Ritchie, Danile, McKenzie, Eberly and Sumter make a mockery of the 2007 Council Reorganization meeting.
Read the HNT coverage of the reorganization meeting.
On Jan 2, 2007 the Council met as it does each year to select people to various Township committees. Amongst other things these committees govern land use, zoning, health and sewage control.
The following videos are excerpts of that meeting. We believe they clearly demonstrate that a voting block of five council members with Ritchie and Danile leading and McKenzie, Sumter and Eberly blindly following is acting entirely on thier own without guidance or consent of their party. We believe that they are only interested in consolidating power and are acting without any regard to the welfare of the people of the community that they took an oath to serve.
TUF often commends people when they take individual action and buck their own party. For specific issues that's fine. According to Councilman Vassanella these five appear however to have separated from their party. The danger of that is that they have no constraints on their actions.
Even in the days of Grippo, when Ritchie stepped out of line by attacking Dr. Orsini her party constrained her. Not now, they answer to no one.
We believe that their actions are not merely negligent but without regard to the harm they may cause Franklin. These videos show them:
Blocking Mr. Vassanella and Prasad from trying to openly and fairly gather information about nominees for the vital citizen committees that run this Township.
Pretending to have thoroughly researched their selections yet
Don't know the names of people for whom they are voting.
Vote for someone that has a poor attendance record and then it turns out that person does not want to be on the committee.
Promoting someone that has missed 8 of 8 meetings. (Ritchie attempts to contort the truth)
Manipulating the system to keep a person on a committee for four more years even if they (the block of five) are not able to stay in office.
Thumbing their nose at there own party by ignoring the traditional method of selecting individuals.
Ritchie pulls the puppet strings of Mr. Sumter exactly the same way that Ashley-Williams did it.
In this first segment we hear Vassanella and Prasad promote open government yet are then chastised by Danile, McKenzie, Ritchie and Eberly for trying to follow procedures outlined on Nov 9th. The video you will see is heavily edited because the exchange took place over 45 minutes. Everything shown is in order (except the portions clearly labeled from the Nov 9th meeting) and in context. Admittedly this video is a little complicated but it lays the foundation for several other videos. 6:45
Despite their claims of being well prepared McKenzie, Eberly and Sumter don't even know the names of the people they are voting for on the Agricultural Advisory Committee. It appears that their votes were orchestrated by Ritchie and Danile. Sadly Danile, Sumter and Eberly think it's funny. 2:49
When making nominations for the Historic Preservation Commission Ms. Ritchie does not care that her nominee has missed 8 of 8 meetings to date. She is caught again when she misrepresented the nominees record but then started back peddling when Mr. McKenzie started asking questions. TUF has "beeped" the nominee's name. Our issue is not with him/her. 3:38.
For the Zoning Board (Board of Adjustments) Ms. Danile manipulates the system and gives someone who still has one year remaining on their membership a nomination for a four year position. While this person is well qualified this tactic is clearly political in the worst meaning of the word. Again TUF has "beeped" the nominee's name. Our issue is not with him/her. 1:34
The Ethics Board - Tradition has it that the nominations of the respective parties are honored. Here, out of spite, the block of five show more curtesy to the opposing party then to their own. To us this demonstrates that they do not consider themselves bound by any allegiance to their party or the 90 plus Democrat committee people that govern it. 4:05
We would hope that Ms. Ritchie is particularly embarrassed by this one. Despite her "complete" research Ritchie didn't realize that this good person, with an admittedly less than perfect attendance record on the planning board, has recognized that he does not have the time to give the board its proper attention and did not wish to serve. The day after the reorg meeting he emailed his intention to resign to the chair. Clearly Ms. Ritchie hadn't done the research she claimed she had done. We have not beeped out his name. While we have no issue with this person we are providing a copy of the email and to do so without including the name would lack credibility. We believe this person acted responsibly. 2:08
Apparently Ellen Ritchie is the new Wandra. Remember when excouncilwoman Wandra Ashley-Williams used Mr. Sumter as a puppet to do her bidding. Well it happened again. This time it's Ritchie doing it. We initially clearly hear Mr. Sumter wants to be on the Redevelopment Agency. We then see that Ms. Ritchie doesn't want him there. Next we hear Ritchie declining for him. 2:22
Finally some common sense. Councilman Vassanella out of utter frustration lets all Franklin know the inside party information that Ritchie and Danile and the other three as well, have thumbed their noses at the party and are operating unrestrained. 4:39
