Well, here we go, yet again. Below, you’ll find the Whitehall City Council making arguments against term limits. (Notice that no one defended keeping them intact, as is.) What I couldn’t help but feel as I watched them was that I felt like the foxes were making arguments to the hens as to why they should be in charge of the henhouse.

I will show the video first and make points or counterarguments after.

Alright…their arguments:

1. Argument: Term limits, particularly for the Mayor, limits the momentum they may have when either a) doing a good job or b) that two terms isn’t enough to really get the job done.

Counterargument One: I agree that running a city is a lot of work. The intricate business of it takes a lot of time. One of my favorite mayoral figures was Fiorello LaGuardia, he helped to shape NYC for generations (with the help of a lot of very talented and tireless people) and he really loved the city and its people, all of them. However, Ronald Reagan made a lot of progress in this country in 8 years (on a much larger scale), as did Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. To suggest that a mayor of a tiny municipality in a Midwestern city needs more time is a bit much to swallow.                                                        Counterargument Two: Shaping our city’s charter simply to reward someone for a perceived good job is wrong. It can also backfire because someone can get in there and do either a middlin’ job or have a political juggernaut behind them and keep a stranglehold on the position. As Councilperson Lori Elmore pointed out, there can be favoritism and nepotism. Why could that be a concern with endless terms but not for three? This is the very reason term limits were voted on in the first place.

2. Argument: Enticing good and qualified people to fill these higher positions(Mayor/Attorney/Auditor) requires someone to make a four to eight year commitment that they would have to pull themselves away from the private sector in order to make. That risk might be more palatable if they knew they might be in the job longer as it might be harder for them to reenter the private sector when done. To work in the private sector and give that up to run for office is a heavy risk for someone both monetarily and whom has the brain and skills to run a city well.

Counterargument One: City Manager. If the city manager does well, they keep their job. If they do poorly, they’re out. Its incentive to do a good job, one doesn’t have to worry about leaving private sector work as one is doing what they have the qualified education and skills to do. I suppose this could also be done for City Attorney and Auditor as well. This was not brought up by the Charter Review committee.

3. Argument: The ability to reward or punish elected officials is already in place, its called voting.

Counterargument One: While this is a well-worn bromide and should be true, sadly, there are many reasons it doesn’t and should be improved upon. Voting in this city and this country is disgraceful. In country’s that can’t vote, the opportunity is seen as an awesome responsibility. Americans, too often, take that right too lightly. As a result, people get into office with such small percentages of the overall voters. That is not a true mandate of the people. Councilman Rodriguez only won in 2017 by 2 percentage points with overall voting in Ward 1 at a sliver of 16% of overall voters. If people aren’t paying attention, as is too often the case here and elsewhere, it is very easy for someone who has political power to use that influence to sway voters in the favor of the status quo. If the choice is made purely from influence and not the building blocks of close observation due to everything from insightful literature to candidates forums to personal interactions on doorsteps as well as using critical thinking skills aligned with deep personal philosophies, then anyone can get in there and stay in, as we have seen.                                                                                                                                                             Councilman Morrison uses the recall of Councilperson Thompson as a means to illustrate that people will use their power to rid the city of someone, quote, “if somebody stopped doing their job”. Mr. Morrison is utterly incorrect in this tired falsehood. First of all, words matter; Ms Thompson never ‘stopped doing’ her job. Ms. Thompson was, ostensibly, recalled because of allegations she’d gotten someone fired from their job. I believe the truth is that this was not a citizen’s revolt but rather a political coup. 78% of the funding to oust an elected official could be viewed as political, largely coming from elected officials and unions themselves. This was a concerted effort by politicians to rid themselves of someone they didn’t like nor wanted around, regardless of her actions or behavior.
It was only a very small group of regular citizens who donated and worked to oust her, heavily abetted by the pocketbooks of the government officials and unions whose vested interests financed the show (the fliers, the car magnets, the yard signs, the hyperbolic literature). Due to this patronage, this small group of citizens was able to convince a large group of people how they felt and what they and (more importantly) some officials of Whitehall government financing the effort, wanted to convince them of. Given this then, I believe the people, without aid of complete information nor use of critical analysis based on self-investigation of the matter for themselves, voted with their passion, which the program of information fliers distributed incited in them, all without ever knowing the truth of the conflicts inherent and exactly who financed the fliers distributed. I believe it was a bloodless coup engendered by some largely self-interested, rotten government officials and unions whose vested interests were threatened by Councilperson Thompson’s presence, despite the hyperbolic surface allegations they used to convince them otherwise. The tale is in their inappropriate patronage of a purported citizen’s revolt.

4. Argument: The council themselves shouldn’t be the ones to determine the question of term limits by way of Charter Review recommendations, they should let it go to the voters for them to decide.

Counterargument One: Very generous of them to think of us. It HAS went to the voters! Three times!! The only reason it keeps coming back is because Charter Review Commissions, appointed by personal recommendations and not vetted for conflicts of interest present, keep suggesting that term limits are a problem. Now, I’ve stated many times why conflicts of interest must be heeded but, naturally, no one at City Hall listens. Why? Because its not in their interests to do so. Plain and simply. The conflicts, as I stated in a letter to the editor of the Whitehall News; ‘throws into question the fairness and integrity of decisions made due to bias the conflict’s presence engenders’. I claim some elected leaders are untrustworthy. Given that, why should we then put our trust in them when they say that the choices in whom they’ve made to recommend changes to our city’s Charter, are? Because of the conflicts present, I say we can’t (but of course, ‘can’t’ isn’t expeditious of our time). It is no stretch of the imagination, at least then, that corrupt elected leaders keep appointing people to this position that recommend things amenable to those elected officials themselves. Given all the circumstances, what other considerations are we to reasonably conclude?

So too, I mentioned this in other blogposts; where the council doesn’t heed the conflicts, the Charter Review makes recommendations that are amenable to the elected officials themselves, then the council innocently throw their hands in the air and say, ‘Well, we’re just innocents caught between the Commission and the voters, its really not our place to make such decisions. Who are WE to keep that decision from the voters?’ (Where they’ll then gather all their supporters and their money, their purse strings will burst open (likely keeping their own names out of the pre-election campaign finance report but showing up in the one post-election, where those insiders who helped finance the campaign will no longer matter in voter outrage) and influences will be exerted to persuade largely uninformed voters as to why its in their best interests to get rid of term limits/change it to 3 terms. The fix is in Whitehall, these people currently in (most, not all) is exactly why term limits were put into place. They don’t respect you, the citizens. Rather, they respect their own power and their own positions (and their egos and vanity…).

5. Argument: (Jim Graham’s) Voters have used term limits to not inform themselves of their elected officials. “They figure, ‘the most I gotta put up with is, 8 years at best, and then they’re gone.’ I honestly do think that’s why people aren’t in favor of eliminating term limits altogether.”

Counterargument One: While this indeed is Council President Graham’s opinion, his argument is nevertheless so nonsensical. People would actually make a physical and mental effort to vote on something which then allows them to be lazy, uninformed voters?! There might be many reasons why voters don’t care to vote (none of them truly right), however, to suggest that they would pull themselves out of their lives to actually go vote so they don’t have to pay attention shows the kind of thinking that exists at City Hall. I say, we can do better than this, we must.

6. Argument: Letting elected officials get to ten years allows them to qualify for pensions.

Counterargument One: And that is important to the voter….why?

7. Argument: If people only have two terms, they’ll be lazy and kick back knowing it doesn’t matter if they try because they’ll have to leave anyway.

Counterargument One: And if they’re the kind of lazy bum that would do that with a two term limit, who’s to say they’d perk up and not be lazy with a third term? The argument is silly. As well, if the voters couldn’t tell this about a candidate from the election, what self-investigative work did they not do to discover this before they elected the lazy bum?!

8. Argument: Going from 2 to 3 terms should be separated on the ballot because council should have new blood.

Counterargument One: If having ‘new blood and ideas’ for council is a good idea, then close the loophole that allows council members to travel from Ward to at-Large and back which disrespects the spirit of the law the voters affirmed three times. Then maybe ‘new blood’ might have a chance to get in.

Counterargument Two: This is in direct conflict with the idea that the mayor and a ‘team’ are getting things done together which you need cohesive momentum for. If you have new blood then that new group might not agree with or go along with the plans already set in motion.

Bits and pieces  Overall, listening and watching I noticed two things; One, they were very reticent to begin talking about this issue, an awkward part that was lost due to my camera only recording 8 minute intervals. Knowing how they like to keep publicly silent on matters, lest it cause a brouhaha which may then cost them their seat (silence among candidates for office is deemed a virtue…In a city of disinterested voters, its political gamesmanship), I felt that my preemptory comments on this topic, warning of this subject, made them all skittish about what is obvious; that yet again, they have been handed a decision to make which is packed with conflict, the sending along to the ballot of which makes them look suspicious and self-serving (which I believe, most are). As well, their comments are now up for scrutiny. If they appear uneducated or senseless or unprepared or dimwitted, those out there who are watching who aren’t these things, will see them for who they are. That kind of pressure has its toll, but, that’s too bad. You should rise or sink on your merit, not climb and stay seated based on disinformation regularly served to the populace (as too many have).

I have to once again praise Councilperson Elmore. While it was her and Councilperson Morrison who brought up the most forceful and distinct arguments of anyone at the table, it is Ms. Elmore who consistently asks questions and brings an eager vivacity for our community to the table (sometimes to the risk of making Councilperson Bailey sleepy-eyed).

While Councilperson Heck did bring something short to the argument at the end, my camera once again went off while she spoke. My apologies to her. Councilperson Bailey fairly only brought up the concern for the 10 year requirement for elected officials pensions. Councilperson Rodriguez only briefly clarified Councilperson Conison’s split term limits advice and Councilperson Wes Kantor merely, briefly, reiterated what others had said but neither he nor Mr. Rodriguez brought anything to the conversation. No opinions? Fear of sounding foolish? No doubt Mr. Rodriguez will merely nod his head yes to what the others agree with and he’ll continue to be part of the fleshy humanoids… I MEAN… ‘The Team’, moving Whitehall forward. There is nothing honorable about a person in power holding their tongue for self-interested safety’s sake.

I thought it ha-ha funny that Ms. Conison, who had a sign for Mr. Rodriguez in her yard in 2017, said that she’s both a huge proponent of having new blood and ideas brought into council and term limits, while Mr. Rodriguez, himself in his 17th year on Council, sat across from her as she vocalized these hypocrisies. Perhaps that is why Mr. Rodriguez chose not to talk about the term limits question because he’s the king of disrespecting the laws intents.

Throughout their arguments it seemed like they were strenuously arguing in favor of ending or extending term limits to three. One of the excuses they keep finding (which the Charter Review also brought up…) is that perhaps the ballot language was so convoluted as to confuse people and that is why ending term limits didn’t pass (that language the City Attorney is responsible for crafting and which the Board of Elections maintains or amends). They’re not getting their way so it must be some outside issue that’s causing them this problem (eye roll). ‘The hens keep saying no to the foxes but the foxes won’t accept their answer or say they answered wrong because the ballot language was flawed, etc.’ Any argument which will bolster the chances to keep their death grip on power in office.

Why wasn’t there one single citizen’s representative arguing for the citizens having affirmed them three times already and keeping it as such? (Could it be that no one goes against ‘The Team’?). Why is it that those who would directly benefit from the changes passing at the ballot are the ones most strenuously arguing why they should be amended or ended? Its beyond curious at this point. When they refuse to heed conflicts of interest they then forego earning the public trust. They cannot say conflicts and bias in government affairs don’t matter and then when they hold out their hand for you to take it, suggest that they are to be trusted in these affairs which directly benefit themselves. And if the public then does simply give them their trust they don’t deserve, then its shame on those who are helping to erode our democratic processes, as well-outlined in this blogpost:

Why Ethics in Public Office Matter

My argument is this: While they build up business they are also chipping away at our community’s moral center and spirit as a people. When tax abatements to businesses (Opportunity is here!) are given out like candy, who are the real winners and losers in that giveaway?

When they finagle and abuse processes and the spirit of laws to grab at people’s rightful property for business, who suffers? The Constitution as well as our right to say we respect law and its spirit and the citizens and property owners themselves. While there are citizens who don’t care how they look for allowing their city, in their name, to abuse our processes and the law to steal from citizens, there are many others who I like to think possess the true heart and spirit of this community who do care how their city operates in their name. Who value morality and ethical principles and the U.S. Constitution above greed and profit and yes, even business and development. For what are we left with when the cash is falling out of people’s pockets, business is booming, they’ve put the ‘white’ back in Whitehall and there’s a golden statue of Kim Maggard at the entrance to our city? Will we still be Whitehall? Will we still be made in God’s image? Will we have the respectability to hold our heads high as human beings and know in our heart of hearts that we’re a good and just and kind community? Or, will we simply represent the worst of mankind; rapacious, avaricious, hateful, divisive, self-serving and selfish? There is a way to go about things and this is not the way. Pro-business, pro-greed, pro-profit and anti-law, anti-human and anti-morality. As a Whitehall native whose parents helped to build this community in its youth and who has dear memories when it was about community and the people in it, I say that is NOT Whitehall and so I reject any argument that gives the people who are driving its moral standard into the ground more time in which to do so.

Post-script: The difference is startling between what our city’s motto was and the things it represented to now, where its simply a business slogan; ‘Opportunity is here’, that which I say sounds like a beggar’s come-on.