Shayathon

[shinblind]

Don't forget in less than a month you will be able to vote on whether to increase the severance package tenure of City Manager John Shay from 1 year to 5 years and other power grabs giving Shay access to the city's cookie jar.

My thoughts on this? Piss on you John Shay.

This is nothing short of a money grab by an incompetent and over compensated City Manager.

It will be much better that when his final compensation is ever resolved, that it is based on a 1 year contract rather than 5 years.  You are a greedy bastard John Shay. If you need more money I suggest rather than you now do, that you get a squeegee and a bucket, and grab the corner of Lud Avenue and James while it is still available and earn some honest money for awhile cleaning windshields.

[XLFD]

The three proposed amendments to the city charter to be voted on in August are as follows:

1) Would change the time for the City Manager’s presentation of a budget proposal and accompanying message from the first Council meeting in November to the second Council meeting in November.

2) Would give the City Manager authority to obligate or expend City funds for emergency repairs without prior Council approval.

3) Would change the one-year term for the City Manager’s employment to a term not to exceed five years.

The two that were defeated would have allowed the city manager to reside outside the city and would have changed the clerk and treasurer into appointive positions. 

The three that will come up for vote allows the city manager to:

1) ...send a budget to the council that cannot be challenged/tweaked without making an additional council meeting necessary, giving the council and public only two weeks (in a period including Thanksgiving, Black Friday) to review its complex contents before approving it.  Note, Shay has violated this section  of the charter anyway until the last two years without repercussions from his boss (the city council).

2) ...create a way for the city manager to create 'emergencies' (an undefined term he mangled during the Brother Street Sewer affair) to put tax money into projects, of which the public can be kept in the dark about.  This is a recipe for corruption, fraud, and embezzlement.

3) ...get better contractual agreements and severance packages (already done without public knowledge or input) and not come under review except for extremely gross negligence or actions until five years elapse. 

They all provide more power and less accountability to the city manager, they all need to fail. 

[AQUAMAN]

That last one with the CM contract for work will also be a big problem later if he's not rehired, or fired. He could probably get an attorney to get him a full 5 years of severance pay, that's $500,000!!! Can Ludington, always complaining about being broke, afford that kind of contract? And yes, if the Lazy City Council were doing their jobs properly, they wouldn't need all these amendment changes to start with. My feeling, as it stands right now, is that the council will gladly pass all these Shyster changes, and then Shay will schedule the other dropped two amendments later and get them too. 

[Willy]

[XLFD]

Anybody interested in working to make sure these proposals get defeated?  I am planning on making some investments to get some signs and literature out before the August election.  Send me a message or reply to this if you are interested in the distribution aspect of the operation (or other aspects).