Six
city councilors lead by lame duck councilor Pam
Neilon voted to support censorship last week when
they ganged up on Council President Joseph
Quartarone in an illegal vote to stop the airing
on channel 22 of the educational forum sponsored
by RUMBO.
Neilon placed an item on the council agenda
Thursday October 15,1999 claiming it was an
“emergency”. When council president
Joseph Quartarone asked her why it was such an
emergency she replied “because the tape was
already shown on channel 22 last night”. Her
answer was proof of her intentional deceit. The
video tape was aired the evening before, (Monday)
but this did not explain Neilon’s excuse for
declaring it an emergency the Thursday before.
Ms. Neilon continued to mislead the public,
“never has the council shown a political
debate on channel 22 until this week.”
Neilon
obviously has forgotten about HER participation
in the 1997 City Council race, where the Mount
Vernon Associates sponsored a POLITICAL DEBATE at
the Frost school. Ms. Neilon also took part in
the Tower Hill Neighborhood Association debate
that year. At both of these DEBATES candidates
asked each other questions and took questions
from the audience. BOTH DEBATES were shown on
Channel 22 by City council president Steven
Kfoury. So much Neilon’s bogus claim that
this week was a first. Neilon thinks the public
is too stupid to remember her participation just
two short years ago. Either that or she knows
that most people just don’t pay attention.
Neilon had no problem with channel 22 being used
for airing of political debates when SHE was to
benefit from the publicity. But this year Neilon
is not running for reelection. She has no way to
benefit from the airing of the debate. Those who
do stand to benefit from the airing of the tape
are the public, and the candidates who attended,
most of whom Neilon is campaigning against.
That
is exactly what happened last Tuesday night when
Jose Santiago called for a charter objection
which, by law, stops all debate on t he issue
until the next council meting. Neilon and the
rest of the MAYORAL SIX (Laplante, Armano,
KIVELL, Kanaan, Gosselin) only quote the city
charter and the law, when it suits them.
“THIS IS OUR BIBLE MR. CHAIRMAN”
Francis Kivell yelled out disrupting the meeting
and violating charter rules which mandate that he
be recognized first. He held up the charter
yelling over and over disrupting the meeting and
refusing to respect the President of the council
and the rules of council procedure. Quartarone
banged the gavel but Kivell ignored his authority
and continued. Eventually, Mr. Kivell’s
outburst were so disruptive that no council
business could be discussed and President
Quartarone had to call in police to restore
order.
Is the city charter Mr. Kivell’s Bible? Is
it the bible of the council? It should be. But
when the charter called for the removal of
residency violators Mr. Kivell and the M6 seemed
to have sinned a little. The charter also states
that the council president has the prerogative to
recognize councilors and maintain decorum. Mr.
Kivell, yelling out loud and acting out of order,
seemed to be sinning yet again. As his charter
sins were piling up, an audience member called a
point of order. According to the charter, a
member of the audience can call for a point of
order if the council is violating procedure and
that point of order is to take precedent over all
other discussion. Several of the MAYORAL SIX
yelled “Shut up! SIT DOWN!” Have these
people even read the charter cover to cover? When
an audience member knows more about the charter
provisions than the elected councilors something
is seriously WRONG! Thank God this fiasco took
place before the election so the public can see
who the real sources of disruption.
How sad for Lawrence. It is clear that the
majority of the councilors only care about the
charter when it suits them, but when the charter
rules against an action favorable to theMAYORAL
SIX (Laplante, Armano, KIVELL, Kanaan, Gosselin,
Neilon) the provisions of the charter are
trampled and when that doesn’t work,
disorder and chaos are promoted to confuse the
people.
With so few voters paying attention to the
history of recent political events it is easy for
politicians like Pam Neilon to lie and
misrepresent what the law says, and what has been
past practice on the council. Who else is going
to remember whether Pam NEILON’s 1997 debate
was shown on 22 or not? Neilon knows most voters
don’t go to the meetings or watch them on
television. So who is going to challenge her
bogus claims? According to Dalia Diaz and Alberto
Suris, editors and owners of Rumbo, this is now
my job. If you the public do not pay attention to
what your elected officials do when it is NOT an
election year, especially the corrupted
officials, then how can you make an informed
decision when they lie to you at election time?
The MAYORAL SIX (Laplante, Armano, KIVELL,
Neilon, Kanaan, Gosselin) are purposely trying to
prevent the public (especially the elderly who
can not go to these events) from seeing a public
forum because most of them have lied and broken
campaign promises. They don’t want the
public to hear the answers or even the questions
because that will remind you that three of the
M6, KIVELL, ARMANO, and GOSSELIN, looked you in
the eye and promised you they would defend
residency and then did the exact opposite. They
don’t want the voters to see, that when it
comes to the issues like public safety and TAXES
they can not face the music and defend their last
2 years in office.
Only one of the M6, Mark LaPlante bothered to
attend the forum. When was the last time you saw
so many politicians pass up an opportunity to be
on television and mug for publicity? But five of
the M6 refused to attend because they can not
face their opponents and they can not face their
voting record. Suspend your personal feelings for
any of these people, good or bad, and just think
about this before you vote....”If public
officials refuse to face their opponents and the
voters to defend their voting record, are these
the type of people you WANT REPRESENTING YOU FOR
THE NEXT TWO YEARS?” Only you can answer
that question, but if you answer “YES”
remember what Chinese philosopher Confucius once
said “ Be very careful what you ask for,
because you might just get it!”
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