Augustine's Open Letter to the Times' Editorial Board

Dear Anne,

When I opened the newspaper and read the introduction to the endorsements, I was overjoyed. I believe (to echo the comments of Paul Kirsch) that the editorial board laid out rational criteria by which to choose candidates for endorsements. The quest for a collaborative group (as opposed to a ‘team’ marching in lockstep) is, in my opinion as well, the main objective.

But key to collaboration is, I believe, the presence of elected representatives who hold themselves to that same rational approach to city deliberations. In order to achieve that, people must have three fundamental traits: 1. A sense of fair play in sharing and receiving opinions; 2. An understanding of the gravity of the position with regard to stewardship of the public trust and the public purse; and 3. A commitment to open and honest governing (meaning integrity in the making and following of the public laws).

I suppose that I should be happy that you attributed those qualities to me, and to some extent I am. However, there are three glaring errors in your endorsements that not only make me concerned for the potential struggles of the next four years, but point to a more systemic barrier to moving Geneva forward in the best way possible. So I am writing not out of an immediate emotional reaction to certain persons, but out of a genuine and, I believe, well-founded concern about standards, integrity, and accountability in the long term. I hope you will consider my comments in that light and share them with the editorial board.

1. The non-endorsement of Chip Capraro. What you say about Chip is true until you state that “along the way Capraro’s demeanor has worked against him. It puts people on the defensive and inhibits collaboration.” What has put people on the defensive is Chip’s commitment to telling the truth. He is not contented to just ‘let it go’ when it comes to critical matters of city government. He also doesn’t give into the “why bother” attitude that has hobbled even the best councilors before him. When he joined council last year, things were very bad. The ‘back room’ was a place of bullying and dirty deals. Those are not baseless accusations, it is the truth! Until Councilor Nyrop was elected four years ago, I had been totally isolated in the back room. If you ask Jan what he regrets most about council he will tell you, as he told me, that it was compromising on issues that were wrong, but seemed small at the time. What seemed small then was the snowball of bad government that was rolling down Castle Street. This is, in my view, Chip’s greatest strength. He understands that tolerating the things that seem small in the short term is simply priming the pump for the long term exclusion of principles and, by extension, the people’s interests. Chip understands that good government doesn’t admit of degrees. It’s an all or nothing proposition. This doesn’t mean that in the practice of good government nothing can ever go wrong, it simply means that in the practice of good government, the intention to practice good government must be ever-present. When he points out its absence, people get defensive. But they get that way because they know they have done something wrong, not because he has done something wrong. If I look in the mirror and don’t like what I see, should I break the mirror? You rightly point out that Chip has been “the point man for ‘accountability’” but then dump him for doing exactly what being the point man for accountability requires. If it had been the case that an equally capable ‘point man’ was running and you simply chose one over the other, I could accept that. But you chose, instead, to endorse Ron Alcock, pointing to his experience with the OZAC. But therein lies the rub: Ron Alcock barely participated in that committee and, when he did attend the meetings, he was unprepared and hardly spoke. Those are not the actions of a point man for accountability. Not endorsing Chip is, in effect, trading good government for feel-good government, and I believe that is a serious disservice to all who are impacted by Council decision-making (not limited to city residents, but our regional partners as well).
2. The endorsement of Paul D’Amico. Returning to the three criteria discussed above, D’Amico does not play fair. He believes in belittling and marginalizing people as a way of deflecting attention from legitimate policy discussions. I have not been the only recipient of his bullying tactics. He also does not take the role of a city councilor seriously. During budget discussions he said that we should not be giving the city manager direction on the budget because “we are just part time volunteers” and we have to trust “the experts.” Setting and overseeing fiscal policy for the city is one of council’s most important duties. Another important duty is following the proper procedures and safeguards for the expenditures of public funds. One of D’Amico’s first acts on council was accepting the role of ‘swing voter’ in deciding to grant a raise to our city manager without first completing the evaluation process. Despite the urging of myself, Jan Nyrop, Alaine Espenscheid, and Chip Capraro to abstain from the vote or to oppose it because it contained several false statements, D’Amico went along stating that he has “known Rich for a long time” and “it would be hard” not to go along with the raise. Well, doing the right thing is often difficult, but that doesn’t relieve one’s obligation. Lastly (and related to the former points), D’Amico has not been committed to open government. I have received several nasty e-mails from him, but chose not to turn the election into a game of ‘gotcha.’ But I will share an excerpt of an exchange about the open meetings law that took place on June 6, 2007: I wrote “the sale & lease of city property is only proper in executive session where there's some issue that could substantially *negatively* effect the value of the property. Unless that's the case on Sweeney, I think item #2 should be brought up in public.” D’Amico responded, “I hope I never get to the point where I question the City Manager OR the City Attorney on what is appropriate conversation/topic for executive session. I wish to go on record that I trust the people I sit with and guarantee to you all that I will never go to an outside source to question the validity of our planned agenda/proceedings.” Not only was he saying that he would ‘go along to get along,’ he was openly criticizing me for bringing the NYS Open Meetings Law to bear on our proceedings. His treatment of City Council as a fraternity rather than a fact-based public body is an attitude that is toxic to government, regardless of the particular make up of council.
3. The endorsement of Lou Cosentino. You rightly pointed out Lou’s tendency to ‘shoot the messenger.’ And I agree with you that his attitude alone is not enough to deny him the endorsement. But the legitimate grounds for denying him the endorsement are that he does not want to do what’s best for the city and its residents. I would argue that councilors must lead by example. My husband and I are landlords, we take code enforcement seriously. We understand the role fair and firm code enforcement plays not only in safety for renting families but in stabilizing neighborhoods. My husband and I are also taxpayers, and we take our need to pay our fair share seriously. Lou Cosentino has held himself above the very policies he votes in favor of, and your paper has known it, has reported on it, and has apparently chosen to forget it.
   

That last point brings me to the overarching message I’d like to leave you with. The real collaboration that will improve Geneva, is better collaboration between the public servants on council and the press in serving the watchdog function of government. What we have right now is an over-reliance on government self-reporting as “news.” Using the city manager’s raise as an example, council narrowly passes a resolution stating that an evaluation has been completed and that after ‘due deliberation’ a contract modification was deemed necessary. Imagine that none of us in the minority had given public reasons for our dissent. How would the story have read? Would the Mayor have followed up with a patently false letter to the editor? Would Lou Cosentino still have submitted a letter of his own, confirming the contradiction? Unlikely. If Councilor Capraro and I didn’t start the blog and the radio appearances, would we have moved as much information out of the back room? Unlikely.

What is dysfunctional on council is not the communication style of particular councilors and therefore the remedy is not simply to find people who will ‘hear each other out.’ The problem is bad government and the only solution is good government! It’s not a question of style, it’s a question of substance and I believe the endorsements punted on that. The endorsements assume that everyone is telling the truth, but that is not the case! Chip and I have both been point people for accountability by demanding that the facts be aired publicly. Does that mean that people might be uncomfortable as we call them out for violating the public trust? Sure. But is that our fault? Not at all!


What Chip and I have done on council is not offensive and does not inhibit collaboration. It inhibits dirty politics! We are not content to participate in good government only “when asked,” we are doing it every day, with every statement. I happen to believe we do more than we should--not because what we do is not necessary, but because we are filling the void left by the absence of a watchdog press. We are left to do the governing and the reporting and analysis of the governing. That is too much, but the answer is not to purge us, it is to infuse city politics with accountability from a new source, namely your paper. Consider this quote from George Krimsky, former head of the AP news “There is still a need today -- perhaps more than ever -- for identifying sense amidst the nonsense, for sifting the important from the trivial, and, yes, for telling the truth. Those goals still constitute the best mandate for a free press in a democracy.”


So, to be consistent with your own guidelines, you should have endorsed both of us or neither of us. We both have the best intentions, and have committed to the necessary actions. We have been bold, and it has come at a cost. To negate Chip’s extensive contributions due to a perceived issue of style while endorsing me for those same commitments and endorsing people who actively look to suppress those concerns (and suffer real issues of style) is not rational and not in the best interest of Geneva. Therefore, I cannot in good conscience accept your endorsement.

I do hope that the editorial board will, regardless of the outcome of this election, take seriously the charge to improve the level of accountability that you bring to bear on city government. You, too, are stewards of the public trust.


Sincerely,
JAckie Augustine