Nextdoor Chronicles #1 The Forum and bigger issues
A candidates view of the forum.
In general, I think many questions were mundane enough, however there were a couple of clearly tendentious questions from the audience that provided a soapbox for one candidate's negative campaigning about some vague, personal beef she suddenly has with Village Board “leadership”, and employee turnover.
The questions came from the audience in written form, and the forum committee decided which ones would be presented. I was disappointed to find out afterward that some very pertinent and even-handed questions from the audience were ignored while they took new questions more amenable to more liberal ideologies.
The format of the forum was such, that 90 seconds gave plenty of time for someone to make false claims and accusations without substantiating them, while that same time frame made it nearly impossible to decisively rebut such claims with the factual details.
I used my time to get a few facts out there to provide a reasonable doubt to the false claims. If I would have had more time, I would have explained more of the truth of the matter, which is that there has been a stressful, frustrating office work environment at the Village office FOR YEARS, as it is nothing new. Back in 2019 this issue was identified by the Board and the staff as a MANAGEMENT PROBLEM. As trustee, I was the staff's greatest advocate for better conditions, and I still am.
The only thing I see as being new about any of it now, is this tactic of one of my opponents and her devotees to scapegoat the Village Board for staff turnover as a means to deflect from administrative accountability. I see this behavior of the a few bad actors on social media, as being an example of dishonest, dirty politics and a deliberate misrepresentation of facts in order to affect the election vote.
I guess that is what people do when they have nothing of merit to show as a means to recommend themselves, or by those who support them.
Others can choose to make up false accusations and inflated issues that are hyped up now, and will certainly disappear after the election, but we have real-world issues to deal with in this village, like water quality, keeping tax rates low, ordinance revisions, accountability, and the need for financial transparency. I have dealt with issues like this head-on for the past 4 years, and if re-elected, I will continue to do so. I have details on some of these issues, as well as realistic reasons for employee turnover at kencharneski.blogspot.com
At the forum, I found it very unprofessional of you to say how much better things have gotten in the last 6 months. I believe you said it twice. It was a low jab on your part. Sorry, not voting for you. There might be one person , prior to the forum I might have voted for. After listening to them talk I changed my mind. They are too aligned with you.
• Kronenwetter
Author
Tim,
What am I supposed to do? Lie to cover up the fact that we hired some not-so-good fits, based on Mr. Downey's glowing recommendations?
Two of those hires came out of committees that held illegal, unposted secret meetings in violation of Open Meetings statutes, and which Ms. Wadel-Leff, Ms Akey, and President Voll, etc. participated in. We have no recording or minutes - no record of any kind. Shouldn't that concern you more than these vague and false accusations that someone was not polite enough to someone else?
Good employees are like gold, and get the honor and respect that they should. Bad employees are a liability. And yes, there is such a thing as a bad employee.
You may be biased against me for whatever reason, but I really don't think you know what you are talking about. Call the current department heads, Clerk, Treasurer, Zoning Administrator, Police Chief, and see what they tell you about my conduct or integrity.
Better yet, do this: take a large flash drive to the Village Clerk and request copies of my emails.
Someone from the media did a public information request for all of my emails from 2020, and 2021, all in .pdf format. Since they are there, and already all prepared, get them and browse through them. See what I have been doing on behalf of the Village residents, and see what was going on behind the scenes. Until you see how dysfunctional things were, you won't know how reserved I was being in my statement at the forum. Then decide if I am the bad guy that your friends are trying to paint me as.
(edited)
ken charneski
Please edit and REMOVE MY NAME from your comment about "unposted, secret meetings". I have never knowingly or unknowingly attended any secret Village meeting. If any meeting I attended wasn't posted properly, it was 1) not my responsibility; and 2) very likely an accidental occurrence. I've never known a staff member to schedule meetings that are knowingly handled improperly. • Kronenwetter
Author
Well, you know about it now.
I did not say it was your responsibility or assume that you "knowingly" did anything. I just stated a fact that you participated in it.
Were you not on the selection committee in 2020 for a new treasurer? Didn't you think it was odd that there was no chairman, no agenda, no recording or minutes, and yet you were conducting Village business as assigned to you by the Village Board? You, Wadle-Leff, and Mr. Fifrick have been around enough to have known better. (I have corrected my previous post – It was Randy Fifrick on that committee, not Chris Voll. Mr Voll was on another committee that held meetings under identical unposted circumstances.)
As for an "accident", - no dice. It turns out that Mr. Downey has been conducting these "search/selection" committees in a non-compliant manner for several years. They were deliberate and in fact the way I found out about it was that as one of those selection committee members, we all got an email from him setting the date and saying that he was not going to post the meeting.
If you have been listening to the Board meetings the way you say you have, you must have heard the discussion about this issue when the subject of unpaid committee members was on the agenda. Why were you not as vocal about Mr. Downey's misconduct as you are about the "chilling" effect of the "tone" of Village Board meetings? Mr. Downy still denies wrongdoing.
I list your three names as examples of those who hypocritically nit-pick the alleged behavior or “tone” of those like me who seek a better government, just for the sake of disparagement. Fifrick and Wadle -Leff make outright false accusations. All the while you yourselves have been part of the problem of a very lax, slipshod, inefficient government.
You arbitrarily set morals of how others should act, while you all are involved in violating clearly defined statutes. It is a “glass house” situation.
Some people think I exaggerate when I use the term "dysfunctional" but I'm not. Village operations and staff morale were a disaster when I was elected in 2018. I have been working to fix it ever since.
You have been no help.
You already know about last year's discovery that Downey has ignored the purchasing policy right from the time you hired him. That is no small deal, and is still not corrected according to statute. He also has 5 years of local ethics code violations under his belt, and so do many others because of him. He apparently has not directed any lawful budget amendments for years either, certainly not since I was elected. Only after I explained it three separate times and demanded compliance, did he finally conform to following the law.
Now we find out about his unlawful secret meetings to conduct Village business. What next?
President Voll has ignored Downey's misconduct, and you have ignored it when you should have noticed it, but now that you have to own your association with it, you want your name removed. Why should it be? If you don't like the feeling of being unwittingly a part of Downey's antics, welcome to the club; he has drawn the Board into similar situations a number of times. The difference is that I'm trying to identify and correct this hazard, while you have consistently defended the status quo.
There is much more to say about the management of this village, and I can't help but think that I have been targeted for removal by Downey supporters due to my efforts to clean up and straighten out Village Hall.
The things I just mentioned are only a few of the kind of things that I'm trying to put an end to before others get caught up in his reckless and incompetent activities.
You and your friends can go on making your pious judgments about things like my "tone", but I have bigger things to deal with on behalf of the people who elected me.
The new department heads are a great step forward, but there is still a lot to get straightened out. I see the “see-no-evil, hear-no-evil” attitude of the village left (as particularly exemplified and proclaimed by Ms. Wadle-Leff), toward their golden child Administrator as being the crux of the chronic problems in this Village.
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