Today's Montco Commissioner's Meeting

A trusted source sent me the following summary of today's Montgomery County Commissioner's meeting. It's a bit long, but quite an entertaining read:

Montco Commish Meeting, March 6 of Aught Eight ...

The meeting began with a bang -- and a ball gag! News and pictures of the 911 workers having fun with alcohol and sex toys were reported by Jim Maza and Maureen Coggins. This will be in the news to no end, so I won't go over everything, only that Matthews and/or Hoeffel may have slipped by confirming identity of the fired supervisor. See Carl Hessler's story (click here) for that tidbit.

Following the gag portion, there were numerous resolutions regarding the ubiquitous Montco trail system and its progress dating back to the '70s.

The contract for E-Consult (sp?) passed 2-1, but not before Bruce made the point that this was the first step toward Hoeffel getting his $50 million slush fund -- a fact he reiterated to the press in his office, saying repeatedly that "Jim has to do what they (the Dems) want or he'll lose their support." Bruce also questioned, during the meeting, the need for an outside consultant when we have close to a century of experience in economic development with the current county department heads and such. Steve Nelso said an outside consultant could more easily raise "controversial issues" that might be to sensitive for locals to broach. He did not elaborate.

Matthews justified the move by saying "I don't think we're breaking new ground here."

Then came the issue of the Donnelly/Markley automation money that was transferred to the general fund before the new Dems took office. Matthews and Hoeffel said returning the money to those departments would be "returning to the status quo," though Bruce noted that in Miller's vaunted opinion, the department heads would not be able to spend that money. The argument went round and round a bit with Jim and Joe saying that part of Barry's opinion was "not the issue at hand," even thought he rest of the opinion was the word of God. Nancy Becker pressed Matthews on the issue, saying she doesn't want to get this money back, spend some of it only to find out at the end-of-year audit that she broke the law. Matthews and Hoeffel kept saying everything was fine and that portion of Miller's opinion was not at issue, though they refused Bruce's "alleged motion" (Matthews) to remove that paragraph.

Also, Mark Levy refused to answer Bruce when asked "do you want the money back?" Weiss was more forthcoming, saying she definitely wanted the funds back.

Bruce made sure copies of Miller's opinion reached the press and others. (read more about the automation fund debacle by clicking here)

After another 2-1 vote, Bruce's negative vote count in two months is now greater than Ruth Damsker's over a course of eight years.

Matthews and Hoeffel refused to directly answer Carl Hessler's direct question "so can they spend the money tomorrow or not?" They talked in circles about the "status quo."

Then, in dramatic fashion, and older gentleman, Major Timoney, a former county employee, stood in line with Bruce from the back row and repeated several times, his face turning red and clearly angry, that he had attended many public meetings, that he had called Bruce before the election and talked to him many times, that he had tried to get involved in politics and voted for Bruce. The scene was fairly tense with Timoney displaying all the signs of a disgruntled employee about to lose it when he finally dropped the other shoe: "Bruce. I told you before the election that I would vote for you and Damsker. You said, no, vote for Jim. Bruce, why did you tell me that, and why shouldn't I go change parties right now?"

Bruce apologized for telling him to vote Jim. "I made a mistake," Bruce said.

Timoney stormed out, vowing to re-register as non-partisan.
(ed. note: and we wonder why Republican registration is down?)

Bruce then spent about 20 minutes with the press, further explaining what has been going on and why King James has to continue being Joe Hoeffel's puppet.

Other than the redundant open space stuff, today's meeting seemed fairly entertaining.