Pandemics, local politics and public participation - Part 1
Last Thursday, the Board of Public Works held a remote public meeting.
I attempted to listen to this meeting. I attempted to listen to this meeting. After sending numerous emails to the Mayor, the Director of DPW and the Board, the agenda was posted with a presentation on an update on Burke St. I was looking forward to hearing the answers to some of my questions.
Turns out the meeting was not public. Under the Governor’s emergency orders:
The Board is required to post a notice in a public location. – This appears to not have happened.
The Board is to provide a call in number and access code – This did not work
The Board is to provide a contact of the public body to receive a message if the public cannot access the meeting. This contact was not provided.
If the Board learns that the public cannot access the meeting, the Board must immediately adjourn and reschedule. The Board did not do this.
This Board is chaired by Mayor Donchess and on April 8th, he conducted a remote meeting, during this pandemic, with access to the public. Why was access denied for the April 23rd meeting?
I have been listening to city meetings and learned, at the budget meeting, that 141 Burke St, the “white elephant” building purchased years ago to consolidate the DPW facilities, had not been sold. However, the public and the Board of Public works had been hoodwinked believing the building had sold. Additionally, the public and Board(s) were told that the money from the sale of Burke St. would be used offset the costs of the new DPW office facility that was bonded for $6M on December, 23, 2019.
The Mayor announced at a November 7, 2019 Board of public works meeting,
“We are realizing $3.9 million from the sale of Burke Street so the numbers we are really talking about when we apply those proceeds to this project, are $6 million for the new building at the landfill versus $12 million for the renovation.”
The cost of the DPW office project is just over $10M, but we only bonded $6M. It appears the sale fell through in January, but both Boards (Aldermen and Public works) were never told, at least not on public record. One has to wonder exactly what we are building and what did the taxpayers buy? The architect is working on the drawings now; are they designing a $10M or $6M dollar office facility? What did the Mayor know and when did he know it? Are we carrying a bond on Burke St. and are we paying off the debt or do we just keep bonding?
This looks like bait and switch tactics used by the Mayor to push through a project without proper funding, then shove the balance, unknowingly, on the backs of the taxpayers. This is not how transparent city government should work. This project should be shut down now.