Thursday, January 10, 2013

What He Said

Yesterday, Victor Mendolia interviewed Common Council president Don Moore on his WGXC radio show @ Issue. In addition to the news that the Galvan Foundation has offered to supplement the funding for the senior center, which Gossips reported yesterday, here are some more highlights from the interview.

Fracking Fracture  Moore's comment about the opposition vote to the fracking ban: "If people needed more information, that should have been made clear instead of killing the bill." He later commented, "I try not to deal with people's motivations." He stated his intention to have an "informed discussion of the effect of the law" and to reintroduce it at the informal meeting of the Common Council in February.

Gossips Note: The word is that the defection of three aldermen and possibly a fourth from the majority caucus, in reaction to the opposition to the proposed anti-fracking law, was the subject of a heated discussion at the Hudson City Democratic Committee meeting on Tuesday night. According to the reports Gossips has received, the most fiery exchanges were between Bill Hughes, Fourth Ward supervisor, who was defending the actions of the aldermen from the Second and Fourth wards (one of whom, of course, is his sister), and Moore.

Weighted Vote The numbers are due from Rutgers professor Lee Papayanopolous at the end of next week. Responding to insinuated allegations that he was deliberately holding up the process, Moore shared the information that Papayanopolous's computer "had to go through one million iterations to get the right balance for Hudson." According to Moore, the draft bill is ready and "only needs to have the blanks filled in." Moore confirmed that the new weighted vote is subject, as it was in 2004, to permissive referendum.      

New Home for the Police and Court Moore indicated that the City is "definitely pursuing a new space that would provide shared space for the police and court," although he would not reveal what that space was. He also indicated that the goal is to acquire and adapt a new space for "under $2 million."

Senior Center After sharing the information that the Galvan Foundation has offered to help with the senior center, Moore made the point that there were "a great many ifs," mentioning that the City has been "late in meeting deadlines" associated with the original Community Development Block Grant awarded for the project.

City Hall Break-In Moore echoed Mayor William Hallenbeck's interest in finding out who broke into City Hall and bringing the person or persons responsible to justice. In Moore's words, "It is not good for the soul of the city to have City Hall broken into and the crime to go unsolved."

Residency and Elected Office When asked to comment about an unnamed alderman who is rumored no longer to live in Hudson and allegedly is now using the relative's address for his voter registration, Moore said, "I trust that as of the end of this particular session [of the Common Council], we will be back with eleven members who live in Hudson."

The entire interview can now be heard online.

8 comments:

  1. Ordinary desktop computers can run a million iterations of mathmatical formulas in relatively little time nowadays. Unless Papayanopolous is working on a TRS-80, it is highly unlikely that running that computer model is the hold-up.

    --S.

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  2. As someone who never insinuated that the weighted vote topic was being intentionally delayed, I'd like to say that of all the things listed above it is by far the most important issue.

    I hope that all residents are discussing what the current disposition of the vote has meant for the city up to now.

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  3. Seems to me the priority should be to keep the city's hands out of Galvan's pockets, look to build a new facility with perhaps homeland security funds for an HPD/court facility across from the central fire station and then tackle the weighted vote. The issue of residency for an elected official simply gets down to the law saying it's okay and the individual involved having the gall to live the lie. As for the city hall break-in, that gets down to whether all parties involved really want to show the police chief's involvement in this debacle.

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  4. I told Don Moore that he was holding up the weighted vote the last time he was on the radio with Sarah Kendall. I stand by that sentiment and have recently FOIL'd any and all communication between the Council President and Papayanopolous as well as any other official's in the city of Hudson. Don Moore continues to work in the back rooms of politics more so than any other progressive in recent history was Don born in Hudson?. Most people who have any relationship with politics knows that you are trying to get the finish line building for the police/court it's not a secret open the front door and close the back Don. And many people know that with the new numbers the second and fourth ward are basically a simple majority or very close and that's why you are holding this up. Don people have had enough of you and many of your colleagues the free ride is over and I am excited for the upcoming election season you will be held accountable. Finally I would like to congratulate you on your 115% percent raise even though you have a lackluster record of accomplishments you are going to need every dime for your upcoming election.

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  5. I relent on the question of an intentional delaying tactic regarding the weighted vote.

    "Social Justice" is particularly persuasive; the results of their admirable FOILing of the officials involved will likely be probative. (Nor have I ever come across a better description of Mr. Moore's role at the head of the council.)

    But Hudson DAR, how can you put anything ahead of the weighted vote when your own legislative goals are so counter to the disposition of the current voting system? If you need the votes on the council to attain the results you say you want, then aren't you putting the cart before the horse?

    Both my aldermen combined equal the "weight" of Mr. Moore's single vote. Let's change that arrangement first, only after which we may begin to steer the city away from the predictable aims of the old boy network and Mr. Moore's anti-democratic "progressivism."

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  6. Hudson DAR this is Quintin Cross you are totally wrong about the alleged involvement of the Police Chief in this city hall burglary case. Don't believe the hype this is the systems way of getting the most vocal citizens mad about the police department so that they can push through major cuts and a political good old boy re-organization that will hurt the business community as much as it will hurt the minority community. Ask Mayor Hallenbeck, City Attorney's Roberts & Whitbeck,and Police Commissioner Graziano who all had a clandestine meeting at city hall and ordered an internal review and I can guarantee you one thing as one of the alleged I did not talk to or see the Chief of Police until I turned myself in and newsflash I was indicted before they brought me in for questioning on the 19th of March. I was indicted on the word of a police officer no picture, no video and remember not only do I have all records that pertain to the criminal proceeding I have the full unedited police file and investigation by order of Judge Nichols so whenever the powers that be feel it necessary to try to insinuate my involvement in something I did not do I have the records, pictures and video to back up everything I have stated.

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  7. I found these two articles written by
    Gossips of Rivertown, very helpful to understanding Hudson and the weighted Vote
    and how we got here.
    They are both in Blog Archives on lower right hand column of this page.
    Well worth a read, or reread.
    .................................
    Wednesday, February 9, 2011
    Some History of the Weighted Vote
    ..................................
    Wednesday, August 22, 2012
    About the Weighted Vote
    ........................

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  8. The weighted vote advances the interests of the majority wards and offers no recourse for the minorities. It's as if the US Congress had no Senate, restricting smaller states to their minimum share of power in the House.

    For many years, Hudson's most "weighted" 5th ward has rarely if ever deviated from the aims and agendas of Hudson's recent mayors. It's almost as if the executive has had a permanent, most-powerful seat in Hudson's legislative house, emphatically underlined by the fact that the Common Council borrows its legal advisor from the Office of the Mayor. (Even with a lawyer on the council today, it still would have been Cheryl Roberts at the helm of "our" LWRP and GEIS, fabricating her counterfeit environmental fides on her way to higher office.)

    Has the council agreed to avoid any big votes until the updated (2010) ward numbers are known? Wouldn't that be the fairest response to the charge that the process is being delayed intentionally?

    A good suggestion Prison, to reread these two older Gossips posts:

    1. "Some History of the Weighted Vote" (2/9/11):

    http://www.gossipsofrivertown.blogspot.com/2011/02/some-history-about-weighted-vote.html

    2. "About the Weighted Vote" (8/22/12):

    http://www.gossipsofrivertown.blogspot.com/2012/08/about-weighted-vote.html

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