(Our Mayor) “Are there any other petitions or communications from the public, God help us”

That’s a quote from Mayor Dona Stebbins after she ‘ejected’ Mr. John Hubbard from the city commission meeting on January 2^nd, 2007, the same meeting that the public was not told that Mr.

Lawton and SME would be responding to the public’s questions offered on December 19^th, 2006?  ‘Why’ didn’t the City inform the public that they would be answering ‘OUR” questions (from the previous meeting) at this 2 January meeting? This ‘flippant’ remark cannot be allowed to go without public scrutiny.  It was a disrespectful statement in itself, as the ‘public’ – no matter what level of education, background, experience – is not to be treated in a condescending manner, and only the ‘experts’ like SME, Stanley Consultants and all the ‘hired PAID guns’ get preferential treatment and the ‘public be damned’ and left uninformed.

Mr. Lawton knew ‘days’ ahead of the meeting that SME and the consultants would be there in consideration of travel and lodging needs.  SME just didn’t appear ‘on a whim’, and further illustrates the City’s continued arbitrary and capricious. Behavior.  

SME and the City of Great Falls can recite statistics, show slides, graphs, etc, but it’s like the Oscar Wilde quote, ‘one may know the price of everything, but know the value of nothing.’  What we citizens VALUE is our dedication to offer a better way, less destructive, and more hopeful, not grasping at a ‘dying’ old coal-fired technology.  SME/ECP can ‘choke’ on their slides, experts, consultants, ‘blue shirts’ and more……..

This ‘God Help Us’ statement, from the Mayor, is insulting and she should apologize to the public – and we (the citizens) DEMAND equal time and opportunity to present the case ‘for the people’………..

LETS SEND A MESSAGE ……….Be there on 16 Jan and ask her to ‘explain’ herself…in ‘public’, to the people why she invokes ‘God’s help’ against us………...

Rich Lange