Oldham County Fiscal Court minutes are posted on the oldhamcounty.net website after they have been approved. Example: the minutes from the March 3rd meeting are read and approved (with or without corrections, modifications, etc.) at the March 17th meeting. Then they are posted on the website for all to read. That's great...except when the posted minutes are not accurate.
The Fiscal Court Clerk is Tina M. Schaaf. I would think that it is her ultimate responsibility to make sure that everything posted in the minutes is accurate and factual. Making the minutes available to the public via the web is part of openess that all governmental bodies should have. Making sure that the minutes are truthful about what all transpired during a session of Fiscal Court is paramont.
Case in point:
At the March 3rd meeting, there were two speakers during the first "public comment" session. They were Dewey Wotring and Karen Baughman.
The minutes posted on the website read as follows:
PUBLIC COMMENT: March 3, 2009 Page 235
Dewey Wotring, LaGrange
(concerns about the state of fiscal court)
Karen Baughman, Crestwood
(commended road dept for debris pickup efforts)
While both are true statements as to the nature of the topics they spoke of, there are vital compontents of their comments not conveniently listed for all to see.
Go back, watch the meeting again and see for yourself.
Mr. Wotring did address his concerns about the state of affairs in Fiscal Court. But he pointedly addressed the actions (or lack thereof) on the part of County Judge/Executive Duane Murner and the whole Rawlings secret donation issue. This qualifies as much more than just "concerns about the state of fiscal court".
Even further evidence can be found in this section of the posted minutes:
PUBLIC COMMENT - RESPONSE March 3, 2009 Page 235
Judge-Executive Murner restated his position on the acceptance of the anonymous donation.
As for Ms. Baughman's comments, yes, she did commend the Road Department on their work efforts related to the storm cleanup, and encouraged them to take their time and keep safety in mind while performing their assigned tasks.
BUT, she also commended Dewey Wotring, Jim Pearson (director of the "No Oldham Airport" campaign) and Magistrate Scott Davis for their efforts that helped lead to the defeat the ill-advised general aviation airport issue.
So, you tell me, are the Fiscal Court minutes edited for publication on the web to not publish in greater detail negative opinions or comments that may have been directed at the Court, or an individual member(s) that the Court hears during the "public comment" sections of each meeting?
Get it right Fiscal Court...total openess and transparency and an accurate accounting of the people's business is a mandate before you. Live up to your duties and report to us ALL of the facts, not edited versions that soften the blow when the Court or a member(s) may be criticized or others are praised that do not sit on the Court.
Post a corrected version on the website, and listen closely during the meeting to Ms. Schaaf's reading of the minutes and insist that EVERYTHING be noted and recorded and posted as it happened. After all, the video record does not lie !
HAPPY EASTER to all and may God bless your family this weekend.
The Oldham Observer
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Glad you caught that, cause those people on the court have had their way with things for way to long. Probably didn't include it in the posted minutes cause it would make some of them look bad and they don't wanna see others get credit for doing things that benefit the entire county. Bet Murner had her post it that way. He can't stand being criticized and thinks he's above all of us. Ha! Wait til he runs again and some of the others to. BTW, just what does that Gish lady do for us? Do we really need a deputy judge? He appointed her I bet as a favor then picked his man Church to take her place. They call that stacking the deck don't they? Keep up the good work.
ReplyDeletei see there's at least 3 of you all blogging about o.c. government and that's good since your letting people know the other side of the story or questioning things that need to be answered. that Rash guy sits there and laughs sometimes like it's all a joke and with the way things are now, ain't nothing a joke when it comes to how they spend our money and keep taxing us. and talk about windbags, Voegel and scott Davis sure get long winded repeating themselves over and over to do what, get attention when they are speaking. for God's sake, say what you have to say once and then move on. Voegle laughs almost as much as Rash does and Davis sits there fidgeting with his pen or who knows what? Iva Davis never seems to have much to say, and poor ole Diebel in a recent meeting kept calling the police department the OCD instead of the OCPD I suppose. in my opinion, the only ones that ever act like they take things seriously are Church, Leslie and Greenwell. hope those three will run again and not the others. just my two cents worth. I personally thought Black and Kinser did good jobs, didn't get the county sued and costing us money and they look even better now since Murner's been the judge. oh well, you guys keep up the good job and keep us informed please.
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