4//22/14
Tonight the Board of Trustees repealed the censure on a unanimous vote. Erie has returned to common sense and teamwork. Click here for the article.
4/1/14 - Update
The election today voted out of office Trustees Grassi and Mahe. Trustee Carnival and Mayor Wilson choose not to run. The 4 behind the censure are now out of office. Thank you Erie Voters!
1/4/14 - Original Blog
Censure - strong disapproval or harsh criticism.
It happened to me and Trustee Gruber at the Erie Board of Trustee meeting on Tuesday, Dec 10, 2013.
By resolution, and without an opportunity to respond, on a 4-3 vote, Mayor Wilson and Trustees Grassi, Mahe, and Carnival took it upon themselves to become Erie’s de facto judge and jury. In a show of desperation, Mayor Wilson purposely and willfully did not allow us to speak in our own defense without interruption during this shocking process. Our voices were silenced. The process resembled politics of a country ruled by a dictator and his cronies - ignore the facts, silence opposing views.
A bit of history/timeline is important:
- Mayor Wilson negotiates a property deal for the Town without oversight of town staff.
- The Town declines to purchase the property.
- Mayor buys the property at a discount below what he brokered to the town.
- Mayor confronts tenant on property and is issued a restraining order and ordered by the court to divest the property.
- All 6 Erie Trustees launch an investigation into the Mayor Wilson’s actions knowing costs would be incurred by the town.
- Erie resident, Liz Fisher, files a subsequent ethics complaint.
- Trustees unanimously vote to suspend their duplicate investigation of Mayor Wilson. This ensure costs for only one investigation.
- Investigator asks Board for relevant information from an executive session - Grassi, Carnival, Ogg vote to block him from seeing the information.
- Investigator then concludes ethics investigation and could not confirm Wilson profited.
- Investigator also says that the information from the executive session was not made available and the landowners who profited could not remember key discussions with Mayor Wilson.
- Wilson, Carnival, Grassi and Mahe then vote to censure us for not telling them we answered Liz Fisher's questions. They stated that we caused the cost of the investigation, conveniently ignoring the fact they approved the investigation.
- On another close vote, the board approves $10,000 in legal fees for Mayor Wilson. That is $9,000 over what the law allows. I voted against this and strongly voiced concern regarding the appearance of legal fees included from his personal retraining order case.
Neither of us knew about Liz Fisher’s ethics complaint before it was filed to investigate the Mayor Wilson’s ethical behavior. Neither one of us filed nor wrote the ethics complaint.
There is nothing unethical or illegal about talking with constituents. And we certainly don’t have to get Wilson, Grassi and Carnival’s approval to do so. We discuss Town business with constituents, associates, town staff, and other government & business leaders all the time. We can and will continue to talk to any Erie resident that have questions on any subject related to town business.
The willingness of Wilson, Grassi, Carnival, and Mahe to impose domination through censure is a direct threat to democracy in Erie. In a free society the views of our citizens must be heard without the threat of punitive action.
As elected officials in the minority we also must have voices not squelched by those who hold a majority. Our voices in Erie will not be stopped nor censored by people who behave like a bullies.
Take care,
Janice
