Councilors Neitzert, Starr and Stehly will be attending the conference this year next week. I think they will bring back a wealth of great information we can grow on in our city. Hopefully they won’t ’embarrass’ us 🙂
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lin-a2lTelg
One of my favorite song writers passed. Rest in peace sir.
“It is with profound sorrow we report that legendary poet, songwriter and artist, Leonard Cohen has passed away,” the statement read. “We have lost one of music’s most revered and prolific visionaries. A memorial will take place in Los Angeles at a later date. The family requests privacy during their time of grief.” A cause of death and exact date of death was not given.
From Chuck Luden;
It is sad to learn of Leonard Cohen’s passing.
I bought his 1st LP upon release for $3.27 at Kmart on S. Minnesota Ave. I was a freshman at Augustana then. Followed his career ever since. He was a gracious man and had vision. Had a wonderful conversation with him in Minneapolis a few years ago in the lounge of the hotel I was staying at. We even exchanged gifts. A priceless memory for me. This cell phone photo was shot by my friend Ray Novak.  (I won’t say what Chuck got as a gift, but it was something Leonard hand made, and pretty cool. This was actually the second time Chuck met with him in the same lounge before a show).
This past Tuesday, 4 city councilors decided to attend election parties of their designated parties. Not that there is anything wrong with that. Selberg, Erickson and Neitzert attended the GOP bash while Pat Starr made his way to the weeping room at DEM party headquarters. Starr opted out of speaking at their shin-digs, but Neitzert and Selberg made a brief statements and Erickson was the emcee at the GOP event. Like I said, nothing wrong with supporting your party even if you serve on the council as a supposed non-partisan. But I wondered why councilor Stehly did not attend the GOP event after being invited by Erickson.
Stehly told me she believed in staying non-partisan as a councilor, though she belongs to the Republican party and believes in a lot of their values, “Hey, I represent Republicans as well as Democrats and Independents on the city council. I don’t need to get myself tied up in party politics. We need to care about others and treat them with respect no matter what political party they belong to.”
First, I will start by saying people who are upset about the election results to stop crying and get involved on a local level to make change. Change doesn’t come from the top, it starts locally.
I say this because the similarities between Trump and Huether are a bit startling when you start looking at it. Huether became our mayor almost 7 years ago on the promise to run the city like a business and to ‘get things done’. Sounds like a familiar stump speech by Trump.
So how has this business acumen attitude worked out for our city?
• Huether has grown our economy and population
• Huether has grown development (mostly thru annexation and urban sprawl)
• Huether has improved infrastructure and quality of life amenities.
But what has been the cost?
• By the time Huether leaves office, he will have bonded more then any previous mayor, even crushing Munson’s record. We will most likely be a half-billon in debt by the time he leaves office. His total credit card bill during his administration will be well over $200 million in 8 short years. To put that in perspective, when Hanson became mayor our city debt was $90 million, 23 years ago.
• The rapid growth has caused two major problems. Not enough jobs for medium skilled workers and violent crime increase. Huether himself has even blamed rapid growth on the crime increase, so you ask, ‘Why did you promote it, and what are you doing to fix it?’
• Corporate like salary increases for city management and crumbs to support staff.
• Transparency at an all time low. Secret development deals, secret settlements, secret firings, behind the scene bullying and intimidation, and the list goes on.
• Lack of a diversity coordinator. Two people have already stepped down from the position.
So if you think Huether’s business acumen has worked out for the city, you certainly won’t have a problem with how Trump will run our country.
l3wis