County Board Recordings

The local papers covering the County Board meeting Tuesday reported on Commissioner Duff recording the meetings. I went to his site - http://www.alanduff.net/ - and sure enough a pretty good recording of the meeting is there. I had to download the file to listen.

The last 10 minutes or so had Commissioner Morris ripping me for maligning her. I was a bit surprise by this since I have mentioned her only once that I am aware of in my blog. That was last month over the Comp Plan debate. It was not about her vote but her statements and I have included that blog post here. She says I attacked her personally which I can not see how she comes to that conclusion but I will let you be the judge of that. I hope everyone will listen to the County Board recording. The Isanti City Council has recorded and posted our meetings online for everyone to hear for the last year or so. It is an excellent way to let the people know what their elected leaders are doing. Transparency in government is a great thing. The hundreds of people that have listened to our meeting online would attest to that.

Knowing now that Commissioner Morris is an avid reader of my blog I would invite her to meet with me at her earliest convenience so we can discuss whatever issues she has with me. Here is the only posting I can find with Ms. Morris in it.

Disappointed

The County Comprehensive Plan was passed today 0n a 4-1 vote. That was expected especially since the Citizens Advisory Committee that created the plan was appointed entirely by the Commissioners. That is as I said expected, unfortunate but expected that it passed in its flawed state.

The disappointing part was Commissioner Morris's disrespectful comments that the 3rd District Commissioner should in essence not comment on the Comprehensive Plan since he was newly elected and had not participated in all the previous comp plan meetings. Ms. Morris is the new Chair of the County EDA and she has missed County EDA meetings last year - should she be disqualified for that. Why does Ms. Morris feel the 9,100 (most populous district in the county by the way with nearly 25% of the population) people living in District 3 should have no voice in this decision.

At what point does she think a Commissioner is suppose to participate. I assume she was active on the Board as soon as she was sworn in just two years ago herself. If Mr. Duff agreed with her position would she have still not wanted him to speak his mind?

I hope it was a momentary lapse and not a firmly held position because it opens a slippery slope of discussion. I would have liked to direct you to the audio of the discussion so you could make up your own minds on the interchange but unfortunately our County Board does not record their meetings.

We face real problems and we will at times disagree but we all deserve the right to have our voices heard. I respect Ms. Morris and all our County Board members and hope we will continue to be able to move forward. I disagreed with this vote but that is now in the past and we must work together to make this new county comp plan effective.

I believe it was President Reagan that said our 80% friend is not our 20% enemy.

********Update 3/10/09******

Commissioner Morris gave me a copy of last years EDA meeting minutes that show she was not absent. I suppose it is possible my notes are wrong but she did admit she was late to at least one meeting and perhaps we missed each other at that meeting. The meeting minutes do not reflect when members arrive. It would be nice to have recordings as the City of Isanti does to verify times but that fight appears lost.

Ms. Morris stated there are many meetings and some do get missed or arrived at late. I agree completely as I had 4 meetings today myself and had to leave two early. If it was about her missed meetings then I would have raised the October 1st Board meeting she missed (per the minutes published on the county website) or the meetings missed by other board members. That is not the issue - we will all miss some meetings I am sure - due to the fact everyone at the local level is asked to do a lot with very little. I was trying to draw the conclusion that even if a meeting was missed it does not mean a duly elected leader gives up their right to vote. Perhaps it was not written well if it caused so much heartache.

The issue of course is not how many meetings a person missed it was Ms. Morris's statement that the District 3 representative should not even vote on the comp plan. I am big enough to put the other side out - I am still waiting for an apology that my citizens had no right to be heard about the comprehensive plan. I said it before and I will say it again, I like and respect Ms. Morris but I completely disagree with her position on who should be allowed to vote. I had hoped that we could all continue to move forward and try to make the best out of the situation.