This morning OpenCdA received an email from an alert reader.  The reader linked us to this Coeur d’Alene Press newspaper column headlined The Front Row with JASON ELLIOTT April 6, 2013 – NIC gym getting a makeover.  The second sentence in the column reads, “Thanks to some funding from the Coeur d’Alene department of public works, the next time anyone steps into the gym at NIC, it will be onto a brand new gym floor.”

Our alert reader asked why the Coeur d’Alene department of public works is funding a new gym floor at North Idaho College.

We emailed the reader’s question to Coeur d’Alene City Councilman Dan Gookin with a couple questions of our own.  Within a few minutes, Councilman Gookin responded that he intended to ask that question of City Finance Director Troy Tymesen.  Gookin also observed that since the City does not really have a department of public works with that formal title, the Press article may have been in error and meant to say the Idaho Division of Public Works.

We went to the Idaho Division of Public Works, Construction Projects webpage and found this:

We wonder if anyone at the Coeur d’Alene Press bothers to check stories for accuracy.

And our thanks to Councilman Dan Gookin for his quick response to our question!

On April 2, 2013, First District Court Judge John P. Luster released his decision approving the City of Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, petition for judicial confirmation to incur $36 million in debt to upgrade the City’s wastewater treatment system.

After officially voting to approve the City’s petition on January 2, 2013, Councilman Adams reconsidered.   Although he could not change his vote at Council, Councilman Adams appeared at the Court’s hearing and was heard by Judge Luster.

Judge Luster’s decision addressed the issues Councilman Adams had raised, and as reported in today’s Coeur d’Alene Press article headlined No vote necessary, Councilman Adams will not appeal the Court’s decision.

Councilman Adams has been vilified by the Mayor, the City Attorney, and some disturbingly ignorant colleagues on the Coeur d’Alene City Council.

Online Press pseudonymous commenter “Sheeken Hunter” says it best in his online comment.

Well done, Councilman Steve Adams!

ADDENDUM:  The questions raised in our March 21 post “Under Color of Law” remain unanswered.  Specifically, what Idaho statute gave the Mayor and four members of the City Council the authority to pass a motion to exclude a duly elected City councilman from a deliberation but not a vote on a matter pending before Council?

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Memo to Idaho’s Justices and district court judges:  Want to see what a real, dedicated, honest judge looks like?

Some of you need not bother looking in the mirror.

Here’s one.

Please learn — if you can.

In a March 29, 2013 news article headlined Ex-Atlanta Schools Chief Is Indicted in Testing Scandal, the New York Times reported that former Atlanta School Superintendent Dr. Beverly Hall and 35 of her fellow educators were indicted by a Fulton County (Georgia) grand jury for “… racketeering, theft, influencing witnesses, conspiracy and making false statements.”  The grand jury indictment alleges that those charged were involved in “the most widespread public school cheating scandal in memory.”

The mechanism was simple.  Seven teachers nicknamed “The Chosen” were sequestered together in a room.  There, they erased incorrect answers from student tests and marked the correct answers.

The story came to light because of very solid fundamental news reporting by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution newspaper.

The sad but true outcome of the efforts alleged to have been made by Dr. Hall and her alleged co-conspirators is painfully clear:  Students who should not have been advanced to higher grades were.

But does inappropriate advancement of unprepared students happen in Idaho?  Apparently so. (more…)

The US Secret Service has announced the nomination and almost certain appointment of Julia Pierson to be the organization’s 23rd Director.  She will replace recently-retired former Director Mark Sullivan.

Being the chief executive law enforcement officer of the US Secret Service does not require that she continue to stand in front of doorknobs and be a handcuff jockey, though she has done both throughout her career.  What it does require is that she be a capable, competent leader and administrator .

Julie Pierson is fully professionally prepared to lead the agency with a multimillion dollar budget, thousands of employees, and a reputation tarnished by some male employees who couldn’t keep their zippers zipped when they should.  There have been far too many women in the Secret Service whose knowledge, skills, abilities, and talents were intentionally minimized because of their gender when it came time to be considered for advancement.  No truly professional law enforcement agency can afford to waste its most valuable assets in that way.

President Obama’s intention to appoint Julie Pierson to be the US Secret Service’s 23rd Director is unquestionably a step in the right direction.

Yesterday’s OpenCdA post titled “Under Color of Law” explained how an action taken by Coeur d’Alene Mayor Sandi Bloem, City Attorney Mike Gridley, and Councilmen Mike Kennedy, Deanna Goodlander, Woody McEvers, and Loren Edinger would deprive Coeur d’Alene’s citizens of effective representation by Councilman Steve Adams.

It wasn’t the first time one of the Mayor’s cohorts had exceeded the authority of his or her position to withhold (or try to withhold) time-sensitive information members of Council needed to make a major financial decision.

In October 2012, Coeur d’Alene City Administrator Wendy Gabriel failed to timely inform the City Council that School District 271 had given the City 30 days to advise whether the City will buy Northshire Park and the School District’s portion of Person Field.   Whether to purchase or not was the Council’s decision, not Gabriel’s, to make.  (more…)