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Nazareth, Pa., United States

Thursday, July 24, 2014

Karen Dolan Plays the Spin Game

Bethlehem City Council member Karen Dolan likes to remind people like me that she's a former reporter. And at this moment, she's playing the spin game. Though she's been forced to resign as Executive Director at Illick's Mill, she sent out a news release as "Founder" on Sunday. Apparently, she's shutting it down. Now I was under the impression that all communications concerning Illick's Mill were to come through Board Chair Andrew Bollinger. But rules don't apply to her. Today, at 1 pm, she will parade a number of Mill success stories, so that everyone knows how sad and unfair it is and get angry at the Mean Mayor and even meaner DA. 

Here's the skinny. It is beyond dispute that Illick's Mill served a noble function. Dolan had a great deal to do with its good works. But in recent years, she lost her way. She racked up nearly $130,000 in monies owed to the City, mainly because she was misallocating grant money provided for that purpose. Due to her own mismanagement, the Mill lost its nonprofit status. It failed to file tax returns for three years in a row. As a paid Executive Director, she engaged in blatant conflicts of interest that included voting for budgets in which she had a direct pecuniary interest. She stopped paying utilities at the facility, while installing a whopping nine room air conditioners. She threatened the Mayor that she would use her position on Council and as Parks Chair to prevent a new lease, and one that required a rent payment, from seeing the light of day. She began using the Mill for weddings at which alcohol in excess of the 7% limit was served. She suggested on Council that it was time to allow people to use alcohol in City parks.

The problems at the Mill occurred for one and only one reason - Karen Dolan.

The real reason for her "Poor Us, We're Closing" announcement, is to pressure Mayor Bob Donchez into giving her what she wants - a rent-free Mill with nine room air conditioners and free oil. Let the taxpayers and other non-profits subsidize her turtle aquarium. She needs to stir up the troops, and that is what she is doing.

Just as the right has extremists like Ronnie Del Wacko, the left has extremists like Gloria McVeigh. They were both shouting at each other on Sunday when they both abused KidsPeace children while pretending they care. But they are both united in their hatred of independent observers like yours truly. Here's what McVeigh has had to say.
This is just a tragedy. No other words suit. All thanks to two publicity-seeking ego-maniacs + one spineless political leader of Bethlehem. Nice work, guys! Of course, the poor + minority families who enjoy the Park most + could educate their kids on the environment for free are big losers, but they never have any political power, anyway. Dark day for Bethlehem.
Put in its simplest terms, McVeigh's argument is that violations of the Ethics Act are permissible so long as it helps a "poor and minority" family. These transgressions were no help to the poor or minorities. They helped Karen Dolan collect her paycheck. I pointed this out at Facebook, but Dolan deleted my comment, claiming I am no "friend"of the Mill. Actually, neither is she.

She is currently under investigation by a Grand Jury looking at her own very obvious mismanagement at the Mill. Yet she is telling her uninformed supporters things like this:

"It can't hurt to call or email the Mayor's office. He needs to know people care."

"Our current Mayor has never seen the Nature Center, despite his recent comments that he "loves what we have been doing here."

"Write a letter to the editor or the Mayor or both, speak out at a city council meeting."

What she's really doing is trying to spin both the press with stories about how wonderful the Mill is, while simultaneously trying to make the Mayor out as the Bad Guy.

What she doesn't get, even now, is that she's the Bad Guy.

I'll be there to remind everyone at 1 pm today. So far as I know, it is open to the public and press.

She needs to resign from City Council, unless Bethlehem likes having ethically conflicted people.

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

You really have a serious problem with hatred and vindictiveness. Your blog is a manifesto of psychological troubles that spew from the mouth of a scorned angry failure.

There are any number of support groups for people like you, but as I see it, you are content to be a miserable nasty jerk. It pleases you to be exactly as you are, a reclusive failure who has delusions of grandeur, and sees himself as an editor of a major metropolitan news outlet.

But , in the rare case when the mirror catches a glimpse of its horrid reflection, only then do you catch up with reality, and soak up what you try so hard not to see...then you cry yourself to sleep alone, in your 10 ft by 10 ft box, financed by Ron Angle.

The best place for you is in front of a mirror.

Anonymous said...

Anon 3:00 I think you are the one that has a really serious problem with hatred and vindictiveness.

Anonymous said...

RESOLUTION NO. 2011-214
BE IT RESOLVED by the Council of the City of Bethlehem that the
following Rules of Council be hereby adopted:

RULE 7. A member who has a personal or private interest in any question,
measure or bill proposed or pending before the Council shall
disclose the fact to Council, and shall not vote thereon, nor take
any part in the discussion of the same. (See Rule 6E.) If such
interested person shall vote without disclosing his interest in such
question, measure or bill, he shall be subject to censure, or
Council may pursue any legal procedures under law necessary for
the removal from office of such person. (Resolution 15,291 –
passed 4/1/08)

Hey Karen karma sucks!

KARMA: means action, work or deed;it also refers to the principle of causality where intent and actions of an individual influence the future of that individual.Good intent and good deed contribute to good karma and future happiness, while bad intent and bad deed contribute to bad karma and future suffering.

Much Luv, Lee

Anonymous said...

Don't worry BO, as soon as she is thrown out of Bethlehem and the Mill, she will be heading up the Friends of Housenick and be starting all over with that money pit mansion. She will have learned from her mistakes in Bethlehem and will make sure that the Township taxpayer covers every cost right up front! Just watch.

FAHKINAHSUM said...

Doober continues to make a fool of herself. It seems she just can not help herself.

Anonymous said...

Karen, Resign already or I am coming to a council meeting and demanding that they follow the law that you voted on to put on the books

Anonymous said...

3:00 am. Brilliant analysis. Accurate as well.

Anonymous said...

O'Hare is anything but independent.

But, then again, when did the truth ever get in O'Hare's way?

All hail Lord God King 0bama ... or else get ready for that long, overdue IRS audit you deserve.

Anonymous said...

I disagree with you.

I think the city should be paying the freight on this building and that the nature center's revenue should be used to make improvements.

The mill is being closed down because someone at the city agreed with me and apparently didn't weave through the proper bureaucracies to make tax cutters happy.

Anonymous said...

Spin? Students and Interns help to restore Illicks Mill
http://www.mcall.com/news/breaking/mc-pictures-students-and-interns-help-to-resto-007,0,6836608.photo

Anonymous said...

Karen, perhaps these lyrics fit:
Na na na na, hey hey-hey, goodbye
Na na na na, na na na na, hey hey hey, goodbye

Anonymous said...

Yeah, that's great. Let's close down all of the shit that costs money. We don't need heritage, culture, or art. We need Duck Dynasty and a steady flow of Miller Light! We can drunk and sing the na na na song to all of the losers who find enrichment in these things.

Anonymous said...

Heritage, culture and art are not well served by lying,incompetent administrators with multiple conflicts of interest. She's done more harm than good for heritage, culture and art.

Bernie O'Hare said...

Karen is the person who let down all these students and environmentalists. But she's never been willing to admit her own flaws.

Anonymous said...

3:00 A.M. sounds like Dolan because she is up all night with her guilt!
Keep the pressure on Bernie.....

Anonymous said...

Having read all of the supposedly lurid details, some mistakes in accounting led to the closure of this place. Congratulations.

Bernie O'Hare said...

It's a bit more than that. Using your position on City Council for favorable treatment at an entity in which she is financially interest is no accounting error. Threatening to use her position on Council to prevent a new lease from being seen is no accounting error. Misleading me into believing that the Mill was paying utilities is no accounting error. Keeping the suspension of nonprofit status a secret is no accounting error.

Anonymous said...

You were deleted, ha. Love it! How does it feel?