Ryan Fenwick (Louisville) and Nick Vaughn (Floyd County) reject developer, contractor and special interest campaign donations. Shouldn't this be a trend, Jeffrey?

Back in January when Nick Vaughn announced for Floyd County council, I noticed this.

Can you imagine ranking Democratic office-holders in New Albany rejecting developer, contractor or special interest money? It's simply inconceivable given the voracious needs of the political patronage machine, as newcomers like Jason Applegate seem to have learned all too quickly.

Over in Louisville, Ryan Fenwick is making a principled stand similar to that of Vaughn. Fenwick is challenging the incumbent Pat Mulvihill in the Democratic Party primary.

Ryan Fenwick for Metro Council District 10

As Jeff Gillenwater noted: This, everywhere, now.

I AM NOT TAKING DEVELOPER MONEY

My opponent has received thousands in contributions from developers and high ranking Metro Government officials.

Since Metro Council has the final vote on project incentives, waivers, zoning and planning issues, and landmark status designation, as well as a regulatory role over Metro Government agencies, I am calling for an end to what appears to be a common practice.

At best, accepting such donations creates the appearance of a conflict of interest; at worst, it creates a regulatory environment where favoritism can outweigh merit when voting on development related issues. This can result in outcomes that are out of step with the community’s expectations and pernicious to taxpayer interests.

Today I pledged not to take any money from developers or high ranking members of Metro Government. This campaign will be funded by grassroots donors. Can you chip in?

These 30 free-spending special interest donors top Jeff Gahan's 2019 pay-to-play campaign finance windfall of $150,000 (so far).

So far in 2019, aspiring mayor-for-life Jeff Gahan has raised close to $150,000, combined it with cash on hand in excess of $100,000, and spent more than $200,000 of the total -- and as he's fond of reminding us, he's not finished yet.

CFA-4 Follies: OMG, just look at Gahan's huge pile of special interest donor cash flowing to out-of-towners.

All this so Gahan can continue his enlightened, selfless administration of a city of 36,000, one with negligible population growth, and with increases in the poverty rate and concentrated poverty rate; few new jobs offering anywhere close to a living wage; but more than 100 new city employees, lots of bread and circuses, and a huge increase in public indebtedness "engineered" by Gahan to convince those few who are doing well that he is a benevolent dictator.

After all, their grandchildren can figure out how to pay the deferred bills.

Gahanism is a bizarre delusion abetted by the unchecked consumption of Kool Aid and Rice Krispies Treats, but the following numbers are purely factual.

They're cumulative Gahan campaign finance haul totals for 2019, to be appended to the numbers quoted in this link (valid through 2018). I'll release an updated list later in the week.

The Jeff Gahan Money Machine, Part 20: Buying and selling a city? Our master list of 59 Gahan wheel-greasers is a pornographic potpourri of pay-to-play.

Yes, there are the occasional small donation going toward the perpetuation of Jeff Gahan's personality cult, but not many come from disinterested parties (translation: people who don't work for the city and owe their positions to Gahan). They're so numerically rare as to be non-existent.

I hate to be the one to burst pie-in-the-sky bubbles, but the following Top 30 donors are not writing checks to Dear Leader because they think the mayor is handsome or they trust his good nature to improve the lot of humanity. They're doing it because there'll be something coming back to them in return -- and boy, does it ever.

Full stop.

If you're comfortable with this, so be it, but for all our sake, can you stop being hypocritical about it?

* indicates more than $10,000 in donations since 2011
+ is a first-time donor

$1,400 
Sprigler Development Co. LLC (local developers; currently building the townhouses on Vincennes)

$1,650
Axis Architecture & Interiors (no-bid contracts for engineering and design) *

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$2,000 
Jacob L. Brown (Marian Development Group, apparently working with Chad Sprigler on the Vincennes Street townhouses) +

$2,000 
Mitchell Green (HMB Professional Engineers; Adam "Tricky" Dickey's no-bid employer) +

$2,000
Infinity Homes & Development (suburban McMansion builder; its presence here is one of few mysteries) +

$2,000 
James Kemp (Kemp Law Office/Kemp Title/affiliated with Lancaster Lofts)

$2,000 
Robert E. Lee (EcoTech, the city's sanitation contractor; total includes $1,500 from EcoTech)

$2,000
Patricia Yount (of Lochmueller Group, wastewater consultants) +

$2,400
Frost Brown PAC (no-bid contract-holding legal firm) *

$2,500
Amy Letke (Integrity HR; no-bid city contractor)

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$3,000
Form G Companies ("land development" company from Jeffersonville) +

$3,000
GM Development Co LLC (Indianapolis-based "consultant") *

$3,000
ProMedia (de facto city propaganda ministry and no-bid contractor) +

$3,000
Colin Receveur (Mt. Tabor Road commercial property owner; this link should explain it) +

$3,000
Christopher Stewart (from no-bid HMB Professional Engineers; Adam "Tricky" Dickey's employer)

$3,000
Dennis Wesley Co. (apparently part of property holding companies connected to Mike Coyle; the total includes $1,000 from Coyle Chevrolet)

$3,150
William E. Hall (United Consulting; no-bid consulting engineers)*

$3,650
DF Development (Denton Floyd; M. Fine/Mansions on Main, and more recently the Reisz Mahal "extreme special contractor treatment" city hall project)

$3,650
Lemor Dowell (Democratic Party financier and grandee, includes $650 from his company New Albany Heating & Air Conditioning) *

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$4,000 
Beam Longest & Neff LLC ("consulting engineers and land surveyors" and recurring recipients of no-bid contracts) *

$4,000 
Bennett's Towing and Recovery (extended information here; now we know why the tow trucks are allowed to drive so recklessly) *

---

$5,000 
Fagre Baker Daniels LLP (no-bid legal firm) *

$5,000 
John Neace (former insurance mogul, now building a Southern Indiana wheeling and dealing empire via Neace Ventures) *

$5,000 
Plumbers & Pipefitters Local 502 (a rare, huge union tithe, and the first from Local 502 since 2013)

$5,500
Terry Baker (HWC Engineering -- see Jolliffe -- and CRS Marketing) *

$5,500
Ed Jolliffe (HWC Engineering, a "full service consulting engineering firm" and frequent no-bid contract recipient) *

$5,650 
Stephen Triplett (total includes a $650 donation from AllTerrain Paving; this is to be regarded as a Neace investment) *

$7,500
Ohio Valley Properties of Kentuckiana (it's a Jorge Lanz company, and why not? Lanz is one of Gahan's best and most enduring big-money friends) +

$9,000 
Clark Dietz (CD) PAC (no-bid engineering contractors; with a narrow lead over Jacobi Toombs & Lanz and HWC Engineering, they're Gahan's biggest all-time donor)

$27,000
Indiana Democratic Party (its first ever reported donation to Gahan in two massive installments, both coming in October) * +

In 2019, these 30 contributors have accounted for $131,550 out of the approximately $147,000 raised by Slick Jeffie.

Looking at these 30 donors with an liberal view of residency, perhaps 7 or 8 of them (but no more) reside or do primary business in New Albany.

CFA-4 Follies: OMG, just look at Gahan's huge pile of special interest donor cash flowing to out-of-towners.

"Don't forget that Gahan is legally entitled to convert those campaign funds into personal funds. All he must do is pay the income taxes on them. He can make charitable donations, political donations, or buy groceries with that money. In other words, the excess monies are bribes. That's not his fault. It's the way campaign finance works in Indiana."

So far in 2019, Jeff Gahan has raised $147,000 (on top of roughly $128,000 cash on hand) and spent $204,800 to remain mayor.

$140,000 of these expenditures has gone to companies and individuals outside New Albany's city limits.

That's 68%.

Gleaned from the expenditures side of the October 18 CFA-4 filing -- remember, Cherished Leader isn't done yet; this accounts for only the first three quarters -- here are a few highlights, restricted to expenditures of $2,000 or more, year-to-date.

* To establish context, I've appended a few statistics from the US Census Bureau.

In NA's history, no candidate for mayor has raised this much money (I'll be chipping away at donor numbers during the coming days), and no one has spent this much money. Gahan says he's moving the city forward, but the numbers don't lie even if he's prone to doing so.

Jeff Gahan is moving himself forward by means of the most pervasive pay-to-play political patronage system ever seen in this city during modern times. It is one built to benefit donors from far and wide, political cronies and his own family. Gahan's vision? It's New Albany as a Banana Republic -- with Gahan himself remaining Top Banana.

Now for the numbers, in ascending amounts -- and boy, do they ascend.

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$2,195.38 La Catrina for the Sherman Minton Dinner "after party."

$2,950 to Susie Gahan (wife of the mayor) for "operating expenses"; these are recurring expenditures and literally thousands of dollars have been itemized this way during the past eight years.

$3,500 Ryan Media LLC for radio.

$3,744.52 to Warren Nash for rent. The former failed mayor and exalted Democratic Party grandee is charging Gahan only $600 monthly for use of his dilapidated building on Bank Street, presumably including utilities (which his previous Floyd County Democratic Party tenant was seldom able to keep up to date).

$4,480 to Meyer Consulting LLC for advertising (there are several businesses with this name and it isn't clear which this is).

$4,482.80 to the Floyd County Democratic Party for ... basic life support? Interestingly, the only other Democratic candidate whose name appears on the expenditures ledger of the 2nd and 3rd quarter CFA-4 is none other than Matt Nash ($250 from the Genius of the Floodplain), who is Warren Nash's son. Perhaps the NAHA job wasn't enough.

$4,810.98 to Grace by Design for signs, stickers, shirts, bags and dog bandannas. Grace by Design is located in Louisville, and the owner appears to be Andrew Delahanty, who might even be a genuine "progressive," which is surprising given the way Gahan works assiduously to avoid being viewed as one, probably because he isn't.

Grace by Design's Facebook page hasn't been active in a while, but circa 2012 the company donated signs to the Occupy movement in Louisville.

Very interesting. Maybe Delahanty's credentials are why Team Gahan didn't Buy Local.

$5,878.97 to Linda Moeller (city controller) for label, postage, printing and magnet reimbursement.

$5.918.13 to Christopher Gardner for printing, postage, invitations reimbursement and "operating expenses" (also a city employee and son-in-law of the mayor). It's fascinating how "operating expenses" appear nowhere else except  itemized by family members.

$6,000 to Kristen Self for "fundraising." Self lives in the Indianapolis area and was the finance director for the Liz Watson congressional campaign, billing herself as a "campaign consultant."

$6,825 to ProMedia for videos and billboards. During 2019 ProMedia also has donated $3,000 to Gahan4Life for "in-kind" professional services. That's a lot of money; this is campaign-related, so wouldn't you love to see the contract for no-bid "professional services" between the city of New Albany and ProMedia?

$8,678.52 to Valley View Golf Club for ... new balls? There is no explanation for this expenditure.

Now for the heaviest hitters.

$15,000 to 76 Words (Washington DC): "We craft campaign strategy -- and turn that strategy into television, radio and online communications to elect Democrats and support progressive causes."

$40,000 to Media Fortitude Partners (Jersey City NJ) for this: "Media Fortitude Partners — a revolutionary media buying agency — will combine traditional and evolving digital platforms to efficiently and effectively win political campaigns from local to national levels. MFP uses the next generation of media buying solutions and targeting technology to achieve each of our clients’ goals, particularly in the political realm."

$57,746.05 to Terris Barnes & Walters (San Francisco, California): "Founded in 1988, Terris, Barnes & Walters is a full-service campaign firm, specializing in general consulting and direct mail. Our mail philosophy is simple: we believe any campaign has a maximum of five seconds from mailbox to recycling to make a voter decide to open your mail and keep reading — and you’re competing for readers’ attention not just with other political media, but commercial appeals as well. Since 1988, we have created high-impact mail that grabs and holds voters’ attention — and has helped win over 350 successful campaigns nationwide."

Allow me to observe that Jeff Gahan is not publicly listed as a client at TB&W. Is he shy, or does this imply that while $57,000 is substantially more than the median household income in Nawbany, it's chump change for a major national slush spewer in the Bay Area.

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* A few statistics from the US Census Bureau.

Population estimates, July 1, 2018, (V2018) ... 36,604
Population estimates base, April 1, 2010, (V2018) ... 36,349
Population, percent change - April 1, 2010 (estimates base) to July 1, 2018, (V2018) ... 0.7%
Population, Census, April 1, 2010 ... 36,372
Median gross rent, 2013-2017 ... $753
Households, 2013-2017 ... 15,232
Bachelor's degree or higher, percent of persons age 25 years+, 2013-2017 ...  20.6%
Median household income (in 2017 dollars), 2013-2017 ... $43,914
Per capita income in past 12 months (in 2017 dollars), 2013-2017 ... $25,266
Persons in poverty, percent  ... 18.3%

Explaining the mayor's Rally's/Checkers photo-op in the context of Pay to Play, the Suburban Experiment, and Strong Towns.

This embarrassment owes to boondoggle splashback. I'm happy to explain.

The City of New Albany subsidized the Summit Springs hilltop development by means of using the roadway to the top as pretext to redevelop the Daisy Lane intersection at State Street.

At the time, this intervention was artfully justified by then-redevelopment honcho David Duggins' assertion that by working with private profit-seekers, the city could be sure the ensuing development would be done correctly.

Duggins subsequently was packed off to ruin human lives at the housing authority, but this lies outside the scope of today's Rally's indigestion.

From Team Gahan's standpoint, the "right" results from its Summit Springs TIF One Card deferred costs were immediately evident, and to avoid clutter, we'll spotlight just one.

In fact the overall verdict remains very clear.

The city's participation in Summit Springs under the scarcely examined rubric of "economic development" inevitably meant that business winners and losers were being chosen by local government, as in the instance of the laughably termed "iconic" Rally's/Checker chain restaurant grand opening; just note that by virtue of the public subsidies showered upon the private profiteers of Summit Springs, this restaurant itself benefited from municipal subsidies, as these same benefits were unavailable to a true indie small business opening elsewhere.

The city's propaganda team desperately needs a dose of localism, and also might learn from the example of Strong Towns, because in addition to the preceding, the infrastructure being TIFFed into creation on and near Summit Springs will bear maintenance costs in the future, and these are not being factored into the costs at present. While Summit Springs is within a short distance of the dense urban core, its rationale and required expenditures are firmly within the boundaries of the short-term "Suburban Experiment" described below by Charles Marohn ... of Strong Towns.

Read up, pay-to-play Gahanites.

Ha ha. I make myself laugh out loud at times.

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What do you do when you need to change everything? by Charles Marohn

Our cities are struggling financially. But culturally, we lack a common understanding to explain why this is, let alone decide what to do about it.

Many people want to believe we’re simply not paying enough taxes. Others believe that our tax rates are too high. We might have too little regulation, or not enough. Some say we need an active government, and some, more of a free market... But at Strong Towns, we don’t see things in such binary ways.

Plenty of Americans wish we would listen to the experts and hand things over to the people who claim they know what needs to be done. Others believe we have too many experts, and that they know a lot less than they think they do...

We’re more nuanced here at Strong Towns; a little expertise combined with a lot of humility can be a powerful force for good.

A Cultural Consensus That Lacks Real Understanding

One area where we have something approaching an American cultural consensus is our need to spend more money on infrastructure. Left, right, center... it seems most people can agree on this. But Strong Towns advocates think differently.

What we at Strong Towns have seen so clearly is that our cities struggle not from the lack of a cultural consensus, but because of one.

We’ve structured our economy around the principles of the Suburban Experiment, an approach to growth that provides lots of short-term rewards at the expense of our long-term strength and resiliency. Our cultural consensus on infrastructure spending is built on false statistics and short-term planning, but it lacks a common understanding about the root causes of financial failure and financial success.

Strong Cities, Towns and Neighborhoods

If America is going to be a strong country, it must first have strong cities, towns and neighborhoods.

We can't manufacture prosperity with infrastructure spending or federal dollars; it has to be built from the bottom up.

We understand that cities become strong and resilient when they grow incrementally, when they shun the easy path of simplistic solutions and instead do the hard work of making modest investments over a broad area over a long period of time.

We know that local governments must focus on their financial productivity and that doing this math is not optional if we want to create prosperous places.

And at Strong Towns, we know that the cities that obsess about the struggles of their own residents — cities that make a commitment to observe where people struggle day-to-day within the community, and then focus on continuously doing the next smallest thing to reduce that struggle — these cities are not only going to help people; they are going to be making the highest returning investments they can possibly make. They are going to become Strong Towns.

These are radical insights. They run counter to our current consensus about growth, development and infrastructure. Yet, when we share these radical notions with others — when we have a chance to expose people to the Strong Towns message and our vision of the future — something amazing happens.

A Powerful, Radical Message That we can All Agree on

People who don’t agree — who can’t even productively talk to each other today — find something they agree on in Strong Towns. Something challenging. Something radical. Something that, if spread to enough people, can form that basis of a new cultural consensus.

A strong America made up of strong cities, towns and neighborhoods. That’s the vision.

We have a powerful message and we have built our organization around a movement to spread it. We’re attacking the complex problem of struggling cities by changing the current cultural consensus. We do this in three simple ways:

We create content.
We distribute that content as broadly as possible.
We nudge people to take action.

And it’s working. Don't miss out. Be part of what we're building together. Memberships start at just $5 per month. Join the movement.

In a unanimous decision, NAC's New Albany "Person of the Year" for 2018 is Jeff Gahan's Money Machine.

It’s time once again for NA Confidential to select New Albany’s "Person of the Year." As in 2017, there'll be no run-ups and time-wasting teasers, although our basic definition remains intact, as gleaned from Time.

Person of the Year (formerly Man of the Year) is an annual issue of the United States news magazine Time that features and profiles a person, couple, group, idea, place, or machine that "for better or for worse ... has done the most to influence the events of the year."

In 2018 there was a consistent theme in the governance of the city of New Albany. As such, what do these occurrences have in common?

• David Duggins' unpunished threat to taser a public housing resident
• Riverview Tower and the recent self-inflicted electrical system damage, as blamed on others 
• Jeff Gahan's Reisz Mahal luxury city hall boondoggle
• The city's neglect of the Moser Tannery, leading to the fire that destroyed it
• Automobile aggrandizement projects being built throughout the city
• The ongoing idiocy of Gahan's cult of personality 
• Summit Springs corporate mud slide and franchise theme park
• Spike in the popularity of Rice Krispies Treats
• A shared use pedway leading straight out of town, rather than linking to the Greenway
• Gahan's bizarre mishandling of the Human Rights Commission

Managerial incompetence, for one thing; for another, shamelessness on the part of people who haven't read books since faced with the imminent failure to graduate high school.

However, they're all connected to greater or lesser extent to the overarching theme of Gahan's seven years in office: the construction of a self-aggrandizing political patronage "pay to play" system unprecedented in the modern era of New Albanian political malfeasance.

Photo credit.

With municipal elections just around the corner in 2019, New Albany has become a banana republic -- or maybe that's a Bud Light Banana-O-Rita Republic.

Gahan's face is on everything, as is his chosen symbol, the anchor. A steady stream of political propaganda proclaiming Gahan's flawless brilliance emanates from City Hall, while the compromised local chain newspaper ducks, covers and cowers over at its Jeffersonville headquarters.

But little of this would have the wherewithal to stick if not for Gahan wetting his beak on each and every expansion of the city's budget. His campaign finance/re-election fund invariably receives a piece of the action on these expenditures of taxpayer money -- and, of course, we only see the transactions he bothers to report on the public forms. 

The emperor and his cash are tied together by the propaganda, and if you think I'm exaggerating, consider this one question: At any point during the past seven years, have you heard Gahan or any of his minions concede to making a mistake or committing an error?

Mull this for just a moment. They're human, and humans are fallible. How can they ever be perfect? And yet, like the Kims in North Korea, we're supposed to believe that a former veneer salesman exemplifies perfection.

It's revolting -- and it's time to revolt. Do we need a mayor whose primary interest is self-deification, or do we need a mayor whose policies make a difference for ordinary citizens, like me and you?

All things considered, there can be only one choice as New Albany's Person(s) of the Year for 2018. It's Mayor Jeff Gahan's Money Machine, and all the people currently benefiting from it. If you're not one of them, please consider voting for one of his challengers next year.

Previous winners:

• 2017 ... #MeToo -- the NA silence breakers
• 2016 ... Chloe Allen
• 2015 ... New Albany property tax payers
• 2014 ... Heroic Non-Incentivized Downtown Developers
• 2013 ... (tie) Houndmouth and "Quality of Life"
• 2012 ... Bill "Slumlord" Allen
• 2011 ... The Sherman Minton Bridge

Nocturnal edition, in which Dear Leader clears up the matter of who comes first.

Meat Loaf Is the Answer, Part 3: A brief postscript to yesterday's Taco, Broccoli and Lutefisk Walk reference.

Meat Loaf Is the Answer, Part 1: Local food culture presupposes local culture. Popeyes, anyone?

Meat Loaf Is the Answer, Part 2: Let's come together over meat loaf.

The straight dope on the Taco Walk.

DNA's Durian Fruit Taco Walk started me thinking about meatloaf (meat loaf).

Develop New Albany's Broccoli Walk is August 12. What? Oops, sorry -- it's a Taco Walk.

I'm not an ogre, and I'm not hiking my leg and Dugginsizing all over a good idea from a well-intentioned individual. Rather, I regard it as a teaching moment, whether or not I have any students in attendance.

A Taco Walk or similar activities should be the domain of a functioning restaurant association, which currently (and unfortunately) we possess only as a conceptual outline. Some day, I hope this comes together.

Eateries constantly are approached with such ideas as a Taco Walk, many of them good and others not so much.

Invariably, these events are one-offs, constructed to maximize the future of the event itself and the share taken by the sponsor. Just as inevitably, the events are "special," not reinforcing of the day-to-day, as with the notion of a pizzeria making tacos only one day a year, only for the Taco Walk, which isn't necessarily a productive use of time or effort because it doesn't represent what it does on a daily basis.

In the case of one-off events like the Taco Walk, owners and managers are hesitant to refuse participation for fear that it will offend the city, which is perceived to be the force behind the idea, seeing as the city sponsors DNA, and DNA sponsors the event itself. That's why it can seem like a shakedown, even when it isn't.

Far better that these events come from within a restaurant association as a consortium of those who know best what's best for their businesses. Right now, this couldn't originate where it should, because the framework barely exists. As I said, maybe some day this will change. Note also that the same idea applies to independent local businesses in general, apart from food and drink.

Furthermore, speaking personally, it comes back to how one wishes to direct his or her money.

I'd say the vast majority of expenditures Diana and I make on food and drink goes to eateries and watering holes in downtown NA, precisely the ones participating in the Taco Walk.

Concurrent to this, there is DNA, now positioning itself as yet another captive arm of City Hall's diversionary propaganda and events-planning efforts, while neglecting certain key aspects of its mission as a Main Street organization, presumably because these are matters that Deaf Gahan likes to keep in his own in-box for maximum political self-aggrandizement.

Finally, there is the fact that yes, I served my terms inside the DNA organization (just shy of three years, if memory serves), and have subsequently immersed myself in the wider issues that pertain to the success of the city's food and drink community -- streets, sidewalks, subsidies, policies and the like. That's something DNA itself might try doing -- as a change of pace.

Restaurants and bars cannot exist in a vacuum. Various governmental decisions with ramifications on the conduct of commerce every single day matter tremendously -- and these are the same decisions DNA traditionally has avoided any involvement in reaching, except when they directly impact DNA itself (see market, farmers); only then does DNA leap into the fray.

Put all this together, and it should become clear that while I'm perfectly willing to spend my money by handing it directly to locally-owned businesses, I'm unwilling to do it when DNA acts as the intermediary.

Instead, I'll hand it directly to Chef Israel next Saturday night.

On the other hand, when (if) DNA undertakes useful activities that address the wider issues, I'm willing to support them. As it stands, DNA is serving as a toady for a mayor-for-life's crass daily re-election campaign, and I have no interest in contributing to this.

But I have an open mind, and await persuasion. There are numerous others, but here are three relevant questions for DNA:

1. How much is municipal government contributing to DNA's operation each budget cycle? I believe the sum used to be around $5,000 per year. Now that DNA has a part-time staff person, we can surmise that the sum is greater. Is it?

2. Since it remains the case that any time an organization like DNA is funded by the city, from a mere thin dime up to thousands of dollars, it is the right of any citizen to know where his or her tax monies are going, how much of the proceeds of the Taco Walk remain with DNA after eateries are reimbursed, and what will DNA be doing with the proceeds?

3. Ranging a bit from meat loaf (why?), is DNA playing an active role in the city's implied (though unrevealed "Make parking Great Again" plan for downtown? I've heard city officials make hints at merchant meetings, and am wondering if this is something occurring with the active participation of DNA, seeing as this would actually be a component of the organization's Main Street mission.

I won't be holding my breath waiting for answers, but make no mistake: DNA should be providing them.

Rum, Sodomy and the Lash: Trucking pillagers of civic infrastructure have their own anti-Speck website.

And it's right here: New Albany 4 all.

As one astute observer wrote:

Nothing in this ad gives a single, specific reason why any part of the Speck study recommendations should not be implemented. Still waiting for any fact-based "opposition." You also have to laugh that the operators will not identify themselves (trucking lobby) and want this to look like grassroots opposition. They even went so far as to hide their WhoIs lookup information for the website.

Can a return of Kitchen Fable be far behind?

Debbie Harbeson: "I call illegal procedure on legislators’ (Clere, Grooms) moves."

You can bet that Kent, Amy Adams and the rest of the professional Clere Channel cheerleaders aren't going to like this one.

HARBESON: I call illegal procedure on legislators’ moves

... Similarly, Grooms and Clere have been running plays for special interest groups who have been unable to break through local government to get what they want. Both men are using their state positions to introduce legislation which will create new local government entities with taxing authority. These politicians are doing end runs around the communities they represent.