A good seat in the peanut gallery was easy to find at last night's forty minute meeting of Northampton County council. Aside from department heads and press, I counted only ten people, and three of these were council candidates. A light agenda was obviously intended to avoid controversy on election eve. But two members, Ann McHale and Tony Branco, used their incumbency to grab some last-minute votes. McHale had some fellow there, ostensibly for a "healthcare presentation," but this was just a thinly disguised attempt to heap praise on McHale for saving the county a gazillion dollars. Ann modestly stated, "I was willing to provide the impetus a few years ago to get this done." McClure heaped praise on McHale, and even Angle chimed in. McHale regally nodded.
Branco asked council to contribute $1,000 to the American Red Cross. No particular reason. No emergency. "I think it's a fundraiser," is the only justification Branco provided. Hey, it's only money. The sole council member to vote against this "feel good" grant was John Cusick, who doesn't have to worry about an election for another two years.
Last night's council meeting demonstrates one thing - the advantage of incumbency.
4 comments:
Are you saying Branco now is buying votes with our money? Now stealing our money? Nov 6th is payback time fat-tony!
I wouldn't go that far. But he's obviously using his incumbency to garner votes.
John Cusick's voting "no" was because of principle. He did not want to use the contingency fund for handouts (which this was).
Isn't that funny? A politician voting on principle? How the hell did that happen?
What pisses me off is that he was the only one.
Between the council members, they could have come up with $1000 for the charity, without using tax money.
Maybe even more with the proposed 36% pay raise.
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