Noah,
Apparently, there is a story going around the Village, regarding the goings-on at a recent Commission meeting. I hope you will agree with me that the story is an incorrect rumor. As I hear it, the story is that the Mayor had a resident escorted out of a meeting, and the escort was the police. The last time I heard this rumor spread was today.
Having attended all recent Commission meetings, except the one in July, I don't remember that any resident was escorted out of a meeting. (I've actually never heard of such a thing happening in BP.) I do recall a recent episode when the Mayor, pathetically taking the bait from a resident the Mayor was trying to suppress, asked the Police Chief to escort the resident out, but the resident finished his comments and sat down without being escorted out. Whether this is an example of the resident's having more civility and gracefulness than the Mayor is a matter for interpretation, but it's the episode that comes closest to a resident being escorted out that I can think of.
I'm curious as to whether you think the Mayor was right to threaten a resident with expulsion. My memory of the episode is that the resident's misbehavior was talking more than three minutes, and addressing a topic the Mayor decided was not pertinent to the discussion at hand. I'm guessing you do think the Mayor was right, since the Mayor, you, did not apologize to the resident, or to the neighborhood, for your behavior.
In the event that you do think you were right, I wonder how you would think back on an episode in which another resident, you, raged around during a Commission meeting, far exceeding the three minute limit, going way off topic, yelling, and preventing the meeting from proceeding, accosting both the then Mayor and the Village Manager. And I wonder how you would think about the current Mayor, coincidentally also you, erupting into another temper tantrum during a Commission meeting and preventing another Commissioner from delivering her comments and asking questions.
Do you think the prior Mayor was wrong not to have threatened you with expulsion last fall? Do you think the prior Mayor should have been tougher, less accommodating, more controlling, more prone to managing residents who could not function within appropriate decorum? Do you think the Commission as a whole was wrong not to have had you expelled a few months ago, during your more recent eruption? Do you fault the current Commission for not insisting on a higher level of civility and decorum?
Fred
Correction. I said the resident the Mayor threatened with expulsion sat down, because he had finished his comments. I have been reminded that the resident had not finished his comments. As it apparently turns out, the resident likes the Police Chief and did not want to put the Chief in the position of having to escort him out. So he simply sat down. It seems like a small matter to me, but I have been advised to get this right. So now it's right: the Mayor did in fact suppress the resident from saying whatever it was the resident wanted to say.
Editorial Note: Over the years, many residents have spoken at Commission meetings. Some have been matter-of-fact, some appreciative, some droning, some angry, some threatening. Some were concise, some discursive. The resident in question above was certainly somewhere within that broad range of styles and tones. The unusual, unheard-of factor was the Mayor. Never in the history of BP has a Mayor, or the Commission as a whole, moved to expel a resident from a meeting for doing no more than speaking his mind, and speaking it in a purely civil, non-threatening way.
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