Monday, 18 October 2010

Incredible As It May Seem

It may be Councillors were not aware three Aurora families were being served with a suit for damages of $6million by their town on Thanksgiving Eve.

At the mid September Council meeting, a copy of an anonymous comment to the Citizen Blog was circulated at the Council table, as an add-on to an in-camera agenda.

It was listed on the cover page as a matter involving litigation  for possible defamation.I saw it as just another crazy example of hysteria.

Council had been dragged out as usual   by various activities including the cavorting St Kitts woman.I stayed to vote on a particular matter but left at ten minutes past eleven.

I cannot guarantee good  conduct  in that company beyond a certain hour of endurance. It is no time to be making  business decisions on behalf of the community. Leaving is my protest against the insanity.

When I left, though it was on the table before me, not for an instant did I imagine  an anonymous comment to a blog posting could be given serious consideration by a body served by legal counsel.

Subsequent minutes of the meeting. indicated staff had been directed to retain external legal counsel and consult on the matter.

I voted against that as did Councillor McRoberts and Collins Mrakas.

Until I received a call from a family member , I had no idea three families had been served notice of the town's   intent to sue for $6million

I cannot therefore be sure the Councillors who voted for the motion to retain counsel had any more idea than I did, how far that direction might be taken.

MacEachern and Gaertner moved and seconded the motion.

In a comment to my post, Robert The Bruce  reports Councillor Granger, a week later, claimed no knowledge  of the legal action

Is it  possible other Councillors were  equally in the dark?

Common decency would  mitigate  against agreeing to such a thing.

Political  instinct for self- preservation would set off wild alarm bells at the idea  of  using  the power of government to take legal action against three families of the community at any time, let alone in the midst of an election.

What possible advantage could there be to align themselves with such a heinous act?

Yet they are responsible.

For four years they  surrendered their authority and failed to exercise their own judgement.

There may still  be time to reverse the damage to the three families.

It may well be too late to save themselves.

7 comments:

  1. Apparently if they read this weeks Auroran they will get all the details they need.

    So will all the voters in Aurora.

    I'm sure the AuroraCitizen blog appreciates the publicity, I noticed there have been over 1200 hits there since 5:30 last night.

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  2. Robert the Bruce18 October 2010 at 11:30

    I seriously doubt Granger knew nothing about this. His tact seemed to me that there is "no litigation" because it has only begun and is not in the courts yet. It is all semantics. There is an intent to litigate and the defendants appear to have fire a salvo in their defence.

    Fuimus

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  3. It's seems like Morris is determined to go down in a ball of fire - destroying as much as possible on the way down..

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  4. I agree with RtB that Grainger was likely coached on how to answer, BUT on the other hand if Morris got them to agree to something without fully explaining what she was up to, it would not surprise me at all and would serve them bloody right. I have no doubt she would exploit the blind loyalty they have shown. She is already treating Ballard as the "next regime". I guess the old GoS have been used up for all their worth. Looks good on them.

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  5. Ballard behaves like a bully--the stories I could tell about his tenure on parent council at Regency Acres Public School--but then again, I don't want to get sued--I don't have $6 Mill

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  6. Chris Ballard does behave like a bully.

    By the way ...there was a week The Auroran made him guest Editor.

    The paper was loaded with pictures of the Mayor that week.

    That really tells a story.

    ReplyDelete

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