Day: February 23, 2016

Last night’s Bay City Council meeting was evidently one for the ages and the Mayor’s new citizens group, the Les Lovers United were in attendance. But what interested me most from last night was the above quote from a Citizen that had never previously attended a City Council meeting because only those blinded by cognitive bias born of perceived self interest can’t see the three ring circus that is the Fillingame Administration as it is pretty apparent to everyone else.

Since the local newspaper of record’s idea of beat reporting on recent meetings consists of letting Les Lovers United spew venom at the Mayor’s critics we’ll do our best here at Slabbed New Media to actually inform the public about what is happening in their City and in that way differentiate the news product. The bottom line here is Slabbed gets its news to report from the City Council Chamber, not the back of the Mayor’s limousine.

First on the agenda was the City Attorney’s contract. You see folks, under the Fillingame Administration the City Attorney evidently operates off a handshake, nod and wink and despite months of the City Council asking for a contract, as strongly recommended by the Office of the State Auditor, one has not been presented to them for approval. I was not at the meeting but you get the feeling City Attorney Rafferty would drag this all out until June 30, 2017 if he could but last night Councilman Doug Seal read the council’s offer to the City Attorney and told him to either have a contract which conforms to those terms ready to execute at the next meeting or the Council would advertise the position.

Mayor Fillingame opened the Mayor’s report by withdrawing his nomination of City Cultural Affairs Director Paula Fairconnetue to be City Clerk.  The Council has previously directed Mayor Fillingame to advertise the position in November after Clerk Clark resigned but that has not still not happened according to Lana Noonan of the Hancock County Alliance for Good Government, who was in attendance last night. My own opinion is its hard to find a qualified City Clerk to hire when you don’t look for one. Continue reading “Recessed Bay City Council Meeting: “These people don’t know what they are doing””