond.  The current situation in Ludington (and many other Michigan communities who have one-year agreements with their city CEOs) allows the city manager a raise each year based on job performance-- an incentive for good performance that Shay has supposedly merited since he has received many raises for himself over his 16 years.  

You may recall such annual evaluations at WSCC led to the recent change in their president; absent any such periodical review, a chief executive's termination can not usually be properly justified.  Research of multiple cities and villages in our areas that employ managers typically (contrary to Councilor Winczewski's limited research on area superintendents and hospital executives) hire them for 'indefinite' terms.  Why not change the wording of the charter to allow for this latitude while mandating annual reviews at open meetings?  This should please everybody.

Issue Three, Rotta settlement:  PSP mentions "$200 for 'overpayment' of charges related to the Baby Kate case", a major misstatement of facts worthy of Shay.  During Peterson's tenure on the city council, six FOIA appeals came before the council, he voted to second the denial of all but one of them and voted against them otherwise, so judge that as his journalistic understanding of transparency, and how he has a history of denying reasonable appeals and fostering secrecy. 

He wonders aloud why I may want the police report of the Baby Kate disappearance.  I will give him the benefit of the doubt that he doesn't read the Ludington Torch or watch the city council videos since his departure, instead looking at the COLDNews for his inspiration.  A requestor never needs to provide that, but I will give the journalist who has worked at least six decades a brief reason as to why.  It's rather sad that somebody with his experience in the field cannot do any research before he asks such an obvious question.  I will do so by asking unanswered questions that you won't find being asked elsewhere.

The record of the LPD with this case is replete with 'gaps', I was hopeful the report would fill some of those.  Why was Ariel not ever considered a suspect or co-suspect?  Why wouldn't the police allow her to release the supposedly-passed lie detector test?  Why was Nick Grandstaff's testimony that blew a wide hole through Ariel's recollections ever investigated further?  Why wasn't Ariel's phone records traced back to the last time she was seen with Baby Kate?  Is there more evidence of poor investigative protocols than already exists in the record?  Did they ever verify that the DNA given to the police by Ariel wasn't from Baby Kate's sister?

These are just a few of the questions I had in seeking this report.  Many are still unanswered, and like a typical LPD report, the investigations conducted are incomplete and directed towards their goal, which was to convict someone for this abduction.  But since PSP hasn't been paying attention, the local circuit court had to be used because his old gang decided an outrageous figure for a police report was somehow legit, then not to be outdone, allowed their minions to defraud me further by charging an unjustifiable $99.07 fee.  Here was my initial comment to inform the public about what all transpired.  

April 23, 2018 Ludington City Council meeting from Mason County District Library on Vimeo.

XLFD:  (2:30 in) "Tonight likely ends a long saga that began over a year ago when I asked through a FOIA request to see the police report regarding the 2011 disappearance of Baby Kate. In the response I was told it would take 100 hours of time for a detective to scan the report to edit out material that would constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy of those involved, without explanation of why it would take so long in what would turn out to be a 98 page police report without any significant invasions of personal privacy contained therein. Isn't that an outrageous fraud?

Not to this council; they reviewed my appeal of the response, were told that the police report was 2750 pages of privacy-sensitive material and upheld the $2500 price tag to inspect the record. It was appealed to circuit court where I allowed the city a redo of the request, and yet I was still charged nearly $100 for the 98 page report I had strictly requested in the first place. Those 2600+ pages that were claimed to be part of the report were eventually asked for in discovery and denied precisely because they never existed as any part of the initially requested report.

In this odyssey for a simple police report there was one fraud after another perpetrated by the City, their contracted FOIA attorney, and their chief of police. I was charged for 150 paper copies that were never made, fraud. I was charged a much increased rate for the detective's salary for the second determination, fraud. I was charged an inflated detective's salary for work that could have been better done by a clerk at about a third of the rate, fraud. I was charged for a hundred hours then four hours of work to review 98 non-exempt pages of a police report when I could do the same in 15 minutes, fraud.

With all that fraud going on, maybe I should have contacted the police, but they were the one's claiming all the fraudulent fees and extortions. Had they used all that effort properly investigating the case, maybe we'd have some answers to what happened to Baby Kate rather than just a bunch of unanswered questions seven years later [END of Comment]."

Surprisingly, Chief Barnett failed to respond to the minor taunt at the end of that statement, nor did he or anybody else try to vindicate their lie about the 2600+ non-compliant records.  Also surprisingly, the city council must have got some sort of legal advice to remain silent, for the only thing the COL put forth was City Manager Shay reading his memorandum found in the packet, before a unanimous vote to accept the settlement.

My second comment was more difficult.  I wanted to stay on the same topic, but I had to be able to adapt it to what the council might do or say.  I wasn't even sure they would settle, even though it was recommended by Shay and their attorney.

XLFD:  (1:10:00 in)  "I appreciate the council conducting their discussions on settling my FOIA case in open session this time rather than they did last time in closed session. I would hope that such a move would signal that they are wanting to vest themselves in transparent conduct, but after listening to what I heard here tonight, it's rather clear they only want to spin their decision to settle in a way that makes them look good. I understand that. I have learned that if I seek either admission or contrition by any city official to ethical or legal misconduct, I have come to the wrong place.

Thanks for not disappointing me tonight. You could have talked of how the City could prevent overcharging the public in the future for information, of how such cures would be better for all involved. But no, you had the city manager read a misleading statement.

Three councilors, the city manager, and the mayor took time out of their busy schedule to see the City's position fail under legal scrutiny 13 days ago in the local circuit court, if they want to weave a new narrative that says they did nothing wrong or acted in the public's best interest, I would encourage them to buy the transcript from the court of the proceedings and share those with the public so they can gauge that for themselves.

Then, for more transparency, share the minutes of the closed session you had in January with the public and explain why this council unanimously rejected a rather fair offer of settlement before this case had reached the courtroom and moved you to this obviously bitter settlement you grant to me tonight and to paying many thousands of dollars more in legal fees.

Well played, councilors, well played [END of comment]

Amusingly, Mayor Holman failed to note my sarcasm, and seems to have appreciated my left-handed compliment, just the last of a host of frauds I noted that evening.

[Freedom Seeker]

A rose of any other name still smells the same, to put the positive spin on, "what did you expect of a cat, but a meow or of a pig but a grunt." True in a couple cases here.

[Willy]

Thanks for that report X. it is quite a phenomenon that the Councilors and chief held their tongues. Did you observe any steam coming out their ears when the admission of their loss of the FOIA court case. The day they admit that they have  wasted thousands of dollars on FIOA attorny's fees will be the day smelling salts will be handed out at the door when people enter Council chambers. As Freedom says " a rose still smells the same" I would add bullsh_t still smells  like bullsh_t no matter how it's presented.