Post in Reflections

Jun 23 20:28 UTC

Certainly a positive message that I am sure many would like to project to those
outside the community.

I prefer to stick to the cold hard facts.  Let me expand upon the previous
comments.

1. Central Park, along with all of our parks, are a community asset.  We can
first thank the voters and city leaders back in the 1960's and earlier for
having a high level of community vision in setting aside the land, and
approving referendums to make this happen.  I personally believe this kind of
leadership and vision is lacking in most of society today.

The Parks and Recreation staff do their best with the limited resources they
have.  Thankfully we have citizen volunteers who step in and contribute.

But when you look closely, you see that there are "issue".  Let's face the
facts, you have a park system that has a $5,000,000 to $10,000,000 backlog in
repairs.  This isn't small change.  The council just recently bypassed voter
approval to approve bonds in the $2,000,000 range for some arena expenditures
and this isn't part of the backlog I am referencing above.  Burying our heads
in the sand won't make it go away.

Then you have leadership issues at the elected level where there seems to be a
greater desire to build even more new items rather than place a priority on
fixing what we have.  Should we be installing more streetscaping and pathways
which require long term maintenance costs when we can't afford to fix what we
already have?

2. We do have well kept homes in general.  The Neighborhood Enhancement Program
really is just window dressing and more to do with public relations if you take
a broad look at this whole issue.  The Roseville Housing and Redevelopment
Authority has wanted to really dive into this issue for the past two years but
has been rebuffed by the city council every step of the way.  Mr. Klausing
along with staff who do not live in Roseville, have blocked their efforts
numerous times.  Just recently, public hearings for many of these issues were
eliminated by the council.

We can do ten times better, and we have volunteers who have stepped up to the
plate to lead the way, if certain people would put aside personal power,
political, and ego issues.  The HRA is in an excellent position to take a
leadership position on this issue.

3. Our streets are well maintained.  The comment about them being done without
special assessments is false.  The council years ago followed state law which
allowed them to bond for millions of dollars without voter approval, by
assessing properties anywhere from 25-100% of the cost.  The bonds have been
paid back over a lot of years through increased property taxes.  Having new
streets means minimal maintenance in the short term.  There is no free ride.

Then from what public works staff has said in so many words, the taxpayers were
overtaxed over many years in order to create some kind of endowment where they
use the interest off of this endowment in order to pay for minimal maintenance.
Let me be clear that this is taxpayer money, not some gift from Guidant, 3M,
etc.  Instead of us using this money to pay down our mortgages, car payments,
credit card debt, or sending our kids to college, the city has our money and is
using it.  In other communities, they chose to let the taxpayers keep their
money and simply use assessments when projects come along.  Again, there is no
free ride.

Government overtaxing citizens and keeping their money is not what I would call
planning or vision.

4. Pleasant city staff does exist.  I have personally met many of them.

What is unfortunate is that a few bad eggs spoil the batch.  When we do find a
few bad eggs, rather than separate them from the batch, they are protected by
the city manager.  The manager uses a loophole in state law to keep
investigations of other employees non-public and out of sight from council
members.  This loophole doesn't exist for state level management employees.
The desire to bury problems by the city manager ends up creating an atmosphere
where it appears that all employees are on the take.  It also lowers the
standards that other employees feel they should strive to achieve.

Let me give you some examples of what this management style creates.  If the
fire chief can run a political campaign website from city hall during the
business day on city owned computers with no repercussions, then certainly an
employee should be free to run their ebay business from city hall on city owned
computers during the work day.  If a communications department employee can
make a derogatory comment towards council member Kough during a public meeting,
then why can't all employees make similar derogatory comments to county or
state elected officials in a public environment on city time in their official
capacity as a representative of the city of Roseville.

Then look at the example our council sets for our employees.  The council never
holds the city manager accountable for anything.  When a police investigator
from the Maple Grove Police Department proved that the city manager broke the
law, the council never even considered disciplining him.  Never considered a
written reprimand, a day off of work without pay, or firing him which would
have been the standard action.  Instead they let him stay on the payroll as
long as he wanted while he looked for another job.  Then the police chief who
stayed silent when emails showed she knew the city manager was breaking the
law, is allowed to continue on as if nothing happened and it was just another
day at the office.