Good morning.
Wednesday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of 76. Sunrise is 6:56 and sunset 6:30 PM for 11h 34m 11s of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 70.6% of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1795, Napoleon first rises to prominence by suppressing counter-revolutionary rioters threatening the National Convention.
There are those wondering, today, what last night’s meeting of the Whitewater Common Council means for the city. A few offerings:
-
It was inevitable, or nearly so, that the Whitewater Common Council would hire a third attorney, at municipal expense, to counsel them in their ill-advised posture toward Whitewater’s current city manager. One is reminded of a passage from Proverbs: ‘Like a dog going back to his vomit, a fool repeats his folly.’ Over these last weeks since August, I’ve contended in correspondence or conversation with residents that this council would most certainly hire a third attorney.
-
A key point about this council majority: bad often goes to worse, and that’s because bad seldom recognizes itself. It’s something like the contention that the first condition of a barbarian is that he doesn’t know he’s a barbarian. That’s this majority: about as dense and dim a group as this city has or could produce. It’s as though someone called central casting and asked for a mix of deep ignorance and unmerited arrogance. Credit where credit is due: if someone did ask for those types, then central casting sure delivered for Whitewater!
-
There’s no point in expecting good judgment from this crew; that was never going to happen. Nothing but nothing a serious person could say or write would ever matter to these ridiculous people. One speaks and writes for others; neither in public affairs nor at table would anyone profitably converse with the members of this majority.
-
Since April, this council majority has become an impediment to its own city.
-
No normal professional would stay working for a city where the council majority is a collection of mediocrities and misfits. Of course normal people will head for the door — expect much more of this.
-
For some of these council members, the exodus of others is like an unconfessed goal, so that there is no one better to make them look inevitably worse by comparison. Some people prefer to rule in dirt rather than serve in cleanliness.
-
No one who sees a few clips of this council majority would want to work for this city. As long as this council majority persists, Whitewater (including the already execrable CDA) will never be able to hire good employees. Losers, liars, layabouts, and liquor pigs are all we will be able to attract. The former council majority put together good hires and a good team; it’s all downhill for hiring since April.
-
You broke it, you bought it. The city should look elsewhere for success and prosperity, but it’s a sad truth that the portion of a libertarian’s time focused on the Whitewater Common Council will yield fruitful examples of their inadequacies. There’s something to be said for the role of happy warrior. Never a dull moment.
The first step is to recognize that this council majority has nothing good to offer Whitewater; the next step is to turn toward those others in the city who offer in their private efforts incomparably more.
There is a way out for the community, itself, however, as this libertarian blogger has written repeatedly: turn away from this inadequate and addled band on council, and work to build a better city apart from them. They represent the bottom of Whitewater; look elsewhere for the top. There is no better community in which to be, embarrassment and inadequacy of this common council notwithstanding. I’ve written this way for years; it’s never been more true than now.
On that better private course, see Waiting for Whitewater’s Dorothy Day, Something Transcendent, and in the Meantime, An Oasis Strategy, The Community Space, People Bring Color. and From Government, Failure is Both Loss and Distraction.
Is This the Best Salt In the World?:
That’s the bottom line. This council is a write off. Allen and crew are a wrecking ball but they don’t get it. Totally agree that it’s a crap show from here on out as long as they’re in place. Don’t you think that’s the point though? As long as they run the place and feel important that’s enough for them.
Can you imagine interviewing with Allen/Gerber/Hicks/Stone/That NPC Guy? What a joke.
Best line is “Losers, liars, layabouts, and liquor pigs are all we will be able to attract”. 100% correct Mr. Adams.
We are about to fall off a cliff with these council clowns.
Good morning. Thanks for commenting. I am sure that the city has awakened to what seems like a new situation. It’s understandable that residents would see it this way.
It’s not new. From the time the former city council hired a productive manager to overcome years of stagnation, some on the council and others on the CDA have worked behind the scenes to stymie that progress. When a few inadequate councilmembers were joined with others in April, they formed a majority that has worked even more diligently to preserve the failed status quo.
Everyone’s welcome in Whitewater, but not one among your list should ever have found his or her way to the Whitewater Common Council. Collectively, they work a worse result than individually.
The problem of attracting private residents and good public-office candidates to Whitewater is now acute.
big step back for whitewater except that is a step back of the cliff. more like a fall now.
funny that people in town didn’t believe you that thsi was coming. yeah, this was definitely coming.
it’s like this city really is cursed. get a chance to be better and the same olds pull it back down.
thanks for telling the truth about it.
People shouldn’t have had to worry about this coming. It was coming, and it will most certainly continue under this council majority, but people have many priorities. There are two related perspectives that afflict these few: they don’t know what they don’t know, and they overestimate the value of what they do know. They are also incapable of seeing how ignorant, petty, temperamental, or unprofessional they are.
The city’s not cursed, but it is afflicted with a few special interests and their operatives, catspaws, and lickspittles.
I’m not sure, but I’d guess that Allen in particular thinks that if a few capable people are driven out, replaced with the kind of misfits that would be willing to take a municipal job where he runs the show, it’s back to business as usual.
Back to business, however, would only matter to people who respect the kind of business that this ilk conducts.
There’s another angle to all this. The campus has made gains this year, but that’s all in jeopardy with the old guys back in the driver’s seat. The people you call special interests were not able to stop the campus slide. It really turned around despite them. There is little reason to think progress will continue with those guys back behind the wheel. Same with the community development association. Why send your kids to a campus in a city that’s hitting the skids? Why move here for that? The school district will take a hit, also.
It’s just common sense to predict decline with this bunch. It really is a double task going forward. What can help ordinary people while these guys are scraping bottom? That’s going to be hard because any professional from anywhere will laugh at how these guys talk and act.
I’m not sure it can be done but I admire you for thinking you can try.
Now this is hard — the very heart of the problem. The city is beautiful, her residents worthy and deserving, but the Whitewater Common Council is now a millstone around the city’s neck. Not one or two, but a majority.
And so, and so, how to write about inadequate men and women of council (or the school board) while supporting and encouraging private accomplishments? I’ve thought about this, as though one should include a disclaimer with each post about council, for example (‘this city is better than the councilmember whose words and deeds I am about to describe’).
Effort will need to go toward promoting a better private course in spite of this council. see Waiting for Whitewater’s Dorothy Day, Something Transcendent, and in the Meantime, An Oasis Strategy, The Community Space, People Bring Color. and From Government, Failure is Both Loss and Distraction.
The city has deserved better from its council majority; this city is better than its council majority.
Looks like Jim Allen got caught lying about not sending language to the city with the word termination. READ THIS: https://whitewaterwise.com/council-approves-10000-expenditure-to-hire-attorney-to-advise-it-on-personnel-matters/
Also, can you tell me why someone needs 10K to get advice on their job when other places just have representatives who can think for themselves?
It’s a big scam.
It’s a simple technique to keep denying, rather than admitting, and hope that others don’t trouble themselves to refute the original false claim. That’s what this was — catch me if you can.
Look at the claims Allen makes at the 8.15.23 council meeting about the need for a third attorney, and in the space of 6 minutes he offers 5 justifications:
Transcript and Video.
1. At 0:28 on the video, he says “All right, I’ll second it” to this motion: “I move to authorize the council to retain a separate attorney for common
council’s use in regard to personnel matters or employees that council oversees.”
2. Fewer than three minutes later, at 2:57, Allen says “We need separate representation when doing John’s performance evaluation.”
3. At 5:48, Allen then declares representation will be “Only as needed.”
4. At 5:52, Allen then declares “No. We don’t have a use for it right now, I don’t believe.” (If it’s “only as needed,” or he felt the council didn’t “have a use for it right now, I don’t believe,” then why did Allen make the clear declaration only two minutes earlier that there was a specific and concrete purpose for the attorney?)
5. Then at 6:10, Allen says he’s entitled to hire another lawyer because “It’s just discretion.” (If that should be true, and hiring a lawyer doesn’t require a specific purpose, then Allen must believe that he can say and do anything.)
Allen’s 8.15.23 claims look like a child’s pretexts, the way young children will offer any number of consecutive justifications for whatever they say or do. In those cases, however, an adult guides the child to a more direct way of speaking and behaving.
As for why “someone needs 10K to get advice on their job when other places just have representatives who can think for themselves?” well, the stated need is so unpersuasive that I’m not able to offer an explanation.
“The city has deserved better from its council majority; this city is better than its council majority.”
Words very much worth some pondering. Thank you for such forthright commentary.
Thank you for reading and commenting.