The politics of diversion: "Chief Bailey is playing a losing hand, but then, they're not really his cards."

Much ado about nothing, Jeffrey. Zilch, nada ... ничего.

New Albany police chief questions motivation for 911 dispatch merger, by Erin Walden (Let Them Eat Fake)

NEW ALBANY — The need for a joint city-county dispatch center in New Albany is disputed by the city's police chief.

Chief Todd Bailey called a news conference Friday, when he accused City Council President Al Knable of telling a falsehood to show a need for a unified dispatch. Bailey also said the push for joint dispatch is political.

In short, another round of made-for-somnolent-media bile and spittle.

Chief Bailey sadly pursued the same contrived attack line at last week's council meeting, hoisting Jeff Gahan's jockstrap like a maypole as the mayor beamed happily from the bunker's shadows, his increasingly nervous appointed minions trotting out to join forces with the remaining jellied Democratic spines on the city's legislative body to sing a rousing chorus of "Job Security Uber Alles."

In an interview following the news conference, Knable maintained there was a call made, but said he believed the error was on his end, not a result of the two dispatch centers. Knable said he did make a call, and turned over his phone records to the chief of police to prove it, but he used Siri to do so. As Knable explains it, he has the New Albany Police Department’s tip line saved in his phone under “911/NAPD,” so when he instructed Siri to call 911, the virtual phone assistant called the wrong line.

By the time he hung up from the tip line, he had assessed the situation and helped the young child, who had been scared and screaming “fire” and "help,” said Knable, adding at that point he realized it wasn’t an emergency. He said he did not make claims of an alarm sounding.

Knable contends Bailey's focus on the anecdote is a distraction from the bigger conversation, merging the two centers and “making sure the taxpayers have the safest, most-efficient system out there.”

“I’m looking to get the chief of police, sheriff, mayor and commissioners to the table,” Knable said.

The fact is that throughout this entire 9-1-1 call center non-discussion, Bailey's professional integrity hasn't ever been questioned, not even once.

Rather, certain Republicans, joined by some like-minded independents and even a Democrat or two, are petitioning for a discussion of costs and potential savings.

Is this also a political position? Yes, just as much as Gahan's benumbed, rote insistence that past county government fiscal turpitude -- a habit of suicide by starvation pioneered not by the GOP but by old-school Strom Thurmondesque pretend Democrats like Ted Heavrin and Larry McAllister -- somehow forms an eternal excuse for the mayor to erect straw men and gather municipal power into a veneer salesman's idea of an unbearably vapid cult of personality.

Another day and another display of petty, time-wasting theatrics by Team Gahan's resident DemoDisneyDixiecrats.

Is this really the best that local government has to offer?

Previously: The devil's in the framing, and it's public safety versus cold hard cash in the discussion about merging city and county dispatch centers.

The devil's in the framing, and it's public safety versus cold hard cash in the discussion about merging city and county dispatch centers.

Let's take a quick glance at the calendar.

January 1 in 2020 falls on a Wednesday, meaning that the first city council meeting will take place on Monday, January 6, by which time an electoral comet is likely to have metaphorically struck the local political landscape, scattering the fee-range Nashosaurs and Triceratops Adams, and suggesting that dispatch center unity in the sense suggested by Billy Stewart will be only a matter of scheduling.

I'm not a fan of uni-gov in the broader sense, although my ears remain attentively perched. But it's quite likely that while not a game-changing issue in itself, most ordinary folks sense the merit in the idea of merging this function.

It's also worth noting that the mayor is "waving the bloody shirt" with regard to county government's iniquity. The phrase derives from the decades following the American Civil War.

In the American election campaigns in the 19th century, "waving the bloody shirt" was a phrase used to ridicule opposing politicians who made emotional calls to avenge the blood of the northern soldiers that died in the Civil War.

Since taking office in 2012, the nominally Democratic Gahan often has justified decisions, perhaps most famously the parks department split, on the basis of county (read: Republican-controlled) government's impoverishment-impelled duplicity. In the e-mail reply quoted below, Gahan once again levels this charge, the veracity of which continues to diminish with the passage of time.

Power, folks. Whether the big time or the small pond, politics is about who has power -- and who gets the money deriving from it. The problem for Gahan and his clique is that in this instance, county Republicans have a solid, common-sense argument based on public safety -- which the mayor has answered by talking about money.

Framed in this way, that's an argument Gahan ultimately will lose, probably sooner rather than later.

Floyd County Commissioner favor merging dispatch centers, by Chris Morris (Hanson's Random Ephemera Generator)

Mayor Gahan, however, not a fan

... Floyd County Commissioner Bill Stewart said it's time for both dispatch centers to be merged into one. He said following the recent school shooting in Florida, seconds can mean the difference between life and death.

“Surely we can do that for Floyd County,” Stewart said. “For county police to listen to city calls, they have to change their radio. Can't we put politics aside and get together to have one call center? I propose we do it this year.”

It looked like the merger was going to happen in 2011, but the New Albany City Council defeated the measure 4-4 on final reading. Then-mayor Doug England supported the measure. Current Mayor Jeff Gahan, who was a member of the city council in 2011, voted against it according to a News and Tribune story.

... Gahan's stance as mayor has not changed.

"Given the recent interest regarding these issues at the Statehouse, and Floyd County leadership’s history of not paying their bills and reneging on inter-local agreements, we are not interested in entering into a messy political arrangement with the county," he said in an email response. "Our current model has proven successful in protecting the citizens of New Albany and has the full support of our public safety command staff."

1 - For New Albany's troglodytes, it's still a "Town Called Malice."

How we made: Paul Weller and Bruce Foxton on Town Called Malice ... 'It's partly about Woking where I grew up. I don't think the swinging 60s ever hit there' (Interviews by Dave Simpson, The Guardian)

"Town Called Malice"

Better stop dreaming of the quiet life
'Cos it's the one we'll never know
And quit running for that runaway bus
'Cos those rosey days are few
And...stop apologising for the things you've never done
'Cos time is short and life is cruel
But it's up to us to change
This town called Malice

Rows and rows of disused milk floats
Stand dying in the dairy yard
And a hundred lonely housewives
Clutch empty milk bottles to their hearts
Hanging out their old love letters on the line to dry
It's enough to make you stop believing
When tears come fast and furious
In a town called Malice

Struggle after struggle, year after year
The atmosphere's a fine blend of ice
I'm almost stone cold dead
In a town called Malice

A whole street's belief in Sunday's roast beef
Gets dashed against the co-op
To either cut down on beer or the kids' new gear
It's a big decision in a town called Malice

The ghost of a steam train echoes down my track
It's at the moment bound for nowhere
Just going 'round and 'round
Playground kids and creaking swings
Lost laughter in the breeze
I could go on for hours and I probably will
But I'd sooner put some joy back
In this town called Malice