Taft gets the shaft, and other council hijinks.

Well, today's regular meeting of the Quartzsite clown council promised to be contentious and we were not disappointed or amused. Mayor Foster had placed items on the agenda to return the meetings to 7pm, as the town code stipulates, bring back a call to the public which would be placed at the beginning of the meeting, remove the authority of the town manager to hire outside contractors, and such.

Remember. the illegal "emergency" meeting on July 10, 2011 "draft minutes"stated that the suspension of the Town Proceedures and Policies Manual, including meetings held at 9am and no public comment were only to remain in effect "until the second Tuesday in September, or until two thirds of the council determines that an emergent circumstances no longer exist which create an imment risk to public safety, and the safety of elective and appointive officials, whichever occurs first". They just kept it that way because they like ignoring the rules.

Now Councilman Ogre-on has never meant a campaign promise he didn't dislike, so he ammended the agenda and removed Foster's items, with the other sock puppets nodding in approval like bobble heads on the dash of a four wheeler.

Then, they all went into executive session, came out and without any discussion they fired the evil Queen Taftalex! Despite this being the only campaign promise Ogre-on is willing to make good on, we must remember that it was his flawed orchestrations that got us into this mess, with Taft being placed on "administrative leave" instead of fired outright the first time. Now she can sue the town for changing the terms of her contract. But since it appears that she was terminated "without cause", I suppose they'll have to pay her "golden parachute" or be forced to admitt that the meeting her new contract was approved in was actually illegal. Of course, that would require admitting that Norma Crooks usurped the office of Councilperson, having been appointed in the aforementioned illegal meeting. How much you want to bet that Marty the barf bagger is providing free legal advice to the other ousted cabal members?

The overpaid engineers that are designing a do over of the wastewater treatement plant gave a fancy power point presentation about how it's only going to cost 5.9 million to expand, and without it there can be no growth. Here's a thought, if our leaders can't manage what little they've got, why are they even talking about growth and expansion? Put your house in order now morons!

Ogre-on's item to direct that the town mismanager spare no expense in pursuit of town debtors passed with Workman dissenting. It appears that she understands the lawsuits this sort of action will incurr. It also appears that Foster will dare them to go after the Big Tent, Lukkasson, Oldham et all. Naturally, Ogre-on had supplied no supporting documents for his agenda item, no definition of how debt was to be determined, provision for due process, or if this gives carte blanche authority to Bruno to enter into contracts for support services in excess of $5,000 without council approval, etc. Do you miss the old cabal yet?

Fraulein Bruno said she found us a possible high risk private insurer, but it's going to cost about $70,000 a year in additional premiums. No worries, she's cutting town staff  to compensate for the expense that she helped cause by being unwilling to work with the Risk Pool. Oh, and she still managed to try and blame the insurance cancellation on Councilwoman Workman, according to an alleged "phone conversation" that took place on October 25th, after the Risk Pool already held the meeting to discuss notifying the town that they were cancelling. Nice try honey! Go back to Sacramento and peddle your snake oil because we aren't buying it here in Qville. Rumor has it that Workman filed a 23 page complaint against Bruno a week or so ago. I can say "revenge", can you?

We don't know what Councilwoman Anderson has against that nice man that's managing Desert Gardens RV Park, but she sure tried (and failed) to keep him off the planning and zoning board. The Council also approved that nasty town employee Susan Fonda to be on the Heath and Development Board. You will remember that Fonda quit as Manager for Quartzsite's branch of the Horizon Community Bank and moved out of town. Apparently her employment options have dwindled, because she came back here to be a seasonal vendor permit lackey. Another loser on the payroll. Why did they fire the qualified employees last year? Oh yeah, they knew too much.