Tag: #localelectionsmatter

The tale of the irrelevant abstainer: Your July 17th meeting run-down!

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It’s been a rough four years!

It seems to be that we will be reporting on these last few meetings with a sense of relief. For everything that Shrelauter and Tony does is TEMPORARY. Let’s get to it!

Kirby comes in late and Billy abstains on voting on the agenda.

There are a bunch of concerned citizens making comments about the Sheriff’s agreement with ICE. More specifically how there needs to be an external audit since he’s apparently taking in more than he’s spending. Lots of good points made about how the Sheriff’s office should not be the only entity that has oversight of this program. We also loved Matt Seubert’s comments about the primary election results!

Billy abstains on the budget adjustments, of which there are many, AND the minutes. He then goes on to abstain on the appointment of Kathy Schey to the division of Senior Services, as well as to the appointees to the Board of Appeals. Can someone just write him an excuse note for the rest of his term?

Other board’s members are approved with no issues.

The Bikeways and Trail plan is approved 5-2. Billy tries to make some noise about how this is just like the Monocacy River Plan, to which Tony disagrees.

A bulk of the evening is spent discussing the charter amendments that will find their way to our ballot this Fall. Tony doesn’t win with his amendment that would allow the council to add, delete, and move money around in the budget. Most people are in agreement that we need another council to see if this is actually a charter problem or just a problem with certain “personalities” on the present council. LOL! Jessica pulls her collective bargaining amendment that she was working out with the firefighters because they wrote their own and have been all over town getting people to sign their petition. You can read a more in depth analysis of this section of the meeting here.

The council voted to surplus a building on Ballenger Creek Pike. Originally slated for a firehouse, it has been sitting there for 30 years. Billy wants to see if the original owner can be tracked down, and the county representative is pretty much flabbergasted by this suggestion. The council, except for the abstainer, agreed to surplus it.

We then go through a bunch of First Readings, which will be discussed in more detail at a later date. And sorry/not sorry, we are skipping the sewage amendment hearing portion of the evening!

We return at 7:00 with two public hearings on bills that have to do with accessory dwelling units. All conversation is positive!

He’s been quiet all evening, but now it’s time for council member comments and Kirby has some things to say! He’s got one issue! The mayor of New Market contacted him because the he says the county agreed to take care of a new by-pass, but now wants the town to do it. We are treated to such Kirbyisms as:

“The county is trying to strong-arm a municipality!”

“The agreement says what it says!”

What will we do without this hyperbolic language come January?

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True Facts!

Billy agrees that we’ve all seen this movie before! And don’t you know that all the municipalities are suing the county?! We sure didn’t!

Jerry has nice things to say about the carnivals. Tony has nothing to say. Jessica reminds us that the council really can’t do anything about the agreement with ICE nor can the Executive. M.C. makes us aware of a forum that Ft. Detrick is having about the sterilization plant shut-down and also had some nice events to tell us about. Bud ends the evening recounting all the fine things going on around these here parts.

Overall, we made it through the first post-election legislative day relatively unscathed! Here’s to the last four months going as smoothly!

Lame ducking it through the next 5 months! Your summer time council drinking game is here!

fclocalyokelLeave a comment
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Take it easy Fluffy!

Today is the first legislative day since the primary election. That means..dun, dun, dun….council member comments! Billy didn’t bother showing up at the last workshop and Kirby was very quiet and even pulled his bill, so we don’t know what to expect!!! It makes us a little uneasy! Anyhoo, grab your trusty agenda, fire up your FCGTV, and be sure to take care of that liver. There’s no way that Billy is coming to save any of you ingrates now!

What are we going to do without someone to vote against the agenda come December? Who will abstain on the budget adjustment just to see the expression on the faces of his fellow council members? Just thinking of this makes us feel all giddy inside. No matter what happens with the passing of the agenda and approval of adjustments, slam back a tall Happy Camper, for this will all be over soon!

Up next is a bunch of approvals of nominees and appointments. May be the time to get some last minute digs in, but we hope not. Mix up a pitcher of Tomorrow We Sail, in anticipation of rosy times ahead!

Now it’s time to vote on the Bike and Trails plan and Four proposed amendments to the County Charter. Don’t listen to the “noise” about the collective bargaining and instead know it’s going to help our county employees, firefighters included, to get a fair shake. If the “noise” becomes too loud, soften it up with a high ball of Silent Touch.

Now it’s time to determine if a building in Ballenger Creek is no longer necessary, and there’s quite a few First Readers to get through. Let’ s see if everyone can remember that First Readers are just an introduction, not a time to debate!

For the three public hearings, pick your poison and drink at will!

It may be a long night with all of this on the agenda! When the time comes for council member comments make sure you have your wits about ya! You probably don’t want to miss a second of this!

Workshop absentee.

fclocalyokel5 Comments
2dssrt
Naa, we’re good!

From our post on Tuesday we saw that there was some speculation that Kirby would not show up. He did show up, though he was as silent as could be. Billy, on the other hand, did not bother. Therefore, between Billy’s absence and Kirby’s silence we had a pretty nice meeting!The first order of business is that Jerry would like to add an amendment to the Elderly Individual and Retired Military tax credit. The FNP, did a nice job of covering this part of the meeting, so we’ll just direct you to that.

With no explanation Kirby pulls his bill for the Public Safety workers tax credit.

Lori Depies is always a pleasure to listen to. There will be a bill asking to remove the BoE representatives from the Retiree Benefit Trust. There is also a representative from the BoE on hand to explain why they would like to dissolve their relationship. The BoE will be managing a separate trust for their employees. Read more about the bill here.

Bud has a bill that would transfer control of compensation from the County Executive’s office to the County Council for council employees. Bud has worked on this for over a year, however, many of the council members did not see this exact bill until this evening. This bill caused the most back and forth of the evening. Some council members are concerned about this turning all council employees into at-will. Others want to know why this is necessary. Tony accuses M.C. and Jessica of saying this bill is horrible. Something we did not hear. M.C. takes issue with this characterization and tells him that having concerns and wanting some language changed does not equal saying it is horrible. Jerry has a few hypothetical situations that a future vindictive council member may take advantage of with this bill. This then leads to Bud saying the most wonderful thing: ” The public will take care of unreasonable council members”. Damn right we will! There’s some more discussion, so we predict some more changes before this bill sees its first reading.

No one to object to going into closed session! What a refreshing change!

The council reconvened at 7:00 for a public hearing on the new bike trail bill. The county has been operating under the 1999 plan and staff feels the need to update it. They are taking some of the trails out of the original plan due to such factors as cost, need, and environmental impact. The third reading of this bill, which means the final council vote, should appear soon.

We were spared council member comments this week since it was a workshop. We’ll see how things go next week during their first legislative meeting since the election.

Oh how we fear! The first post-election workshop is here!

fclocalyokelLeave a comment
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We are pretty nervous folks!

The day has come. It is the first convening of the county council since very few believed in Shreve, not many were interested in Kirby’s straight talk, and Tony’s development ties did him in! We still have to pinch ourselves, because it doesn’t seem real that all three were knocked out in one fell swoop! There’s still five months in which they can cause trouble. And, if past behavior is an indicator of future conduct, we are in for it! The only saving grace is that since tonight is a workshop we will be spared the horror of council member comments! Here’s the agenda:

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We’ll let you know how it all turns out!

Click, Clack, NO!

fclocalyokel12 Comments
2dmgi8
That’s what we would like to know Bessie!

In today’s edition of the Frederick News Post is a brilliant letter about how unfit Cindy Rose is for a seat on the BoE. The letter writer not only lamented Cindy’s position on transgender people, but the fact that she’s unable to take any criticism on her Facebook pages, and therefore deletes and blocks opinions that differ from her own.We previously discussed, in Part Uno of our Cindy Rose field guide, her call to action to ban the award-winning children’s book Click, Clack, Moo. In case you missed it take a looky:Screen Shot 2018-07-08 at 12.30.55 PMIf you haven’t read the book, and Cindy obviously has not, it is not teaching kids to have a temper tantrum to get what they want. The plot of the story is as follows: The cows are very cold at night and since they cannot speak English, they type a letter to the farmer asking for some electric blankets. The farmer becomes enraged and refuses. The cows then talk to the chickens, who are also very cold at night, and they also ask for blankets. The farmer again refuses, and in return the cows refuse to give the farmer the milk produced from their bodies and the chickens refuse to relinquish the eggs they laid! The cows send another letter saying that they will relinquish the typewriter in return for the blankets, to which the farmer agrees. Can you imagine the horror of teaching your children speak up for themselves when they are cold? What kind of world are we living in anyway? Cindy also wants to know if the counterpoint is being read to the poor defenseless children?

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Take note that she turned off the commenting for this post! Guess she didn’t want to hear any other sides!

Let us just imagine the counter point to this for a moment. What could possibly be the alternative to the cows and chickens not getting their blankets?

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So many shades of wrong!

We contacted the author via Facebook about this and she was taken aback!  Her exact words after reading the above diatribe from Cindy were, “Wow…that’s a very interesting position! Only in today’s environment can typing cows become political.” Isn’t it horrible how Cindy is perverting the message of this book for her own political agenda? And lest you think this is the first time she’s advocated to remove books she hasn’t even bothered to read, check out these PIA requested emails that showed up during last election season:Screen Shot 2018-07-08 at 3.22.26 PMScreen Shot 2018-07-08 at 3.22.36 PMScreen Shot 2018-07-08 at 3.22.44 PMWe know it’s summer and you want to relax, hell so do we, but there will be no relaxing if Cindy gets on the board. We all know too well what can happen when we get complacent. Forward this, and anything else you’ve seen about her, to every Frederick voter you know. This is an easy problem to solve. #localelectionsmatter!

This is not a drill! Repeat, this is not a drill! Get out and vote today!!!!

fclocalyokel1 Comment
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What else do we have to do to convince you?!

If you haven’t already taken advantage of early voting, then today is your day! Do not sit this one out folks! It’s not only time for you to make choices about who gets through on your party ticket, it’s a chance for EVERYONE to make sure our BoE stays on a sane path! If you missed it, take a look at what Cindy said about all you vile progressives:

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Not afraid, just oh so very weary!

If you need help finding your polling location click here.  And if you are a procrastinator who still needs help figuring out who to vote for,  click on the League of Women Voter’s 411 site. Just get out and do it. There’s too much going on both locally and nationally for you to sit this one out!

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If cute kittens can’t get you out the door, then we don’t know what else to do with you!

#localelectionsmatter

It seems like a great time to be callous about separating kids from their parents!

fclocalyokel1 Comment

It’s hard to believe that people are anything but outraged by children being taken from their parents. We here at the Yokel have been sick over it. We all have little ones and cannot imagine what these people are going through. If you are thinking, “Well, it’s their parents fault,” or “Obama did it too,” go away now! We are done with the likes of you!

Even though Trump has finally signed an Executive Order to overturn his very own policy, which he insisted he wasn’t able to do because it was a Democratic law, the question remains as to when the already separated children will be reunited with their parents. That’s the only thing anyone with a heart should be worried about.

However….we live in a crazy world. And we have some people running for office who have some interesting interpretations of what we should be worried about instead of the obvious.

Something is disgusting all right! If she would have taken half a second to fact check this picture she would have found out it was taken at a protest about children being held in cages, not someone staging a picture of kids being held in cages.

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Because there are plenty of real pictures of that. But, that’s not what this BOE candidate wants us to focus on is it? By posting this she’s insinuating that this whole story isn’t true. Snopes is your friend, Cindy. If you can’t bother to check the validity of a simple picture how can we possibly trust you to make fact-based decisions concerning our children’s education?

On that note, go ahead and jump over to her Local Control Facebook page, because there are some real heroes interacting with her and Seth!

 

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How does Kirby feel about all this hullabaloo? Take a look:

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Hey folks! Why are we spending so much time focusing on the deep psychological scars that these separated kids will endure when we can engage in some deceiving whataboutism?

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Don’t fall for it Mittens!

There are no sanctuary policies  letting criminals out of jail. That is just a lie. Just like all the lies his Dear Leader tells. We just love how both he and Jenkins love to use MS-13 and illegal immigrants in the same breath in order to associate them together as one. Ain’t that clever? Go ahead and read up on MS-13, yes they are bad, but you may learn a thing or two. Like they are an American born gang, their victims are most likely to be other gang members, and illegal immigrants actually commit less crimes than native born people. We’ll stick to talking about Trump’s immigration policies thank you very much.

#localelectionsmatter!

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9 more days until voting starts! What’s been going on around here anyway?

fclocalyokel2 Comments
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Sorry, Tiger, hopefully everyone who can vote will!

We’ve been talking about how to go about showing our gentle readers all that’s been going on around here lately. Honestly, it’s next to impossible. Therefore, in preparation for the primary election we are going to show you as much as we can about what we’ve found in recent days. Let’s start with Kirby and this “Guess Who?” meme:

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Ah, first of all the only candidate who has received any benefits is the only one that has been elected to the office. So, how can it possibly be all of them? That makes zero sense. Let’s delve a little deeper into this though. Do we really expect people who work full-time in a political office not to be compensated for their work? Or, perhaps Kirby is one of those elitists we keep hearing about that believes that only those who are independently wealthy should hold political office. Guess who else has worked close to 8 years as a politician? That’s right Kirby. And he wants 4 more!

We can’t point out Kirby without taking a look at the other half of the Shrelauter equation: Billy! There honestly isn’t much to say. He hasn’t put out any signs. He did answer the FNP’s questions in which he claimed to have solved the opioid epidemic. But, besides that we’ll let the likes on his Billy for Senator Facebook page speak for themselves:

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#SAD

Now on to the BOE race. Seth Eisenberg has been a constant source of amusement for us these past few months. From his freaking out over every bad piece of press he gets, his car-side chats, and his claim to be running because of his son even though his son does not attend an FCPS school, there are days that we don’t even know where to begin with this guy. Here’s a good view into his candidacy.  This is his answer to a testing question put forth by the FNP:

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What is with him and Kirby and the double negatives? Well, we give this guy a triple negative endorsement! How do you like them apples?

And you know we have to mention Cindy…again. Even though we’ve done it a million times over, we need to make sure that everyone knows what a terrible choice she would be for our BOE.  If this lady had just stuck to over-testing, we may have had some common ground. But alas! We’ll leave you some of our favorite, more recent, posts we’ve seen her make:

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The Wonkette, one of our favorite blogs, did a couple of great pieces about him a few weeks back. If you missed the New York Times article about this fella, take a gander. He believes not only in the patriarchy, but that women should be in enforced monogamy with men! Why, you ask? Well, if not men will become violent, like all those disgusting incels you’ve been hearing about lately. And who is to blame? The man? No, no, no! According to Jordan Peterson women are!

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Sanctity?  When is she going to leave the transgender population alone?

And, let’s not forget the other two that have hitched their wagons to the aforementioned:

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You are the company you keep fellas! Wait, I thought they weren’t a slate!

We don’t rubber stamp every Democrat that comes down the line, nor do we rally against every Republican (Vote Steve McKay in District 2 if you are voting in the Republican primary!) Click here and here to read what we think about Galen Clagett.

This morning we were alerted to a story about congressional contender David Trone and his efforts to get the African American vote in A Miner Detail. Read it all here, but pay special attention to this excerpt that has to do with trying to recruit two Frederick City Aldermen to his campaign:

On Shackelford, Trone writes, “he is the easy fruit.”

“I don’t want to use him right away. I want to use Roger Wilson because we have to bring him out and get him to support us openly and that will send other messages to the black community because he represents in absentia Jan Gardner in the county government and he has his own strong network of people than Derek who has been to my house and been great doesn’t have [sic].”

Trone continued, “After we run Roger down and get as much help from him as we can get, then we will talk about when to shift over to Derek.”

Trone does not have the backing of your Lady Yokels.

We know there are more candidates that we need to bring attention to, but this is all we have the time and energy for today. If you know of any other stories that need to be shown the light of day, do not hesitate to put them in the comments for all to see!