The Observation Deck

What is it: A public record from the McEwen Files. What it means:

In response to Bullock a scheme to have a "unified message" by Council prior to the fake December 21, 2015 vote on the Master Agreement, Bullock proposed concerted "Training" of Council by McEwen for Council to collectively "go on the offense."

The attached emails outline clear violations of Sunshine Laws and contains back room admissions of what most of us suspected: Council had already agreed to the Master Agreement before the December 21, 2015 "vote" and a "unified message" was secretly orchestrated--not surprisingly by Bullock.

Indeed, the attached emails between McEwen and Bullock were written on December 10, 2015, the day that Council made the theretofore secret Master Agreement "public."

Recall, O'Leary told me (two days earlier) at Cravings on the morning of December 8, 2015 that he had the Master Agreement and would be voting for it.

McEwen writes "Its an open-meetings-law situation," "for all kinds of reasons I don't understand" and "go get em"

After some classic Bullock "bull" back and forth interaction, McEwen writes: "Ok, cool. Keep me posted."

This is just further evidence of what I've been saying for years.
Tom Bullock is by far the most dishonest, disingenuous politician I have met in my 26 years of local activism.
There is no depth to which he won't stoop to advance his career.
I thank God that after ten years he is still nothing more than a part-time council member from a medium sized town.

What concerns me is that Bullock et. al. seem to clearly understand that there ARE Sunshine Laws that they must abide by and yet they conspire to work around them.

So they didn't just inadvertently or naively violate Sunshine Laws. Not that that would be any better, but the willingness they show to do as they please and public be damned is remarkable.

And further, the council needed "training" on how to respond to constituents? Does that mean they didn't understand the contract they signed? They needed someone to teach them how to sell something they didn't themselves understand?

Bridget Conant wrote:What concerns me is that Bullock et. al. seem to clearly understand that there ARE Sunshine Laws that they must abide by and yet they conspire to work around them. So they didn't just inadvertently or naively violate Sunshine Laws. Not that that would be any better, but the willingness they show to do as they please and public be damned is remarkable. And further, the council needed "training" on how to respond to constituents? Does that mean they didn't understand the contract they signed? They needed someone to teach them how to sell something they didn't themselves understand?

Exactly.
I know Team Summers is reading this.....perhaps Mr. Anderson or one of the City Hall acolytes would like to offer an explanation.
Or are they going to stick to the empty "We love Lakewood, the complainers are haters" mantra that they have been spreading online recently?

"Tom would like to get council's blessing before something goes out.."

"Backroom" Bullock and "Fez" McEwen hard at work in the closet at City Hall.

This seems like an appropriate opportunity to revisit one of the most important developments in this affair, to date:

It isn't just "people on The Deck" asserting a violation of sunshine laws at Lakewood City Hall.

Addressing this issue in February, Lakewood's law director wrote that "there was a violation." The formal representative of city council members, accused of violating open-meeting laws, abandoned the claim that they hadn't broken the law. Instead he proposed that the law had been broken but repaired, or cured, and spelled out the implication of this very plainly: “A cure recognizes that there was a violation.”

(I presume that Lakewood's law director, who last posted to the Observation Deck more than four years ago, does not at this point count as "just one of those people on The Deck.")

Michael Deneen wrote:Or are they going to stick to the empty "We love Lakewood, the complainers are haters" mantra that they have been spreading online recently?

How is wanting to see Lakewood documents, and proof they were right, hating Lakewood?

What kind of screwed up world is this?

How is wanting the truth, bad?

Only in Lakewood.

3 courts, 3 judges, 4 magistrates/moderators have demanded City Hall turn over the records, to the PEOPLE OF LAKEWOOD.

They LOVE CITY HALL, they hate residents.

.

I wonder the same.

Funny how easily some people accept the Team Summers explanation that Mr Essi is a crazed attorney demanding an ungodly amount of documents for some nefarious reason.

In fact, the only thing nefarious is city officials refusing to release documents AFTER BEING ORDERED BY THE COURTS TO DO SO.

If Essi's requests were unreasonable or excessive, the court may have ruled differently.

If 3 judges can look at this situation and agree that the documents should be turned over, and that perhaps the "confidential" documents shouldn't have been classified as such, then where does anyone justify the continued attacks on Essi and the support of city officials who clearly are in violation of the law.

How do you rationalize away the truth so you can "believe" the city's line? Are they that desperate to believe that they weren't duped and all is well in their perfect vision of Lakewood?

Asking questions and demanding answers is your civic duty. To do less is to become complacent and easily led.

People who question are the people who REALLY care about Lakewood and its future.

Someone alerted Eric Sandy of the Cleveland Scene to this thread. Thought his answer was spot on.

Maybe he'll do an expose!

Take notice readers who bash the Deck. It's not a "handful of disgruntled residents!"

There are LOTS of people who recognize that there are problems in Lakewood. It's just that only a few care to take a stand and try to fix them.

Bridget Conant wrote:I wonder the same.

Funny how easily some people accept the Team Summers explanation that Mr Essi is a crazed attorney demanding an ungodly amount of documents for some nefarious reason.

In fact, the only thing nefarious is city officials refusing to release documents AFTER BEING ORDERED BY THE COURTS TO DO SO.

Brian's are not the only request denied. Some people have requests for computer usage of City Hall computers. CLEAR LEGAL PUBLIC RECORDS.

Emails, not connected to the hospital, CLEAR PUBLIC RECORDS, swept to side.

Pssssssssssssssst, Residents of Lakewood. Lakewood City Hall has spent ten years and over $2 million of your tax dollars, to lie, confuse the issues at every turn, every time. It started with "The Hospital is not closing" and continues to this very day.

This is where it gets so easy and so great for everyone!

City Hall produce the documents, show us your ten year secret plan to liquidate our hospital was built on sound thoughts and good processes. Not an effort to siphon off the funds for the mediocre dreams of a small handful of people.

Heal the city TOMORROW, release the documents.

Maybe I was wrong and Lakewood Hospital isn't closing.

If Brian Essi is only partially correct, we need the FBI to step in now. Who has lied more, City Hall? Brian Essi? Who worked for free to unveil DOCUMENTS AND FACTS, and who spent millions of tax payer dollars on miss-information, outright lies, and even intimidation?

Lakewood, time to wake up, as I have said for a couple years. Lakewood has a problem.

.

One of City Hall's good friends was the one to alert Eric Sandy of the scandal.
Does anyone else love the irony of that?

"City Council is a 7-member communications army." Colin McEwen December 10, 2017---the day the Master Agreement was made public.

May Roger Ailes rest in peace.

Jim O'Bryan wrote:

Michael Deneen wrote:Or are they going to stick to the empty "We love Lakewood, the complainers are haters" mantra that they have been spreading online recently?

How is wanting to see Lakewood documents, and proof they were right, hating Lakewood?

What kind of screwed up world is this?

How is wanting the truth, bad?

Only in Lakewood.

3 courts, 3 judges, 4 magistrates/moderators have demanded City Hall turn over the records, to the PEOPLE OF LAKEWOOD.

They LOVE CITY HALL, they hate residents.

.

I think one of the many Team Summers members that reads this forum could better answer that.
Patrick Wadden brought the "Summers critics hate Lakewood" theme to this forum a few days ago.
Wednesday and yesterday it was unleashed at Jen Pae's counterfeit "Lakewood Community" facebook page. Summers groupies came out in force to defend City Hall and the Clinic against any heretics that dare pose questions....among the terms was "nasty", "sore losers" and "haters".

I was even labelled as "mentally ill" by one avid City Hall supporter. Ya know, because mental illness is funny and always a great insult.
City Hall and its minions don't see mental health as a serious health crisis....they see it as a joke.

They don't see much of anything - they wait for City Hall to feed them their lines.

Again, I hope readers take note. THE COURT ORDERED THE CITY TO TURN OVER THE RECORDS.

They have yet to do so.

What is hard to understand? It's not me, or Jim, or the "Deck" saying they need to hand over public records, it's the APPEALS COURT JUDGES!

They aren't here on the Deck and I do not think one of them is from Lakewood. They are independent and impartial.

They said TURN THEM OVER.

How can a reasonable person not understand that the city is NOT FOLLOWING THE LAW?

I thought we heard that council was doing their "due diligence" and had not made up their minds about the Master Agreement in advance.

Is it appearing to anyone else that this was a done deal a long time ago, possibly before the Cleveland Clinic even knew about it? Why did Mr. Cosgrove suddenly abandon ship?

I believe this was all planned out, and that the Cleveland Clinic was just one of City Hall's pawns. It was likely all a plan to give away downtown and city-owned assets to a few friends for a rec center, World of Bars, and you name it. We still don't know what they're going to build.

If anyone feels that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (F.B.I.) needs to be called in, it is best to write a letter and attach all relevant documentation, and send it all to:

Federal Bureau of Investigation - Cleveland Field Office
ATTN: Complaints Department
1501 Lakeside Avenue East
Cleveland, Ohio 44114