Speakers: Carol Srajer, Winchell Road an Aurora Meadows; Roger Hurd, no need for "tours" of the center school with open house approaching; Dave Pollard, soundness of Center School; Carole Pollard, demands for special privilege by some speakers/residents.
Carol Srajer: Winchell Road gets pretty bad when snow is accompanied by high wind and could use extra attention at such times.
Also: The people in Aurora Meadows, with the sewer project, are living in the middle of an awful mess, and it will be a while before it is all done. They could use our prayers.
Note: Remarks summarized.
Roger Hurd: Considering that we are having an open house at the Center School this spring, I see no useful purpose for any resident to go through the school except for personal reasons--and that would be criticism of what has been done.
Dave Pollard: At the last meeting I brought out that the township is being run like a well run business. You will hardly find a business anywhere that does not have at least one door marked "No Admittance" or "Employees Only."
We are supposed to be adults, and adults learn patience. We are within a few weeks of open house. Dawn Pechman has pictures and Frank Horack has drawings and that should be enough to satisfy everyone who didn't go through when you took people through the building in January [2010], Jason.
At the last meeting we heard that the school was the worst in the district. [The next sentence or two are paraphrases/summaries.] I spent at least a year at the Village school, and there was water running through the locker rooms there, through channels cut into the concrete floor.
Dave asked Vic about whether there was water in the Center School basement.
Vic: No water, and no structural damage.
Dave: It is a solid building--much more solid than the 55-year-old high school building. The water and the drainage [at the Center School] seem to have been handled properly here, while it was not at the other schools.
If the Health Department had been doing its job of making sure that the school was safe for small children, they would have closed it [the Village school building].
John Festa: Asked about the stairs from the basement of the Center School and ADA compliance.
Vic: The stairs will meet the requirements set by the Fire Department.
Carole Pollard, 5359 Allyn Rd.: Basically what I mentioned last time was about the rule of law as opposed to the rule of men. The whole Middle East is going up in flames because they want the rule of law. They are suffering because of the rule of men.
There has been a steady drumbeat meeting after meeting to set aside the rule of law and rule by people's indiividual whims. There have been complaints about the time limit on speaking and complaints about people being required to speak only during public comment. There were comments to the effect that "That's a bad policy" because it didn't please somebody. Somebody also last time overrode the time limit, apparently because he owns three properties and therefore will speak more than the rest of us.
And that is exactly why this country's systems were designed as much as possible to make things equal. One person, one vote. That does not mean that each of us can only go as high as the person next to us. We get the chance to go as high as we can. But we are expected to go by the law and that is the miracle of this country. George Washington declined being appointed king and only ran for two terms as president. And when he stepped down, nobody knew whether we would survive.
What goes on in the Middle East is a good example of what happens when one man or one family rules according to their own whim. And [so]we have Roberts' Rules of Order, a fat little book, and the reason it is so fat is that it covers absolutely everything because it came into being because the first meeting lasted 14 hours, and I want to tell you that there are some meetings here that I thought would go on that long because everybody was doing their best to ignore any kind of order or law.
I have been to meetings when one person monopolized the floor for as much as 45 minutes. So . . . . I think that carping and cavilling about having order in the meetings is, as Carol Srajer said at the last meeting, just plain childish. You don't have a meeting if you don't have poeple. So if you are going to control the meeting you have to control the people. DUH.
End of Public Comment.
The board went into executive session and returned. Matt Deyoung was removed from unpaid administrative leave; his accrued vacation and sick leave were allowed [Note; I think pay for those days was approved]; and his employment with the township was terminated effective February 28, 2011.
About This Blog
The purpose of this blog is to give an accurate account of what is said during Public Comment at Mantua Township Trustees meetings.
Trustees' decisions are in the official minutes, available on request from the Mantua Township Fiscal Officer, Jodi Thompson, at 330-274-8443. The Township charges 10 cents per page. FAX, 330-274-8447. E-mail, fiscalofficer@mantuatownshipohio.gov. The minutes are also posted on the website after they have been approved. That means that there is usually a two-week lag between a given meeting and the minutes being available to read on the website.
Since meetings are the first and third Thursdays of the month, there is a three-week wait during months with five Thursdays.
Other items of interest or the writer's opinions will be included from time to time, clearly identified.
This is not a forum or chat room, but a source of information, so it is closed to outside input.
During the time I have been doing the blog, the posts have expanded to become very detailed accounts of the meetings. Doing that is time consuming, to say the least, and I am going to try to return to the public comment focus, with background and perspective (and the occasional pointed editorial comment). Such additions are usually enclosed in brackets. However, since some extended accounts of the meetings reveal significant things--and character--better than I could by commenting, there will probably still be a fair amount of semi-transcript. (Sigh.)
My thanks to the readers who have found the blog, and to the ones who from time to time tell me that they value it. You have encouraged me when the tedious work of keyboarding has made me wonder why I am doing this. Then you have reminded me, and I am grateful.
Trustees' decisions are in the official minutes, available on request from the Mantua Township Fiscal Officer, Jodi Thompson, at 330-274-8443. The Township charges 10 cents per page. FAX, 330-274-8447. E-mail, fiscalofficer@mantuatownshipohio.gov. The minutes are also posted on the website after they have been approved. That means that there is usually a two-week lag between a given meeting and the minutes being available to read on the website.
Since meetings are the first and third Thursdays of the month, there is a three-week wait during months with five Thursdays.
Other items of interest or the writer's opinions will be included from time to time, clearly identified.
This is not a forum or chat room, but a source of information, so it is closed to outside input.
During the time I have been doing the blog, the posts have expanded to become very detailed accounts of the meetings. Doing that is time consuming, to say the least, and I am going to try to return to the public comment focus, with background and perspective (and the occasional pointed editorial comment). Such additions are usually enclosed in brackets. However, since some extended accounts of the meetings reveal significant things--and character--better than I could by commenting, there will probably still be a fair amount of semi-transcript. (Sigh.)
My thanks to the readers who have found the blog, and to the ones who from time to time tell me that they value it. You have encouraged me when the tedious work of keyboarding has made me wonder why I am doing this. Then you have reminded me, and I am grateful.
Principles
Two ideas guide and support me:
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.
______Attributed to Edmund Burke
GOOD PREVAILS.
Those ideas are also the reason I have been doing the blog since late February 2011.
I have discovered that a transcript is almost impossible to do and that verbatim accounts are usually not absolutely necessary. When in doubt, I check against a recording.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.
______Attributed to Edmund Burke
GOOD PREVAILS.
Those ideas are also the reason I have been doing the blog since late February 2011.
I have discovered that a transcript is almost impossible to do and that verbatim accounts are usually not absolutely necessary. When in doubt, I check against a recording.
