How Does Accountability And Transparency Start...

[Jim O'Bryan]

... in a City with almost none?

So we have a serious problem that seems desperate for a solution but is there any real solution in sight? Why do elected officials seem so desperate to remain unaccountable for their deeds and actions? Why do Lakewood’s elected officials run on honesty and transparency, literally all, yet all fall in line within a month or two of being in office?

In Lakewood, why does it not matter that elected officials are not only not honest and forthcoming, but actively work together to hide the facts, conspire to cover up the truth, and then take part in the continuing disrespect of the very people who voted them in?

This brings us to Councilman Rader’s “Ethics Committee” proposal, and the real question: Will it have any teeth? Why is it needed? Why does Tristan feel it is needed? Instead of Council Members simply asking the Attorney General and/or State Auditor to come in and look at something? Doesn’t it make more sense to get rid of redundancies, and make City Council and City Hall more accountable for their own honesty at City Hall?

Here is a list of topics I would love to see the State look at. What would help get these in front of the State Auditor faster, another Ethics Committee, or a straight pipeline to the state?

1. Potential misappropriation of public funds through the misuse of city-owned computers and facilities for partisan political purposes.

2. Potential misappropriation of public funds through the misuse of a city-retained consultant for partisan political purposes.

3. The city failed to seek an independent appraisal of Lakewood Hospital prior to its liquidation. The city failed to bid the hospital assets in accordance with public bidding requirements.

4. By this liquidation of Lakewood Hospital, tens of millions of dollars of public value have been transferred or will likely be transferred to private parties, i.e.: the Cleveland Clinic Foundation, a non-profit foundation and a developer slated to receive the former hospital site along with millions of dollars in site preparation costs.

5. The value received by the city for its ownership interests under this hospital liquidation is disproportionately small in comparison to the value conveyed to various private parties.

6. City officials have routinely made material financial misrepresentations about Lakewood Hospital and the value of the liquidation and redevelopment benefits to both the public and, concomitantly, to investors holding our municipal bonds.

7. One or more city employees are believed to have used city-owned computers and facilities to harass individual citizens who opposed the closure of Lakewood Hospital.

8. The governmental processes resulting in the liquidation of the hospital appear to be tainted with multiple conflicts-of-interest relating to certain trustees of the Lakewood Hospital Association.

We need to ask ourselves early in this discussion... "How would an Ethics Commission in Lakewood deal with these and many other daily issues over ethics and government that seem to crop up daily in Lakewood?"

If City Hall, City Council and others are unwilling to answer and look into these important topics now, when does Ethics start to matter? Only after the start of a redundant Ethics Committee? Is the past forgotten? Do we dare take one step to the future until we are allowed to at least see City Hall actively work to be more accountable and transparent? It seems to me that all of the talk of an Ethics Committee comes from City Hall's repeated efforts to ignore ethics at every turn, and it has become so inbred in the way the City runs, that all that is left is for another group, outside of those promising accountability but delivering none, to carry the load and make decisions, which will be ignored.

There is very little doubt in anyone's mind that the worst Mayor in Lakewood's history has traded financial security and the heart of the city for some magic beans, and $50 million for their friends to play with. That this entire debacle has been riddled with ethics violations, misrepresentations and outright lies. Why the lies, why the hidden documents? Why the ethics violations and intimidation for the "best thing to ever happen to Lakewood" as it was sold to us by Mayor Summers and his sycophants?

An Ethics Committee-- great idea if anyone can explain how it makes our current government, and all our current elected officials accountable for their past and future actions.

Why can't our current council demand a clearing of the past, so that together as a City healed and filled with REAL facts we can move on like the community we used to be before the current regime took over?

Council President Sam O'Leary and Councilman-At-Large Tom Bullock need to understand that if either of them expect to become Mayor, the community needs facts, accountability, the truth and the documents?

When do accountability, transparency and honesty start in Lakewood government?

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[Mark Kindt]

This Says It All!

I nominate this post as post of the year!

It says it all.

For those that need a visual representation, please drive by the intersection of Detroit and Belle each week and observe as our community hospital is demolished as a result of the feckless, tainted, and wooden-headed decisions described by Mr. O'Bryan above.

I support the proposal for an Ethics Commission and an ethics officer.

However, that proposal does not replace the need for openness, accountability, and transparency with respect to withheld documents that city council could and should demand.

However, that proposal does not replace the need for a competent investigation by other public agencies.