Gonder on HJR-6 resolution: "Most of the City Council did speak for the hopes of those who appealed to us."

John Gonder published this essay at his blog (below).

Verily, there have been times in the past when I've fully agreed with a close friend, who once said of Gonder, "I wish he'd spend more time being a council person and less time being Senator Gonder," or words to this effect.

I also agree completely with John's sentiments in this piece, even as I wish that certain of the council's progressive/coherent members would remain engaged publicly with local concerns on a less rarified plane, and to advocate for them over time, even if it takes more time than usually is allocated for such advocacy.

Here then is one: Our city's streets as an indice of civil rights and social justice.

I know; it sounds mundane. But it affects each and every one of us, every single day -- black or white, straight or gay (and perhaps more importantly) Democrat or Republican.

Here is the essay.

Reach Out

 ... A couple nights ago the New Albany Common Council met in what seemed to be one of its particularly thin proceedings. No ordinances were under consideration. The administration had asked for nothing. Instead we were asked to weigh in on something The News and Tribune likes to refer to as, (and why not paraphrase?) "a meaningless, empty, expression". The empty rhetoric this time was directed at those in the state legislature who would commandeer the state constitution for political purposes (HJR-6); as bait, or shiny objects for those who would see danger, and thus political advantage, in the pursuit of happiness by "others". Others may be refined, or defined, to include q-words, f-words and anything other than me- or we-words.

As I looked out into the gallery that night I was humbled by the hope the "others" had placed in us--their local government. As The Tribune is wont to say, the New Albany Common Council weighing in on state or national issues is pointless, perhaps grandstanding, but certainly, ineffectual. But for the time the others spoke in our chamber, I, at least, glimpsed just a bit of representative democracy. For that brief time, I think, people looked to us to hear their message of disaffection, their hope for inclusion in that which the majority takes for granted. They looked to us to speak for them, our friends, our neighbors, our un-acknowledged kin.