A Romney apple landing fairly far from the tree.

All along, Mitt Romney's flip-flop waffling has seemed to me an extension of the sacred and periodically correct business axiom, "The Customer Is Always Right." It's nothing new to base one's political campaign on telling voters what they want to hear, whether the sales pitch is contradictory or not, although Mitt's pitches are noteworthy for the sheer bottomlessness of their lies and contrivances.

Romney Is Attacked by His Father’s Longtime Aide, by Michael Barbaro (The Caucus blog at New York Times)

A longtime aide to George W. Romney issued a harshly worded critique of Mitt Romney, accusing him of shifting political positions in “erratic and startling ways” and failing to live up to the distinguished record of his father, the former governor of Michigan ...

... “While it seems that Mitt would say and do anything to close a deal – or an election,” he wrote, “George Romney’s strength as a politician and public officeholder was his ability and determination to develop and hold consistent policy positions over his life.”

Cappuccino and McWafflin roll over as budget measures approved over NayGain's objections.

It was a continuation play, carried over from the previous meeting, and with two councilmen AWOL and Jeff Gahan casting the dissenting vote. I didn't attend because the UEZ meeting lasted so long and there was beer to drink. Beyond council news, it certainly appears that the evening's "spririt & spirit" ghost walk was a huge success, with probably 125 people queuing at Destinations at 7:00 p.m. Had Gregg Seidl known there was a city council meeting, I'm sure he'd have included it just for the fright of it.

New Albany City Council approves 2010 budget; Budget hasn’t changed, but England says council can make cuts as it goes, by Daniel Suddeath (News and Tribune).

New Albany has a budget in place for next year, as the City Council voted 6-1 Wednesday in favor of the 2010 financial plan for the general fund.

7th visitation: EDIT for police. Nay to 2nd reading ... but "yes" to the amended (reduced) 3rd reading.

INTRODUCTION OF ORDINANCES AND RESOLUTIONS: READING

A-09-09 Additional Appropriation Ordinance from the E.D.I.T. Fund for the Police Department (2 & 3 Zurschmiede)

Well, here it is.

No discussion

No: Caesar, Price, McLaughlin, Gahan, Gonder
Yes: Benedetti, Messer, Zurschmiede, Coffey

Defeated in the 2nd reading.

Messer: Would like to amend the ordinance to $500,000, which would allow for some restaffing.

Benedetti seconds, and a vigorous discussion ensues. Messer mentioned money previously approved but not spent. Coffey says he's been urging to put "police in the pipeline." Coffey compares levels of interest in police, hazardous sites, etc.

Price: Everyone told me 5 wouldn't do it. "I don't play poker ... I don't like politics," when you wait until the last minute to do this ... that's wrong ... "I don't play poker." Upset that he previously asked if 5 would do, but everyone said no. Now he's hurt.

Coffey: "Y'all mind if the chief says something?"

Chief Crabtree: States his case. 13 officers can retire at any moment.

Price: "Hurts the reputation of the department when it says in the paper" that an "officer is eating breakfast" and "I don't even know if it's true ... "

Huh?

Crabtree: Entitled to lunch. Every department allows breaks. "There's no such thing as Robo-Cop."

Haub: "Not an issue of playing politics," but if you remember 2008 and the original presentation, and the DEA's criticism. The city has to grow up and show it's serious about fighting crime. The department has stepped up and followed the DEA's recommendations, but the council has to help meet the other condition: Increased manpower.

Erika and her gnarled friend now stand up and glare toward the chair.

Haub continues. The sheriff pocketed the drug seizure money recently, not the city police.

Price: "If I was a policeman, I'd vote for you."

Haub: Louisville gets money for drug interdiction, NA gets nothing. "I'm not trying to call your bluff."

Price: eyeyeyeyeyeyeyeyeyeyeyfiveeyeydoiteyeyey

Pat McLaughlin: "I don't buy it either."

Acrimony.

Council votes for the amendment: Caesar flips, and the amendment passes 5-4 against.

Final vote on the original wording. Now and only now Caesar asks: Where does the money go if approved.

Now he asks. Before the third reading. Seriously.

Now the council starts talking about when and how the money would be spent.

Price: What is we have to make cuts later?

More acrimony.

KZ: How much notice do the retirement guys have to give?

Crabtree: None.

Coffey: Call for the vote.

Vote, 3rd reading

Caesar flips again from 1st and 2nd readings, and on the 3rd, the council approves the EDIT funding reduced by half. 5-4, Caesar making a majority.

Finished at 10:35 pm. Erika is very unhappy.

Cosmic liability, Mayberry politics, designer flip-flops -- hmm, must be city council tonight.

I was teaching "beer class" (seriously) and couldn't make it to last evening's work session, so this question may have been answered.

R-09-16 Resolution To Appropriate E.D.I.T Funds To Assist Residents With Damages Caused By Recent Storms And Flooding

Can readers recall a bigger can of worms being opened by the city council than CM Jeff Gahan's proposal (evidently coming tonight) to extract EDIT funds to reimburse flooding victims?

Note that in asking this question, I'm not ignoring the drainage problems in the neighborhood behind my business interests off Grant Line. Once I owned a house there, and the blessedly unfinished basement was prone to the very same issues discussed by residents at the last council get together. Yes, I have seen sewage geysers. Three years ago, we killed a car dead by driving it into suddenly revealed, knee-deep water near Our Lady.

Just the same, as council attorney Stan Robison's pained expression last Monday indicated, does the city council really want to establish a precedent that it acts as the community's insurance fund, ready for tapping each and every time something goes wrong? How far (and for how much) does this responsibility extend? Does it ever end? And what does any of it have to do with economic development?

Answer to the last question: About as much as using EDIT monies to subsidize sewer rates, which is tantamount to a yearly political action committee donation to the re-election campaign of each city council member.

Not that storm and floor repair monies would resemble that remark in the 6th district sense, mind you.

It should be wonderful tonight, and I'll be blogging live if there's an available connection.

Go here for the agenda, spin your council wheels of flipping flopping chance and whim, and come out to the historic City-County Building tonight for these and other enduringly entertaining diversions, including the unknown landing point of the Blevins Memorial Swing Voter (i.e., CM Bob Caesar) on supplemental police funding. There's also the question of whether Gomer removes the bucket before Aunt B's cookie jar is emptied, but we'll let Goober resolve that one.

Flip flops and open-air footwear, how we get from here to nowhere.

City council recap, by Grace Schneider in the Courier-Journal:

… At its first reading, the panel voted 5-4 against an ordinance to back an additional appropriation of EDIT funds, or economic-development income tax money, for the hiring. The money is normally used to supplement the general fund ...

… Council member Bob Caesar, who'd voted on a resolution to support the hiring plan on June 18, said he decided to vote no this time over concerns about the city's tight budgets.

"I've just got to see some numbers before I vote on it," Caesar said.

With this comment, CM Caesar leaps feet first out of the closet and declares to the city that he’s a swinger -- specifically, the swing vote on this particular issue. With two readings remaining, proponents of the EDIT-for-police ordinance may freely target the 2nd district councilman with advice, persuasion and ardor.

How might those wishing to lobby this self-identified swing voter proceed?

Since Caesar wants to see numbers, show him numbers. Lots and lots of numbers: Phone books, spread sheets, personal bank statements, a prospectus or three, and the stack of Tommy Lancaster cocktail napkins dating to 1956 with the real, unadulterated sewer utility receipts scrawled in pencil.

But why all those messy napkins?

If any one secure point emerged from last evening’s grandstanding-laden scrum, it’s that every politician involved, whether executive or legislative in origin, agrees that the sewer utility is the proverbial cash cow that needs to be appropriated from EMC at the earliest legal maneuver.

Trouble is, not a one of them trusts any of the others to fondle the trophy first, for fear that some of the money will rub off. It's "Treasure of the Sierra Madre" -- make that "Treasure of the Sewage Treatment Plant" -- in living, New Albanian Techno-Color.

That said, pro-police lobbyists also need to ensure that they provide the final five phone calls to Caesar’s cellular just prior to the beginning of the next meeting … wait, sorry – that’s the chosen methodology of the 4th district’s Pat McLaughlin, not Caesar, but what the hell – it might work with Bob, too. Dressing up like Sheriff Taylor might help neutralize CM Steve "Mayberry Reverie" Price, but I doubt it. He's pickin' ... and no one's grinnin'.

---

It couldn’t have helped city council attorney Stan Robison sleep last night to hear both Price and Caesar publicly concede that it’s the council’s responsibility for sewage and storm water invasions in the ‘burbs.

In the sense that numerous decisions at different times over long periods of years contribute to the way things are now, yes, then we’re all responsible for the present. In New Albany, it all adds up to a living heritage of penny-wise, pound-foolish, and sadly, this is the philosophy that returns politicians to office to make decisions in the same futile vein that come back to haunt future voters – who, in the main, don’t so much as blink before repeating the process.

Doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different outcome? That’s the popular definition of insanity. In New Albany, it's politics as usual.

Who’ll change his or her vote next time?

To learn this and other tales of the Open Air Museum, you'll have to heed the wisdom of Emerson, Lake and Palmer: "Come and see the show."

The next council meeting is on Thursday, July 16. By then, I hope to have secured the Coney dog and beer concession – if a sewer tap-in is still available.

Can someone just tell me who to pay?

A-09-09 ($ from EDIT to the police department) defeated 5-4.

The first reading of A-09-09, an additional appropriation from EDIT to the police department to hire new officers, was defeated 5-4.

Previously, a resolution to do this passed 5-4. Changing his vote was 2nd district councilman Bob Caesar. He explained this to me afterward by saying that the reasoning behind a resolution is very different from the reasoning behind an ordinance, although he did not explain the difference.

No Caesar
No Price
No McLaughlin
Aye Benedetti
No Gahan
No Gonder
Aye Messer
Aye Zurschmiede
Aye Coffey

Fails to pass on first reading, 5-4 against. 2nd and 3rd readings next time.

I'm having a beer now.

Okay, I'll say it: Messer and Coffey unite to promote cynicism in Wendy's flip-flop.

Some of you won't agree with me today, and that's fine. I'm sure you'll let me know about it.

When it comes to the relative merits of our elected council persons, most readers know that I hold Jack Messer in high esteem.

Conversely, my view on Dan Coffey is that far more often than not, his caterwauling political career is an unmitigated embarrassment to the council and the city.

Last night, Messer and Coffey flip-flopped on a controversial zoning change. The result was the same, a 5-4 turndown of what we’ll always remember as the Wendy’s ordinance, with Coffey’s dramatic closing flip negating Messer’s breathtaking flop and carrying the day against the change.

Briefly summarized, the two-year-long battle over the last remaining expanse of Charlestown Road green space on the city side of the beltway has been intensely political and occasionally personal, if for no other reason that the people involved, and more importantly, their careers. On one side is a group of respected, professional landowning types that includes County Commissioner Mark Seabrook, and their less savory chosen contractor, the famously condescending Gary McCartin.

On the other, there is a highly organized and motivated collection of neighborhood residents, who have played their defensive game to perfection, maintaining team discipline, researching legal precedents and attending all requisite meetings.

Bunches and bunches of meetings, in fact.

One proposal after another, or as some might say, one end-around after another, has passed or not passed muster with the planning authorities and arrived in better or worse condition before the council for mandated vetting, setting the stage for the usual preening and posturing, and perhaps more productive council hours have been squandered as a result than for any other single activity save full-contact sewer immersion.

As I reported earlier this morning, the Wendy’s proposal was defeated a few weeks ago in its 1st reading, with Messer voting “nay” (against the zoning change) and Coffey “aye.” When the ordinance returned for its 2nd and 3rd readings, Messer was on holiday. Chief “nay” voter Jeff Gahan (did he already know what was to come?) aggressively pushed for the final two votes to be held, much to the anguished squeals of the property’s owners, whose attorney Krafty John could not be present, and the result was two 4-4 tallies. Previous experience suggested that ties counted as “nay,” but council attorney Stan Robison subsequently announced that his research indicated otherwise, hence the presumed finality of last night’s reconstituted fourth and fifth readings.

Reconstructing all this as impartially as possible, it would seem that Messer had confided to some before the meeting that he’d be changing his vote based on a visit to the site, which allayed his initial concerns over increased traffic in the area. Perhaps this accounted for the strange tension in the corridor, as though something unexpected was fully expected to occur. Afterwards, it was plain that Messer’s voting strategy was largely predicated on his dead-certain expectation that traditional enemy Coffey would follow suit, change his vote and restore the status quo, enabling Messer to fulfill his tactical goal of … of what?

Of something, I guess.

However, aloud and for the council record, Messer explained his shift not as a thoughtful reaction to traffic patterns, but as a resounding vote in favor of the right of property owners to seek zoning changes, which sounded far more like Kevin “I am not Ward Churchill” Zurschmiede’s recent paean to fellow Republican Seabrook than that of a Democrat.

But I digress. For his part, Coffey described his last-second conversion as stemming from the realization that Randy Smith is right (huh?), and also the neighborhood advocates, in that there exists no coherent planning and zoning “plan” to follow in making such decisions, and that this was sufficiently troubling for him to change his stance after three (3) previous votes in favor of what he now opposed.

Hmm. Simply stated, it strains credulity to accept any of it at face value, and from either council member involved.

In effect, I’m being asked to believe that a city policeman of long standing didn’t have an accurate reading of traffic patterns, and that a ward heeler whose career defines contempt for any and all planning save that bearing his personal Bazooka Joe stamp might suddenly gain respect for the notion.

Furthermore, there is the strong suggestion that one politician, Messer, could score points of an as yet undefined nature by reading the behavioral playbook of another, Coffey, and proceed with the absolute certainty that Coffey would play his part and salivate at the ringing of a chosen bell. Since when has Dan Cofey been so easily read? How could anyone be thus assured, given the mercurial nature of Coffey’s previous machinations?

Politically, I still respect and support Messer, and I still abhor Coffey, but here’s why this travesty bothers me so much.

In this whole, sordid, ongoing struggle, only one entity emerges as anything approximating heroic, and that’s the neighborhood activists on Lafayette and Savannah.

Yes, there’s a fair share of NIMBY at work, and there always will be in such cases. However, the activists assiduously did their homework, patiently slogged through entire meetings, enduring Steve Price’s homespun platitudes and awaiting their assigned slot, generally at the very end, and in the final reckoning, came off as capable of articulating a principle, supporting the principle with facts, and performing the expected function of informed citizens in a democracy.

Granted, they got the outcome they sought, and given their perseverance and all-around chutzpah, they deserved it.

Here’s the problem.

The crass machinations and blatant cynicism of the flippy-floppy Wendy’s voting outcome tells both the neighbors and the remainder of the city that the final decision had almost nothing to do with the right reasons, and for the right reasons as based on law and order.

It was purely political.

In the end, the neighbors might as well have eschewed the hard work, stayed home to tend to their lives, and played the same style of game as the council persons by quietly raising money and making payoffs to the appropriate parties in the time honored fashion of machine-run cities everywhere.

Note that I’m not suggesting that something like this occurred. I don’t believe it did, and what's more, it might not have been the best strategy for the neighbors to try and outbid folks wealthier than them. But it would have been drop-dead cynical, and as illustrated by the terms of the final outcome, fully in keeping with prevailing trends.

It remains that last night's maneuvering sent an unmistakable message that political gamesmanship absolutely comes first, and facts always come second. Citizens thought they were playing – dare we say it? – by a shared sense of the rules, but the rules ultimately weren’t what mattered. Rather, what mattered were two council persons jockeying with each other for position, to the utter exclusion of the commonweal.

Sad.

Typical of New Albany, but very, very, sad.

Jaws drop as Messer, Coffey execute simultaneous 180-degree flip-flops, killing Wendy's ... for now?

Here's the ordinance:

Z-09-05 Ordinance Amending the Code of Ordinances of New Albany, Indiana, Title XV, Chapter 156, (Docket P-02-09; Fairway Developers d/b/a The Charleston’s LLC, by Gary McCartin)

The battle lines seemed drawn those many weeks ago when the first reading resulted in a 5-4 vote against the plan commission's affirmative recommendation.

For: Caesar, Benedetti, Zurschmiede and Coffey
Against: Price, McLaughlin, Gahan, Gonder and Messer

Then came the quasi-epochal (sorry, D), Gahan-inspired call for 2nd and 3rd readings with the developers' attorney and Messer both absent. These resulted in 4-4 washes, and it was over ... but it wasn't over, with council attorney Robison determing that there could be no stake through the heart without a clear, non-draw.

Which brings us to tonight, and the neighborhood again in attendance. With Wi-Fi not available, I noted that something about the attitude made me uneasy, like a trick was about to be played. I shrugged it off and awaited the expected 5-4 vote against the Wendy's, and that's exactly what we got, except that when it came time for Messer to vote, he launched into full explanation mode and flipped to "aye."

A gasp rose from the crowd, but it wasn't over. Coffey, who'd voted three times in favor, now offered his own explanations before joining Messer in the act of flipping, though opposite, becoming a "nay," and the ordinance was defeated.

I'll leave it at that, adding only that one explanation offered for Messer's change in voting heart was his certainty that Coffey would always vote differently out of spite owing to animus between the two, thus assuring that Messer could serve whatever political purpose necessary for the flip while knowing that the council president would kill the proposal just to be contrarian.

I don't buy it, but for the residents of the neighborhood, who've now viewed something like a dozen votes in two years, it doesn't matter.

In most other ways last evening, the council sought to serve notice that its struggles over turf with the England administration will surely manage to handicap the city for months to come. A high point for me was Price's suggestion that the UEA staff person is paid too much not to be the man in charge of a merged UEA and DNA, with the implication being that Mike Ladd's salary comes from city coffers.

Seeing as Price spent a year as council representative to the UEA, and actually attended roughly half the meetings, he might have known that the city does not pay Ladd's salary -- unless the information was hidden in grandma's cookie jar, which Price is strictly forbidden from invading.

I'm tired.

President Gahan keeps his foot on the gas and an eye on the hourglass.

Odd.

Tonight’s council meeting clocked in at 42 minutes, flat, and I’m not sure whether to demand my money back or dance naked in the street – and even the latter’s no longer a safe bet, seeing as (perhaps) we’re finally beginning to enforce an ordinance or three.

New Albany revives suit over bids; Sewer, storm-water contracts challenged, by Dick Kaukas (Courier-Journal).

The major move of the evening came when the council voted 7-2 (CMs Jack Messer and Kevin Zurschmiede dissenting) to rescind resolution R-08-04, which had been approved 5-4 at the second January meeting.

R-08-04 was the resolution to drop the council’s lawsuit against the sewer and stormwater boards over the legality of those boards awarding no-bid "professional services" contracts to EMC in 2007.

In reversing course tonight, CMs Bob Caesar, Pat McLaughlin and Steve Price insisted they were influenced to change their votes by the dramatic resurfacing of new information. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I can’t recall this new information ever being introduced at any point during the session. All Caesar had to say was to deny that it was aimed at any one person.

Chalk this one up to heavy behind the scenes lobbying of the two council newbies by the faction that favors a court decision.

As it stood, and without the mercifully retired Larry Kochert to chime in, Zurschmiede yet again defended his role in negotiating the EMC contract, and CM Dan Coffey yet again damned Zurschmiede with faint praise and vowed to place his paws around the wastewater spigots post haste.

In short, it was a rerun.

Coffey also used the opportunity offered by the debate over sewer board and related legal fees to suggest that the battle three years ago against New Albany DVD, the generally empty porno front on West Main Street, was worth every penny it cost the city because it prevented a slew of similar businesses from locating along the strip.

As with the “new” information about sewer-related legal action, no documented claims for any of this were offered by Coffey.

Apparently Bazooka Joe U. offers no courses in pornography forensics; either that, or pumpkin patches just aren’t in season.

They sell wax ones, you know.