08-24-15 Common Council Meeting Minutes

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REGULAR MEETING AUGUST 24,2015 downhill. I don't know what is going on but you are the council and you can solve this. Like you would hold me accountable for my area, I hold you all accountable. Samuel Brown—222 E. Navarre St., South Bend—I represent the group Citizens United for a Better Government. We heard about the Western corridor, now we want to drive it and pray nothing happens to us. I want to talk about a small neighborhood on the Westside of South Bend,there are three (3) families. The Browns,the Gordons, and the Wardens over 16 years they have owned their homes from Linden to Orange. They have a street light that has been knocked down three (3)times. I want to thank the people at traffic and lights who make it safe for the kids to walk by at night. I tried to talk to the Mayor about it and can't get a hold of him and at this point I don't want to talk to him. Again, I thank the people from traffic and lights for coming out and making our city safe. The issue with the drug house,I went to talk to the boys they won't do anything still riding around in their cars; no problem. I tried to get a hold of the Chief but they didn't call me back. The thing about Mr. Brown is I know people outside the city federal marshals and people in drug task enforcement. We are going to skip out of South Bend and ask for other people to come in and help my family. I'm tired of the games and playing politics. I have lived here all my life, I know the politics and am tired of begging for help. That little stretch has more traffic on it. Then they want me to fill out a police report, each division is separate. I don't understand what is going on with our city anymore. I understand the redevelopment of our streets, but I don't care. We have to fix it,the only one to fix it is the taxpayers. We have to step up and fix this thing. I've asked for help and can't get it. I'm moving to the feds and state police and anybody else that can come and clean the drug lords out of here. If you know anyone that can help I'm going to call them. E. Michael Jones—206 Marquette Ave, South Bend—It is a privilege to speak with you again, I promise I won't ask for extra time this time. I come before you about the issue with John Voorde and the Ashly Madison situation. It makes the front page of the newspaper as it is a problem. Everyone knows that there is something wrong here. Even though we are told it's not wrong. We have a crisis now as we don't understand how people can govern us with people who are involved with bad behavior. Some people come and call for his resignation,I'm not trying to defend what he did. If with what Pete Buttigieg does is sexually right, then I don't understand how anyone else can say what this man does is wrong. I don't understand it as we have a totally incoherent system of morals in the government here. How can you enforce the law if the man who represents the entire city is engaged in behavior that is worse than what his behavior is? How can you do it; you can't do it. You have an ongoing crisis of government people becoming demoralized. People becoming involved in more and more gay social behavior, as no one wants to address the problem. I tried to address you people a while ago and got shouted down. It was embarrassing to me the way this body behaved shouting at me 20 seconds, 30 seconds this type of thing. I'm sorry to bring it up but we have a crisis here. We can sweep it under the rug and just say we are going to deal with grass and how high the grass is going to grow, but there is something bigger here and we have to address it. Mr. Sabo—Offices on Mishawaka Ave, South Bend—I would like to request five (5)minutes. So moved by Councilmember Oliver Davis. Councilmember Valerie Schey seconded the motion which carried by a voice vote of eight(8) ayes. The first point is the discussion of taxes coming up,that were on the agenda. Council President Tim Scott interjected that you are unable to talk about what was discussed on the agenda. Council Attorney Kathy Cekanski-Farrand agreed. He continued that is fine as this topic was not on the agenda. That is the transfer of funds from every department in the city to pad the budgets of the Mayor's office, the clerk's office,and this council being conducted as a scheme of tax money that should be going to satisfy the needs of the taxpayer but are instead fatting the budgets of those offices to 65% of their total budget. That is nothing more than an underhanded extortion to get their hands on more money they do not want to account for to tax payers, as it is coming out of the budget of all these other departments; who have to give up on average, at last calculation of 3.2% each of their total budgets that is given as tribute to these offices for administration functions? I cannot believe that the Mayor's office spends 65%of his time providing administrative duties to every single department listed here evenly at 3.2% each,nor 12