The mutiny at city council has been well reported by Emily Opilo, ace reporter for The Morning Call. Emily provided blow by blow tweets to her fan base during the meeting. Some of the barbs were much more interesting than the votes themselves. Even though Pawlowski questioned Julio Guridy's salary at his no-show state commission job, Julio still voted Ed's way. He once again proved to be a loyal soldier of the party, which has rewarded him well for over a decade. Candida Affa also fits that loyal soldier definition very well, although her incentive is less clear. Surprisingly, Cynthia Mota, Julio's protégé, voted with the majority against Pawlowski's pick for Community Development Director, Michael Walker. Pawlowski even tried to use the race card, touting Walker's African-American background for needed diversity.
In an interesting plot twist, Craig Messinger, nominee for Public Works Director, withdrew his name, over council's refusal to grant new salaries ahead of the budget proposal. In the Allentown of years ago, we would say that he got his Dutch up. Of course, the big story of the night was that city council finally asserted itself. It only took eleven years.
This is an analysis of the meeting from news sources, I was not in attendance.
Too bad you were not at the meeting. You would have enjoyed it. Affa tried to amend the salaries to those proposed by the Mayor and voted for what the Mayor wanted in every instance. Guridy did not until the final vote of the evening. That vote was for the confirmation of Walker. That was not surprising given his racist comments of a week ago. Guridy will be elected off City Council next year due to his poor recent decisions.
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ReplyDeleteAs I stated last night, the miniscule quarterly .006% increase equals what in pension allocations when it comes time the mayor gotta go and a whole nue restructuring is eminently taking over?
pathfinder@4:17, after many years and meetings, i now limit my attendance to mostly trying to save our historical structures. many people have been disappointed by julio's votes for over a decade, yet he keeps winning. i wouldn't bet against him winning again.
ReplyDeleteI too spent many wasted evenings down there. God bless those who still have a stomach for it. Hope those who have a sense that they can change things in this town prevail.
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