Response to mayor's refusal to attend meeting

The city has been informed of the Mayor’s decision to refuse to attend tonight’s city council meeting. That is her right. 

However, we’d like to correct on the record several misstatements made by the Mayor. 

“After learning earlier today that citizens were required to personally pay for access to audio and video recordings of public budget meetings after requests for full access were denied or significantly limited, I cannot in good conscience participate in today’s budget hearing.”

A citizen requested the audio copy of the budget hearing she attended on April 11th. Because she submitted it as a ‘public records request’, the city has a process and certain obligations under Oregon law. As part of a Public Records Request, the city has authority under ORS 192.324(4) to charge the fee to generate the information. This is very typical. Our base fee is $25, and while does not fully cover the time or cost to produce the record, does help defray the costs so that every citizen are not paying for individual records requests.

A link to the audio recording was provided and once paid for, is now freely accessibly by any party. It is the city’s intention to make all of these records public on our new website, but the records request demanded that it be produced earlier, hence the fee. The citizen was informed of the fee and paid it readily. 

At no point was an audio recording ‘denied or significantly limited’. It is available readily on browsers and is formatted to be used by accessibility tools – similar to any audio or video recording at the county or at a number of other state entities. 
 

“I also remain deeply concerned that the City Council has not reviewed or approved a completed audit presentation for several years. At prior meetings, requests were made for the auditors themselves to present findings and answer questions publicly. Those requests were not accommodated.”

A request was made by a citizen to interrogate the auditors mid audit. This would have been costly to the city, and have served only as political theater, as auditors cannot legally say anything until the audit is completed. In fact, at today’s meeting the city council will learn that the FY21 audit draft has been received – we are asking the auditors to explain in more detail (not redact or remove) a couple pieces of language that are very technical, and should have the audit for public presentation at the June council meeting. We will say, there were no surprises nor findings of impropriety in the audit, and we look forward to its final release. 
 

“In my experience serving on municipal budget committees, I have never participated in a budget process where not a single substantive change was made to the proposed budget presented by administration, despite questions and concerns raised during committee discussion.”

Apparently the Mayor does not remember she served on the Waldport Budget Committee years ago, and voted to approve the budget both as a committee member and councilor with no changes. No committee member proposed any changes to the current budget, including the Mayor herself. In fact, she was specifically asked by another budget committee member, and she declined. 

She also voted against the Road District Budget and the Urban Renewal District budgets in committee stating that it was due to lack of audits, even though those distinct entities are up to date. We are not really certain the mayor understands the budget process as she has also indicated that this is a ‘budget committee meeting’ tonight, but instead is a Council Meeting as the budget committee has concluded for FY27. 
 

“I am additionally troubled by the lack of clear reporting regarding ongoing capital improvement projects, including the status of millions of dollars in grant-funded work, remaining balances, and future funding obligations.”

As major projects are completed, they are audited by the state. Once completed, that is presented to Council – this state process does not happen overnight. As was stated at the last Council meeting, it is our intention to provide this record as available within the next few months in ongoing detail on our new website. Again, the details necessary to the budget are include in the spreadsheets of the budget. 
 

While we certainly respect the right of the Mayor to abdicate her responsivities to the city to focus on her health, it would be remiss not to point out that it is her own supporters who have brought decade old & dismissed allegations and created the tense atmosphere. And she herself has created a retaliatory environment through her actions felt by all staff and council. It is also her who has filed not one but two lawsuits against the city seeking $250,000 in ‘damages’. 

Leadership is working with a coalition of people, many who do not share your beliefs, to create a better good for the people overall. She asks us not to perceive her lack of attendance by stating it “should not be interpreted as a lack of commitment to the city or to my responsibilities as mayor.” However, as staff who has been vilified by many of her supporters, called atrocious names, have memes made of our images, and threatened and bullied we still continue to show up every day. So, no…  we will not let her dictate how we feel about her actions.