[4:39] Welcome to the August 13th, 2024 special call and city council meeting. Consideration of adopting a resolution

[4:44] centering and punishing council members, Jeff Helgeson and Martin Missions for disorderly behavior and misconduct.

[4:50] I hear by move to adopt the resolution, excluding resolving clause number 8. Do I have a second?

[4:59] The resolution speaks for itself as far as I'm concerned. If I may or for all these, do you have any?

[5:05] All right. Is there any further discussion?

[5:12] Yes, I've talked to both Jelf and Marty, and been talking to the mayor.

[5:22] I've been talking to both Jelf and Marty,

[5:28] and the mayor, for us to come up with a solution.

[5:32] a peace for solution, one that everybody can agree to, and I've asked Jeff Marty and the Mayor

[5:43] to ask our city officials our attorney, and all the employees for forgiveness for our

[5:53] behavior, I include myself also, because our behavior have not been that which become leaders.

[6:03] Our children are watching us, I get a call from Washington D.C. from my sister-in-law, they are watching us.

[6:12] They get a call from San Diego from my brother, they are watching us. They call us idiots.

[6:22] We need to put a stop to this. We need to, by the grace of God, ask for forgiveness.

[6:30] And I'm asking for forgiveness first because I should have stepped in and stopped this mess.

[6:40] Now, if we can apologize to one another and ask for forgiveness for everybody that has been heard,

[6:49] we'll be okay.

[6:51] And promise each other that this insane stuff is going to stop.

[6:57] We need to stop it.

[6:59] The media love this they love it and we need to stop it.

[7:12] Can I get

[7:13] Will the Jeff

[7:15] Would you like to apologize to the citizens and city council and Mary I'd like to apologize to anybody that I'm offended

[7:24] You know, I'm sorry that I fought too hard for the citizens when

[7:31] I first ran that's what I said I was going to do

[7:34] And that's what I've done for 20 years.

[7:37] I fight for the taxpayers.

[7:39] And if I fight too hard for them,

[7:41] sometimes we get personalities get in the way.

[7:45] And I recognize that.

[7:46] Sometimes we get emotional on things

[7:50] that should be factual.

[7:54] So, and with that,

[7:56] I would like to appreciate that council member Taylor

[7:59] for your godly wisdom.

[8:02] I would like to, for fear of if I quit speaking, I won't be allowed to speak again.

[8:10] So apparently I've got to keep on talking since I have the floor.

[8:16] So what I would like to say is one, I did send an email this morning.

[8:20] Excuse me.

[8:22] So you slide before good, so I haven't had the slide.

[8:25] You saw me for attitudes in all this been displayed from the city council.

[8:31] Absolutely.

[8:32] I mean, I wish we could work together better.

[8:35] I was so hopeful after we had five Republicans elected.

[8:40] That's why I had meetings or tried to get meetings at my house

[8:43] to where we could work together and come up with good solutions.

[8:47] I'm sorry if I offended folks, you know, it's not my intent, so you still have the floor, right?

[8:55] You can have.

[8:55] No, you still have the floor, because I don't want to have the floor if I have to.

[8:58] No, it's still the floor is still yours.

[9:01] I've just answered your question.

[9:07] Are you satisfied with what has been said so far?

[9:11] Is there any further discussion for you now?

[9:14] I would like to hear from my.

[9:17] Well, I really appreciate the initiative you're taking, and I think you're right, because

[9:26] when we're distracted by all this nonsense, we're not doing the business of the citizens.

[9:32] So I can absolutely apologize for being too forceful, trying too hard sometimes.

[9:42] And you know, I'm sure there's probably folks out there that have offended and it's never mind tend to offend people.

[9:49] So I do apologize for that. I apologize for

[9:56] all of us and then I also, you know, apologize to all of us up here for those of us up here that I've offended.

[10:04] One question I have for you is, you were circulating a letter for us to sign with the apologies on it.

[10:12] And can you tell us who signed that letter before?

[10:17] You and Jeff have signed or ready?

[10:19] Are they ready?

[10:20] I need one more signature in this from the mayor.

[10:24] And this was, say, that you three, and I grew myself going to stop this time.

[10:31] Yes.

[10:32] Thank you.

[10:33] Thank you.

[10:34] You're going to stop it.

[10:38] You know, some of y'all take communion together in the same church.

[10:44] That's a dangerous thing.

[10:49] Your brothers and sisters in Christ, you shouldn't be backed by an indulgent one another.

[10:57] I'm sorry.

[11:02] Get filled up with it.

[11:12] I'm looking at the camera.

[11:13] I'm speaking to all the folks watching.

[11:16] Are you satisfied?

[11:18] Because I'm not.

[11:20] I reached out for separate times,

[11:23] She counts him in help of him before the press conference that day, the grievously called.

[11:30] Two phone calls to one number, one phone call to another, and a text message.

[11:38] Then you get Jack back.

[11:41] Not until 330 the next day when it said, oh yes, I'd be happy to talk.

[11:48] It was my intent to say this has got to stop guys.

[11:52] I don't know what your plan is for tomorrow.

[11:56] but it's not kind of be helpful. Please don't do it.

[12:03] Then convenience, Larry, I can't

[12:04] be going fall. Larry, I have before. Yes, I know you do.

[12:11] And then yesterday, I

[12:12] get a text conveniently from Jeff saying, are you able to talk?

[12:22] I genuinely

[12:22] consider it. I actually reached up to some of my friends and said, hey, what do you

[12:28] think I should do? Part of me wants to talk to Jeff. And 30 minutes later, I get

[12:33] BS link to some concocted news article with people in this very room quoted in that article

[12:44] saying by the way I assume you've seen this already.

[12:50] I've been down this road with Jeff

[12:52] Augustine before and I know what this is. It's nothing more than a submission tactic.

[12:59] I don't like it.

[13:01] This letter that Larry has produced, Larry, you're being played, hard.

[13:07] I have owned what I've done wrong.

[13:11] I've lost my temper.

[13:13] I've said stuff that are unproductive.

[13:15] I've owned that.

[13:16] I wear it on my back and I apologize for it, I have apologize for it.

[13:23] Saying I apologize if I offend you is not an apology.

[13:29] Here's my view on this quite simply this.

[13:33] If you think violating a turning client privilege is appropriate

[13:39] then vote against the resolution.

[13:44] It is often said by those in the legal community

[13:47] and the research I've looked into that turning client privilege is one of the most

[13:53] sacred components of our Republic.

[13:58] It should not be violated.

[14:01] should not be violated willfully, intentionally or unintentionally. Unfortunately, in this case,

[14:11] it was violated by

[14:15] my guess in what I have seen documented three separate intentional

[14:21] times. Folks, at home, I don't care if you're a Democrat Republican independent, if you're

[14:34] about. This is about do you think violating a turning client privilege is appropriate?

[14:43] Some

[14:44] folks might think so. I don't. I don't think it's appropriate.

[14:53] If there's some components

[14:54] of this resolution that you all would like to tweak, I'm open to it. Larry, if there's things

[15:00] As you don't like in there, let's talk about it. But we can't let this go on addressed.

[15:11] It's interesting,

[15:12] because even those in my own party say quite often, you know, they're going to be centering

[15:18] conservatives tomorrow. They're going to be going after their own tomorrow. Which implies that

[15:26] I would presumably care more about the reputation of my own party than the city I represent.

[15:36] No

[15:36] Guys,

[15:42] I care more about this city, the reputation of this body

[15:47] that I do anything else.

[15:53] I'm all ears.

[15:55] If I hear a genuine apology that I should not have violated and been in contempt of the

[16:01] will of counsel, and I'm sorry and it will not happen again.

[16:06] That's an apology.

[16:11] Are you back?

[16:11] I agree, the apology, we're dealing with two separate issues here.

[16:21] So, Consumant Taylor, we're dealing with brothers and sisters in Christ, we're dealing

[16:29] with elected officials.

[16:32] Now there's a part that that intertwines, and then there's a part that's separate.

[16:40] The apology, as far as what has been done that brought us to the center, is that two of our elected officials, as the Vice Mayor said, violated a turning client privilege, while doing that in arguing that they didn't, but they did.

[17:05] They defamed the character and the reputation of our city attorney numerous times saying things

[17:15] that were just inaccurate about him and his job and what he had done based on the narrative

[17:22] that they were trying to spin and tell our citizens that are now in social media platforms

[17:33] on the Internet forever, attached to his name that who

[17:36] have to defend and explain, if you ever wanted another job that

[17:41] went, and their efforts were politically motivated.

[17:44] That's what laid out in this resolution.

[17:49] So, an apology for violating the trust and the misuse of our

[17:54] attorney, the attorney client privilege, and for attacking and

[17:57] defaming the character of our city attorney, that needs to be

[18:00] period, because that's really what the essence of these centers are about in the motivation

[18:07] behind it.

[18:11] What's happened individually between all of us on and off the day is a separate

[18:17] issue. This is not the church. This room what we're doing as light of officials. But we are

[18:30] some of us, depending on the belief systems up here,

[18:37] believers in Christ,

[18:40] and that's a different,

[18:40] that's a different conversation than what we're trying

[18:45] to do in an official capacity with this century.

[18:50] Every organized body has a method in which they discipline

[18:57] people from his conduct, schools, discipline their students,

[19:02] business, any business that has an HR department, has a method in which they discipline

[19:10] people. And so do we. When you don't follow protocols, when you are outside the bounds

[19:18] of your duties. And that's what this is about today. It's been outlined in the center.

[19:27] So, people may not like that, but that's what we're doing.

[19:32] We've had countless citizens come to us for a long period of time, at least a year, asking

[19:42] us why is it that certain council members just get to say whatever they want to say, do

[19:46] whatever they want to say, or do violate certain moral or ethical standards that they believe

[19:53] that they're doing, excuse certain types of speech and so forth,

[19:57] and they get away with it.

[19:59] But yet, they try to expect others in our city

[20:01] to follow some type of coder conduct,

[20:04] but then they're not bleeding by example.

[20:07] We have an obligation to this instance,

[20:10] Republican or Democrat, young or old,

[20:12] the children that are watching,

[20:13] to show that we do hold our fellow council members

[20:18] to a standard, just like every other organized body

[20:22] tries to do as well.

[20:25] And to the point of the vice mayor, if we as a political party were to say, well, we're

[20:33] not going to do that to fellow fill in the blank that are we saying rules for the not

[20:40] for me?

[20:41] Is that the message that we want to sell?

[20:43] is we're not going to do that for our party members and if so what type of message to

[20:55] that is that cell or do we say no even in this situation we're going to hold everyone to

[21:02] the same standards and show that we do have to send a message here and that if that's the person

[21:11] that's being held to the disciplinary action, they accept it.

[21:15] And then have an opportunity to say, I'm sorry, you're right.

[21:19] You shouldn't have done that.

[21:21] Have an opportunity to humble themselves and then move forward.

[21:24] There's ways that this can be handled for a learning

[21:27] opportunity for everybody watching and listening.

[21:33] As the parents in the room, when we have to discipline our children,

[21:37] out of a place of love, sometimes you have to explain to your child,

[21:41] This is going to stink because it's not fun to have to discipline, but I'm doing it because

[21:45] of a caring place, and you hope that you can get them to a good place in the end because

[21:49] you're doing it because you do care.

[21:51] And whether people want to believe this or not, sometimes these disciplinary actions, including

[21:56] this, is out of a place of caring because we care about our citizens, we care about those

[22:02] who are watching, we care about the integrity on this day.

[22:08] And whether my fellow council members believe this or not, I actually do care about

[22:14] them. And I do care about their reputation in our community. And I do care about how we're all

[22:28] looked at. But corrective action does need to be taken in order for us to move forward. So while

[22:39] I appreciate Councilman Taylor's letter and the intent behind it.

[22:44] One is separate than what we're trying to do as the body.

[22:52] Any further discussion?

[22:53] Councilman Augustine?

[22:54] Well, thank you.

[22:56] You know, this is a called special meeting.

[23:00] Normally, we have meetings that are for the benefits of the citizens.

[23:05] Normally, we have meetings.

[23:07] You know, a called special meeting is something that is done kind of very quickly.

[23:12] normally maybe because we have to do something expeditiously, because we have a grant that needs

[23:18] to be acted upon, or we have a lawsuit that we need to stop the city attorney from fighting

[23:25] one side. Or if we have the other time that we had a special meeting years ago was when we had

[23:32] a polling place. Under the voters rights act there is a special called meeting that we had to

[23:38] to council members because we had to do it in time for the voters' right to act, so you have

[23:45] those kind of special meetings. This is nothing but division and divisiveness, as a special

[23:51] called meeting that says, it's not for public safety, for the safety of our citizens. It wasn't

[23:59] so we could improve education for our children. It wasn't so the fact that we could say, hey,

[24:05] We have this huge surplus, let's maybe give it back in a timely fashion.

[24:09] This has absolutely nothing to do with the citizens that we are elected to represent.

[24:17] You know, what's interesting, I said to an email this morning, or this afternoon, actually,

[24:21] because although I do appreciate the fact that there was the notice that there was going to be a special

[24:27] called meeting today at two, I got that at Friday about almost five o'clock.

[24:33] The actual resolution with the language in here didn't come until last evening.

[24:41] Those of you that are up here that represent or we were sworn in or sworn to uphold the constitution.

[24:49] Part of that constitution says we have due process.

[24:53] That's why I sent this email today because we had this long verbose resolution that does lots of things.

[25:02] So maybe accurate, some, I really question and some are factually incorrect.

[25:08] Some of them, I really kind of question maybe the ethics of it.

[25:13] With that being the case, as somebody that's being accused of all these things,

[25:19] I do have a constitutional right of due process.

[25:24] Giving this to me last night at about seven o'clock.

[25:27] I think anybody Republican Democrat independent would say,

[25:31] We had people give their lives to sacrifice their lives,

[25:37] their fortune, their sacred honor, to have a country,

[25:40] to have a constitution that separates powers,

[25:44] that actually says, here's some rights people have.

[25:49] It's not just forfeited because of the fact

[25:52] that somebody forward a meme or a cartoon or something.

[25:57] What it is is the fact that we have this due process.

[25:59] That's why I said this, you know, again, the resolution, I got the official language last night.

[26:07] I do hope that all of you appear, agree.

[26:12] That I should be given the opportunity to prepare and present a comprehensive response.

[26:19] Shouldn't be given something last night and, you know, it's like saying, okay,

[26:25] I'm going to sue you and we're going to court next Thursday.

[26:28] for what? Well, I'll let you know when's denied.

[26:35] I probably should have the ability to have

[26:37] counsel. I should probably have the ability to present my case to be able to meet with legal

[26:44] counsel. If that's not done, that should be a very chilling effect of everybody in here.

[26:50] You know, we hear some language that says, oh, well, we're for this and for that. That should be

[26:59] body. That's not a good thing. Give ample time. That's why I sent this email. You know,

[27:06] just in breeding some of these things, I realize there's many factual ethical issues that

[27:12] I think need to be addressed with legal counsel. There appears to be lots of items that

[27:17] are arbitrary and capricious in here. There's even items in here, you know, it is no secret

[27:24] that I have been, as the mayor pointed out,

[27:28] have been one of the sharpest critics of our city attorney,

[27:35] because I don't like him.

[27:36] No, it's because I'm evaluating his performance.

[27:40] Competence, ethics, bedside manner,

[27:44] all of these kind of things that you evaluated an employee

[27:47] on, I've had Walter Irwin for almost 18 years

[27:56] I think every time I've given him a blow and report, I actually gave him the best report

[28:01] of any of the three members that we review our city attorney, our city manager in our

[28:09] clerk of council. Walter Erwin was a prince of the gentleman. He understood the law. He didn't

[28:16] come out out of the blue and say you're making a motion to lower the tax rate 89 cents.

[28:23] That's

[28:23] resolution just last week or two weeks ago, that was about money being presented.

[28:29] And saying, oops, I forgot to put the amount of the money in that resolution.

[28:34] Lots of things that I had put in my critique, my employee evaluation, backed it up objectively, backed it up factually,

[28:45] wasn't no slander us.

[28:47] It was looking at the actual results.

[28:49] And now in this resolution, I see the fact that he, one of his sharpest critics, is now

[28:58] somehow in this not able to weigh in on his performance evaluation retroactively, find

[29:05] that strangely odd, you also can't decide on his pay, which I voted against last year when

[29:14] his pay was increased by 20 or $40,000.

[29:17] I thought, oh my gosh, this is not a good thing.

[29:22] We need to actually, maybe look at something

[29:25] that can actually make improvements.

[29:28] Interestingly enough, as I see this,

[29:31] and I see these conflicts of interest in the record

[29:35] at phone call, the one recorded phone call

[29:37] that I did in my 20 years, was with the city attorney

[29:40] when he called me on a Saturday.

[29:43] I wasn't sure about what this was going to be about.

[29:47] My gut told me, hopefully the Lord told me and gave me some wisdom and said, you know

[29:50] you ought to record this.

[29:51] I'm glad I did.

[29:53] But in here he puts things that this was immoral, deceptive.

[30:00] Underhandedly,

[30:03] never once did he say this couldn't be recorded. I think he knows Virginia Law, Virginia Law is one sided, where one person can record. Again, one time in my 20 years of recording calls.

[30:16] You know, but there's no mention of this when, you know, again, not trying to be poking in the eye.

[30:24] But this happened before, all of you read about it.

[30:27] You read about that Chris Feraldi recorded and released

[30:32] private phone conversation with our congressman.

[30:35] Well, there's no problem with that, but there's a problem with mine.

[30:39] And obviously, we know that this was legally obtained.

[30:43] This was actually a non-privileged phone call,

[30:46] where he specifically said in there,

[30:49] we need one to get your opinion on defending Chris Feraldi.

[30:54] wanting to throw aside a memorandum of understanding and enjoying the electoral board.

[31:00] Throw aside the memorandum of understanding and enjoying the registrar's office.

[31:05] I said, no, that's, and I'm glad I recorded that because it's so now, and in that

[31:13] actual recording a little bit later in that conversation, you know, I know we talked about

[31:16] that with regarding the city attorney getting involved in private litigation and using

[31:21] City Tax Fair Resources Defend, one side of the other.

[31:24] And I'm thankful that that didn't happen.

[31:28] With that being the case, in that conversation,

[31:32] he actually talked about his performance evaluation.

[31:37] He said, hey, you didn't write me very well last time.

[31:41] Have I gotten any better?

[31:44] So he knows that I rated him poorly last year.

[31:48] He knows I've rated him poorly again this year.

[31:51] And now what he want to do in this resolution, we're not going to let you critique him, we're

[31:58] not going to let you decide on his pay.

[32:03] And now we've just heard the mayor say, oh my goodness, even these things could be bad for

[32:08] him to get another job.

[32:10] Well, that isn't my responsibility.

[32:15] I mean, I would, I gave the most glowing reports from Walter Runne because again, and some

[32:21] some of us behind this dias heaven hit that privilege of working with Walter. But Walter,

[32:26] even though you disagreed, he would disagree not disagreeingly, but he would say the other

[32:32] side and he would present it not in an attack fashion. I heard Vice Mayor for all the

[32:38] minute ago talk about that this is so important with regarding attorney client privilege.

[32:44] Let me just talk again. Back to my email. This isn't a defense. This isn't my case because I haven't

[32:50] the ability to meet with legal counsel. I'm sharing this because just in case somebody

[32:56] says, oh man, we're going to vote on it anyway without due process. That is a bad thing

[33:02] to do. So back to the city attorney where he said this was immoral. It's deceptive. It's

[33:09] underhanded. Obviously we know it's legal. Virginia laws pretty clear.

[33:15] But now onto the second

[33:16] element that the vice mayor mentioned as far as attorney client privilege. And absolutely

[33:21] I will apologize for any release of attorney client privilege that I have never done

[33:28] that. This one was different. This one was different because it was already released. Those

[33:36] of you who are at the meeting, we had a special meeting where the city attorney actually

[33:41] July 9th, read 2-3rds of the email that he marked Attorney Klein privilege.

[33:47] I'm not an attorney, but she definitely pointed out.

[33:51] But when you release part of the thing that you marked Attorney Klein privilege, you're

[33:55] not waving privilege.

[34:00] Prior to that, we also heard the mayor on the morning line, releasing that email, releasing

[34:07] the fact parts of it, didn't read the email by any means, in order to did, but read parts

[34:13] those. Saying that, oh yeah, the city is not going to protect the defend

[34:19] Chris for all day. Oh, yeah, the city though does need to get

[34:23] involved because of the fact that elections are important. All of that.

[34:28] So you'd really look and say this attorney client privilege wasn't first time

[34:34] released by me that privilege was waived by several people behind this

[34:40] most notably the city attorney, but even before on July 9th, but even before that, Chris's

[34:48] campaign announcements said the same kind of thing, which is perfectly fine, saying that

[34:54] the city attorney is not defending him. Again, no problem with that. The problem that we had was

[35:02] the fact that the city attorney was willing to use and trying to use taxpayer resources to

[35:07] in one person in a private litigation, not a good thing.

[35:12] We tried to be transparent.

[35:14] We tried to be very open and state, this isn't right.

[35:18] He said in a meeting a while ago that, oh, I could have called him.

[35:22] When we talked, we talked on Saturday.

[35:25] We talked about that.

[35:26] I tried to get him to say that this wasn't a good thing.

[35:31] Monday, he sends another email, or to see me.

[35:35] Saturday afternoon, 20 minutes after the phone call.

[35:37] He sends the email, saying, hey, here's what we're going to do.

[35:40] And Mark said, turn the climb privilege.

[35:42] That's what we call the special meeting on Monday.

[35:45] We called it at 9 a.m. because it was timely.

[35:49] It wasn't calling the special meeting just so we could be

[35:51] rate two members of council that maybe we disagree with.

[35:56] But it was actually there intentionally because it

[36:01] was needed timely.

[36:04] Back to the due process.

[36:06] and back to the Saturni client privilege with due process again as the city attorney will very

[36:14] vehemently point out that I'm not an attorney nor I pretend to be, but I can read some of

[36:19] the things along and have a kind of a brain. With that being in the case, I need, and I think

[36:28] this council needs to follow due process, needs to follow our constitutionally protected rights

[36:32] do process. I'm having to come up with this on my own, not having the ability to, because

[36:39] again, it came at about seven o'clock last night. To now try to come up with a case and defend myself

[36:45] without being able to meet with legal counsel what this is all about. So that's where I said

[36:51] this email today saying that my due process and this resolution does nothing but create further

[36:59] division and I appreciate the fact that some may think that it's a great thing and you got

[37:03] a punish or you got to do some things.

[37:08] But I think this does nothing for the benefits of our citizens.

[37:14] This does nothing because it's for their division.

[37:19] I believe that what would be an order is for us to actually table this to keep it on the

[37:24] agenda and do it our next regularly scheduled meeting.

[37:28] So, I can have time to actually meet with legal counsel of my own choosing so I can actually have the ability to defend my good name, to defend my reputation, to defend my 20 years of service,

[37:50] and in the spirit of cooperation, I think that we can work together for the good of the citizens, and we can move forward once we actually cool the temperature.

[38:01] You know, I realize there's been hurt feelings over time and, you know, this has never been done in my 20 years.

[38:10] Nobody has ever even thought about that.

[38:12] Nobody has said, oh, well, we can remove somebody or we can, we didn't like what they said, so we can try to censure them, or we can,

[38:20] you know, and I first read this resolution as it begins, you know, when it says, because of our chaos or not chaos, what was the word that was used.

[38:29] are disorderly behavior and misconduct.

[38:33] And so with that, I'm thinking disorderly behavior.

[38:38] I'm thinking about when we had a special call meeting

[38:40] where we didn't have a quorum.

[38:44] July 3rd.

[38:45] After that, July 3rd, where we didn't have a quorum,

[38:47] so we couldn't actually have business.

[38:50] Council member, Mr. Jones, and I got out from behind this

[38:52] dias, because we don't want to make it look like it was

[38:54] active the city, because we didn't have a quorum,

[38:58] So we didn't have a meeting.

[38:59] We went down because all the press were here.

[39:01] And we talked to the press.

[39:04] And not let me just ask you about disorderly.

[39:08] Was that disorderly?

[39:10] And somebody was standing over there

[39:11] on the other side of the room, saying, shut off the press.

[39:14] I hate to even say that because now I'm going

[39:16] to be recorded to say, shut off the press.

[39:19] I should go quote, it's helpful.

[39:21] It's about that.

[39:22] When somebody, the mayor said, get out.

[39:26] You must all leave the room citizens. You can't be here even though we had the room booked from four o'clock to five o'clock

[39:34] Where after every council meeting council members for the last 30 years. I know

[39:40] Mr. Whitehead that's been covering this for years and some of you newer reporters

[39:46] You talked to council members in the will same place where we

[39:51] talk to the press that day about the issues because we didn't have a

[39:56] quorum.

[39:57] We didn't have a meeting, but there are issues that still need to be addressed.

[40:01] And we address those openly, transparently.

[40:05] We address them without malice, without contentiousness, without meanness, but

[40:12] stating the facts.

[40:13] Now if people don't like the facts,

[40:18] that I'm sorry, but we presented it that way.

[40:21] But now, again, back to the disorderly, we had somebody in the back of the room shouting,

[40:29] waste fraud and abuse, so much so that the press said, hey, can we do this again?

[40:35] Because we couldn't even hear you with a person in the back of the room yelling,

[40:41] waste fraud and abuse repeatedly.

[40:43] And somebody in the front of the room yelling, get out of the chambers, shut off the press.

[40:49] I need a police officer in here now, again, violating some pretty important issues.

[40:56] You know, I appreciate our police officers.

[40:59] I appreciate that I was just endorsed again by the police benevolent association.

[41:04] I realized that I am not a person that is going to boss them around.

[41:09] I appreciate the fact that there are public safety officers.

[41:13] I'm not going to say officers, get in here and arrest these citizens.

[41:17] Throw out the cameraman.

[41:18] throw out the reporters, throw out the citizens, throw out the council members, they don't work for me, they work for the city manager.

[41:26] With that, I don't want to try to boss them around.

[41:29] And I know somebody got censured for saying something.

[41:33] And this center is talking about, you shouldn't talk to one of your employees that directly reports to you, the city attorney directly reports to city council.

[41:45] That's one of the people that we hire.

[41:47] We hire three people.

[41:48] The city attorney, the clerk of council, and our city manager.

[41:52] Those are our three employees.

[41:54] It's not our men and women in blue.

[41:58] It's not our deputy.

[42:00] It's not our other folks.

[42:03] So we have no say over them.

[42:05] You can ask them kindly if they could help.

[42:09] But back to the disorderly that this was talking about.

[42:13] The disorderly conduct.

[42:14] now are disorderly behavior. I'm trying to think, and I remember that I thankful that there's

[42:21] videos presented, reached far and wide, where we're standing up there, getting yelled at, and

[42:28] yelled and yelling going on, we stood up there and still had our press conversation, because it

[42:38] was important from transparency, for openness. Now, if Council is going to say, well, doesn't

[42:45] matter about your due process, doesn't matter about facts, because we want to do this anyway.

[42:53] I don't think that's a good thing, you know, this again just came out last night, got it

[42:58] at about seven o'clock last night, wasn't able to read it right then, just had my, just got back

[43:05] from a family vacation in Minnesota, just had my 10, and a wedding anniversary.

[43:10] When I got the email, we were trying to celebrate.

[43:13] I got an email saying, hey, I got a special meeting, and you are the butt of the special meeting.

[43:20] So with that, I received this stuff in the mail last night, tried to present an email this morning,

[43:30] or by the time I got it, it was about 12 o'clock to say that I do hope.

[43:36] And I humbly request that this item be deferred until our next regularly scheduled meeting September 10th.

[43:43] If you would like to do as council member Taylor suggested, which I think would be very

[43:47] prudent, and that is to deny this, that would be great, and work it out privately like

[43:56] adults should, or what we could do, I'm sorry, that was bad.

[44:03] I apologize to that.

[44:04] That wasn't a good thing.

[44:05] Thank you for laughing, Chris, I mean, that wasn't a good thing.

[44:10] I should, again, I'm trying to not be, I'm not trying to specifically not be, you know, throwing in, you know, bombs, and that's, I apologize to that. I shouldn't have said that.

[44:24] Where we can actually think it through, where we can actually talk about it as, as Council member for all they said, I, he reached out to me.

[44:32] I didn't get it till three o'clock that afternoon because we did have the press briefing.

[44:37] I did reach out and said, I'll be happy and delighted to talk with you.

[44:42] I reached out again yesterday, as he said, to say, I'm happy to talk to you about this.

[44:49] This was even before I saw this resolution of all these different items in here.

[44:54] And so again, back to the due process, back to the ability to defend myself.

[45:00] I do humbly ask that you defer this until September 10th. You know, with that being the case, you know, I realize this is, you know, it's political, has no thing whatsoever. Having at the 10th may even be more beneficial for you if you'd like to slap me closer to an election time, or you would like to take it out totally.

[45:29] But again, due process is important and I do hope, and again, I'm going to close with this that I do

[45:36] humbly request that this item be deferred until our next regularly scheduled meeting September 10th and I will make that as a substitute motion.

[45:50] I have

[45:59] nothing else to add to my motion.

[46:04] Thank you.

[46:08] So much.

[46:10] So first, Madam Clerk.

[46:15] If you can please make note for the record,

[46:18] a disclosure that I'm not waving my due process rights by participating in these deliberations.

[46:35] I've got some questions.

[46:36] I don't know about a mayor if you'd be willing to answer any questions, or is that something

[46:42] you're willing to do, or are you not willing to do that?

[46:44] Just speak to your second, please.

[46:46] Okay.

[46:46] Well, I may have some questions for the city attorney as well, but the primary question that I

[46:50] have is who prepared the resolution?

[46:53] Because I have some serious concerns about the resolution typically our resolutions are prepared

[47:03] by the city attorney.

[47:08] And then we act on them.

[47:10] So in this resolution it says in paragraph 7,

[47:14] Councilman Helveston and Councilman missions are barred

[47:15] from submitting an annual review and discussing compensation

[47:18] for the city attorney for the period of July 1, 2023

[47:21] through December 31, 2024.

[47:25] So that's a wide-ranging bar on discussion.

[47:28] That's basically saying that when I leave here,

[47:30] I can't discuss the city attorney's salary.

[47:33] Well, have you known because it's public record?

[47:37] If you're to do a FOIA request, in the previous fiscal year, in the next fiscal year, there was a massive salary increase last year.

[47:47] And, you know, that's something to think about because at the four-clock work session, we have on the docket, going to close sessions to discuss the performance of the city attorney.

[48:03] So, now think about that for a second.

[48:08] If the city attorney prepared this resolution,

[48:14] where he's retroactively erasing our performance evaluations,

[48:18] and, you know, you can't speak in here,

[48:22] and I can't engage with you guys,

[48:24] but, you know, I would be interesting to see if there were

[48:26] show a hand how many people get a performance evaluation

[48:28] or have got a performance evaluation in their times,

[48:32] because you typically don't get the retroactively,

[48:35] removed one or another. And I think that's kind of interesting. So, what this does

[48:45] is effectively bars myself in Council Member Helsing from having any influence whatsoever

[48:57] into his performance evaluation that's getting ready to be done in close session.

[49:06] And, any salary negotiations that may be done in close session if that ends up being a part of it.

[49:12] So they're doing that in advance.

[49:14] So, preemptively, here we are, you know, Council Member Halvison mentioned, normally

[49:18] special meetings are done quickly because there's something that needs to be addressed expeditiously.

[49:24] Well, expeditiously what needs to be addressed is the prevention of our performance evaluations

[49:29] from becoming record for the city attorney.

[49:31] and our voice as your representatives and how your tax dollars are used in his compensation

[49:40] baggage. That is what's happening.

[49:43] I will speak to that in the next question.

[49:46] So you will answer the question if you prepare the resolution?

[49:48] Yes. I will answer. I will I will tell you that the city attorney did not.

[49:53] Okay. Who prepared the resolution?

[49:55] An outside council.

[49:56] All right. So we'll have this be known that I'm submitting a boiler request.

[50:00] right now for any correspondence related to the preparation of this resolution without

[50:05] side counsel.

[50:07] Previously, when I was sent here on November 28th last year,

[50:13] well, in August, I submitted

[50:15] a performance evaluation that's about to get erased by this resolution, right?

[50:23] And then on September 11th, Mr. Friedman emailed a Mr. Watel down at a law firm in Salem,

[50:34] regarding the preparation of a resolution to century.

[50:39] Now, it's here's what's interesting about that.

[50:41] So September 11th is when that first email, Shadow Cross,

[50:46] and I'll be happy to publish all those documents online this evening.

[50:49] I got them in a FOIA request.

[50:52] September 11th, Mr. Friedman, about two weeks after I submit my

[50:57] performance evaluation, sends an email down to a law firm in Salem.

[51:02] And what I know is that it was responsive to a request.

[51:06] for records pertaining to the preparation of the resolution to

[51:09] censor me. So that was the first email that I got that was

[51:13] response into that. Well, everybody makes a big deal about, or not

[51:19] everybody, but the press and Chris Veraldi and Stephanie Reed and

[51:23] some other folks met a huge deal about, you know, the Liberty University

[51:29] students spying on Christopher Aldi at a public event in a public forum.

[51:37] Seeker really told a reporter phone call by Christopher Aldi from Congressman Good,

[51:40] which I'm sure he's going to justify later.

[51:44] He's but aside from that.

[51:47] So everybody makes a big deal about that piece of it, right?

[51:50] Well, here's the thing that's interesting.

[51:52] On September 11th, that phone call hadn't even happened yet.

[52:00] So two weeks after, I submit by performance evaluation for the city attorney,

[52:06] the city attorney initiates

[52:09] an email with an outside council outside firm to do that.

[52:16] And then I get censored for something that hadn't even happened yet.

[52:20] And the other thing that's interesting is you see the news articles that fly back and forth before

[52:25] there's an opportunity for them to actually get the teeth to make it more of the

[52:30] of a century. So Mr. Friedman actually sent a bunch of news articles to Mr.

[52:34] Wadell and then, excuse me, not Mr. Wadell, Mr. Quinn, and then the one thing,

[52:41] the one statement that wasn't really redacted in there after he sent all the news

[52:45] articles that were part of the emails and letters that were leaked in some way

[52:53] performance, which the public records that's fine, the one statement that came back

[52:57] after all the news articles were submitted was not be happy to assist.

[53:04] So Mr. Friedman,

[53:08] who's supposed to be working for the governing body, working for the

[53:12] city of Lynchburg, is instrumental in facilitating the censure and the discipline of your

[53:22] elected representatives and providing no assistance or a legal support to them to defend themselves.

[53:31] Now let me tell you something, there's a lot of people in the city that rely on public

[53:35] defenders, that rely on organizations like Legal Aid, right?

[53:41] Wouldn't that be screwed up if

[53:43] those people were just hung out to dry? You got to go pay for some four or five figure

[53:48] attorney, right? So essentially, that's what they're doing when they come after myself and

[53:54] Council member Halibusen, completely violating or due process rights, not giving us any opportunity

[54:00] to look into things.

[54:04] So with that being said, some more questions that I have are,

[54:16] you know, we have the ability

[54:20] in both state code and the charter to investigate, to find facts, to get to the bottom

[54:33] of things.

[54:36] Just like the previous politically motivated center, right, of me in November 28th,

[54:47] it's interesting because it talks about interfered in personal issues.

[54:53] But let me tell you about that quote-unquote interference in personal issues.

[54:59] Myself and Council Member Helverson had a meeting with the city manager in the city attorney.

[55:05] About a police lieutenant

[55:08] who has served the city valiantly for years

[55:17] who was getting ready

[55:18] to be fired, completely unjustly, policies being violated.

[55:27] it.

[55:37] He went through the Grimans procedures. In the first step of the process, it was discovered

[55:44] they did violate policy. And he got his job restored. All rank, all time.

[55:55] There were

[55:55] officers that came forward on that person's behalf. And you know what? I will take a

[56:03] that you're every day of the week fighting for the people that put their lives in harm

[56:09] way for this city.

[56:11] That's what I did then.

[56:13] And with this,

[56:16] I'm fighting for the citizens, I'm fighting for the taxpayers, I'll do

[56:19] it then too.

[56:24] So

[56:28] it's kind of profound.

[56:33] This is an exercise of power, raw power.

[56:37] That's what it is, right?

[56:40] power, the presiding officer has the ability to set the agenda, right? And I find it funny,

[56:49] my friend Chris over here talked about how attorney client privilege is such a fundamental

[56:55] piece of our republic, right? This is the United States Constitution.

[57:04] Do processes in it,

[57:06] Attorney-Fly of Privileges not, okay?

[57:12] So, you know,

[57:16] I think what you want to think about that.

[57:21] With

[57:24] Fapping said, if you had a unpolitically motivated majority

[57:32] here, they would investigate.

[57:34] They would get to the facts.

[57:36] Now, unfortunately, they don't want to get to the bottom of things.

[57:40] They don't want to get to the facts.

[57:42] It's no secret that the mayor supports the opponent of Jeff Heldison.

[57:47] She's got Facebook page post stating as such, I've got him printed out, is this election

[57:53] interference?

[57:53] That's a question that I have.

[57:56] Is it election interference?

[57:58] It's so, that would be absolutely terrible, absolutely terrible,

[58:06] you know, one of the things

[58:09] It's interesting in our rules of procedure, right?

[58:12] And this is where

[58:16] there's a misconception

[58:19] about how business

[58:23] is conducted in the legislative body,

[58:31] right?

[58:35] The presiding officer may adjourn

[58:38] without the Council's vote or appeal and emergency.

[58:41] And here she may also call a brief recess

[58:44] without a vote at any time when necessary to clear the air and thus reduce friction among

[58:53] council members.

[58:56] What we have here is very simple. We have a majority that wants all of

[59:04] council to say what the majority thinks. That's not how it works in America.

[59:14] The other

[59:14] that our rules of procedure say,

[59:20] is that it enabled the Council to

[59:21] train that to transact business fully expeditiously and efficiently, while

[59:24] affording every opportunity to sit in the citizens to witness the

[59:27] operations of government.

[59:28] You know what?

[59:29] But Mr. Friedman called around and was whipping votes on whether or not

[59:33] to intervene on behalf of Chris Faroldy and his lawsuit related to

[59:36] his election.

[59:37] That was not business being conducted where citizens were able to

[59:43] witness the operations of government.

[59:45] It was not.

[59:47] So, yes, I will always fight for you to be able to witness the operations of government.

[59:54] It also says that we need to protect the rights of each individual council member.

[1:00:01] While I also sent mayor read an email earlier, raising the same concerns, raising concerns about due process, raising concerns about having time to actually look at this, understand what it means, get legal guidance on this, speak with an attorney, meet with an attorney, right, and determine how to proceed. Never got a response to that email.

[1:00:27] I'll make sure that email is available to the press as well, with the time span.

[1:00:39] Just what we see here is, you know, quite frankly,

[1:00:46] it's an abusive power.

[1:00:48] That's what it is.

[1:00:50] Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should do it.

[1:00:58] Now I commend Council Member Taylor, because he is the first person that I've seen up here, that's embodied.

[1:01:05] Number C, we're glad to see under the purpose of the rules of procedure, to preserve a

[1:01:12] spirit of cooperation among council members.

[1:01:17] Council member Taylor is the first one to try to do that and I appreciate that and I thank

[1:01:21] you for that.

[1:01:25] And it's unfortunate that this resolution also penalizes council member Taylor.

[1:01:30] And that's what happens when you outsource something to a law firm that doesn't understand

[1:01:35] details, and then it doesn't get properly proofread, but they're actually knocking you down

[1:01:39] and seeing you already too broke. I don't know if you need that or not.

[1:01:45] So with that being said, I'm also curious, Madam Mayor, because you lodged a claim of defamation

[1:01:54] here in your opening comments. Can you speak specifically to what that was because you actually

[1:02:04] made a claim that we defamed someone.

[1:02:11] So what specific statement was the famitors?

[1:02:13] Are you able to answer that?

[1:02:17] Or are you just alleging that we made defamatory statements

[1:02:20] without actually having a statement to address?

[1:02:26] You have the four to speak.

[1:02:28] Could I go to the comments?

[1:02:30] Well, I think we know the answer to that.

[1:02:34] I'll be providing these to the clerk that she can put in the official record.

[1:02:42] But these are transcripts, one is from a WLNI audio interview of May read on the morning

[1:02:47] of July 3rd, 2024.

[1:02:51] And I'll just kind of highlight some of the things that she said.

[1:02:57] I think she's, let's see, vice mayor for all these, not being represented by her city attorney.

[1:03:03] Well, when you look at the email where we are told that we broke attorney-fly privilege,

[1:03:12] which

[1:03:16] there's parts that aren't redacted, right?

[1:03:27] That's this one.

[1:03:29] That's right.

[1:03:30] That's where he says that was previously attorney-fly privilege that the city wasn't

[1:03:36] defending Vice Mayor for all this.

[1:03:38] Something else that was stated.

[1:03:45] I asked her opinion about the city entering into some type of interest because the city pays for the elections so we have an interest in anything having to do with city elections that was this question was kind of in general, right?

[1:03:57] Slaus is not a private matter.

[1:04:08] Financial resources are not a properly expenditure discarded.

[1:04:11] I'm reading the wrong part hold on.

[1:04:25] I got to read the unredacted part.

[1:04:28] So that's in the unredacted part.

[1:04:35] Again, something else that was in that attorney-client privilege email at the mayor stated,

[1:04:40] right?

[1:04:40] That we pay for them.

[1:04:43] So the first person to actually break attorney-client privilege was my read on WL&I,

[1:04:49] the morning of July 3.

[1:04:54] And then in the meeting, the special meeting that actually happened on July 9th, right?

[1:05:01] Here's Mr. Friedman's remarks, and I want to point out that I specifically asked because

[1:05:06] I saw that he had a script in front of him, right,

[1:05:11] that he was reading off of with his prepared remarks.

[1:05:14] And when he was reading that script,

[1:05:16] I asked for that script to be entered into the official record,

[1:05:18] and that was denied, denied, OK?

[1:05:26] And

[1:05:29] he wanted to address some claims.

[1:05:31] The city's not representing Vice Mayor for Rolty.

[1:05:33] That was part of what was attorney-clined privilege.

[1:05:35] That's no longer attorney-clined privilege when he said it.

[1:05:38] He said that my self-accounts and members of the Helgysin are not attorneys.

[1:05:43] That is accurate, right?

[1:05:47] Right, and here, Jeff, you are not an attorney and not qualified interprets statute litigation

[1:05:51] events or the like, same thing.

[1:05:55] Laws should strictly a private matter.

[1:06:04] Laws should strictly a private matter between two persons is the claim that was made

[1:06:07] of the Helgysin made, right?

[1:06:09] He respectfully disagrees.

[1:06:11] And here, the Laws should not a private matter involving only two individuals, as Jeff publicly

[1:06:15] state of the same thing.

[1:06:18] It's going to disenfranchise thousands of voters.

[1:06:20] He says it right over here, right?

[1:06:23] So he sat there, now think about that for a second.

[1:06:27] I'm not going to go through all this.

[1:06:29] I'll make sure that this stuff's available.

[1:06:35] But here's what people actually said.

[1:06:41] It is exactly what was underneath the redactions here.

[1:06:50] And they want to grandstand and gaslight all of you and turn this into something political.

[1:06:58] When it's not.

[1:07:01] There's no spirit of cooperation being displayed by Mayor Reader Vice Mayor Faraldi.

[1:07:07] They don't have any interest in that.

[1:07:15] They have interest in compliance.

[1:07:19] It's been that way since day one.

[1:07:22] And they have a problem that some of us, who were also elected by the citizens, aren't willing to just comply and quote unquote kiss the ring.

[1:07:37] As Christopher Aldi always likes to say.

[1:07:41] But I'm not the one wearing a free mason ring. That's Christopher Aldi.

[1:07:48] You usually wear it.

[1:07:49] No, we're talking about those two on your piece of work.

[1:07:54] So, with that being said, you know, I just think that it's very interesting that this

[1:08:09] is what's happening.

[1:08:11] My surprise, not surprised.

[1:08:15] Not surprised when you see things like, you know, and I apologize to those of you in the room that actually had the guts to talk to reporters on these two articles.

[1:08:26] that came out over the weekend.

[1:08:30] The first one was Lynchburg Mayor shuts down.

[1:08:31] Critics exerts chilling effect on free speech and mid-conjipersy.

[1:08:36] A national news.

[1:08:39] I absolutely apologize to those of you for the disingenuous comments made by my peer

[1:08:47] over here that it was no big deal.

[1:08:51] There's a lot of people that I've heard from behind the scenes that are

[1:08:55] terrified about coming forward against Stephanie Reid and Chris Veraldi, absolutely terrified.

[1:09:02] You would not understand the resistances that you run into, door knocking and normal neighborhoods,

[1:09:10] normal working class neighborhoods for people to support other than Chris Veraldi or Stephanie

[1:09:16] Reid.

[1:09:17] And then the second one, in Battle of Lynchburg, Mayer faces more allegations of bullying

[1:09:21] verbally if you're using constituents, right?

[1:09:25] You know, I apologize to those of you that are in the room that are sourced in that

[1:09:31] article that I have to go up to come forward because I know that's not easy because you're

[1:09:35] looking at the power government here.

[1:09:37] I mean, look at what they're doing.

[1:09:38] Jeff has been on city council for 20 years, five terms consecutively.

[1:09:43] Five terms consecutively.

[1:09:46] There's nobody that's fault for taxpayers harder than Jeff, right?

[1:09:48] And then to get removed from the finance chair position and replaced by somebody that didn't even know the school budget numbers on the radio.

[1:10:03] Right? To reduce him to the most junior member of council is petty. It's petty. This is like middle school high school girls locker room, pettyness, stuff. That's what this is.

[1:10:21] There's nothing about this that has anything to do with policy. Right? Policy.

[1:10:27] And you know, when we're wasting our time being distracted on these political witch hunts being carried out by the mayor,

[1:10:39] then unfortunately, you know, we're not spending that time on doing the business for the citizens.

[1:10:49] And it's interesting, too, because they carefully line up these wear-as clauses on here, right?

[1:10:59] To make it look like we release something after the vote, but they put them out at order,

[1:11:07] because they're trying to make it look like, you know, happen in a different way.

[1:11:14] You know, I hope somebody proof read this.

[1:11:18] I have, like I said, grave concerns about the conflicts of interest.

[1:11:23] You know, we can't have, you know, the city attorney's office is responsible for the rest

[1:11:26] of the elections to come before us, as a matter of outside council, did it.

[1:11:30] It's in his job description, it's in city code, right?

[1:11:34] So if he didn't review it, then he wasn't doing his job.

[1:11:39] And for that to be the case, you know, and then for him to also be the parliamentarian in this meeting and not recuse himself is also in no disclosure whatsoever that this is going to affect who can negotiate on any salary and benefit changes for him.

[1:12:04] I am just deeply concerned that we are setting the city up for liability, that we are

[1:12:13] setting individuals in here up for liability related to the conflicts of interest act,

[1:12:19] the Virginia State and local government conflicts of interest act, which is the main reason

[1:12:24] why I support and seconded Council Member Helgeson's motion, because I do think if they want

[1:12:32] go ahead and carry out this censure against us, you know, take our pay, try to get us to

[1:12:39] go to taxpayer-funded training where they have people that support policies that want

[1:12:45] to restrict your second amendment rights, no, not doing that. Sorry, not going to waste

[1:12:51] your money on organizations that are pro-government pro bureaucracy and anti-citizen and

[1:12:59] anti-liberate, not doing it, right?

[1:13:05] And

[1:13:08] one thing that I do think is interesting

[1:13:10] is the change some language in here about

[1:13:13] how they would collect the fine.

[1:13:19] I think I have to have that wrong in the first time.

[1:13:23] And I am curious about one question I have about,

[1:13:27] paragraph number nine is, is empowered to take

[1:13:30] any necessary steps for future communications

[1:13:32] with Councilman Helgison and Missions. What are any necessary steps may read? Do you have any idea

[1:13:38] what that means?

[1:13:43] Okay. I'll take that as a note. So what that being said, I do think that it

[1:13:50] would be pertinent to table this until the next meeting so that everybody has ample opportunity

[1:13:57] to have attorneys look at it. Obviously the city side, wherever this came from, wherever initiated,

[1:14:04] And we'll get a chance to get the FOIA request back by then too.

[1:14:07] It should be great to see, wasn't the city.

[1:14:09] Attorney that initiated this resolution of censure,

[1:14:12] because he did send an email to all of us saying that, you know,

[1:14:17] censure or removal would be in order for releasing that phone call.

[1:14:27] Right? So one person is telling the governing body up here that they

[1:14:35] disenfranchise all your votes,

[1:14:40] but we're not allowed to weigh in on his performance evaluation.

[1:14:46] We're not allowed to weigh in on his compensation package, according to this.

[1:14:53] And in addition to that, I think that there's facts to be discovered regarding this attorney

[1:14:59] Thank you very much.

[1:15:00] And,

[1:15:03] you know, I think that when people are going to lodge arbitrary and capricious claims, against folks,

[1:15:13] any time government lobb, an arbitrary capricious claim against you, you should have an opportunity to make with legal counsel and be able to defend yourself. Every time, every time. But apparently,

[1:15:28] when Stephanie read, and Chris Ferrari set the agenda, that's not the case.

[1:15:32] So, I will be supporting the motion to table this.

[1:15:38] I do think that we need to have some more folks look on this.

[1:15:41] And I would hate to see how much money we spent with an outside law firm.

[1:15:48] If this ends up being totally, you know,

[1:15:50] a griegiously wrong as far as, you know, being consistent with law, right?

[1:15:58] There are concerns that I have about how this is impacted by state code and other things.

[1:16:06] And then in addition to that, it also needs to be looked ever again, because California

[1:16:10] Taylor is senior on this council to May read, because she was sworn in the day later.

[1:16:16] So that's all I have, I'll be supporting this motion.

[1:16:19] So, so it's kind of unfortunate that they've penalized Council member Taylor on this.

[1:16:27] Is there a problem?

[1:16:29] You'd be an interesting dig into Council's records to find that I'm pretty sure two members

[1:16:36] of Council walked out of closed session.

[1:16:40] And thus, the minutes may reflect that,

[1:16:43] Missions in August and we're not present because they decided to leave

[1:16:47] for whatever reason I can't go into that because that is closed session.

[1:16:51] But the minutes reflect that they were not there to certify the closed meeting because they left a year ago in August.

[1:16:57] They decided to leave. They didn't want to be a part of the discussion with the city attorneys review.

[1:17:04] They declined to do it.

[1:17:08] So, if you all want to be a part of the conversation, maybe you should express an interest in doing so.

[1:17:14] Um, I would like to point out we have been talking, excuse me, you have been talking for nearly an hour.

[1:17:23] Yeah.

[1:17:23] And I humbly submitted at the foreground.

[1:17:26] I just want an apology that what was done was wrong.

[1:17:30] It won't happen again and it's moving on.

[1:17:32] And I'm not going to listen to anyone telling me what I do not want and what I do want.

[1:17:38] What I know is that it was wrong.

[1:17:41] And I'm looking at all these folks in this room right now, who worked so dang hard with these two to cause chaos in this city.

[1:17:55] Oh,

[1:17:58] right. Keep it up. Keep it up. Keep it up. Keep it up, guys. I'm telling you, I don't look at you and think anything.

[1:18:10] Oh, good grief.

[1:18:12] Don't only weasels up here the ones who are going to just take this to court anyway.

[1:18:15] We know that's what they do best.

[1:18:22] Let's vote.

[1:18:23] Let's do it.

[1:18:25] Let's do it.

[1:18:26] Matt, Matt, Matt, Matt.

[1:18:27] And also, I have the floor still.

[1:18:29] I'd like to point out anyway.

[1:18:31] These fines are just going to be paid by two men in this room anyway.

[1:18:34] I see them in here right now.

[1:18:36] The biggest donors in Lynchburg.

[1:18:38] They're just going to pay it off for them.

[1:18:40] And also, you guys could go to any organization you want to.

[1:18:45] It's not just some organization that you have to go to any of them.

[1:18:49] Find the appropriate training, go to it, and you're done.

[1:18:52] It doesn't have to be VML.

[1:18:54] It doesn't have to be for cities.

[1:18:59] Madam Mary, I'm not finished.

[1:19:02] I'm not finished, and I would appreciate some decorum in this room.

[1:19:05] I didn't get y'all for notes.

[1:19:18] This is what we have to do.

[1:19:22] We've got to put an end to this.

[1:19:25] We've tried multiple ways to do so, and we just listen for an hour plus to defending themselves

[1:19:35] over what they've done.

[1:19:38] Folks, this whole claim over due process, let's consider it for a moment.

[1:19:47] Due process

[1:19:51] in a legal setting, sure?

[1:19:57] This is a legislative body.

[1:19:58] We govern our own, a clear distinction from an executive branch.

[1:20:05] Can we please vote on the substitute motion?

[1:20:09] Vote on the primary motion.

[1:20:12] And they conduct the business of the city.

[1:20:18] I'm not acknowledging you right now on the floor,

[1:20:21] because I'd like to see if anything else about it.

[1:20:22] Yes, Councilman Dolan?

[1:20:24] Yes.

[1:20:24] I mean, I just say something.

[1:20:25] Yes.

[1:20:27] I see we've been here for an hour and 16 minutes.

[1:20:29] and I really am experiencing PSDD and suffering over the reliving the last 20 months of a dysfunctional

[1:20:37] console.

[1:20:38] And all I want to say is enough is enough.

[1:20:41] I just think that the divisive behaviors that we've experienced over the new majority, this

[1:20:48] console is truly dysfunctional and really getting in the way of our doing business and our

[1:20:52] governing in the city.

[1:20:53] And you can sit up here and apologize, but then you turn right around.

[1:20:57] I've watched it the last hour and 16 minutes and your behaviors are all the same.

[1:21:01] So I don't, I don't believe anything's going to change.

[1:21:03] I think that I would support the resolution for this reason.

[1:21:08] Hopefully people will wake up and decide that their behaviors have been really bad for this

[1:21:14] console.

[1:21:15] I just, I, I, I, I sit here silently watching this and I am in absolute other disbelief.

[1:21:22] And I can tell you, this does involve the citizen.

[1:21:26] This does affect the citizens.

[1:21:28] I can go anywhere, then I am not stopped by it.

[1:21:32] Republicans, Democrats, independents, or whatever,

[1:21:35] looking at me and saying, why can't Council do something

[1:21:38] about the members to see Council that are so disruptive?

[1:21:41] So I'm telling you, something has to change

[1:21:44] because this city is really suffering as a result of it.

[1:21:47] It's a lose.

[1:21:49] Dr. Wow?

[1:21:52] So before we go out on the substitute motion, I'll just say this, as I'm sitting here listening

[1:21:58] to all this, you know, I'm so sorry that Councilman Taylor has been put into the middle

[1:22:05] of this and I feel like used in some way, because I really feel like you have been Councilman

[1:22:12] Taylor because I know you're intent and I know you're heart and you and I talk a lot about

[1:22:18] kinds of things that had nothing to do with what's going on up here.

[1:22:24] I had a conversation

[1:22:26] with you earlier today about people's hearts and the hope and the prayer that I'm trying

[1:22:36] to see you, okay, they're great. The hope that genuine hearts would be shown up here so that

[1:22:44] when we had to call the vote maybe what was necessary wouldn't necessarily be necessary. But

[1:22:52] Unfortunately, I haven't seen that.

[1:22:58] I haven't seen genuine repentance here as far as apology

[1:23:05] for the actual acts that brought us to this place.

[1:23:11] I haven't seen that.

[1:23:16] I've seen mud slinging and lying and intentions

[1:23:23] to throw other things,

[1:23:31] throw other people under the bus rather than just address the behaviors

[1:23:36] that we're supposed to be talking about. And that doesn't make things better, it makes things

[1:23:41] more challenging. So those are my concerns, and that's what I had told you I was hoping

[1:23:52] that we could get to and just address this.

[1:23:56] But then a whole one to other things unrelated

[1:24:00] have come up deflection tactics and so forth,

[1:24:05] and that's what happens.

[1:24:09] And so you know, you all can see what you want to say.

[1:24:14] That's fine.

[1:24:18] All my life I have been faithful.

[1:24:22] Oh my life I have been so so good.

[1:24:33] Okay let's take a vote please for the

[1:24:38] sub-preet motion please. I wasn't directing anything towards you Councilman

[1:24:44] Missions and I would like to call the vote for the substitute motion right now please.

[1:24:54] Yes, Councilmember Taylor? Yes. Councilmember Wouter? No. Vice Mayor Frawdy?

[1:24:59] Mayor Reed? No. The motion fails. Okay, now I'd like to call the vote for the main motion.

[1:25:06] I have a chance to speak to the main motion. You have a chance to speak to the main motion?

[1:25:11] I would like to call.

[1:25:12] Madam Mayor, I have a chance to speak to the point of order.

[1:25:19] What's your point of order?

[1:25:20] My point of order is that I haven't had an opportunity to speak to the main motion.

[1:25:24] Mr. Friedman and I believe that the rules of procedure actually give council members a

[1:25:29] right to speak to the motion before voting on it.

[1:25:32] All right.

[1:25:33] I need to speak to you in all of these reasons why he didn't believe that we should have

[1:25:37] That's not your interpretation.

[1:25:38] I'm talking to the attorney, Madam Mayor.

[1:25:41] It's the attorney's interpretation.

[1:25:43] You don't live inside my mind.

[1:25:47] I understand, I understand the question, Madam Mayor, what I would offer in your district.

[1:25:55] Sorry, can you hear me?

[1:25:58] What I would offer is, while Council Members Helves and Missions have made various points as part of their substitute motion, given the nature of the resolution that's on the table and the primary motion being back,

[1:26:12] especially with claims of wanting due process and being able to be heard.

[1:26:17] So, long as they have an opportunity to be heard within the rules of procedure,

[1:26:20] I think it's fair to allow all members, again, to speak to the censure, now that it's on the table.

[1:26:28] Okay.

[1:26:28] Okay, for

[1:26:33] due to the interest of the time, because we've been going so long,

[1:26:39] that I would like to this, at this point, acknowledge our time limit of 30 minutes total for debate,

[1:26:46] because we do have a four o'clock work session.

[1:26:51] So total for everyone to speak, so I can call the vote.

[1:26:55] That means everyone's speaking maximum of 30 minutes.

[1:26:59] Go ahead.

[1:27:03] All right.

[1:27:04] So, let me get back to my notes here.

[1:27:14] So, I have some questions.

[1:27:17] Feel free to answer them.

[1:27:19] Attorney, mayor, if you don't answer them.

[1:27:21] It's fine too, but you know,

[1:27:27] on page one

[1:27:31] in the first paragraph, section 37 and city charter

[1:27:35] it says that members of council of the profound duty of making decisions to the best interests

[1:27:41] of the city.

[1:27:44] So I'm not just agreeing with that statement, but as the sections say we have the duty

[1:27:49] to act in the best interests of the city, the language is not in the charter, is it?

[1:27:55] I said that because what's in the best way of the city is most often the subject of our public-to-date debate and disagreement.

[1:28:01] Right, so like I said earlier, you know, part of the process is the debate.

[1:28:09] And it's pretty clear what's happening up here is, you know, there looks like they might be trying to squash debate.

[1:28:20] Using retaliatory threatening and bullying tactics.

[1:28:30] So, again,

[1:28:33] you know, the closed session, we could have had a closed session to discuss these issues with the city attorney and that ever happened.

[1:28:42] There was just phone calls that went around, right?

[1:28:47] That's skirted the whole deliberative process, right?

[1:28:50] We didn't get an opportunity to agree with your disagree on things.

[1:28:53] We should have been able to do that.

[1:28:58] So next, you know, it talks about the charter being able to address the sort of behavior

[1:29:06] misconduct.

[1:29:07] So what definition of disorderly behavior are we using here?

[1:29:12] What definition of misconduct are we using here?

[1:29:17] Where are we getting those definitions from?

[1:29:21] You know,

[1:29:24] if the government is going to do things, we're just going to make claims, right?

[1:29:27] And Chris made his statement about legislative versus executive, right?

[1:29:36] Well, probably should get the legislative part, you know, to the point where we know

[1:29:46] what it's saying or where it's coming from, because we run into a lot of issues going into

[1:29:53] and the

[1:29:57] next question that I have is,

[1:30:03] You go to paragraph 9 on page 3,

[1:30:12] whereas, while the legality of the grievances outlined in this resolution, may or may not be unlawful.

[1:30:17] They, among others, have been a further detriment to the public trust and reputation of the city-lines.

[1:30:22] in this council, right?

[1:30:27] I think we talked about this, recording a phone calls, one participants totally legal,

[1:30:32] It's not a moral.

[1:30:34] So,

[1:30:38] we have that recorded phone call.

[1:30:40] Mr. Friedman never asserted, it's any client-pages in that call, right?

[1:30:48] So, in addition to that, when we look at,

[1:31:01] This is where, as without authorization from a majority vote of the Council on July 9th,

[1:31:07] Cardinal News reported that Council and Helges and Admissions provided a copy of that

[1:31:10] same email stating the body, text with a DACA except for a portion of a sentence.

[1:31:19] So,

[1:31:23] what I'm trying to figure out is assuming that the allegation is that a majority

[1:31:27] vote of the Council not taking place, we couldn't release it, that's a question that I have.

[1:31:38] The attorney doesn't invoke the privilege, the client invokes the privilege.

[1:31:48] So, was it waived when Mayor Reed said, but she said on the radio?

[1:31:55] Was it waived when Mr. Friedman said what he said on the dice?

[1:32:03] So,

[1:32:08] you know,

[1:32:12] find that interesting.

[1:32:20] So

[1:32:23] something else too,

[1:32:35] that's

[1:32:38] come across on here,

[1:32:44] takes it right back down to the fact finding why does this

[1:32:50] Council majority seem so uninterested, they're willing to

[1:32:55] exercise the power to do this with less than 24 hours

[1:33:02] notice. Okay? Less than 24 hours notice on this resolution, and they're willing to exercise

[1:33:10] the power to do this.

[1:33:17] Not willing to exercise our ability to fact-find, subpoenas for documents,

[1:33:26] subpoenas for testimony.

[1:33:29] Let's see where it goes.

[1:33:34] I'd love to see where it goes.

[1:33:39] I'm

[1:33:40] things that Mr. Freedman said over and over and over and about Mr. Hell was in, in myself.

[1:33:45] We're not attorneys.

[1:33:47] Neither is Chris for all day. Neither is Stephanie Reed,

[1:33:53] but there

[1:33:53] are the ones asserting that privilege wasn't waived. They aren't attorneys,

[1:34:03] right? So why is it?

[1:34:08] whatever we say something, that's the response we get, and then on the other side of that,

[1:34:16] while Mr. Freeman has made those claims.

[1:34:24] I also would say that we do have the ability

[1:34:29] to interpret laws, because it's very clear that legislative bodies we make laws have the ability

[1:34:35] to interpret them. This is a mess when it comes to interpretation.

[1:34:49] You know, Christopher Aldi said, just a moment ago,

[1:34:59] Councilman Halvesson admissions a green writing to attend a type of

[1:35:02] newly effective elective official training with a reputable

[1:35:04] Virginia association within three months of adoption of its

[1:35:06] resolution, such as the ML emerging for cities, the fines

[1:35:09] above will be avoided. He said it can be anything, anything.

[1:35:17] This doesn't say it can be anything, so it has to be a type of duty effect like the official training with a reputable Virginia association, right?

[1:35:26] So arbitrarily you just change it.

[1:35:38] So, you know, again, I find that interesting.

[1:35:50] What

[1:35:58] we have here is very simple, you know,

[1:36:08] it's politics, this is purely political, and

[1:36:13] it has nothing to do with politics, nothing.

[1:36:23] Politics are good for ratings for the news, Mr. Taylor mentioned that earlier, as on

[1:36:29] WL and I this morning,

[1:36:34] they love it.

[1:36:37] They love it. I'm tired of it.

[1:36:42] Um,

[1:36:47] you know,

[1:36:50] if we exercised our ability to find facts around here, right?

[1:36:56] If we actually investigated,

[1:37:01] I think a lot of people would be shocked

[1:37:06] what would come up in discovery,

[1:37:10] Depositions,

[1:37:13] testimony,

[1:37:16] you know.

[1:37:20] It's easy for me to come up here and say what I say every time I'm here because I don't

[1:37:23] lie.

[1:37:24] I'm not a liar.

[1:37:24] I've never been.

[1:37:26] The mayor called me a liar, mom, and I go, I'll forgive her for that.

[1:37:30] She does it all the time.

[1:37:33] On January 9th of this year, I'm sitting right up here between a work session and a meeting.

[1:37:38] She told me how important it was

[1:37:43] to get together with a third party mediator, we were

[1:37:47] trying to work with the Barry the Hatch, and Jane, we're not. I challenge her to tell me I'm

[1:37:55] lying because I can prove it. She said

[1:38:04] it. It's now August. There's phone calls. There's

[1:38:09] text messages. There's emails.

[1:38:17] There's no interest in burger in the hatchet.

[1:38:21] None. It hasn't

[1:38:23] You

[1:38:27] know, notice I asked her earlier. What lie?

[1:38:33] She's not going to respond.

[1:38:36] But on January 9th, she told me she was going to do something, and I can prove it.

[1:38:43] And it hasn't happened.

[1:38:46] And it's because for nearly a year, I've been trying to bury the hatchet.

[1:38:53] But if the hatchet was buried, wouldn't be good for ratings.

[1:39:05] So I would hope we consider the legal and ethical implications of this resolution to really

[1:39:13] bad luck for us to

[1:39:19] borrow Councilman Helderson and myself from

[1:39:30] into a race performance evaluations.

[1:39:33] I

[1:39:37] mean, it raised performance evaluations.

[1:39:39] I guess the upside of erasing the performance evaluations

[1:39:41] is that there are no longer personnel records,

[1:39:43] no longer public records, because they're just,

[1:39:47] so I guess I could just release them to the public, my questions.

[1:39:53] But, I'll have to get some consultation on that.

[1:39:59] But, you know, this is just really just a really bad precedent.

[1:40:04] be racing, formance evaluations, and saying we can't have a say, and you know what, it's

[1:40:09] interesting.

[1:40:19] I didn't think that we were supposed to talk about what happened in close session,

[1:40:24] but

[1:40:25] Vice Mayor Feraldi, just it.

[1:40:35] I didn't think we were supposed to talk about what happened in close session, but Vice Mayor

[1:40:37] Feraldi, just then, and because of that, I can't address or counter his plane because we're

[1:41:21] I'm just looking forward to the next session.

[1:41:27] Again, I just continued prayer for our community as a constant

[1:41:29] and tailor.

[1:41:30] And doing with indicating, we have received so many comments

[1:41:33] from all over the country about the cast in the

[1:41:40] I mean, a dysfunctional unit, and it hurts my heart to see, especially if you're from

[1:41:45] Lynchburg, as you love our community.

[1:41:48] I mean, someone just texted me and said, I live in the city, because they just saw him bare,

[1:41:51] so what's going on?

[1:41:53] This is just, this is just, this is really sad to see people who, who, who have so many challenges

[1:41:59] and so many, just functions and can't get along, and they all love Jesus, and they just

[1:42:06] said to see this happen, I support the motion, because again, I'm going to get back to some

[1:42:12] enormous as possible, and again, be much remember, I was in favor of someone doing evaluation

[1:42:18] on an attorney who you're currently suing, so that should not be permitted in the first place.

[1:42:25] But again, I was not voters that vote them in, so again, that's, again, I still don't think

[1:42:30] that's appropriate to be having someone doing an evaluation on someone you're currently suing,

[1:42:35] press another case. I do support the motion. I think we need to get back to, I'm praying

[1:42:42] that we can get back to some normacy. I'm praying that we can get back to working for our

[1:42:46] citizens. I'm praying because they focus on the issues that really affect our city and that

[1:42:52] all the other issues that I've just beyond our realm of what we can do focus on the city and

[1:42:57] making this for a great place to live or can play. Thank you.

[1:43:06] Council.

[1:43:07] Thank you.

[1:43:08] You know, it's, I think the last resolution or the last motion was pretty straightforward.

[1:43:17] The matter of due process, you know, I know the city attorney said, oh, we're having

[1:43:21] our due process by speaking, though we're not, had less than a day, you know, half a day

[1:43:28] to kind of review this resolution.

[1:43:32] had no ability to talk to legal counsel, and it's just a shame that you're going to say we're

[1:43:42] going to, the folks that are up here sworn to uphold the Constitution, uphold the fact

[1:43:49] of citizens' rights, the whole the fact of the due process where you can actually present

[1:43:55] your case, you can have time to actually come up with a good argument.

[1:44:01] You know, I can appreciate the angst up here, you know, some folks they can hold

[1:44:09] man this is going on too long.

[1:44:10] Well, the issue is if we were to just say, yes, we will defer this, where we can actually

[1:44:18] present.

[1:44:19] But we're kind of in a catch-to-one, too.

[1:44:22] Well, hoping that we can actually defer this motion to where we can actually fulfill our

[1:44:29] due process, where we can actually meet with legal counsel, where we can actually see this

[1:44:36] resolution and come up with a presentation and a vigorous response to it by more than just

[1:44:44] few hours. We would be just talking about where we could actually do that and we could

[1:44:50] look at lots of these items that are in this resolution that are that are really

[1:44:55] factually incorrect. These things are.

[1:45:00] Or just vindictive. I mean, it's almost, you know, some of the comical, and some of

[1:45:08] they says, oh, we want you to apologize. But we're going to take somebody who is head in my mind,

[1:45:15] I guess an impeccable record of 20 years, and say, oh, well, you are going to go to the

[1:45:22] back of the bus, like that matters. I've heard on the radio, the attacks that, oh, Jeff only

[1:45:29] wants to be mayor, or only wants this, or is misogynistic,

[1:45:34] or he's sexist, or he's racist, or all of these things.

[1:45:37] It's never responded in that.

[1:45:39] Because why?

[1:45:40] It's foolishness.

[1:45:42] I don't respond to it.

[1:45:43] I don't say, oh, no, no, I'm not.

[1:45:45] I don't say that I called you a naughty word,

[1:45:47] like you had suggested for so long.

[1:45:50] I don't do these kind of things because it's not good for the city.

[1:45:56] And sadly, today hasn't been about coming together.

[1:46:02] Today has been about inframing one side.

[1:46:05] You know, we have some folks that are like, yeah,

[1:46:08] I'll let you on.

[1:46:08] Another side that says, no, you know,

[1:46:11] and I just,

[1:46:15] it is pretty appalling.

[1:46:17] But it happens and you can do what you want.

[1:46:20] You know, I would hope that there would be still some sanity that said,

[1:46:27] know we got to pull some of these things because this isn't due process. This isn't and I'm not

[1:46:33] saying this is I have been able to present a case. I haven't been able to meet with attorneys.

[1:46:38] I haven't been able to actually go through these items. I got it last night and now to come forward

[1:46:43] the very few hours later to kind of come up with some kind of response. I don't think it's proven.

[1:46:50] You know, the issue is, this is good. We're going to just take it and stomach it.

[1:46:57] Or is it going to go to another level?

[1:46:59] I mean, there's a little waste, you know?

[1:47:03] What a waste of time.

[1:47:06] But I mean, when you throw out things that are just rotten,

[1:47:10] and factually incorrect, you just sit there and take it.

[1:47:14] You know, we tried earlier.

[1:47:16] All right, tried earlier, and I appreciate Council Member Taylor saying,

[1:47:19] yeah, I mean, where there is real apologies.

[1:47:21] That was heartfelt.

[1:47:22] And I appreciate Chris saying that, you know,

[1:47:24] was genuine.

[1:47:26] Why not genuine?

[1:47:28] I've been genuine for 20 years.

[1:47:30] I haven't done things for my prestige or my power if I would.

[1:47:34] I certainly wouldn't be sitting behind this dyes.

[1:47:37] Spend lots of time for no money, no benefits, no anything.

[1:47:42] I've been in the minority for almost 20 years.

[1:47:46] And we finally get Republicans and I'm in the worst minority.

[1:47:50] I said, you know, Council Member Taylor said it correctly.

[1:47:55] We should do this prudently.

[1:47:58] We shouldn't just attack people publicly.

[1:48:00] We should give due process.

[1:48:04] It's just,

[1:48:08] with throughout these allegations, we heard it, oh, well, did defamed or lies or,

[1:48:14] well, what?

[1:48:15] Nothing.

[1:48:16] When the question was asked, well, where was the defamation?

[1:48:19] Where were the lies?

[1:48:20] Nothing.

[1:48:22] So I appreciated what Abraham Lincoln said a long time ago, basically I paraphrase it, that

[1:48:29] he said no man is smart enough to remember all his lies.

[1:48:33] So you tell the truth all the time.

[1:48:37] And so with that, I've been stating the truth for the last 20 years.

[1:48:41] I say the same thing that I say in private, as I do in public.

[1:48:46] When I first ran 20 years ago, I said, I'm going to look out for the taxpayers wallet.

[1:48:50] I'm going to fight for the citizens, they have the citizens or the city live within its means, that's what I've done.

[1:48:56] I recognize this, you know, kind of thing as maybe a little more theater.

[1:49:01] I don't think it's a good, you know, it's almost like a public lynching just because you don't like somebody and maybe you can find something.

[1:49:11] But lots of these items, when you look at the fact of due process, there has not been any due process.

[1:49:17] I'm having to do this at the top of my head.

[1:49:20] Our city attorney has repeatedly said, I'm not an attorney.

[1:49:23] Do you think I've been able to get with an attorney

[1:49:25] before being presented this today?

[1:49:29] So the question is, Council Member Helgison,

[1:49:32] is whether due process and a legislative center session

[1:49:36] would entitle you to write to Council constitutionally.

[1:49:40] And I don't think it would, sir.

[1:49:41] I think whether what I think is,

[1:49:45] but we can evaluate it for performance.

[1:49:48] What I think is, is whether you are having an opportunity

[1:49:53] to respond to what's been presented to you.

[1:49:56] Yeah.

[1:49:56] And can you answer that?

[1:49:58] And there's your opportunity now to respond.

[1:50:00] I'm having an opportunity to respond, but it's very short time

[1:50:04] frame.

[1:50:04] We just now have the ability with the combined seven people,

[1:50:08] 30 minutes maximum.

[1:50:10] I just got this last night within several hours.

[1:50:13] we should be going line by line of what is factual and what is not, and I don't believe,

[1:50:20] especially when in here there are fines and seizing of people's property in this resolution,

[1:50:28] that says we're going to find you, we're going to do whatever.

[1:50:33] I recognize it's different, but my goodness, there is, I don't think the Constitution stops

[1:50:37] want to walk into that council chamber.

[1:50:49] Our citizens' rights aren't stopped just because they're in here.

[1:50:53] We have the right, the first amendment, which was tried to be stopped by kicking out the

[1:50:58] right to the press.

[1:51:01] They're the rights of the citizens, and that same first amendment was trying to be stopped

[1:51:04] by the rights of the citizens to peaceably assemble, told to get out the rights of citizens.

[1:51:11] Councilmember Missions and I, to publicly have our free speech by saying what we think is very critical and open.

[1:51:20] Now, I don't know what other kind of apologies are needed, but this resolution isn't any good.

[1:51:28] That's why I suggested we table it so we can actually talk privately, whether we can talk publicly.

[1:51:35] We've given apologies apparently that isn't good enough because somebody will apologize for something only to say, well, I don't appreciate it or I don't like it.

[1:51:50] Well, I am very, you know, I heard an apology by the mayor not long ago that she apologized that the citizens had to witness her disorderly disrupted behavior.

[1:52:01] She didn't say about her, she said it was about us.

[1:52:05] We were sitting there, and we heard screaming going on up there.

[1:52:09] We heard chanting going on the back, and we just sitting there giving a professional presentation

[1:52:15] regardless of heckling.

[1:52:17] But then the apology wasn't for somebody's disorderly bad behavior.

[1:52:24] The apology was for us for what we did.

[1:52:29] So, I hope you will accept this apology that I gave earlier.

[1:52:33] I hope you will vote down this resolution.

[1:52:36] I hope that you will actually say,

[1:52:39] do processes critical protecting citizens rights are critical.

[1:52:44] I hope that you will ask for forgiveness that you will actually work together for the good of the citizens.

[1:52:51] not just for your aggrandizement.

[1:52:55] I know some folks may have had PTSD from discussion of this.

[1:53:01] It shouldn't have been a two minute discussion.

[1:53:03] It should have been a fact that we can just say,

[1:53:06] yeah, we're not bringing it up.

[1:53:08] We're going to talk privately.

[1:53:10] We're going to give people due process.

[1:53:12] I do hope that you will vote this down in the spirit of and bear in mind.

[1:53:18] That even if you vote this down,

[1:53:20] things are changing.

[1:53:24] If you vote for it, you got to live with your conscience, vote it

[1:53:28] down and I can vow to you that we are going to be working towards peace and harmony over

[1:53:35] this rest of this session and I hope you will vote it down today and when we will still move

[1:53:43] on and it won't be lost as the mayor and vice mayor has said what we want to teach a lesson.

[1:53:52] It's almost watching like the Game of Thrones, where a public shaming, you know, maybe I should

[1:53:58] take out my shirt and put blood all over me and walk out and hit myself with the, so

[1:54:03] anyway.

[1:54:04] Hopefully that's done.

[1:54:06] Hopefully you'll vote against this resolution, and I will pledge to you that I will be

[1:54:10] working as Council Member Taylor said in the spirit of cooperation and the spirit of openness,

[1:54:16] the spirit of coming together collegially for the benefit of the city.

[1:54:22] Like I think I have done for the last 20 years, so please vote against this resolution.

[1:54:27] Thank you.

[1:54:37] All right, we'll go ahead and vote on the original motion.

[1:54:40] Councilmember Dolan?

[1:54:41] Yes.

[1:54:42] Councilmember Hegelson?

[1:54:43] No.

[1:54:44] Councilmember Missions?

[1:54:44] No.

[1:54:45] Councilmember Taylor?

[1:54:47] No.

[1:54:48] Councilmember Wilder?

[1:54:49] Yes.

[1:54:50] Vice Mayor Frolting?

[1:54:51] Yes.

[1:54:51] Mayor Reed?

[1:54:52] Yes.

[1:54:53] The motion passes.

[1:55:01] Okay, this reading is adjourned, we will be reconvened for a clock for a work session, thank you.

City Council Special Called Meeting - August 13, 2024

Transcript