It's the busiest time of the year for me, so I'm leaving this one on the marquee until Wednesday evening in the hope that a discussion will develop ... RAB.
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All those current and aspiring city council members who’ve ever uttered the words “I’d do it for free” aloud, in public, please step forward.
Congratulations. You’re the new volunteer fire brigade.
Hell, we have to start somewhere, right?
Galoshes, horse-drawn wagons and wooden buckets are stacked in the storage area of the Floyd County Historical Society. Newly minted EMTs – don’t forget your leeches.
Readers are free to interpret the tortuous three-year saga of New Albany’s firefighter hiring ordinance according to any or all prevailing theories of human political, social and economic affairs, from Shining Path to Ayn Rand, and from Ronald Reagan through Noam Chomsky, and if at any point you’re able to make sense of it and discern any thread of consistency amid the shifting alliances and rhetoric, please don’t keep it to yourself.
Such insight just might qualify you to serve as mayor, fire chief, city council member or dogcatcher, or perhaps all -- or as is equally likely, none of them.
Verily, only one thing is beyond doubt, and that’s the long overdue discovery of the central active ingredient in the New Albany Syndrome: A profound inability of New Albanians to communicate with each other.
It’s the reason why it has taken so long to determine the best way to hire a firefighter, and moreover, it’s the reason why the current city council has wasted so much time on issues great and small during the course of its tenure.
But, given that we as residents tend to get the sort of government we deserve if we’re unwilling to work together to change it, poor communication is also the reason for the curious decision on the part of certain of the author’s 3rd District brethren that the “best” way to displace the incumbent – one of the chief symbols of the New Albany Syndrome’s inherently dysfunctional miscommunication – is to run not one, but two candidates against him, presumably to better split the anti-incumbent vote, ensure his re-election, and to help bring about the perfect circumstances for a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Now that’s New Albanianism at its finest – and most profoundly disillusioning.
Truly, we’re all cut the same in a town this size. The office holders we elect are no different than we are, and if we’re incapable of something so incredibly simple as uniting tactically around a single credible candidate as part of an overall strategic plan to lift the council bar, exactly how can we criticize the ensuing dysfunction?
In fact, by doing so, we’re enabling the dysfunction.
Effective communication among all parties involved might have precluded this unfortunate juncture, and yet at various times, critical elements have chosen to unilaterally excuse themselves from the numerous forums offered to facilitate communication.
Not unlike the firefighter hiring imbroglio ... and that’s very annoying for those of us seeking for three long years to be facilitators.
There are no hidden meanings in today’s sermon. If you’re reading this, you’re still a valued friend and neighbor. None of what I’m writing here changes anything in a personal sense, although the present absence of reassurance in any substantive and collective sense has jaundiced my view of future hope.
At first, I wasn’t going to speak of these 3rd district matters publicly, primarily because it would be easier for me if I were not forced to listen to the vindictive chortles of the congenital naysayers and semi-professional obstructionists, but in fact, and to be perfectly, brutally fair, these non-contributing hyenas have every right to enjoy a good laugh at our expense, because somehow we’re well along in the process of managing to pull the stupefyingly difficult feat of pulling the 3rd district rug out from under our very own feet even as we stand atop it.
Readers may recall this excerpt from my January manifesto:
Mr./Mrs./Ms. Candidate: Just in time for the filing period, here are my modified rules of voting engagement.
I regard the city council tenure of Steve Price as a nadir for my 3rd council district. I am absolutely positive that the district and the city need better if we’re ever going to escape the leaden grip of the self-defeating, self-perpetuating, underachieving and anti-intellectual New Albany Syndrome.
To my extreme and enduring embarrassment, I did not foresee the opposition’s pell-mell descent into the Syndrome’s crippling factionalism, and while I remain convinced of the reality that CM Price is the very embodiment of political inadequacy, it appears now that in personal terms, there’s no place for me in the 3rd district’s Democratic primary sweepstakes. Perhaps it will be a different story when the slate is wiped clean following the primary, but today, right now, according to the dictates of my conscience, I’m effectively nullified as an active participant in the forthcoming campaign.
As a public affairs blog, NAC will continue to report on activities pertaining to the 3rd district race, and on relevant pronouncements made by the three candidates. My colleague and co-editor Bluegill may wish to comment and editorialize, and he is perfectly free to do so, as I’ve not sounded him out prior to writing this essay.
It’s quite possible that he doesn’t agree with my position, and that you, the reader, don’t agree either, but please bear in mind that the preceding is a statement of personal conscience, and shaped by not only one, but by a series of factors largely outside my control as an individual.
So be it. See you in May.
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18 comments:
good writing. I think you have captured rather well the frustration in all districts.
speaking of effective communication, eh, I'm lost: you wrote: "Effective communication among all parties involved might have precluded this unfortunate juncture," Can you add some detail to this unfortunate juncture part? What did I miss? We have three candidates running for 3rd distrist council, right? So far I've not discerned any campaign platforms but there's still time...?
Gina, the secondary issue is that owing to a lack of communication between people who ostensibly advance the same aim, we have a tripartite primary, and it's going to be more difficult now to topple the incumbent than it would have been otherwise.
Note that everyone involves agrees the incumbent needs toppling.
The primary issue is that we have bright, capable people who ostensibly advance the same aim, but consistently, again and again, just refuse to work together to achieve it.
This isn't the first time I've said it, but it may be the last, because it's obvious that unifying efforts have failed.
After three years of effort, it's now possible to identify the like-minded, but it has proven immensely frustrating to convince them/us to work together, unified, toward a common aim.
Is that any clearer?
Roger,
Like Gina, there may be things about this situation that I am not aware of. I am, admittedly, on the outside edge of the local "progressive" movement.
I am not sure how you expected this communication among "all" concerned was supposed to happen. Who exactly are the leaders? Do the leaders have any power? There is no organization that I am aware of. You are upset but at whom?
I participate fairly regularly on the blogs. There are some people that I would follow and support almost without question, yet no one has asked for my support or even said that they may run. This communication ain't gonna happen without organization and guess what, that sounds a lot like a political party, doesn't it?
The idea of a primary is to run like-minded party candidates against each other - isn't it? So you take your best candidate into the general election? Can't someone still run as an independent, ala John Alton, in the fall election?
I didn't write it, but my interpretation is:
It doesn't have anything to do with who is running or whether they've talked with NAC or not, but rather the process by which those candidates became candidates.
If job one is to rid ourselves of the incumbent, it would've made sense for generally like-minded 3rd district constituents, most of whom know each other (myself included) to gather and discuss a strategy built around one rather than two challengers, even if it meant someone or a lot of someones agreeing to give up a bit of autonomy for the greater good.
The larger, overarching frustration comes from this being another example of a still mostly disorganized approach to all city issues. Without consensus and the discipline to stay on message and task, our votes and ideas matter less. Our elected government does and will reflect that.
Jeff wrote:
If job one is to rid ourselves of the incumbent, it would've made sense for generally like-minded 3rd district constituents, most of whom know each other (myself included) to gather and discuss a strategy built around one rather than two challengers, even if it meant someone or a lot of someones agreeing to give up a bit of autonomy for the greater good.
It really doesn't get any clearer than that.
On the other hand, is it really too late to do something about this? Perhaps a meeting of these like-minded people that Bluegill mentions could in fact meet with the two challengers and arrive at a unified effort with just one going forward against SP ...? I don't know enough about either and live in the 4th district to boot, but, to quote the great "Bluto" from "Animal House" - "Over? It ain't over till we say it's over!" Admittedly there could have been better scenarios than the one we have at present, but a lot can still happen in the days and weeks leading up to the primary.
I can't stop thinking about this issue...I don't care if 2 or 20 people run in the demo-primary, what I'm looking for is a PLATFORM. A simple sensible statement of goals and the way to achieve it or them. No more pollyanna crap like "I want NA to be a better place for our children" or I will run things efficiently...blah blah. Who wouldn't?! Tell me what you'll do about tax abatements and unsafe housing and the crack-houses dotting our town. Let's hope people keep entering the races until someone enters with a PLATFORM.
Greg
I think Charlie's candidacy is great, too, and so is Maury's.
And, taken together, the two candidacies will tend to attract precisely the same voter, meaning that all this "greatness" does little more than make it easier for Steve Price to remain in office.
Seeing as we've all agreed that Price must go, so please, will someone explain to me how splitting the anti-Price vote makes sense? This is the only question that really matters, isn't it?
Please (please!) Remember one thing: My disgruntlement is spread very widely, and is not to be construed as confined to any one person or any one "group."
We tried neighborhood association conclaves, and the people who needed to be there often weren't.
I've hosted two meet 'n' greets to get people together in one room and get them talking -- and the people who needed to be there often weren't.
I've been writing about these issues for close to three years. Be aware that it becomes tedious to write the same thing over and over again, in the often vain hope those most of need of reading about them will in fact do so.
My conscience is absolutely clear on this point. This blog has always been available for such discussion -- how often has this been utilized? I've done "shuttle diplomacy" so often that I feel like Henry Kissinger. He said/she said is tabloid fodder, and not something that should suffice for tactics among adults seemingly on the same page with regard to goals and aims.
I have tried to keep in touch with everyone, but the fact of the matter is that there are people hereabouts determined not to sit together in one place and do as Bluegill suggested:
... discuss a strategy built around one rather than two challengers, even if it meant someone or a lot of someones agreeing to give up a bit of autonomy for the greater good.
It doesn't mean these uncommunicative people are malicious (well, perhaps Dan Coffey). I'm not saying that at all. I hasten to add that I'm determined to remain friends with everyone. It's not personal. It's business, and the business at hand is displacing the bumpkin who is masquerading as a councilman.
Now, back to the central question: How does splitting the anti-Price vote achive this aim?
Gina
I agree. I'm with you on platforms, and by delaying as long as he did in releasing a platform of substance, Maury erred. Period. I'm sure he has his reasons.
But the long range point remains the same: This issue exposes fatal lapses in communication that make me despair of being able to accomplish what we all seek to accomplish, at least by means of the current dynamic.
If we cannot agree on a common strategy to topple the symbol of what we're against, how can we seriously tout what we're for?
Understand: I'm playing devil's advocate. At the same time, I'm taking a serious look at how best to use my time toward playing whatever role is mine in making this a better place to live.
How many times must we discuss the concept of unity before we act to gain some measure of it? All the talent and ability here may be ultimately wasted if expended scattershot. Why this mistrust and suspicion? Why not communicate? I don't know the answers to these questions. Maybe the answers are part and parcel of the New Albany Syndrome.
Anyone have some garlic and a stake?
Writing clearly is not my strong point(no surprise to anyone).
1. I agree with Roger's analysis of the probable outcome.
2. I read some anger and a "throw my hands up in the air" attitude into his post. I had asked who he was upset with. Perhaps I should have realized the "upset" is with the situation not a person(s).
3. My point about asking for my support was not meant to be elitist. Rather, it was to augment my point about organization.
I know and communicate face to face, through emails and on the blogs, with several progressives. If there was an actual plan, I never heard of it. That could be by design because I was not wanted "in" and I am fine with that.(refer to my being on the outside edge in my comment above)
Take two words from both NA and Bluegill--communication and disorganized. We have all communicated but in a disorganized way, true to our liberal and progressive roots. While a rigid organization is not needed(nor advisable) a framework of some sort is.
Off topic. FYI
Highwayman is still in Jewish hospital and may be for another week. He has had a bit of a rough time. He sends greetings.
Disgusted?
No.
Exasperated?
Yes.
Ceece wrote:
That was the central issue yesterday, now lets focus on doing what we can in getting the best third district representative in there!
You've done the impossible. I'm speechless.
BTW, we're going to try and see Lloyd again this afternoon.
For the third district, this needs to be some kind of far reaching, grass roots movement to stimulate the voters for change.
Even if it is not FOR or AGAINST any particular candidate, those more politically active members of that community need to get out there and knock on doors, go to community association meetings, go to church groups, be willing to take the elderly to the polls, help to get people registered to vote, etc.
It would be a massive undertaking by those who would see change occur, but it would be a needed undertaking to see the fruition of change, otherwise, complacency,a nd name recognition are going to be the deciding factors in what will more than likely be a light turn out at the polls, as primaries generally are in the first place.
As a supporter of Mr. Price...I would beg for the argument for Mr. Goldberg to ONCE AGAIN become the 3rd District Rep.
Connie Sipes relative, Mr. Dan Weiglib, brought tax abatements to the Council stating that is the particular item "killing" the general Fund.
What did Mr. Goldberg do???? He kept it in committee for TEN FRIGGING YEARS, simply to protect his voting base.
We, certain individuals, have worked soooo hard to get rid of the individuals that "slept" through the meetings (before your time); and I'm hear to tell you ( or ask might be a better way); please tell me what Goldberg HAS EVER DONE FOR THE THIRD DISTRICT -- besides the S. Ellen Jones neighborhood? You can check up and down our neighborhood; ain't no support for him.
Where was he when we found out we had paid sewer bills for 30 years; yet none existed?
We supported Maury while he was in office; we support Price now. No one, in our personal opinion, was listed in the top few we "managed" to vote out.
Namely, Niemeier, Gibbons, Bliss, Goldberg, etc.
History, History, History...
Thank you for respecting our opinions. We appreciate yours.
Lost in the preceding, as is lost in the vast conceptual emptiness otherwise known as Price Land, is the slightest notion of future vision for the 3rd district. The mantra goes something like this: Because of the past, there can be no future. That's simply unacceptable. I might be able to respect CM Price's flagrantly non-Democratic commitment to caution when it comes to "our monies" if it were accompanied by any, even the slightest, recognition that without pro-active effort, there can be no viable future for the city. In point of fact, CM Price offers the least of all worlds: Enslavement to the past, doing nothing now, and fearing the future.
Not a platform meant to inspire forthcoming generations, is it?
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