This would be a good time for you folks to draft Patrick Cepola for Mayor. Seriously! Patrick has the interest in our community that we are not seeing from anyone else, the desire to serve the community, and the will to make our government transparent. We have always admired his ability to work in the community and to point out those things that are wrong or corrupt. The criticism aimed at Patrick is that he is a gadfly, butts in where he’s not wanted, etc. This is possibly because he is so effective.
One criticism that might hurt him is to focus on each and every issue. He should be convinced to focus on the bigger picture such as economics, a forensic audit, hiring practices and the like, and not worry about extra money spent on legal pads and copy toner.
Patrick is very approachable and may be willing to run if he is given enough support. The need is now and there is time to launch a good campaign. Let’s work together and make it happen.
Friday, January 25, 2008
Monday, January 21, 2008
Where’s Waldo?
Has anyone seen the slate of candidates for Mayor and Trustee? Isn’t it interesting that just a couple of months away from the election we don’t even have the benefit of knowing who might be running? Jeez, the Presidential candidates announced months ago and we still have nearly a year to go. Here in little old Estes Park candidates are apparently in hiding. Could it be they are ashamed? Maybe there won’t be any candidates. Would we just close down the Town? That would be interesting. Staff runs the Town now, so they don’t really need, or want, a mayor or trustee. That just forces them to go public with their opinions, a real bother.
Some have speculated that Levine and Doylen want to be mayor. Some say it’s Pinkham all the way. What have the bushes shaken out folks? Who do you think (or know) will be running for these offices? Baudek is term limited, didn’t get on the school board so maybe he’ll go away. If anyone is going to step forward, isn’t it time for them to disclose their intention?
Some have speculated that Levine and Doylen want to be mayor. Some say it’s Pinkham all the way. What have the bushes shaken out folks? Who do you think (or know) will be running for these offices? Baudek is term limited, didn’t get on the school board so maybe he’ll go away. If anyone is going to step forward, isn’t it time for them to disclose their intention?
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
LEADERSHIP 101
Accusations of betrayal ring hollow
Dear Editor,
At the Town board meeting last night I was accused of betraying my office and participating in secret meetings to decide how to proceed on the recent citizen initiated ordinance. First and foremost, this did not happen. In my almost four years on this board, the only things discussed in executive sessions are the topics specifically identified on the agenda for the session. That is absolutely all that is discussed. Our attorney, our Town Administrator, our Mayor and each of us Town Trustees take this very seriously.
I know that the easy way to deal with someone who does something with which you do not agree is to cry “conspiracy.” It happens all of the time in our society. In this case I will attempt to walk you through how I came to my decision. I cannot speak for my fellow Trustees as we have not discussed it.
When the issue was introduced I thought that it was unnecessary, but I did not have a big problem with it. The number of signatures gathered was very impressive. I will admit that the easy thing to do would have been to just adopt the issue as written. Between the meeting where it was introduced and the meeting in December where we voted, I discussed the ordinance and the ideas behind the issue with many Estes Park citizens. Some of them had signed the petition, and some had not. There was a clear division in views of the people with whom I talked. I became aware that the unanimity of opinion that the petition coordinators were seeking to portray was not the case. That is why I decided to not do the easy thing, but to let the voters decide how they want to proceed. This is why I changed my mind and voted the way I did. There was nothing secret, nothing sinister, just talking with my constituents.
The people who comprise the Town Board are some of the most intelligent, hard working, honest, and selfless people that I know. They are from diverse backgrounds, have sometimes very diverse opinions and were elected in differing times. The Board is able to work together and able to agree to disagree and reach consensus. I feel it a privilege to work with each of them. I would have directly responded last night but I was not feeling well. I subsequently had to leave the meeting. For that, I apologize to all of those in attendance and to the board. I could not, however, let the public accusation go without response.
Chuck Levine
Estes Park Town Trustee
REQUEST TO ENTER EXECUTIVE SESSION:
24-6-402(4)(e), C.R.S. - For the purpose of determining positions relative to
matters that may be subject to negotiations, developing strategy for
negotiations, and/or instructing negotiators – Lot 4, Stanley Historic District and
24-6-402(4)(f), C.R.S. – For discussion of a personnel matter; not involving any
specific employees who have requested discussion of the matter in open
session; any member of the Town Board (or body); the appointment of any
person to fill an office of the Town Board (or body); or personnel policies that do
not require discussion of matters personal to particular employees.
It was moved and seconded (Pinkham/Levine) the Town Board enter into
Executive Session for the purpose of determining positions relative to
matters that may be subject to negotiations, developing strategy for
negotiations, and/or instructing negotiators for Lot 4, Stanley Historic
District, under C.R.S. Section 24-6-402(4)(e) and discussion of a
personnel matter; not involving any specific employees who have
requested discussion of the matter in open session; any member of the
Town Board (or body); the appointment of any person to fill an office of
the Town Board (or body); or personnel policies that do not require
discussion of matters personal to particular employees., under C.R.S. 24-
6-402(4)(f)., and it passed unanimously.
Part of the team…one of the boys. When Chuck ran for office four years ago, he vowed to “heal this town”. Evidently Chuck feels healing the town will only occur behind closed doors in executive session, and hiding behind the mayor who hides behind the town attorney.
We at the Estes Parkian, have lobbied, and written profusely for a transparent government in Estes Park. We still are ardent believers in an open candid town hall. But calling for “transparent oversight”, we did not intent to promote the contranym form of the root usage of transparency.
Transparent as The Estes Parkian intended:
Transparent: adjective, fully defined, known, predictable, said of a subsystem in which matters generally subject to volition, or stochastic state change have been chosen, measured, or determined by the environment. Thus for transparent systems output is a know function of the input and users can both predict behavior and depend upon it. “Candid, frank, open, manifest, obvious, free from guile”.
Transparent as we receive from our elected trustees:
Transparent: adjective, easily seen through a transparent explanation, as in “transparent excuses”, “a transparent lie”.
Chuck wants us to believe it is honorable to go into executive session to discuss the operation of our community in private. Why vale your discussions from us? What could an elected official be doing behind closed doors, with community funds, that couldn’t be accomplished in the public eye? Occasionally it could be reasoned “personnel issues”, but everything else is public business. A PUBLICLY ELECTED OFFICIAL CONDUCTING THE PUBLICS BUSINESS SHOULD DO BUSINESS IN THE PUBLIC EYE!
Chuck couldn’t discuss issues in front of the community that elected him, during the forum that is intended for us to participate, but he can discus issues in secret session, and or only with his close friends, the rest of us…well...we are just out of luck.
Greg White says you can, but should you? Greg White is staff! Greg White has dozens of reasons to hide his,,,goofs.
Who among our elected trustees were elected for their negotiating acumen? How do you choose what you bid and what is negotiated? If a legal action is brought against the town staff or the trustees, because of their actions, isn’t that all of our business? If the trustees and staff cannot operate the community legally, should they be allowed to negotiate settlements to their goofs in private, and hide the large amounts of money these actions cost us all? If all these suits were played out in public, and not negotiated in secret, wouldn’t our elected officials be a lot more judicious stewards? Why should a trustee publish a statement in an editorial explaining ... we cannot tell you what we discussed but it wasn't that?
Chuck you are elected as oversight, our eyes to oversee the operations of this community, you are not part of its administration and operation, trustees are policy creators.
Chuck you claim that the trustees work well together in developing consensus. Is that really your roll? Compromising to vote in a unified block? Our trustees are elected from the community at large, but they are elected for oversight of the essential services the community requires. We should have six different opinions, not a unified front of people working together. Using your logic, we only need one trustee.
Please note; the community did not reelect two incumbents back on the school board, because it was felt they acted to closely in concert. They hired a school administrator from staff that was not qualified. If that is the community standard, we should have four new trustees this spring. The trustees operate in a block, and they just moved the police chief into the “assistant town administrator” position.
Chuck you will not get my vote in April, because you failed leadership 101…you are a follower, you do not speak up, you always go along to get along. I did not speak up, because I had a belly ache is an excuse, like the dog ate my home work.
Dear Editor,
At the Town board meeting last night I was accused of betraying my office and participating in secret meetings to decide how to proceed on the recent citizen initiated ordinance. First and foremost, this did not happen. In my almost four years on this board, the only things discussed in executive sessions are the topics specifically identified on the agenda for the session. That is absolutely all that is discussed. Our attorney, our Town Administrator, our Mayor and each of us Town Trustees take this very seriously.
I know that the easy way to deal with someone who does something with which you do not agree is to cry “conspiracy.” It happens all of the time in our society. In this case I will attempt to walk you through how I came to my decision. I cannot speak for my fellow Trustees as we have not discussed it.
When the issue was introduced I thought that it was unnecessary, but I did not have a big problem with it. The number of signatures gathered was very impressive. I will admit that the easy thing to do would have been to just adopt the issue as written. Between the meeting where it was introduced and the meeting in December where we voted, I discussed the ordinance and the ideas behind the issue with many Estes Park citizens. Some of them had signed the petition, and some had not. There was a clear division in views of the people with whom I talked. I became aware that the unanimity of opinion that the petition coordinators were seeking to portray was not the case. That is why I decided to not do the easy thing, but to let the voters decide how they want to proceed. This is why I changed my mind and voted the way I did. There was nothing secret, nothing sinister, just talking with my constituents.
The people who comprise the Town Board are some of the most intelligent, hard working, honest, and selfless people that I know. They are from diverse backgrounds, have sometimes very diverse opinions and were elected in differing times. The Board is able to work together and able to agree to disagree and reach consensus. I feel it a privilege to work with each of them. I would have directly responded last night but I was not feeling well. I subsequently had to leave the meeting. For that, I apologize to all of those in attendance and to the board. I could not, however, let the public accusation go without response.
Chuck Levine
Estes Park Town Trustee
REQUEST TO ENTER EXECUTIVE SESSION:
24-6-402(4)(e), C.R.S. - For the purpose of determining positions relative to
matters that may be subject to negotiations, developing strategy for
negotiations, and/or instructing negotiators – Lot 4, Stanley Historic District and
24-6-402(4)(f), C.R.S. – For discussion of a personnel matter; not involving any
specific employees who have requested discussion of the matter in open
session; any member of the Town Board (or body); the appointment of any
person to fill an office of the Town Board (or body); or personnel policies that do
not require discussion of matters personal to particular employees.
It was moved and seconded (Pinkham/Levine) the Town Board enter into
Executive Session for the purpose of determining positions relative to
matters that may be subject to negotiations, developing strategy for
negotiations, and/or instructing negotiators for Lot 4, Stanley Historic
District, under C.R.S. Section 24-6-402(4)(e) and discussion of a
personnel matter; not involving any specific employees who have
requested discussion of the matter in open session; any member of the
Town Board (or body); the appointment of any person to fill an office of
the Town Board (or body); or personnel policies that do not require
discussion of matters personal to particular employees., under C.R.S. 24-
6-402(4)(f)., and it passed unanimously.
Part of the team…one of the boys. When Chuck ran for office four years ago, he vowed to “heal this town”. Evidently Chuck feels healing the town will only occur behind closed doors in executive session, and hiding behind the mayor who hides behind the town attorney.
We at the Estes Parkian, have lobbied, and written profusely for a transparent government in Estes Park. We still are ardent believers in an open candid town hall. But calling for “transparent oversight”, we did not intent to promote the contranym form of the root usage of transparency.
Transparent as The Estes Parkian intended:
Transparent: adjective, fully defined, known, predictable, said of a subsystem in which matters generally subject to volition, or stochastic state change have been chosen, measured, or determined by the environment. Thus for transparent systems output is a know function of the input and users can both predict behavior and depend upon it. “Candid, frank, open, manifest, obvious, free from guile”.
Transparent as we receive from our elected trustees:
Transparent: adjective, easily seen through a transparent explanation, as in “transparent excuses”, “a transparent lie”.
Chuck wants us to believe it is honorable to go into executive session to discuss the operation of our community in private. Why vale your discussions from us? What could an elected official be doing behind closed doors, with community funds, that couldn’t be accomplished in the public eye? Occasionally it could be reasoned “personnel issues”, but everything else is public business. A PUBLICLY ELECTED OFFICIAL CONDUCTING THE PUBLICS BUSINESS SHOULD DO BUSINESS IN THE PUBLIC EYE!
Chuck couldn’t discuss issues in front of the community that elected him, during the forum that is intended for us to participate, but he can discus issues in secret session, and or only with his close friends, the rest of us…well...we are just out of luck.
Greg White says you can, but should you? Greg White is staff! Greg White has dozens of reasons to hide his,,,goofs.
Who among our elected trustees were elected for their negotiating acumen? How do you choose what you bid and what is negotiated? If a legal action is brought against the town staff or the trustees, because of their actions, isn’t that all of our business? If the trustees and staff cannot operate the community legally, should they be allowed to negotiate settlements to their goofs in private, and hide the large amounts of money these actions cost us all? If all these suits were played out in public, and not negotiated in secret, wouldn’t our elected officials be a lot more judicious stewards? Why should a trustee publish a statement in an editorial explaining ... we cannot tell you what we discussed but it wasn't that?
Chuck you are elected as oversight, our eyes to oversee the operations of this community, you are not part of its administration and operation, trustees are policy creators.
Chuck you claim that the trustees work well together in developing consensus. Is that really your roll? Compromising to vote in a unified block? Our trustees are elected from the community at large, but they are elected for oversight of the essential services the community requires. We should have six different opinions, not a unified front of people working together. Using your logic, we only need one trustee.
Please note; the community did not reelect two incumbents back on the school board, because it was felt they acted to closely in concert. They hired a school administrator from staff that was not qualified. If that is the community standard, we should have four new trustees this spring. The trustees operate in a block, and they just moved the police chief into the “assistant town administrator” position.
Chuck you will not get my vote in April, because you failed leadership 101…you are a follower, you do not speak up, you always go along to get along. I did not speak up, because I had a belly ache is an excuse, like the dog ate my home work.
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Immigration 2008
Recent news articles have shown the effects of rising enforcement of new or existing laws on handling illegal immigrants. Some laws are targeting the capture of these illegals, while others are penalizing businesses that hire them. After all, our federal government has done little to curb the influx into our country of these folks so they are putting the burden of enforcement of our laws on citizens. Here in this venue we have heard a great deal about how bad immigrants (legal or not) are for this community; Crime, litter, taking jobs from locals, and more. Other issues are that whether the areparents legal or not ,the children born here are legal citizens.
Taking another tack, just for the moment, what would happen in our community should 70% or more of the immigrant population departs?
Oklahoma is facing that dilemma as they are enforcing the recently enacted House Bill 1804, the toughest state law targeting illegal immigrants. Being law abiding should be everyone’s goal, but there are consequences to these actions as well, as we shall see. One of the many aspects of the law denies illegal immigrants driver’s licenses and public benefits such as rental assistance and fuel subsidies, and makes it a felony to transport or shelter illegal immigrants. Parts of the law will kick in on July 1 of this year and will make it even more restrictive to hire illegal’s by having to check against a national data base, something the federal government has failed to provide in the past. Yes, some people don’t care if they hire illegal’s or not, but there is no real way of knowing today if they are legal or illegal.
It’s real easy for our local experts to say that illegals should be kicked out of the community, but if the federal government someday makes it possible that they are here legally; the suspicion is that many of you wouldn’t want them here anyway.
What is happening in Oklahoma and other states with these new laws? Employees are vanishing, the pool of workers is diminishing, wages are going up, product prices are going up, sales of goods and services are going down, and what about school enrollments?
The employment issue is interesting as it relates to Estes Park. In Estes Park we have about a 20% Hispanic population, with perhaps as many as 80% of them being here illegally. Some of our classrooms have as many as 40% Hispanic students. Many of the comments here think that is a terrible thing. You should be reminded that 10 years ago we had about 1,400 students in our schools, now about 1,100, or maybe less. Let’s drop that number, overnight, to 750 and still try to pay off that $20 million bond.
What about our service industry? Perhaps you are willing to cook your own food and buss your own tables in the restaurants, but most of us are not. Our immigrant population earns and spends a great deal of money in this community. Do they get services we don’t feel they are entitled to? Yes they do. We should fix that. Do they provide services that others in this community don’t or won’t do? They sure do. One thread of argument is that they are taking low paying jobs that locals would take if the price was right. You are so wrong. In talking with many employers we discover that they pay good money ($10-$12 an hour) for unskilled workers that local high school students won’t do. May we suggest that there are many local business owners don’t pay themselves that amount when the year is done. We’re told that locals will work for a day or two then the little princes and princesses walk, never having given even a good days work.
What’s to be done? Well, something. In most cases our Federal, State and Local governments are doing nothing and this will lead to bigger and bigger problems. Should Colorado enact legislation as strong as Oklahoma? Let’s see what effect the Oklahoma has. Already some legislators are saying “this will be the single most destructive economic disaster since the Dust Bowl.” Another says “…HB1804 is achieving its intended purpose, which is illegal aliens leaving the state of Oklahoma.”
What are you willing to support for our community? What will you do to make that happen?
Taking another tack, just for the moment, what would happen in our community should 70% or more of the immigrant population departs?
Oklahoma is facing that dilemma as they are enforcing the recently enacted House Bill 1804, the toughest state law targeting illegal immigrants. Being law abiding should be everyone’s goal, but there are consequences to these actions as well, as we shall see. One of the many aspects of the law denies illegal immigrants driver’s licenses and public benefits such as rental assistance and fuel subsidies, and makes it a felony to transport or shelter illegal immigrants. Parts of the law will kick in on July 1 of this year and will make it even more restrictive to hire illegal’s by having to check against a national data base, something the federal government has failed to provide in the past. Yes, some people don’t care if they hire illegal’s or not, but there is no real way of knowing today if they are legal or illegal.
It’s real easy for our local experts to say that illegals should be kicked out of the community, but if the federal government someday makes it possible that they are here legally; the suspicion is that many of you wouldn’t want them here anyway.
What is happening in Oklahoma and other states with these new laws? Employees are vanishing, the pool of workers is diminishing, wages are going up, product prices are going up, sales of goods and services are going down, and what about school enrollments?
The employment issue is interesting as it relates to Estes Park. In Estes Park we have about a 20% Hispanic population, with perhaps as many as 80% of them being here illegally. Some of our classrooms have as many as 40% Hispanic students. Many of the comments here think that is a terrible thing. You should be reminded that 10 years ago we had about 1,400 students in our schools, now about 1,100, or maybe less. Let’s drop that number, overnight, to 750 and still try to pay off that $20 million bond.
What about our service industry? Perhaps you are willing to cook your own food and buss your own tables in the restaurants, but most of us are not. Our immigrant population earns and spends a great deal of money in this community. Do they get services we don’t feel they are entitled to? Yes they do. We should fix that. Do they provide services that others in this community don’t or won’t do? They sure do. One thread of argument is that they are taking low paying jobs that locals would take if the price was right. You are so wrong. In talking with many employers we discover that they pay good money ($10-$12 an hour) for unskilled workers that local high school students won’t do. May we suggest that there are many local business owners don’t pay themselves that amount when the year is done. We’re told that locals will work for a day or two then the little princes and princesses walk, never having given even a good days work.
What’s to be done? Well, something. In most cases our Federal, State and Local governments are doing nothing and this will lead to bigger and bigger problems. Should Colorado enact legislation as strong as Oklahoma? Let’s see what effect the Oklahoma has. Already some legislators are saying “this will be the single most destructive economic disaster since the Dust Bowl.” Another says “…HB1804 is achieving its intended purpose, which is illegal aliens leaving the state of Oklahoma.”
What are you willing to support for our community? What will you do to make that happen?