After getting a look at the first page of the new Reporter I did not know if I should laugh or cry and this feeling persisted as I scrolled through. Let's take a look at the bottom line here in CV regarding our media outlets.
Channel 63 used to be a mere scroll of announcements and then we had talented people come in and work to change that. First we had Neil Moore who was first under the bus when he disagreed with you know who!
Then we had a nice developmental period of time under the aegis of John and Kitty Gregg who used their experience and laid out their own money to set up a professional system and enhanced the taping and sound of the various committee meetings. All fine and good but the ominous sign were there for the looking.
First Channel 63 was brought in to the Reporter building, the closer to the teeth of Joy Vestal. Better supervision, huh? Some issues about repayment of funds is what I heard but I cannot be sure about that, so reporting it as a rumor heard around the town. Finally we have a great Channel 63 and oops! No Go! Ed Black decides that an innocuous video about a book club that I belong to had to go and why? Because the powers that be have decided that I am to be a non person here in the Village. No paper outlet as I am verboten in the Reporter on the dictat of Vestal and now no visuals as anything I have to say is "tainted". Wow! McCarthy hearings and witch hunts of our own making! Er...Ed....er Fred, made sure to send me a note that the video was removed because "I am a silly old slob and a moron" so thank you for that shining example of the level of your thinking and that of your partner in crime. Sure do admire the syntax and advanced thinking it represents. So the Greggs resigned on principle.
So what is left? Ahhh.... the total and complete submission of the paper to the needs of David Israel and no bones about it. Israel knew and published the letters he received re the ballots from the previous election and in his own inimitable way managed to regress to kindergarten level and then made sure that the paper would have pictures of voting scenes. So what? What does that prove? Nothing, actually, but this is all an attempt to try the issue in a one handed one sided underhanded manner. Par for the course. Here is Vestal's promise - "We promise to seek the truth and to print both sides of an issue, to open dialogue to inform our readers, not to create controversy."
Because there is a disagreement, a different opinion, does not mean there is controversy. That DOES arise when differing opinions are censored based on the whims of a singularly unqualified person.
And yet, read the editorial questioning whether the questions that arose about the election would have been asked under other circumstances. Well, the answer is YES, emphatically so. Our election process is flawed, very flawed, outgrown, out dated, open to violations of honesty and accountability and the meeting was a farce. There was a meeting prior to that and promises were reneged upon, as they were at the election. The whole thing needs to be swept clean and perhaps even get an outside neutral adviser in to formulate new procedures and new voting systems. What we have is a travesty.
Look what the paper and UCO have sunk to. Instead of paying attention to the associations as UCO should be doing, instead of having real and timely meetings with the boards of these associations, instead of keeping an eye out for those associations that are struggling, we get a litany of excuses as to why this whole issue was neglected and allowed to grow and develop into this poisonous situation where there is danger to our very existence via Sheffield O and its venial disruptor. One fool says UCO cannot do anything legally, but who the hell said anything legally. It is called ADVICE. It is called assistance. It is called help during a time of need. It is called the duty of the VP whose assigned role is not to yes, yes to David Israel but to watch his/her own area. So let us see who the Vp for Sheffield area is. .....Ahhhhh - there you have it - Bob Marhsall.
Yes, the same VP who falls asleep at meetings. The same VP who chose at a time of crisis for the Village, to write stories of his grandchildren in his column. Very cute, but seriously! This will help how? Are we to have a grandparent competition to scare off the motel developer? Are we to go down laughing and going aawww, so cute?
The whole paper is rife with pleas for volunteers. Need I repeat the same old same old. Cornish, Vestal, et al, put your money where your mouth is. Have a bit of courage and face up to the sheikh in the back office. Use our resources properly or is asking a former officer, several times over, an expert at finances, to submit an application for a position as an Exec. Bd. member considered proper management and usage of resources. Hey, here's an idea - Howie O'Brien is unfortunately ill in the hospital - and we send our wishes for a full recovery - but how about using this person's skills during this time of need/?Who are you planning to stick in there instead? Bob Marshall, he who is asleep or telling tales, who signed away $80,000 or perhaps Ed Black...shudder...but then again, that man never wants to sign his name to anything and leave a paper trail. So put on your thinking caps for a change, not the dunce caps!
If we do not fix this place up, if we do not start using our heads, then I suggest that it might be time to move on for those for whom this is a home, our only home. I cannot afford to go down with the ship and nor can many others. Unless we get rid of this UCO administration, voting with one's feet may be the most honest way of voting and the most telling and effective. That movement has already begun. Sad, terribly sad, for all of us.
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