Is Innocent Chris Bortz A Liar?
Chris Bortz and little Leslie Ghizzy
There comes a time when City Hall observers have to put personal likes/dislikes aside and call a person out when they are doing wrong. I like Cincinnati City Councilmember Chris Bortz personally, but I don't like what I saw during yesterday's Finance Committee meeting. I watched the whole, long, 3 hour meeting last night and it seems to me that Bortz and the other members of his faction -- Leslie Ghiz, Jeff Berding, and Chris Monzel -- collectively referred to on this blog as the "fascistic five," made a promise in December and have now reneged on it. (As deceased General Kabaka Oba humorously reminded us once, any person who reneges on a promise can properly be referred to as a reneger.)
Here's how the Cincinnati Enquirer's Howard Wilkinson describes the dispute. (link)
The budget agreement signed by all nine council members last month put $2 million of the 2006 surplus into the city's bank account and gave each of the two factions $1.2 million to spend.
The minority - Cranley, Cecil Thomas, David Crowley and Jim Tarbell - came up with a plan to spend $1 million that added $400,000 to the $2.2 million already budgeted for human service agencies.
....
In December, Bortz signed a motion with the four minority members on how that $1 million would be spent, leading several of the minority to say Monday that he had broken his word to support their plan. Cranley said he was told that Bortz was signing off on the document for "the fiscal five."
Bortz said Monday that he was acting on his own. "When I give my word, I take it very seriously. I told them all along that I would support their plan if the city's budget position would allow it. I'm not sure of that now."
The question is: did Chris Bortz say that he would only support the plan put forward by John Cranley, David Crowley, Cecil Thomas, and Jim Tarbell (and backed by Mayor Mark Mallory) if the City's budget position would allow it? Did he make this up? Did he mean to say this but fail to do so? This is easy enough to prove (and I wonder why no one did it yesterday). Somebody needs to produce the document signed by Bortz and lets see if it says what he claims it says.
I'm going to City Hall today and I'll get the document. (I wonder why Howard Wilkinson didn't do this and post it on the Enquirer's weblog.) Then we can put this issue to rest.
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On another note, during the meeting Leslie Ghiz continued to act like a person with Tourette Syndrome. (Tourette syndrome is a neurological disorder. The major symptom is tics. Tics are sudden, brief, involuntary or semi-voluntary movements -- motor tics -- or sounds -- vocal tics.) Hardly a meeting goes by when Leslie loses control of herself and blurts out something inappropriate. Yesterday, she continued to speak before being recognized by the chairman of the committee. Then, in the middle of the meeting, she blurted out something about John Cranley running for Congress. This type of comment is totally out-of-order and is becoming commonplace for Leslie. For some reason, no one on Council has the nerve to stand up to Leslie and bring her back in order.
5 comments:
Everyone on Cincinnati City Council currently is a liar! The black representative on Council (Cole and Thomas) do not represent the Black Community's best interest in Cincinnati. Both of them need to go! As far as the other Democrats on council (and they ARE THE MAJORITY on Council) are not looking out for the poor and underprivileged. The majority who don't care about the poor and underprivileged in Cincinnati like Bortz, Ghiz, Monzel and Tarbell. Cole should never be elected back to Council again because she has turned her back to the black community and has decided to caucass with people like Berding, Ghiz and Monzel. The most intelligent thing that came out of Cecil Thomas's mouth during that Finance Meeting was that "I got a headache." He wants to talk about how Cincinnati needs public servants and not politicans, that's because Cecil Thomas doesn't know how to be a politican. If he did, he would be a lot more productive on Council. Bortz says one thing about voting for services then decides that he wants to "take a couple weeks to make sure he knows what he is voting for". He's an attorney! He doesn't know what he's voting for in the first place??! He knew there was a Finance meeting on 1/29/07...did he forget and not properly prepare to cast a vote? This is exactly what's wrong with Cincinnati politics...they talk out of their necks all the time, they bicker and fight as we saw during the Finance Meeting yesterday and don't get anything done. Vote for one person so there's no overlapping and hopefully your single choice wins out. We need 9 new council members in the fall of 2007 who are not incompetent.
"We need 9 new council members in the fall of 2007 who are not incompetent." l.g
Cincinnati also needs a ward system ASAP. You guys should be sick and tired of the same old "prototypes" of people elected and the lack of resources not filtering down to communities that need it the most. The same neighborhoods keep getting the dollars, while the poor neighborhoods continue to decay. Until then, the Bortz, Ghiz, Berdings, will continue to work in the interest of big business and their rich friends.
Council needs to stop acting so childish, grandstanding and falling all over each other for soundbites. Leslie G-Whiz is a joke. Is she an alledged attorney? Berding should quit delaying his press conference to announce his switch to his real party along with - I cant recall - Bortz.
Some people will say anything to win popularity, get in the news, or to become elected. Most of the time there is no follow through.
What we need to do, is keep an eye on who is not being honest, not vote for them, and show as many people as we can about their lies.
Council does need to lose a few of it's members, the fighting has to stop. This is City Hall, not a 4th grade lunchroom.
I know my own Campaign for Council has been very unorthadox and could be labeled as immature in some ways. This is mostly do to the message of youthfulness and fun in the political process I am trying to inject. BUT... If I was ever elected I would not act like a fool inside a meeting that was meant to benefit our declining city.
The arrogance in office right now is sickening, most these people don't know what it is like to be poor, and therefore should not be making decisions that effect the poor. I want more common people on the council who know what adversity is, and have experienced it enough, to know what really is important in life and our Coummunity.
This is my problem...how is it possible that the CPD not only receive the lions share of the budget but according to the Enquirer there are some concerns that the new CPD contract may require more than previously thought. Why is it that every other branch of local government has to trim its budget but not the CPD. Our health dept, waste removal, all were on the table but not the CPD. Violent crime has steadily increased but there is no call for accountability, no one at City Hall seems willing to call the chief on the carpet. This remains a mystery to me. There were many calls over the years for the CPD to address the crime issues, mostly drug related in OTR. They never did anything to stop the open air drug markets that I myself witnessed and made both city council and the CPD aware of. It is amazing to me that after the Sheriff's dept became involved people begin to see a difference. I wonder why??? The CPD is holding the city hostage. They slowed down after the civil unrest of 2001 and by doing so helped to create the crime climate that we currently face, yet they will get whatever they ask for and more at the expense of the poor, mentally ill and disenfranchised.
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