By: Diane Benjamin
I’ve always thought minutes of a meeting reflect what happened at the meeting. I also believed that minutes were kept as a permanent record for posterity, therefore whoever took them had a duty to make sure they accurately reflected proceedings.
Evidently the City of Bloomington doesn’t think so.
On their website 2 items are listed: http://www.cityblm.org/index.aspx?page=61
Proceedings haven’t been posted since the end of February. http://www.cityblm.org/index.aspx?page=242&parent=7721
These reports used to record everything that happened, including who spoke at Public Comment and a brief recap of their topic.
Record of Motions and Votes doesn’t include anything about public comment, Aldermen comment, City Manager comment, or mayor’s comment:
http://www.cityblm.org/index.aspx?page=242&parent=7720
I don’t know why they call it Motions and Votes because other things are included. Nobody voted or made a motion on beautification awards – but they are in there. So is the roll call, pledge of allegiance, moment of silence etc.
It’s funny the last Council meeting called for Approval of the Minutes on the consent agenda, but really there are no minutes to approve. I wonder what they voted on? http://www.cityblm.org/Modules/ShowDocument.aspx?documentid=8648
The title on the document is even “Motions and Votes”, obviously in error since it contains much more than motions and votes.
The City is attempting to enshrine for history only what they want saved. Deleting all information pertaining to public comment means they believe your comments aren’t important enough to be preserved. Just your presence isn’t important enough to preserve either.
The only place public comment is available to future researchers is on video where it is much more difficult to search. I wonder how long the videos will be kept? If the video isn’t part of a permanent archive, then neither are the citizens who took their time to address the Council.
Most of the Council doesn’t look at whoever is speaking, the desk in front of them must have classified information which is very important. They regularly show their disgust with citizens wasting their time by not paying attention to them. Tari decided at the last meeting to NOT suspend the rules so everyone who signed up to speak could.
Feel that knife in your back? It’s courtesy of those folks that supposedly work for you.
The new City Clerk says she is following the law. According to her, recording names and subject from public comments is not required. The Council members don’t read the minutes before passing them so the record is not necessarily accurate and the Clerk won’t be held accountable for errors. Correct me if I’m wrong–I thought the minutes were required to be made available within a certain time limit. Other than the fact that the City Clerk is new to the City and possibly backlogged, there should be no excuse. The tech savvy Communications Director may have something to do with the way the minutes are currently reported. I know from personal experience that footage can be expunged from the video record.
Transparency in action compliments of Mr. Transparency himself, Tari Renner. The science of politics is to tell the electorate what they want to hear then do what you want once you get elected, because not enough of the electorate pays attention at this point. Then use your newly acquired power to to silence your critics by literally buying off (through advertising dollars) local media to propagate your agenda unto the loyal mass of lemmings who still think they are a part of the game that is being played on them. Continue to smile and kiss babies. This method is tried and true. Be careful however not to tick off the wrong people at the wrong time as you might end up making license plates some day. Stupid is as stupid does.
In case you haven’t noticed, the new city clerk is not as smart as Tracey Covert making her a whole lot more malleable to Tari’s agenda.
Probably why she was hired.