I find it interesting that his letter was sent out to the media (but posted nowhere on city website that I can find).
While Kooistra is correct in saying that public officials cannot talk about the ‘details’ of pending litigation, they CAN talk about what has already been publicly filed. They can also share their opinion, especially councilors, on the matter without going in to detail of the case.
I’m actually surprised and disappointed that the six councilors and past mayor who ramrodded this through don’t even have the courage to apologize for how this turned out. That would have NOTHING to do with a default of the developer. Instead they are trying to hide behind this shield of the city attorney claiming they can’t talk. That is a bunch of boloney coming from a hen house full of rubber stamp chickens.
Also, there’s a difference between can and shall. There’s also a difference between pending and possible. In too many cases, people use the cloak of shall and pending to cover possible, or maybe, or expected.
This hotel/ramp debacle is TenHaken’s Bay of Pigs. Like JFK, who inherited a predecessor’s plan, this current debacle was already set in motion when PTH became mayor; but when it ended in failure – for JFK – he owned the failure, went on national tv and in accepting responsibility saw his polling numbers become the highest they ever were during his presidency, because he took on the reality and did not try to sweep it under the rug.
So what we can learn from this “Bay of Pigs debacle” in a local sense, is that our Mayor needs to own this failure, be transparent, and not hide behide attorneys, or prefer email questions to this matter as opposed to an actual interview.
When our mayor first announced his candidacy, I recall a KELO reporter interviewing him where he said – to paraphase him – that there wasn’t much that needed to be changed with our town, that we just need to stay the course of our success. Well, the stagnation at the railroad yard and now this debacle put into question our towns invincibility and our continual strengthen. We are beginning to learn that growth in this town needs to be more than just marketing, that it needs to be one of substance and openness in order to succeed for all, which the current handling of this debacle by city hall is not exemplifying.
I’d like to also know the settlements that the school and other municipalities have made with employees and plaintiffs but lawyers are the real power in our current system.
stay the course, a thousand points of light, no new taxes.
The first thing that happens when there’s litigation is everybody stays mute. Legacy is in trouble and they’d love to get an out of court settlement for defamation. Councilors should keep quiet. 4 were not in office when the past administration made the ramp deal. Theyll be dragged in if they give an opinion. TenHaken isn’t responsible but will be left with cleaning up Huether’s mess. What do you do with a 4 story vacant parking garage? The same thing you do with a useless 40 million railroad yards, an unprofitable Pavilion/Orpheum, a baseball stadium with more players than fans, bump outs that restrict traffic downtown, inferior streets, etc.. You do some creative accounting and not run for another term as mayor.
“A thousand points of light,” what the hell did that actually mean?
(“Hey, Quayle, do you have anything to add to this speech?”…. “Uh, maybe you should talk about some lights… Yah, a thousand of them, that’s it…”)