Parks & Wreck Creation
 Mayor Funkhouser told us all that he was going to "shake things up" with his appointments to the Parks Board. Mission accomplished. I'm not as much concerned with whom he appointed, it's how he handled the initial announcement and his complete lack of regard for those segments of the community he has offended. I know it's only been a few weeks but it's time to stop hiding behind the "I'm just a lowly bureaucrat" excuse and start displaying a bit of diplomacy that the job requires. In announcing his appointments the mayor called previous commissioners "the city's wealthiest" and said the reason the parks board is separate is an elitist structure to isolate it from "the regular folks." I don't care if you are the farthest thing from a diplomat there can be. There comes a time when every one of us realizes some things are better left unsaid. What could he possibly hope to gain by picking a fight? Some of the mayor's supporters in the campaign are some of Kansas City's "wealthiest individuals." I'm going to guess they get a pass on any elitist accusations from the 29th floor. It's no secret I am not a fan of Aggie Stackhaus. But at least I knew her appointment or something similar was coming when she joined the inner circle of the Funkhouser campaign. I'd never heard of Frances Semler until yesterday. Frankly I really don't care about her views on immigration. Just like I don't care about Ajamu Webster's views on race, or Tyrone Aiken's views on dance. No, in the end I'm disappointed with the entire process. If there were no background checks performed then shame on the mayor for not doing his due diligence. I thought that's what auditors were known for? If he did do background checks and chose to appoint controversial people as political payback (I know Stackhaus and Semler were campaign operatives) then shame on the mayor for becoming what he said he wasn't. A business as usual, favor peddling politician. Finally, his lack of diplomacy in how he handled the announcement and the repercussions afterward are not the qualities of a leader. Shame on the mayor for his "I know better than you" attitude. The honeymoon's over. There are no more "I'm new at this" excuses. Hopefully, for all of us I hope the mayor learns from his mistakes. That is of course if he even realizes he's made one... |
posted by Mark at 1:42 PM
Comments on "Parks & Wreck Creation"
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Alan Birch said ... (9:23 AM) :
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mainstream said ... (10:16 AM) :
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Dan said ... (3:33 PM) :
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Dan said ... (10:10 AM) :
post a commentI am absolutely appalled at the appointment of Semler. All I can do is just hope that he didn't background check well enough beforehand and can blame it on a freshman mistake. It should take no more than 48 hours for Funky to ask Semler to resign and for her to step down. Until then, I am ashamed that I contributed to the campaign of someone so full of shit and that I allowed myself to be pulled in to his increasingly obvious manipulation.
Let's see:
1. Inauguration Party "favors"
2. Personally profiting from the "gift" from Chezik Honda.
3. Appointing an acknowledged racist to the Parks Commission
4. Campaigning in "the black part of town".
5. His wife, whom we did not elect, running rampant in city hall.
6. Bending the rules to allow his buddy Ed Ford to double dip into the coffers.
And those are off the top of my head. We haven't even begun to get down to real city business yet, like reforming development tax incentives.
I think that at this point in his mayoral term, the only thing that Funky is doing effectively is undermining his stated goals and alienating his real grass roots supporters.
I agree with all of your criticisms, but I can overlook not doing the appropriate level of background checks.
Funk can learn from this.
However, it's more troubling to me that once the mistake was found, it wasn't immediately rectified, before the swearing-in. With the new found knowledge of Semler's affiliations, I think the choice to take back her nomination would have been the right thing to do.
Now lets talk about the Honda Civic. Again, seemingly innocent/naive move. But when the Mayor is told that there are legitimate ethical issues here (not associated necessarily with him, but the the act of acceptance generically in and of itself) by objective credible people - that demands quick and decisive action on his part.
None was taken. And, btw, he is taking a $600 car allowance, which could pay for the Civic as well, but he is pocketing the car allowance and accepting a free car on top of that.
People can make mistakes - I think the problem lies where, when FACTS and GOOD INFORMATION are presented, they are not appropriately acted upon.
This behavior is troublingly Bush-like.
I'm still a Funk supporter, but it's getting harder and harder to be one.
At this rate he may, instead of being a one-term mayor, be a one-year mayor.
And he needs to stop with the trash talk, he needs to lead. This isn't revenge of the nerds, this is real life.
Ed Ford? Huh?
Oh, by the way, you deserve tremendous praise for the headline. Brilliant.