We are disappointed that Coeur d’Alene Mayor Steve Widmyer seems to be following the lead set by his predecessor Sandi Bloem.
Bloem liked to pack unelected committees and commissions with cronies and headnodders who would apply the rubber-stamp of approval to almost any big-dollar deal without considering if it was in the best interests of the City’s reputation or its people.
Thursday’s Coeur d’Alene Press “news article” titled Four corners report reveals that Widmyer is showing he’s no different. In fact, he likes to use some of the same cronies and headnodders. Of the nine advisory committee members named in the “news article,” eight have exceedingly well-developed headnodder muscles toned by years of subservience. To us, only the BLM realty specialist might appear to be considered objectively independent.
The bulk of the content from last Thursday’s Coeur d’Alene Press “news article” titled Four corners report came from a report written by the City’s spokesflack Keith Erickson but dutifully transcribed by the Press’s Jeff Selle so it could imaginatively be called a news article (thus, the quotation marks) rather than a press release. Several OpenCdA readers have contacted us, disgusted that Mayor Widmyer and his cronies would be carrying on business as usual in Coeur d’Alene and that they would be so blatant in their disdain for the City’s honest residents. Here are a few bullet-point comments we received:
- Who from the City’s handpicked advisory committee was present at the Monday meeting reported in the story? The “news article” identifies the nine people who were selected as members of the committee, but it conspicuously avoids identifying exactly which of them were present at the Monday meeting.
- In addition to whichever advisory committee members were present, who else was present? Why weren’t all of the attendees and their affiliations identified in the “news article?”
- The “news article” reports that the public and media were intentionally excluded from the meeting, but it failed to identify who made the decision to exclude them. Who made that decision?
- Doesn’t the Idaho Open Meeting Law apply to meetings of advisory groups like the one in the article? Yes, it does.
- The “news article” reports that several possible and obviously lucrative projects were discussed. With so much money to be made from any and all of these projects, we are unsurprised at the decision to exclude the public and media. An informed public just might not agree with who gets which pieces of the pie.
Widmyer may well have been stung by criticism from people whom he thought were already in his pocket. Consequently, the Friday Coeur d’Alene Press ran a damage-control article headlined Widmyer: Meetings will be public. The article did provide some new information but left some questions unanswered.
- In the opening paragraph Widmyer acknowledged that it was the City who made the decision to exclude the public and the media. However in the next sentence, Widmyer claims he did not attend the meeting and was not aware it was not open to the public. So the question remains, if the Mayor did not make the decision to close the meeting to the public, who in the City government did? Spokesflack Erickson says city staff made the decision, but Erickson doesn’t name names.
- The skewspaper article reports that the advisory committee was formed by Welch Comer Engineers the preceding week to discuss the timeline, but according to Widmyer, “Nothing was decided at that meeting. It was just a meeting to explain the timeline and make sure that everyone was on the same page.” Make sure everyone was on the same page? That sounds like an agreement to us. Then something was decided about the project, wasn’t it?
- Erickson acknowledged that during the Monday meeting (characterized in the story as a “walking tour”), “several multimillion dollar concepts” were discussed by the advisory committee. Now why, OpenCdA wonders, would the City’s advisory committee want to be able to discuss big dollar deals privately and out of the hearing range of media and public?
- Widmyer used the terms “meeting” and “walking tour” interchangeably. Can a “walking tour” as described in the skewspaper articles be a “meeting” subject to the Idaho Open Meeting Law? Yes, at least according to the Idaho Supreme Court. In 2010, the Idaho Supreme Court ruled:
“Site visit by [Kootenai] County Board of Commissioners to property that was the subject of landowners’ subdivision application violated open meeting laws, where Board, which intentionally avoided group that was gathered near the entrance to the site location, did not wish for the public to participate in the site viewing, as far as providing comments or presenting evidence, and precluded the public from even listening to the hearing in an attempt to avoid public participation.” (see Noble v. Kootenai County, 231 P.3d 1034 (Idaho 2010))
It appears to OpenCdA there is little difference between the site visit conducted by Kootenai County Commissioners Currie, Tondee, and Piazza in the Noble decision and the walking tour conducted by the City’s advisory committee. Whether the Idaho Open Meeting Law was violated during the recent meeting/walking tour would depend in part on whether a quorum of committee members was present. As we noted earlier, the “news articles” failed to identify exactly who was present at the meeting/walking tour.
OpenCdA suggests readers not become too concerned with the apparent violation of the Idaho Open Meeting Law. At the behest of the Idaho Attorney General and a feckless Idaho press corps, a cowardly Legislature and Governor castrated the law in 2009. By removing any meaningful penalties and by presuming that all illegal meetings are the result of innocent oversight by well-intended but honest public officials, the AG, the Legislature, and the Governor effectively gave public officials the go-ahead to conduct the public’s business in the backrooms and out of the public view. All that is required to “cure” an illegal act is for the officials to ratify in a public meeting the previously agreed upon backroom decisions.
Welcome to Idaho: Esto perpetua corruptam
Did you really expect anything different from the good ole boys? Anyone that thought widmyer would bring change has their head out of the daylight. 😉
This town is run by the select few and no one gets in office that is not a hand picked groomed PUPPET!
Comment by concernedcitizen — August 26, 2014 @ 8:00 am
I beg to differ, although I know that the knives are out for me and Mr. Adams in 2015.
Comment by Dan Gookin — August 26, 2014 @ 8:36 am
Although not listed I am on the committee and I absolutely do not have a hand up my ….
I do however follow Dan’s example of hearing something out, studying it and then making my own decision.
When the time comes Dan will be reelected, Adams no.
Comment by Mike Teague — August 26, 2014 @ 10:03 am
Mike Teague,
So the Press story (Four corners report) is wrong?
Who else has been given the Secret Squadron Decoder Ring and Badge and is on the committee but conveniently not listed? Did the City intentionally deceive the Press about the committee’s composition, or did the Press intentionally deceive its readers in stating that it is a nine-member review committee? The actual number of committee members is important in determining a quorum, and an advisory committee of this kind formed by the City (or by Welch Comer Engineers at the direction of the City) is subject to the Idaho Open Meeting Law.
Who else was present at the Monday meeting/walking tour?
Comment by Bill — August 26, 2014 @ 11:24 am
Take it easy big Bill as usual you are jumping on something that is not a problem. After the article came out, I told him the committee did not seem balanced to me and that there was an apparent problem with his communication director getting even a non-story straight. He ask me if I would care to be on the committee and I said yes. Sometimes if people think, they see a problem it helps to volunteer to help instead of just complaining, now I can complain all I want. Moral of the story, ask first then go nuts.
P.S. meeting no, walking tour yes.
Comment by Mike Teague — August 26, 2014 @ 1:29 pm
Mike Teague,
By your comment, you acknowledge that the Press story is wrong. If the City was genuinely interested in being open and honest, it would have issued a press release announcing your addition to the Committee. It didn’t, and that does not surprise me. That would bring other interested citizens out of the woodwork and would create a control problem for the Mayor. If his handpicked cronies and rubber stamps were equaled or outnumbered by honest citizens, it becomes harder for the City to pick winners and losers when it comes to making project decisions resulting in lucrative contracts.
Comment by Bill — August 26, 2014 @ 7:50 pm
This city does not want volunteers, (they fire them, actually) they want to enlist “cahooters.” No thanks, unless the Mayor wants to form a ‘no more development committee’ or a living wage committee through city ordinance that is considered before the ‘brand’ of Coeur d’Alene, which is prioritized first, because it will attract that ‘outside’ money.
My vision of 2030 for this area is: Who will make the top ten of the slumlord list, first?
Of course we all wanted the slumlords, the entire community participated in the “2030 Vision” which of course was not a law, but just a plan, much like McEuen Park. Now, we have the park, through no vote … and no water/boating access for the non-cahooter people and big plans of more art and gardens paid for with our tax dollars through urban development to attract outside money – DRUMROLL plz – a big smokin’ BARBECUE!! Well the pig was just a walk away, what a waste of coals.
This four corners scam and I mean SCAM is just another example of the bull*** that has been fed to us prior to the smooth Wydmyer transition of business as usual that is on a roller coaster ride of green back dollars.
Bill, it is over and I mean really over here … strong leadership needs to cry and we don’t have any, before anything will be done to stop this monster of cronyism ect.ect. However, I prefer ‘cahootism.’ It sounds less threatening, but it represents most of their very small “stakeholder” (the new term is “leader”) minds.
Comment by Stebbijo — August 26, 2014 @ 8:34 pm
Couldn’t help but take time from a Labor Day weekend to respond–from a “labor” perspective.
“Special” Committees are odd in the City of CDA. First, they are all subsets of other Committees with only one, maybe two people who don’t work directly (or get a check)from the City, the Contractor’s peeps and the like and secondly, out of the numerous (15 or so and counting…) committees, which are mostly comprised of people who either work for the City–or are on at least one other Committee, subommittee, etc. the Labor pool is apparently small in CDA.
The 2030 Plan? The Authors have stated that next year they (whomever “they” become as “incorporators”) will form as a non-profit corporation; my guess is a 501(C).3. Yeeh!Hah! Planning for development (even outside city limits), adopting implementation strategies generated by a tax-exempt write-offs, layered with land under what usually appears to be under the full control of LCDC (not the City Council)–This will work out well.
The City has, according to the Press, already adopted the Goals and Implementation Strategies from the 2030 Plan. What about the State required and already adopted City Comprehensive Plan and the adopted development regulations which presumably are generally consistent with The Plan?
Said if before, but again is worthy. Why is the City Attorney so involved (since prior to study data collection) and why oh why hasn’t the City NOT hired a Planning Director but rather put in charge or the Planning Department the City Attorney’s right hand man?
Don’t “take it easy” Bill. The next phase of how public development corporations operate over the long-term has taken the corner with stride in CDA.
Another Labor Day weekend watching how the City defines participation in a major project when in actuality it boils down to what small handful of city-paid do and have done for decades.
Comment by Old Dog — August 30, 2014 @ 2:34 pm