On this blogging day in 2007: Luddite testimonials and DNA's mayoral forum.

There were two posts on October 23, 2007. The first refers to the infamous and now entirely forgotten era of the Trog Blog Wars.

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Okay, so I changed my mind ...sue me already.

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The second posits the inconceivable (DNA being neutral about politics prior to its annexation by Deaf Gahan) grafted onto the "look how far we've ... er ... never mind." Stay tuned for 2019, when Deaf will dodge many of these same questions.

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Reminder: "Develop New Albany to Host Mayoral Candidates Forum" on Wednesday night.

(From Develop New Albany)

Develop New Albany, the City’s non-profit, Main Street organization is hosting a Mayoral Candidates Forum to be held on Wednesday, October 24th from 7:00 - 9:00 pm at the Strassweg Auditorium at the New Albany-Floyd County Public Library.

The forum will consist of two 45-minute question-and-answer sessions with a 10-15-minute break in between. Mr. Randy Hubbard, Republican mayoral candidate, has agreed to participate in the first session and Mr. England, Democratic mayoral candidate, has agreed to participate in the second session which is anticipated to begin at 8:15 p.m. Neither candidate is invited to attend the session in which the opposing candidate is featured.

The sessions will be moderated by Greg Sekula, Develop New Albany Vice-President, and a series of questions will be asked by the moderator that relate to the issues of downtown and neighborhood revitalization. The public is invited and encouraged to attend.

The following topical issues are likely to be covered in the forum in no particular order:

1) Your vision for Downtown New Albany;

2) Strategies for furthering economic development in Downtown New Albany and surrounding older business districts such as the Vincennes and State Street corridors;

3) Addressing problems associated with rental housing conditions including absentee property ownership, illegally subdivided structures, and your position on a City-initiated rental housing inspection program;

4) Strategies for promoting and increasing homeownership and re-investment in older urban neighborhoods;

5) Relationships between the City and local neighborhood associations and non-profit groups;

6) Historic preservation, including the role of the Historic Preservation Commission, historic district designation, and design guidelines;

7) One-way vs. two-way street circulation patterns in the Downtown;

8) Enforcement of violations of City ordinances;

9) Aging infrastructure;

10) Upkeep of downtown streets and public spaces;

11) Ohio River Greenway project;

12) City-County Building space issues;

13) Relationship between the office of Mayor and City Council;

14) The role of public transportation in downtown revitalization and regional economic development;

15) Strategies for the City and school system to work together to strengthen inner-city schools and what impact that would have on downtown neighborhoods; and

16) Strategies for combating neighborhood crime, particularly drug activity.

For more information contact Develop New Albany at 812/941-0018 or e-mail here.

Keith Henderson and the county's chronic poverty.

Let's begin by turning back the partisan political clock, and PJ Moore's letter to the napping newspaper.

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2013: Charting the "false narrative" of the Floyd County Commissioners.

... I personally witnessed at least three of the auditor’s fiscal misadventures during 2012 alone — his literal rubber-stamping of prosecutor Keith Henderson’s use of almost $28,000 for his personal legal fees; his botching of the entire county’s 2012 spring allotment from the state Department of Local Government Finance (DLGF); and his faulty advice to the commissioners to donate the county’s entire Humana insurance premium refund of almost $700,000 to county employees instead of returning it to the proper account (which they were inclined to do until several residents raised public objections).

Only in the Henderson matter did a commissioner, Chuck Freiberger, question the auditor’s incorrect advice and seek the return of the misspent funds.

Now the case has made its way to Indianapolis. Which of the probabilities are stronger, that the University of Kentucky will win this year's NCAA basketball tournament, or that Papa Morris already has written the column defending Henderson?

Possible punishment detailed for Floyd County prosecutor, by Jerod Clapp (N and T)

INDIANAPOLIS — Floyd County Prosecutor Keith Henderson could have his law license permanently revoked, following accusations of professional misconduct by an Indiana Supreme Court disciplinary board.

The board claims Henderson was “deceitful,” “dishonest” and “fraudulent” to Floyd County officials who approved nearly $30,000 of county tax dollars in 2011 and 2012 to pay his legal fees following ethics complaints after Henderson agreed to write a book related to the David Camm case during an appeal of Camm’s second trial.

Word: "Modern corporate capitalism is anything but natural."

Relating Atkins' eloquently simple reminder to the local scene, it's an election year.

Among the likely candidates for mayor, both hopefuls running as Democrats -- Jeff "Corporate Welfare" Gahan and David "My Career in Big Biz" White -- adhere to the "natural economy" myth punctured here.

The eventual chosen Republican, whether Dale Bagshaw or Steve Burks or Mark Seabrook (maybe he's calculating odds again, maybe not) will accept the inevitability of "natural market forces" as holy writ; in Burks' case, it'll be so tightly wrapped with scripture that Jesus will be swaddled in Armani.

In short: They're all conservatives, differing only by tiny incremental degrees.

Then there's me. I've never been much for "if you can't beat them, join them." Insofar as possible, I'd rather shift toward playing by different, localized rules. If we accept New Albany as a construct personifying "wonderfully and delightfully us," then I favor keeping our resources here as often as possible, and seeing just how wonderful and delightful we can be.

Corporations are Artificial, Too, by David Atkins ("Political Animal" blog at Washington Monthly)

... But there’s another key lie in the conservative “natural economy” story, which is that modern corporate capitalism is anything but natural. It’s an artificial system encoded arbitrarily into law and interpreted in a specific way that tends to give maximum advantage to executive and shareholders at the expense of society.

Charting the "false narrative" of the Floyd County Commissioners.

I ran into Joseph "PJ" Moore a while back and he mentioned that he'd submitted a letter to the newspaper, but much time had elapsed, so I volunteered to run it here. I'm just a nice guy that way -- plus, as usual, PJ's right on target, and he should write more often.

Please note that the Nov. 6 editorial response mentioned here, while examined at NAC, wasn't able to be properly linked because the guys up in the paywall watchtower heard a twig snap and started shining those damnable spotlights. If readers have a link, I'll insert it here. The response was vintage Seabrookian caterwauling, and good for mucho laughs over strong ale. Take it away, PJ.

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MOORE: There’s blame to go around for fiscal mess

I found the editorial response the Floyd County Commissioners published Nov. 6 to be interesting.

I agree that they do not deserve all of the blame for the county’s fiscal dilemma. I also agree that “it is disingenuous and misleading ... to create a false narrative,” so I am curious at their own use of such tactics, even if it was unintentional.

For example, they blame “the fiscal impact of a nationally known murder case and the shortcomings of a new officeholder” as “major contributing factors” to our situation. However, they neglected to mention that they had already set aside significant funds for the third Camm trial, but that much of that money was diverted for other projects, leaving us now scrambling to pay the bill for that trial. So, blaming the David Camm case is misleading.

And I can only describe as disingenuous their comments about former county Auditor Darin Coddington. The commissioners were aware of Coddington’s performance as early as Feb. 14, 2012, yet they chose to ignore the warning signs and approve almost every spending request put before them.

I personally witnessed at least three of the auditor’s fiscal misadventures during 2012 alone — his literal rubber-stamping of prosecutor Keith Henderson’s use of almost $28,000 for his personal legal fees; his botching of the entire county’s 2012 spring allotment from the state Department of Local Government Finance (DLGF); and his faulty advice to the commissioners to donate the county’s entire Humana insurance premium refund of almost $700,000 to county employees instead of returning it to the proper account (which they were inclined to do until several residents raised public objections).

Only in the Henderson matter did a commissioner, Chuck Freiberger, question the auditor’s incorrect advice and seek the return of the misspent funds. In June 2011, Henderson got the commissioners to approve the use of county funds ($10,000) to keep him on the Camm case while diverting almost three times that amount ($27,539) to pay his personal attorney to defend him against an ethics complaint.
Incredibly, even after discovering that they had been deceived, Freiberger’s fellow commissioners chose instead to provide political cover for their fellow Republican Henderson and have refused Freiberger’s several motions seeking an explanation from Henderson, let alone the return of our money. 

Apparently, they value the local GOP’s reputation more than their duty to the rest of us.

Coddington’s incompetence was even defended on other occasions for the same reasons of partisan loyalty. When the Georgetown Township Trustee was forced to seek the commissioners’ help in rectifying the auditor’s mistakes (that left his township with no funds), Commissioner Mark Seabrook — normally much more careful with tax dollars — verbally attacked the trustee at a public meeting Aug. 7, 2012, labeling a legitimate request for help as “political” and telling the trustee that his (and our) only recourse was to vote against Coddington in 2014. 

Has the oath of office been amended to read “party before citizens?”

The commissioners are involved in the budget process and approve many expenditures before they are considered by the county council. In fact, it was Seabrook who asked the council to allocate Henderson’s funds for legal fees. Both bodies bear responsibility and, hopefully, the council has learned to exercise the proper degree of independence from, and scrutiny of, the board of commissioners.

It’s not just the commissioners. There is plenty of blame to go around:

• The law does not require any qualifications or experience to be a county auditor, and Coddington is a poster child for why we need that changed.

• Blind partisanship played a large role. Our Republican commissioners clearly put the interests of their party above those of the taxpayers and our Republican-dominated county chose as our auditor an unqualified truck driver because the qualified candidate was a member of the ‘wrong’ party.

• Our public boards rely far too much on the advice of their consultants and they rarely, if ever, scrutinize the advice or figures of these “experts,” even when there’s reason for doubt.

• Until now, our commissioners and council have spent like drunken sailors, believing that a penny saved is a penny wasted ... or maybe a vote wasted?

• Worst of all, most county residents are relatively apathetic so we get the government we deserve. When was the last time you attended a public meeting that wasn’t about your own backyard? Good government only happens when the politicians know we’re watching them. 

This is a wake-up call, people. What will you do to help change things?

My letter in today's newspaper? Read it to your councilperson.

It's a reworked version of a piece that appeared here, just the other day. Thanks to the 'Bune's Shea Van Hoy for giving me a bit of extra space. Councilman CeeSaw, make these streets two-way!

One-way streets are a road to nowhere

New Albany civic planners of a previous, benighted generation transformed downtown streets like Elm and Spring into one-way arteries suitable only for encouraging vehicular speed and abetting the misbehavior of dullards, and accordingly, that’s exactly the way most drivers treat them, impeded by speed traps that are little more than cynical Band-Aids.

Incomplete streets are the price we pay for "Bail, Caesar’s" modernity avoidance.

The Confidentials were returning from an errand in Louisville, and we made the usual descent into downtown New Albany via the I-64 ramp, crossing State Street and continuing east on Elm.

As the numbered streets from 3rd to 13th passed by, the missus asked, “Why can’t I imagine living on Elm Street?”

Obviously, lots of people DO live on Elm Street, but the fact remains that civic planners of a previous generation transformed Elm into a wide straightaway artery suitable only for vehicular speed and dullards’ misbehavior, and accordingly, that’s exactly the way most drivers treat it, at least from the ramp to Vincennes. It’s a situation entirely at odds with the concept of a safe neighborhood. Sidewalks are crummy, there’s no space for bicycles, and the overall effect is one of a racetrack slicing through a collection of hostage homes.

Any conceivable human aesthetic is erased daily by the auto-centric design, and any conceivable hope is paralyzed by force of timid civic habit, with New Albany’s current “leadership” cadre seemingly unable to skip past council person Bob Caesar’s personal mantra, one repeated so often that it might as well be the whole city’s hidebound eulogy: “I never met a fresh way of thinking that I like, or can even comprehend, so we need to protect ourselves at any cost from the book readers.”

And yes, "Bail, Caesar’s" modernity avoidance is costly. Very soon we’ll have spent upwards of $2 million to repair a quarter-mile stretch of Spring Street leading directly from Caesar’s business to his home in Silver Hills, where two other roads already provide access.

We’ll also be dumping close to $600,000 into a bicentennial park adjacent to two of Caesar’s beloved one-way downtown streets. In a few short years, when the Sherman Minton becomes the only major non-tolled bridge across the Ohio River (you can thank spineless “leaders” like Caesar for bridge tolls, too) – and if nothing is done to abate the ensuing crush of “pass through but do not stop” traffic on Spring Street – the automotive din alone likely will be sufficient to render Caesar’s bronze-plaque, bicentennial park legacy into a forum suitable only for dealing drugs and sipping Mad Dog.

And yet so much as mention the merits of two-way streets for living, breathing people, and listen as the budgetary moaning begins to mount.

Miraculously, New Albany has a brief window of opportunity in which we might “occupy” our own streets, and utilize the concept of purposeful design to the advantage of those living, working and paying taxes right here, as opposed to others from elsewhere who do not – and who neither care about our city, nor can be expected to contribute to a solution.

Is it more important to improve the quality of life in our own historic neighborhoods, or to provide high-speed conduits for outsiders racing to avoid Parson Clere’s bridge tolls?

The credo is right here. Perhaps it is time for this city’s officials and functionaries to hear you reciting it to them, as often as possible, since too few of them seem to be reading it with their own eyes.

The streets of our cities and towns are an important part of the livability of our communities. They ought to be for everyone, whether young or old, motorist or bicyclist, walker or wheelchair user, bus rider or shopkeeper. But too many of our streets are designed only for speeding cars, or worse, creeping traffic jams.
Now, in communities across the country, a movement is growing to complete the streets. States, cities and towns are asking their planners and engineers to build road networks that are safer, more livable, and welcoming to everyone.
Instituting a Complete Streets policy ensures that transportation planners and engineers consistently design and operate the entire roadway with all users in mind - including bicyclists, public transportation vehicles and riders, and pedestrians of all ages and abilities.

Nice work, Paul Fetter: "Bridges plan raises more questions."

Dispassionately, and with admirable restraint, Paul Fetter tells it like it is.

Earlier today, I wrote to Ed Clere, whose weekly Tribune column today discusses "fiscal challenges" for Hoosiers, ending with this statement: "The next two years will be difficult, but if we avoid tax increases and spend what we have wisely, Indiana’s economic recovery will be strong and lasting."

Class, your assignment: How do tolls to facilitate an unnecessary $4 billion bridges project fit into our representative's assessment of the economy's prospects?

Or do they at all?

Bridges plan raises more questions, by Paul Fetter (News and Tribune)

... The authority’s tenure has been characterized by misdirection and misinformation. Its activity has been difficult to follow and understand.

What we do know is the authority’s message seems to change constantly. Even those that have followed this issue closely don’t know all the facts. It’s disappointing that the culmination of the authority’s work is an incomplete plan that raises more questions than answers.

While new bridges have been contemplated for the last 50 years, it seems silly to now be picking an arbitrary date to jam this square peg through a round hole. It’s time to take a deep breath, step back and figure out how we can address transportation needs — without imposing tolls that will only penalize our businesses, our communities and our families.

Okay, so I changed my mind ...sue me already.