“Cronyism as usual”
-Delegate Jill Carter describing yesterday’s City Council hearing.
The above quote gives a pretty basic summary of what happened Tuesday at city hall. There was much more to the hearing and I intend to reveal everything that I witnessed to all of you over a series of posts. The Sun gives a pretty bland description of what they thought happened. Investigative Voice fleshes out the hearing some here. ABC 2 covers the story here. Kinji Scott gives a colorful summary here. There was so much more though! Many of the City Council members showed their true embarrassing colors at this hearing and I intend to dedicate a post to every member who stood out. I will also profile each of the four 9th District council seat candidates. The Baltimore Sun deserves credit for publishing this great article about the 9th District situation. I think it will remind the council-people that they are being held accountable by the citizens and that this decision should not be taken lightly.
Let me set the scene for you. I arrived at the hearing chamber at 5:50PM. All of the first floor seats were occupied. There were a lot of old women sitting in these seats. I had to sit in the balcony which was occupied by mostly younger people who at times were quite vocal. There were a few points during the hearing where you could feel the youthful anger and frustration in the air. The hearing started at 6PM and ended a little after 8:30! Rikki Spector was the only council-member who was not there. Some consider her the Jewish Agnes Welch so it is no surprise that she did not want to show up for this important hearing. I am sure the son of Agnes can count on Rikki’s loyalty vote. Agnes and Rikki have served 60 combined years on City Council and they have produced… inflated pensions for themselves.
I recognized quite a few non-9th district political people in the crowed. Bill Marker of Pigtown, Drew Bennett of the C.A.R.E. community association located near Johns Hopkins Hospital, and Terry Hickey of the 10th district were up in the balcony. Doc Cheatham was on the first floor. Outspoken 9th district resident Chris Taylor was also in the balcony area. Amongst all the old women on the first floor of the hearing chamber sat Agnes Welch.
The four candidates were all in the chamber within five minutes of my arrival. William “Pete” Welch, Michael Johnson, Dr. John Bullock, and Abigail Breiseth were the four people who applied for the vacancy. Each of them plans to run for the office in the September of 2011 election. Welch is obviously well known because of his mother, Johnson came in second place in the 2007 election, Bullock is relatively new to Baltimore and appeals to a younger demographic, and Breiseth is a teacher who knows State Senator Bill Ferguson and who may use some of her teacher connections as street team members like Ferguson did in his campaign. I assume Breiseth is at the very least loosely affiliated with Ferguson.
The four candidates sat in chairs that faced the front of the room where the council-people sat. Every council-member faced the candidates except 8th district representative Helen Holton.
Helen Holton’s 8th District is directly west of the 9th district. One would think that she would take some interest in who her new neighbor might me. Then again Helen Holton has been involved in some shady dealings recently:
“The move came hours after her plea to misdemeanor charges that she asked two developers to pay for a $12,500 poll, exceeding limits on political donations and circumventing campaign finance laws. As head of the committee, Holton had helped orchestrate tax breaks for the developers, bakery magnate John Paterakis Sr. and Ronald H. Lipscomb.
Holton, a Democrat, received probation before judgment under a plea deal announced in Baltimore Circuit Court on Monday. She must pay a $2,500 fine and serve one year of unsupervised probation. A related — and more serious — bribery charge remains unresolved.”
One would think that Holton would want to listen to what her fellow creative campaign finance accounting practitioner Pete Welch had to say about his city council qualifications, but Holton did not pay attention to one word he or any of the other candidates had to say. Holton had her back to the candidates the entire hearing. She was constantly typing on her phone (I assume it was a blackberry). After about 2 hours of sitting in her seat totally oblivious to what was going on she did get up to walk out of the room. On her way out of the room she made sure to stop in front of Agnes Welch and give her a hug and a kiss!
There are some people out there (many of them on the City Council) who think we are gullible enough to believe that this hearing was legitimate. Holton’s unprofessional and disrespectful behavior shows how serious she takes her job. She is a joke and a disgrace, but sadly she was not the even the second most embarrassing member of city council at the hearing.
Adam is the most recognizable face of the recent resurgence in Reservoir Hill. He has appeared on many national and local radio shows, in several news publications, and at numerous events discussing his innovative urban redevelopment ideas and his unique lifestyle. Adam is a successful entrepreneur, community activist, and a local political guru who ran for city council in 2007. He is the founder and director of the TechBalt.com Buy a Block Project and BaltimoreHourly.com. His fearless local political commentary has rocked the local blog scene for most of this decade and he plans to take it to the next level in the next decade here on Charm City Current.