UPDATED - SEE BOTTOM
InFactDaily.com had an interesting headline today, “Watson wants Mobility Task Force to start with a blank slate”. Sen. Kirk Watson's "blank slate" is Watson's own rushed predetermined plan, and once again the public is NOT invited to the table.
Does this help to illustrate a rushed predetermined plan?
Get this. Within one (1) week, Watson became CAMPO chair, altered who sits on CAMPO, altered rules so only he and his hand picked committee can decide what goes on the CAMPO agenda, created a task force to trot out his plan "B", and held the first task force meeting (yesterday).
All this within one week!
If Watson truly cares about accountability and healing the community, why is he moving so fast and most importantly, why is he not allowing folks from the community to take part in the “task force” so it doesn’t seem like a rubber stamp of an already agreed upon plan?
Kirk Watson's op-ed in yesterday's Statesman promises openness. And a set-up:But reality requires action. We must stop talking about “free roads,” as if there ever were such things. Any tool we use, any road we’re on, costs money from some source. We can’t simply oppose things or divert attention from problems with slogans or personal attacks. Our citizens are too smart to let half-truths, untruths, innuendo and conspiracy theories define our future. We don’t have the time and shouldn’t have the patience for unaccountable ideologues distorting our present or jeopardizing our future.
Setting up a straw man argument and attacking us personally - calling us conspiracy theorists isn’t going to help his cause. We've done our homework and know what good solutions are.
An interesting note I keep forgetting to share: Many of the TV stations showed a video clip of Watson, who stars in the “Circle of Payola” online video, with bags of cash. Reliable sources say Watson threw a fit, bitched to his aide Steve Scheibal (who once was a decent reporter for the Statesman) and swiftly called the news stations and demanded on air apologies.
My sources tell me Watson is very “sensitive”. Too bad he’s not smart enough to see the public must be part of the process.
I challenge Sen. Kirk Watson to prove he has left his past behind. As part of the new spirit of openness that he says he favors, he shouldn't have a problem with explaining his role in diverting $67 million of year 2000 City bond freeway money to toll roads.
I want to thank Mark Kilgard for this great report of the first meeting of Watson’s CAMPO Mobility Financing Task Force that took place Monday, Jan 29th, 2007. Click to read. Here's our line in the sand: If Watson's plan B has "tolls on roads we've already paid for", we'll tear it to shreds before you can say "Watson's Back Door deal with Intel".
UPDATE 12/1/07: ROGER BAKER GIVES ANOTHER REPORT ALONG WITH PARTIAL TRANSCRIPT (Roger taped the meeting then typed the transcript) OF WATSON TAKING COMMISH GERALD DAUGHERTY TO TASK.
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