Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Who Do You Want To Fill Salette's Vacant Council Seat?

The Explorer reported today that there are 19 applications of candidates to fill the vacated council seat of Salette Latas. The article lists the names.

Amoung the names are three former council members who were voted out of office by you including Paul Loomis, KC Carter and Helen Dankwerth. Certainly, these three should not be appointed. The voters are tired of the same old stuff.

Current appointed Council member Pat Spoerl, who is filling Paula Abbott's term, which expires shortly, is also on the list.

Wouldn't it be refreshing for the Council to appoint Matthew Rabb, who received over 5,000 votes in the recent election, has also applied.

Click on the link above to see the list.

Give us your take.

6 comments:

OVDad said...

I'd like to point out two things regarding your last two posts:

1. Your proposal that it should be Matt Rabb is nonsense, given that you say the "voters voted these three guys out of office and are tired of them." Well, Matt Rabb was never voted into office. In fact, he never came close. The voters spoke in this case as much as in the others. Now, if your other protege, Mike Zinkin, was on the list, I'd be all for it because it was such a close call. However, Matt Rabb makes no sense whatsoever given your previous line of argument.

2. I agree that unanimity should be preferred for this appointment. However, I question whether you had raised this argument if Mike Zinkin and Matt Rabb had gotten elected - changing the makeup of the council in your favor.
I doubt, given the people in office now, that there will be such unanimity. And given this blog's previous positions, I believe you are setting up a story along the lines of "the business people/special interest are dominating everyone else."
I believe in the democratic process, and while unanimity should be preferred, it might be impossible to achieve. In such case, a simple majority will do - and despite what VC will argue, everyone that's a council member deserves to be one - they received the votes. Insofar, a majority vote will be just fine.

Anonymous said...

While I can understand why he may not wish to apply, I would like to see Mike Zinkin on this list. What an opportunity for the new council to exhibit their desire to bring the community together by appointing Mike Zinkin.

Richard Furash, MBA said...

Regarding Matthew, 5,000 voters out of 16,000 voters did vote for him. He really is a good guy. You ought to meet him. (Rabb received more votes than Loomis or Carter).

It would be nice for Mike to be on the list, but he didn't apply. So he won't be on Council.

We would have called for unanimity if Mike had become Mayor because Oro Valley simply needs to get its act together to move forward. I know this is what Mike wants.

If only the simple majority of the new four approves a new council member, it will send a message to all that the town is divided and it will get worse.

Remember, Satish Hiremath only won by 30 votes. There is no mandate for major change.

If a simple majority (4 votes) approves a new council member who is of exact like mind as the four new members, then the five can move their agenda along with impunity because they will have a super majority.

They will be Monolithic.

They will then be able to change all of our rules, all of our zoning codes. They will be able to cancel studies of the Police Department. They will be able to run the town with an Iron Fist.

That would be disaster for the citizens of Oro Valley.

That's why a unanimous selection of a new council member is a must.

OVDad said...

Thanks for the clarification, Zee Man. You confirmed my suspicion that your call for unanimity is your backdoor way of creating a majority to oppose what you perceive as a unified bloc of newly elected members. The fact that all four (three of which were elected my very large margins) new members were recently chosen by the voters means nothing to you apparently. In the run-up to election day you have continuously demonized them, and I foolishly thought those were tactics in order to get votes for your candidates. How wrong I was. You truly believe there is an evil conspiracy on their part to change all that is dear to you in Oro Valley. Have you ever talked to any of them? You could not be more wrong. Yes, they are in favor of being more flexible with zoning codes and town laws to enable easier business access to Oro Valley. Yet, this is not due to an evil conspiracy wanting to make your life worse. Instead, it is part of a cohesive economic policy that will ensure fiscal stability in this town without raising taxes. Business and citizen interest are not diametrically opposed, as you appear to believe. The majority of citizens apparently thinks that these candidates represent their idea of a future OV more closely than your candidates did. Please consider that in future statements.

Let me spin your argument around. Out of four contested position, three were very clearly chosen. This is a mandate for change. Your sneaky back-door idea won't work.

Again, please consider that your interest is not necessarily the "citizens'" interest as you appear to believe. This election has made that very clear.

Victorian Cowgirl said...

OV Dad,

You are clearly obsessed with me. I haven't even weighed in on this topic and already you are tossing my name into the discussion and oh so confidently telling everyone what I will say. Too bad you're wrong.

You said, "despite what VC will argue, everyone that's a council member deserves to be one - they received the votes."

I have not stated nor decided that any of the elected council members do not deserve the position. Whether they deserve it or not will become evident OVER TIME. If they ARE deserving of it, they will be re-elected. If they are NOT deserving of it (as was the case with Dankwerth, Culver, Parish, Carter) they will not be re-elected.

As for who should fill Latas' vacant council seat, my only comment is that it should NOT be filled by anyone who was previously removed from office by the voters.

The fact that Loomis, Carter and Dankwerth have the audacity to apply for the open position after being removed from office is already a clear indicator that they do not care what the PEOPLE want.

OV Objective Thinker said...

I would like to offer two points. First of all the voters just had a chance to elect Matt Rabb. They didn't. So why should six elected officials make their first move one that goes directly against what the voters just stated? This blog has clearly stated on numerous occasions that one of it's focal points is that the Council should listen to the people. I would think that appointing Rabb (eventhough he is a good guy) would go against 'the grain'.

Secondly, I think there was two clear mandates in this election. The first is that the people have mandated that the rancor created by certain members of the town council (some still present and some departed)must end. The second mandate is that this Town needs to create a better working relationship with the business community. All four newly elected officials made that one of the cornerstones of their campaign. They now need to act on their stated goals and move forward.

PS....It's the people's seat.