The Observation Deck

April 12, 2010

Mr. Tom Bullock
Lakewood City Council
12650 Detroit Avenue
Lakewood OH 44107

Dear Mr. Bullock:

On the evening of Monday, April 5 you as a member of Lakewood City Council
proposed for the first time a series of three supposed "campaign finance reforms." As fellow members of City Council, we were puzzled by these proposals, for several reasons. First, the inflammatory wording of your communication created the false impression that public servants in Lakewood may have been receiving improper compensation or have otherwise been associated with the county corruption scandal. Second, portions of your proposals are likely unconstitutional and are therefore a waste of Council's time and taxpayers' money. Third, although you have been on City Council for over two years, you waited to introduce these proposals until less than a month before your upcoming primary election date against another member of our Council. Fourth, campaign finance reform is mor effectively done at the county level, rather than piecemeal at the suburban municipal level, because our elections are conducted by a County Board of Elections, not by the City of Lakewood. For these reasons and more, many people in the room that night were confused by your out-of-left-field proposals.

The confusion was cleared up the very next day, on April 6, when voters in Lakewood and Cleveland received campaign literature from you, attacking a fellow member of Lakewood City Council. This slick campaign flier proclaimed that you "pushed for tough new campaign finance reforms in Lakewood." In support of this specious claim, the political piece cited the meeting minutes of Lakewood City Council. But your campaign literature was printed and sitting at the mail house BEFORE you even introduced these proposals. The flier makes reference to meeting minutes that did not yet exist because the meeting did not yet occur.

You call yourself "an honest reformer" campaigning for "tougher ethics laws." But your political actions are neither honest nor ethical. You have made a mockery of Lakewood City Council by using our legislative process to introduce unwarranted, unworkable, and potentially unconstitutional ordinances, purely to score cheap political points. You have traded the integrity of our legislative body for a weak punch-line in your campaign literature.

As Lakewood taxpayers in a time offiscal crisis, we are appalled that you chose to introduce legislation that, if passed, would surely require us to spend huge sums of money defending these ill-conceived ordinances against constitutional challenges. As Democrats, we are embarrassed that you as president of our Lakewood Democratic Club would engage in slimeball attack-style negative campaigning against a dedicated public servant. And, most important, as members of Lakewood City Council, we are outraged that you would so blatantly abuse our legislative process for your own short-sighted personal political gain.

You, sir, should be ashamed. The people of Lakewood deserve better than these
political games from an elected representative.

Sincerely,

Mary Louise Madigan / Brian E. Powers

I am very sad to see that a once promising public servant has caused such a pained and heartfelt response from colleagues.
In reading the excellent coverage of Lakewood City Council by Christopher Bindle, it has perplexed me that why it has taken over a year to resolve the question of walking a dog at Lakewood Park has occupied Mr. Bullock's time.
The equally important matter of having a chicken coup has apparently yet to be voted on.

We need a heavy hitter, as our State Representative - somebody who can carry on the legacy of Jim Flannery, Dick Celeste, Francine Panehal, Madeline Cain, Mike Skindell, Brian Flannery.

Nickie Antonio, like the others, is one of us - and will do us proud down in Columbus.

Stan Austin

Stan,

Thank you for the complement. However I wanted to let you know that the matter about having chickens in Lakewood has already been settled quite some time ago. The proposal was put down in the housing committee and never made it to an ordinance stage. I apologies if I did not cover this sufficiently. I thought that I included it, but it may have accidentally fallen through the cracks, I do not remember since it was probably about 6-9 months ago.

If we need to start using chickens to pay for health care, it could end up being important. ;


http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archiv ... ?ref=fpblg

BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES

Screenplay by Michael Cristofer
Based on the book by Tom Wolfe

Morgan Freeman as the judge.

Decency!
And decency is not a deal. Or an
angle, or a contract, or a hustle
or a campaign or a trick or a bid
for sympathy. Decency is not the
beast that bays for money, power,
dominion, position, votes and
blood! Decency is what your
grandmother taught you! Decency is
in your bones! Do I make myself
clear! Now go home. Go home now.
Be decent people. Be decent.


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That must be one of your favorite quotes of all time, I've seen you use it on here before.

Christopher Bindel wrote:That must be one of your favorite quotes of all time, I've seen you use it on here before.

yes it is.

i think what your grandmother would think is a good gauge for decency.

My grandmothers were very decent, understanding people.

Of course, we are all human, and we often fall short. But it is nice to have goals,
and guides that we can try to live to.

I am a Tom Wolfe fan, loved the book, and think Brian DePalma did a pretty
darn good job on the movie version starring Bruce Willis and Tom Hanks,
though the critics panned it.

.

Jim O'Bryan wrote:

Christopher Bindel wrote:That must be one of your favorite quotes of all time, I've seen you use it on here before.

yes it is.

i think what your grandmother would think is a good gauge for decency.

My grandmothers were very decent, understanding people.

Of course, we are all human, and we often fall short. But it is nice to have goals,
and guides that we can try to live to.

I am a Tom Wolfe fan, loved the book, and think Brian DePalma did a pretty
darn good job on the movie version starring Bruce Willis and Tom Hanks,
though the critics panned it.

.

It has come to our attention that the Lakewood Observer appears in the latest Bullock
mailing announcing "Standing Up For Reform" and accountability in government.

It should be noted that the article is written by a friend of Mr. Bullock and that he has
made ZERO efforts to be accountable since winning his election. Matter of fact he has
disappeared from anything that would hold him accountable. In the last election he ran
on the "helped form the Observer" campaign, then instantly went silent, because it no
longer suited his style. So will he do the same with Lakewood if it no longer suits his style?

It pains me to say this, but I am as impressed with this campaign as I was with his
war on Crime campaign, which saw him burning Lakewood to the ground publicly
with how bad crime was, and his pro tagging campaign. Where he basically begged the
taggers of Cleveland to come to Lakewood where you could make his facebook page.

It has also come to my attention that Mr. Bullock was consulted before his move to "change
COUNTY election laws through Lakewood City Council," and was told they had ZERO effect
or impact on county legislation or laws."

This post really pains me because I like Tom, and think should he ever stop running, he
could be a very good representative to the people, should he ever put down roots and
decide who those people are.

As of right now we are preparing to look at how the Observers(all) handle anything
involving candidates running for office, to make sure this does not happen again.

FWIW


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