Misdirected Questions

I had a conversation with Mr. Adkins this morning and he brought something to my attention, something I should have known and I am sure most of you already know.

I will bring it up anyway. We have all asked a lot of questions of Mr. Adkins when it comes to section 8 and why we have so many vouchers, what is HE doing to bring that number down? Do you feel that these questions are better suited for council members? They make the polices and he does what they ask, is that not true? I also did not realize that Mr. Adkins has only been at his current job  for four months so most of these problems were already here. I was also informed that the job in Mason has not started interviewing yet, so nothing about him leaving in November is true.

I guess my question is: do we, myself included, need to start posing some tougher questions to current council members and even some past council members ?

wasteful- your last line in your post says it all. When I talk to Mr. Marconi in private, he will conduct a two way dialogue and is not shy about talking about issues. Now, when I see Mr. Marconi in the Council meetings and see his lack of response in the Citizen Comments portion, I have to wonder. Why are you so talkative in private, but don't respond to citizens in public? (Same goes for the rest of Council- it is not only Mr. Marconi who fails to respond) Randy, I think that if I walked to that podium in Council chambers and asked them, point blank, why do you want so much Section 8 in this town? Do you realize what you are doing to this town by having so much Section 8 saturation and what are you going to do about reducing it to the proper amount, I would get the patented blank stares/the "I'm not really interested in what you have to say"/ and the "I'm afraid to start any dialogue with a citizen because I might divulge some information that the city manager may frown on" type of looks. I think Council is somewhat intimidated by Gilleland for some reason. Odd, since they can hire and fire her and others, don't you think? (they really need to by the way)

Randy- case in point- I asked Adkins, point blank (review the tape on Marconi's 3rd Ward Forum last Wednesday) why the city wants so much Section 8 (advantages of Section 8) and what is the city doing to reduce Section 8? After a 5 minute dissertation on the OPERATION of the Section 8 program (which I didn't ask for) he still did not make a decent attempt to answer my questions. This is what we citizens will get if we ask them, to their face, questions that require a committed answer. They give us the smooth double talk that they are probably directed to give by the city manager, I presume. You just can't talk to them- they are oblivious to direct communication. They DON'T CARE what the citizens think of their little welfare slumlord program and they DON'T CARE what they're doing to this town. That's why they all must go away along with all of their low income, welfare, slum creating programs. There is no way these programs help this town, other than receiving fed funds for operating revenue in lieu of creating revenue from decent jobs. They are not smart enough to approach revenue gathering like most towns do or are too lazy to do it the right way.

Let's have a good voter turnout this November.

OK- given that the ramping up of Section 8's culprits are PAST city managers,PAST council members and PAST city department heads, why do CURRENT city department heads, the CURRENT city manager and the CURRENT councilmembers want to retain/ramp this program up further, rather than to see that it is detrimental to the city in many ways and take the necessary steps to "let it die on the vine". That is what I would be insisting on doing, if I were a councilmember. I don't like my hometown being known as a welfare city. My question concerning the entire program would be, " what do we need to do to eliminate any more expansion of the program, eliminate any more voucher candidates from coming to the city, eliminate any more housing to fall into the Section 8 category, eliminate HUD from having any more participation in this town, eliminate the need for CONSOC, eliminate the need to spend $140,000 on inspection services alone, and eventually, after most (I would prefer all) of that goes away, to eliminate this new housing committee just started by council. This whole program is nothing but one more problem that this city doesn't need to deal with, plus the other residuals we have talked about in depth like image problems/ crime/saturated low income. (54%, right Mr. Adkins?) Should we all feel proud of that? Don't understand. Not logical.

Vet,

Yep, you're right Paul. I understand that they need money to run the city. Just think they ought to earn it the old fashioned way- collect revenue through corporate and employee taxes instead of fed handout programs. Let's see- do I want to get my city money from a large contingent of corporations and people working or do I want to get it by accepting a welfare program handout from the government and dealing with the social, low income and image problems created by this program? No brainer to me! I also know that they procure their money by the method you just described. I also know that there are some massive egos in this little town. Since the 50's, there has been a small percentage of ego trip/good old boy groupies that have controlled the ship here. The egos stay in place; the good old boy club stays in place. Only the names change over time with the old ones dying off, being replaced with younger clones with the same traits and power lusts.

randy wrote: I would love to everyone in town do just that, make citizens comments take 4 hours we need more people to voice their opinions. Maybe its time for a little protest or demonstration before this November 3rd. If citizens feel this way the need to stand up and let it be heard. JMO

Great idea I am in if we can get a enough people, is anyone else here willin to take part? It could get some national coverage and the rest of the country can see what we are dealing with in our town. I would be willing to organize if people are really interested.

spiderjohn wrote:   Please vote NO on all ballot issues AND vote out ALL INCUMBANTS, LOCALLY, COUNTY AND STATE-WIDE!

Don't forget Federal!