Councilman Behaving Badly (More on City Council & Stalinstahl's Veto)

From The Pittsburgh Nonpartisan Examiner on last night's Pittsburgh City Council emergency meeting:

After repeated verbal disruptions, Dowd was told that as a member not present, he was not permitted to comment as a member in attendance. Dowd then leapt into the audience area, where he sat with journalists heckling, smirking, and commenting repeatedly that the council did not convene and say the "Pledge of Allegiance".

When challenged about his behavior, Dowd taunted Shields to have the Sergeant-at-Arms remove him. Due to the session's late hour, there was no such personnel present.

I guess now that Motznik is gone Dowd felt compelled to make a grab for the title of "Clowncilman."

I'm also compelled to repeat my favorite line from Chris Potter's Slag Heap on the upcoming Council vote for President:

But to cast a vote for anyone except Peduto is to say, essentially, that council is content being Luke Ravenstahl's bitch.

(h/t to Ms. Mon for "Stalinstahl")
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Big Election Wrap-up

I think that we can all agree that City Council victories by Natalia Rudiak and Robert Daniel Lavelle do not bode well for Lil Mayor Luke or his coattails.

Change Lukey would rather not believe in:

Bram's interview with Matt Merriman-Preston, political consultant to Natalia Rudiak (& Chelsa Wagner & Bill Peduto), is definitely worth a look. (And, as I'm sure Matt knows by now Lil Mayor Luke did not break 60%.)

That Dastardly Dowd refuses to apologize to Pittsburgh's Favorite Grandson.

For the junkies who like to obsess over numbers, graphs and maps there's Allegheny County's web site, Chris Briem's last few posts at Null Space, Pitt's map and the Post-Gazette's ward map.

There's a discussion on the "power of the blogosphere" as pertains to elections in the comments section of this Slag Heap post. IMHO, the blogosphere in general can be used to raise awareness, to raise funds, to move the conversation and occasionally to actually make news. All of this is more likely to occur on the national level where you can have a viral effect -- not so much here with Pittsburgh's older demographic. That said, as Pittsburgh's MSM (print anyway) tends to read the blogs, it's probably easiest here to make the news (as in the case of the Smith Liar Flier or MacYapper's Opie in handcuffs story).

In those same comments, Potter makes the point that, "In the case of district 2, my guess would be that your door-knocking for Blotzer did more to help her than anything anyone posted online."

Here, I'm in agreement. but I'll add that having someone work the polls can be a big asset as well. Case in point would be Hugh McGough's performance in the 16th Ward. While precincts 3 - 13 pretty much had the same results as his overall unfortunate performance (cause who'd want to vote for someone for judge who was highly recommended by the Bar and endorsed by both the P-G and the Trib...). However, in precincts 1 and 2 where there was a poll watcher (and inattentive Committee folk) he came in second and third respectively. Don't know if someone clued Don Walko that a majority of voters were walking in with McGough flyers or if he went to all the polls, but he and his wife came running over with more yard signs.

Speaking of 16-1, at least a couple of registered Democrats complained that when they went to vote, the screen gave them no choices for mayor and only offered them the option to write-in a name...hmmm, just like a Republican ballot would function. A technician was called and confirmed that nothing was wrong with the machines/software. Ya think maybe a poll worker was occasionally keying in D voters as R's? This would be the same polling place that had to temporarily shut down at 7:00 PM last November because of some poll worker freak out. Voters ended up in line until 9:30 (well, those who didn't give up and leave).

Finally, speaking of temporary shut downs, could the biggest victim of Tuesday's results be Matt H?


Time will tell...
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Inquiring Minds want To Know

Tim, Bram, so did he "throw" it or "slide" it?
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More Strings!

It seems that each day brings a new revelation in the demands being made by the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center from the city in return for their gift donation bribe to The Pittsburgh Promise for college scholarships for city public school grads.

We first learned this week that UPMC wanted a tax credit equal to any monies that they might give to The Pittsburgh Promise.

Today, it was revealed that they will stop making their $1.5 million annual payment to the city for general government.

Neither of these details were revealed in their original splashy press conference announcing their "gift" at the beginning of the month.

Now, 2 Political Junkies has learned that there are even more demands in the rider to UPMC's agreement and we present them exclusively to our readers. These include:

Any and all parking tickets incurred by UPMC vehicles shall be paid out of promised Pittsburgh Promise funds.

All City of Pittsburgh Library overdue book fines incurred by UPMC employees shall be paid out of promised Pittsburgh Promise funds.

The City of Pittsburgh will supply complimentary beverages and lite snacks to UPMC executives. (All brown M&Ms must be removed!)

At Thanksgiving, UPMC shall always be declared the winner of any wishbone pulling contest no matter the size of their respective piece.

12 de-thorned roses shall be delivered daily to the feet of UPMC President and Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey A. Romoff.

Any meeting between UPMC and the city shall take place in an all white room (White flowers. White tablecloths. White curtains. White candles. White couches. Low watt light bulbs.) Coffee to be stirred counterclockwise and 25 cases of Kabbalah water provided.

Any UPMC executive may refer to any elected city official as "Charlie" in a public meeting without being called out for being an arrogant, disrespectful dick.

Pittsburgh City Council members Shields, Peduto and Harris are expected to bulk at the additional requests while Councilman Jim Motznik has been seen helping Mayor Luke Ravenstahl sort through an industrial size bag of M&Ms removing offensively colored candies.

When contacted by 2pj about the other clauses in UPMC's rider, city Chief of Staff Yarone Zober said, "It would be unfortunate if the actions of a few council members have the effect of preventing the class of 2008, those [2,000] seniors, from participating in the Pittsburgh Promise . . . Hey, guys! How are those M&Ms coming?"


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Motznik Chastises the Post-Gazette

Pittsburgh City Councilman Jim Motznik railed against the Post-Gazette's endorsement of Republican Mark DeSantis during today's City Council meeting.

He bemoaned what he said was a less than factual endorsement. His complaint centered on this one sentence in the P-G:

Instead of privatizing a service like trash collection, he extends it to Wilkinsburg -- not because it saves Pittsburgh money but because it's created a few more city jobs while helping a municipal neighbor.

Motznik said the move actually saved the city $815,000.00 a year and that it also took 30 garbage trucks off the streets (Council President Doug Shields chimed in saying it actually saved the city over a million a year).

He also said the following:

"...it doesn't matter to me who they endorse for mayor." (Yeah, right)

"I'm frustrated at the crap that a newspaper I used to think was credible would print." (You mean when they printed your bogus claim that Ravenstahl created the 311 line?)

"Don't they have a board of directors that reviews their stories to make sure they are accurate?" (Uh, Jimmy, that wouldn't be the job of a board of directors.)

"Why isn't the editor reading this stuff?" (Uh, Jimmy, it's the editors who WRITE the editorials.)

"Why isn't the editorial board reading it?" (See above.)

"I'm not here to tell you to vote for Luke Ravenstahl." (Well, yeah, you kind of are.)

He also compared the Post-Gazette to AM talk radio and said that the people of Pittsburgh weren't as dumb as the media thinks they are.

In case you're reading this, Councilman Motznik, I don't automatically assume that privatization is a good thing and even if you're correct on any monies saved (and I don't know that you are), you're only addressing one line in the P-G's endorsement.

You can take your yellow boots off again because, as you say, the people of Pittsburgh aren't as dumb as someone may think we are.

Two Big Issues Before Pgh City Council

First up: Back to the issue of city police and domestic violence.

We published a copy of City Council President Doug Shields' bill (No. 2007-1797) on this issue here. Councilman Bill Peduto has been added as a sponsor of that bill, but he's also introduced amendments to it. Gloria Forouzan outlined the changes here as follows:

"...compel the Police Bureau to refer all allegations of domestic violence by officers to the independent Citizen Police Review Board."

"...bar the hiring or promotion of anyone subject to a PFA or criminal domestic violence investigation. "

"...force officers who are subjects of criminal domestic violence investigations or protection from abuse orders to "surrender all firearms, including their primary service weapon, immediately"

While the FOP has argued of the last measure that it "would be tantamount to taking away an officer's livelihood based on a mere accusation" it must be noted that this policy is 1) considered standard practice by the International Association of Chiefs of Police and the U.S. Military and 2) that an intimate partner must convince a judge that there is a threat of eminent danger before a PFA is issued (far from the accusation at the October 18th public hearing that cops will lose their guns over "shouting matches").

Also as was mentioned by Jeanne Clark (Squirrel Hill Now) at that public hearing, it has been 114 days (on 10/18/07) since the Mayor and Police Chief had promoted three officers with histories of domestic abuse and not one concrete step has yet to be taken. She also held up a brochure released by the Mayor's Office on DV that appeared to be printed on an inkjet printer and she said was not widely distributed. She compared it to the large-format, four-color, professionally-printed Redd Up brochure (I will note here that, tellingly, the DV brochure was not plastered with Luke's images).

What also came out at that public hearing was that the police response was to give verbal accounts of new policy changes -- nothing in writing still at this late date!

An initial vote on the bill (and amendments) will be held on Wednesday, October 31st.

(Previous posts on this issue here.)

Second Issue: Gender Equity

City Council President Doug Shields introduced a bill today (No. 2007-1845) that would approve the release of a Request for Proposal (RFP) from the city for a "A Comprehensive Study of Positions within Pittsburgh City Government" (see draft version here and a previous post by Dayvoe on this here).

As stated in the RFP's introduction, the purpose of the study is "to include a focus on the general soundness of the current system and whether the system affords internal fairness and equity, without gender or other bias."

Both Barbara L. Trant, Director of Personnel & Civil Service Commission for the City, and Heather Arnet, Executive Director of the Women and Girls Foundation, spoke to Pittsburgh City Council today about the study.

It must be said that both Councilman Bodack and Councilman Motznik initially expressed doubts about the need for such a study with Bodack saying that he thought that the city's hiring and promotions system allowed "no room to exist" for gender inequities and Motznik saying that he wasn't ware of any problems.

Ms. Arnet said that it was an "economic development" issue as a majority of college graduates are women and that demonstrating that Pittsburgh cares about gender equity in pay is a plus for keeping and attracting female professionals.

Some interesting (or nauseating) facts came out during the discussion:

Nationally, women make 81 cents to the dollar as compared to males. Statewide it's 73 cents while it's only 70 cents in the city of Pittsburgh.

There are 3,440 city employees but, only 923 are female.

Councilwoman Twanda Carlisle was blown away by the last figure and offered to help in any way she could in her last months on Council.

Councilwoman Tonya Payne predicted that the study would also show a big disparity in terms of race regarding both hirings and salaries of City employees.

An initial vote on this bill will also be held on Wednesday, October 31st.

Now here's where YOU come in:

Please lobby City Council on both bills and the Mayor's office on Bill No. 2007-1797.

Again, I turn to one of Gloria's posts at The Pittsburgh Women's Blogging Society, this time for contact info:

Mayor's Office
Phone: 412-255-2626, Fax: 412-255-2687

Len Bodack, Jr.
len.bodack@city.pittsburgh.pa.us , Telephone: 412-255-2140, Fax: 412-255-2419

Twanda Carlisle
twanda.carlisle@city.pittsburgh.pa.us , Telephone: 412-255-2137, Fax: 412-255-8658

Dan Deasy
dan.deasy@city.pittsburgh.pa.us , Telephone: 412-255-8963, Fax: 412-255-2821

Darlene Harris
darlene.harris@city.pittsburgh.pa.us , Telephone: 412-255-2135, Fax: 412-255-2129

Jeff Koch
jeffrey.koch@city.pittsburgh.pa.us , Telephone: 412-255-2130, Fax: 412-255-8950

Jim Motznik
james.motznik@city.pittsburgh.pa.us , Telephone: 412-255-2131, Fax: 412-255-2821

Tonya Payne
tonya.payne@city.pittsburgh.pa.us , Telephone: 412-255-2134, Fax: 412-255-2821

Bill Peduto
bill.peduto@city.pittsburgh.pa.us , Telephone: 412-255-2133, Fax: 412-255-2821

Doug Shields
doug.shields@city.pittsburgh.pa.us , Phone: 412-255-8965, Fax: 412-255-2821

You can also join others in lobbying Council members in person on both pieces of legislation on Tuesday, October 30th at City Council at 9:00 AM.

UPDATE: Post-Gazette article: "Dispute over police with PFAs heats up"

We hear tell that in today's City Paper the Mayor more or less blames foot-dragging on the DV issue on the women themselves. We'll be picking up our copy soon.
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It's official: Jeff Koch is a widdle pootie cat!

As I posted last week, Pittsburgh City Council took their first vote on koi pond-owner Councilman Jim Motznik's cat licensing bill last Wednesday with the final vote scheduled for today's legislative meeting.

The last vote was a four to four tie with District 3 Councilman Jeff Koch abstaining but promising to choose sides today.

So was Koch fish or feline?

As the headline suggests, Koch cast his vote with the kitty lovers:

From the Post-Gazette:

"The ordinance, the way it's written, is just an extra taxing burden on those who follow the law," Mr. Koch said. He predicted that irresponsible cat owners, whose pets are more likely to cause property damage to neighbors, would just ignore the measure.

"If I thought for one minute that this would help control the population of wild cats, I would be for it," he said.

Councilwoman Darlene Harris argued that an existing code provision requiring that cats carry identification -- be it a tag, tattoo or microchip -- was enough.

Hooray for the purty pooties!
(...And Councilors Dan Deasy, Darlene Harris, Jeff Koch, Bill Peduto and Doug Shields!)

Pgh City Council Vs. Pgh City Cats

Wednesday saw the Pittsburgh City Council take it's first vote on licensing cats (final vote Tuesday). While the Burghosphere is jumping with Councilwoman Twanda Carlisle's remarks on the evolution of feline behavior ("In 2007, cats are more aggressive than they used to be"), she was far from the only Councilor to, um, "distinguish" herself during the debate on the bill.

Councilman Jim Motznik painted himself as being primarily concerned with the safety and welfare of pet cats -- no mention as he had in the past of his own, personal concerns for the safety and welfare of his pet fish in his backyard koi pond. More amusing was his likening himself to former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani. At least he kept the comparison to "quality of life" issues and wasn't claiming to be "America's Councilman."

But, what I found to be most disturbing about Council's conversation wasn't Carlisle's evolutionary thesis or Motznik's Rudy pretensions, it was Councilman Len Bodack's arguments.

Bodack made it clear that he favored the bill and he indeed voted for it. However, he actively encouraged the segment of the cat owning population who keeps their cats indoors to IGNORE THE LAW FOR WHICH HE WAS VOTING.

Yep, he basically said that if you had indoor cats no one would be the wiser if you just didn't bother to license them.

What the hell kind of legislator votes for a law that he's telling people to break?

Oh yeah, one who the voters of his district wisely decided not to invite back.

What a jerk.

[sigh]

Major props to Councilwoman Darlene Harris for all the research that she did on the issue and for taking the sensible and humane position that the real problem is feral cats and the best solution is to have the City reinstate its program to trap, spay and return the cats which was dropped by Act 47.

If you read the MSM/blogs you may know that the vote this week was four in favor and four against with one abstention by Jeff Koch.

Koch will be voting on the bill next week. If, like me, you believe that cat licensing is not the way to go, please contact Koch at:

jeffrey.koch@city.pittsburgh.pa.us
Telephone: 412-255-2130
Fax: 412-255-8950

It's especially important to contact him if you live in Council District Three.

P.S. I hear Koch is a cat owner.

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Thursday Morning Massacre: The Movie

With discussion of the Thursday Morning Massacre taking on a cinematic bent -- and because we like flogging a dead horse -- we're certain that it won't be long until the Pittsburgh Film Office starts lobbying for the inevitable movie to be made here in the Burgh.

Wanting to keep in tune with Pittsburgh's new hi-tech rep, we've turned to myheritage.com's face recognition technology to cast the film.

Just keep in mind: My Heritage is the same website that claimed that Wendy Bell looks like Pamela Lee Anderson and that I look like Keira Knightley with my glasses off and Samuel L. Jackson with my glasses on.

(I'm only the messenger! Do not try this at home! Your results may vary!)

Thursday Morning Massacre: The Movie (as cast by myheritage.com)

Starring:

Josh Hartnett as
Mayor Bob O'Connor
And:

Meatloaf as Dennis Regan	John Cage as George Specter	Harold Ramis as Scott Kunka
Julia Roberts as B.J. Leber	Patricia Arquette as Susan Malie	Albert Finney as Paul Leger

With:

Dick Skrinjar as
himself

Jean-Paul Belmondo as Jim Ferlo	Colin Farrell as Yarone Zober
Sharon Stone as Marlene Cassidy	Adam Carolla as Fr. Terry O'Connor	David Letterman as Jon Delano
Tom Hanks as Doug Shields	David Hasselhoff as Jim Motznik	Dean Cain as Luke Ravenstahl

And:

Zach Braff as Bill Peduto	Missy Elliott as Tonya Payne	Beyonce Knowles as Twanda Carlisle
Jim Carrey as Len Bodak	Gael Garcia Bernal as Dan Deasy	Brad Pitt as Jeff Koch

Of Rats and Slots (and Stun Guns)

RATS!

I just cannot watch any more of that cyborg's Supreme Court confirmation hearing and since Kathy Griffin's "My Life on the D-list" is not yet broadcast 24 hours a day on Bravo, that's led me to spending a few hours with Pittsburgh's City Council (via the CITY channel).

While 2 Political Junkies is a political blog (duh!) actually watching the broadcast of the city council meetings really is going above and beyond the call of most political junkies if only because you might stumble across one of those perennial losers candidate's umpteenth 3 minute speech as to why you should vote for them during the public comments portion of the meetings. There should be a warning flashed across the screen that viewing may cause bleeding from the eyes and ears.

And the rest is often pretty dry stuff.

But yesterday's meeting did produce a few fireworks.

Pittsburgh has a rat problem. As a recent editorial in the Post-Gazette editorial noted:

In 2003, the city had budgeted for six rodent control officers, but those positions were eliminated when the crunch came.

Since then, stop-gap measures have been a notable failure. The Allegheny County Health Department recently gave free training in rodent control to six city workers, but only one ended up being certified by the state Department of Agriculture. As it stands, the city now makes no effort to control rodents in public spaces and the buildings and lots it owns.

What to do? Well, Councilman Doug Shields proposed shifting $30,000 worth of unused funds in the Office of Municipal Investigations budget to hire a private company to handle the rodent problem.

Sounds good, right?

The problem came in when Councilman James Motznik argued that the matter should be considered next week. As the P-G put it Shields and Motznik then "bared their teeth in a minutes-long shouting match."

What was highly amusing was when Shields proceeded to read the transcripts from moments earlier in the meeting to use Motznik's own words against him. That same day Motznik had chewed out two city workers claiming that they were failing to serve the public and putting up roadblocks instead of helping them.

That's when Motznik really went ballistic, repeatedly yelling, "What bill are we on now!" as his own criticisms were used against him. Shields and Motznik then each claimed the other was playing games.

When Shields and Motznik weren't enraged engaged, Councilwoman Twanda Carlisle said that she gets 50 calls a week complaining about rats and Councilman Bill Peduto said that waiting any longer on the rodent problem would be "ludicrous" and "ridiculous."

So why all the fireworks over shifting money now rather than in a week? The P-G claims it's because there's a "flurry of behind-the-scenes finger pointing regarding its spending," that 'Motznik later said Shields "wants to grab his money for rodent control so he can vote 'no' next week" on other budget transfers' and that:

The hallway outside council chamber is abuzz with talk of which members are over budget. An itemization of spending by each was not immediately available.

Council members are sensitive to charges of overspending, since most are considered candidates to succeed Eugene Ricciardi as council president.

Shields, Carlisle and Peduto all voted in favor of the shift, with Motznik voting 'no' and two members out of the room and one absent.

SLOTS!

When they weren't busy discussing our furry fanged friends, they also discussed such mundane matters as whether the city should OWN casinos (covered nicely at Pittsblog's "The Horror, The Horror" post) and when the police should be authorized with tasering citizens.

STUN GUNS!

The stun gun topic came up in the "Post Agenda." While the questioning of Chief Robert W. McNeilly Jr. about when and how much force should be used during group protests was somewhat monotonous, it might not have been so much so if McNeilly hadn't "declined to release those policies, saying sophisticated anarchist groups might use them against police."

Let's just say that apparently the greatest threat to the police seems to be "the Internet." McNeilly repeatedly claimed that Internet communication led to a level of organization among protesters that is dangerous.

Peduto brought in David Meieran, a civil liberties activist, and Elizabeth Pittinger, executive director of the Citizens Police Review Board, for some much needed balance to the presentation.

Pittinger noted that, "police departments in some other cities post use-of-force policies on the Internet" and said, "Tell us what the rules are. That's just fair play."

Meieran who was presented as having some expertise on tasers said, "It's only a matter of time before someone is killed by a taser." He further went on to comment that the larger problem was the "criminalization of dissent" in this country.
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Tags: pittsburgh city council doug shields motznik peduto