Gilbert could select a town manager before the new Town Council is seated on June 23.
That would mean that challenger candidates Victor Petersen and Jordan Ray, should they be elected in the May 17 runoff, will have to work with a manager whose hire they did not have a vote for. However, both said during a candidate forum hosted by the East Valley Tribune on Monday that they have had a say in the process, and are comfortable with it.
“So far, we have been involved,” Ray said. “The recruiter has spoken with each of us, and the current Council has done a good job of getting everyone involved.”
Eddie Cook, a challenger candidate who had enough votes during the March primary to win a seat outright, has been working with the executive search firm retained by Gilbert.
Current Town Manager Collin DeWitt made clear he was not interested in the job long term, and his contract expires in June. Holding off on the hiring process until after the election would have meant another wait of at least six months, incumbent Council members said.
“Our time frame was really compressed, and there’s never really a good time to go through it,” incumbent Dave Crozier said. “It’s an arduous process, and if we have a chance to get it done (soon), we should do it.”
A list of finalists will be released May 18, a day after the election. Each Council member and member-elect will be part of interview panels.
“Whoever is elected on May 17 will be an integral part of the process because they need to be,” incumbent and Vice Mayor Les Presmyk said. “They need to be part of the process because the town manager, legal counsel, presiding judge and town clerk are the four employees that are hired by the Council, the town manager being the most important one.”
Excellent communication skills and the financial and business sense required to manage a municipality of 220,000 residents were the ideal manager qualities most cited by the six candidates at the Tribune forum. Presmyk said that Kent Cooper — Gilbert’s town manager from 1983-2001 and father of current Council member Ben Cooper — is the kind of visionary the town needs.
“I learned first-hand what it takes to do that job,” Ben Cooper said, smiling. “And I know that rather than doing it, I’d rather have someone there working for me.”
• Contact writer: (480) 898-6301 or dzeiger@evtrib.com
gilbertwatchdog posted at 12:23 am on Mon, May 2, 2011.
I never knew (until tonight) that Gilbert had a sister city in Pakistan named Abbott-a-bad, which is what even folks in Pakistan will call their sister city in Arizona if Linda gets re-elected and once again gets back into tax, tax, tax and spend, spend, spend.[beam]
ivotetoo posted at 10:53 pm on Wed, May 4, 2011.
Must drive you crazy that the crazy Petersen and Ray Mormon tea drinkers are so worried that those of us who do not drink their kool aid will have our voice represented on Gilbert's council. Ray and his family moved to Gilbert a year ago after the right wingers like himself drove it into the ground. Keep your hands off of Gilbert, Abbott has helped make this the community they decided they want to live in and now they want to ruin it. No Petersen, Ray or Tea li ban!!!
gilbertwatchdog posted at 2:15 am on Wed, May 11, 2011.
Abbott and Cooper right for Gilbert's future? Well, let's look at that a bit more subjectively.
First, Ms. Abbott. Yes, it's true that she gets things done, but only the things she wants done, not what's truly good for the average "Joe" in Gilbert.
Her list of "things" getting done would include being instrumental in bringing the SEIU union into Gilbert. You know, the same union that boycotts Arizona over SB1070. The same union that our current President is so fond of as well. The same union that she counts on for political support for her campaign (no double standard there, I'm sure).
Her fondness for union's doesn't stop there. She was also a big supporter of starting Gilbert's own unionized Fire Department, pushing a private fire fighting business out of Gilbert, and just by happen-stance, her husband is heavily involved in the unionized Gilbert Fire Department (surprise, surprise).
Ms. Abbott also has an apparently never balanced a checkbook either, since she voted to support spending millions for the Big League Dreams park (while we were entering a recession), and millions more for the Zinke Dairy fiasco (while we were smack dab in the middle of the recession).
In each case, she has claimed over and over again that these reckless financial decisions were great for her vision of Gilbert, never mind that the taxpayers are always stuck writing ever larger checks to help "her" vision become a reality.
It seems curious (again just a lucky break) that Ms. Abbott seems to be spending a considerable amount of her campaign money on web site ads in certain local newspapers, newspapers that seem to have missed why spending $90 million plus (for just these two projects alone) has caused the Gilbert town budget to go into the red.
To be sure, Ms. Abbott was not the only town council member to vote for these two fiscal fiasco's (and that are running for re-election, the others being Crozier and Presmyk) but she certainly has stated over and over that she still thinks these two projects are great for Gilbert.
If Ms. Abbott had any flair for history, when hearing of the complaints from the taxpayers, she might utter "let them eat cake", for her attitude toward the average taxpaying citizen in Gilbert surely must be very similar indeed.
As for Mr. Cooper, it's true that he did not vote for either Big League Dreams or the Zinke Dairy fiasco's (as he was not on the council at that time), but he was hand picked by the current council members (Abbott, Crozier and Presmyk) so one can assume that they viewed his fiscal and political thinking as similar to their own.
Indeed, Mr. Cooper has not gone out of his way to distance himself from these spending disasters, nor has he publically called for the release of ALL Gilbert documents (including any and all executive meetings and minutes) related to the Zinke land deal.
He may be a fine man, but when you're hand picked to join a club with members of questionable fiscal ethics, you need to establish yourself as above reproach to the average taxpayer and citizen, and his campaign has largely been silent on these matters. Perhaps he doesn't understand the need to distance himself from "the good old boys" politically, or perhaps he feels right at home there, but we may never know and his silence could cost him the election.
That leaves Victor Petersen and Jordan Ray as the only two "unknowns" still in the mix. I don't know either man (or his family) personally, but them being outsiders made be their single biggest plus in this upcoming election.
Politically, they may be newcomers, and yes they may make mistakes (if elected) at some point in the future, but can you imagine they would do as poor a job representing the average Gilbert taxpayer as Abbott, Crozier, or Presmyk have during the past several years? I can't.
gilbertwatchdog posted at 11:05 pm on Thu, May 12, 2011.
For those that haven't seen the AZ Republic's reporting on this breaking news story regarding Bobbi Smith (one of Linda Abbott's main backers, she's also quoted on Linda's web site), here you go ....
I think it's a good bet that Ms. Roberta "Bobbi" Smith will never receive the same level of punishment for her illegal actions that any one of Linda Abbott's detractors would if they were caught doing the same thing, as Linda has many contacts within town government that will, in all likelyhood, take great care that Bobbi Smith will receive every possible legal break.
Consider this, here's a woman (Bobbi Smith) that's caught red-handed by Gilbert Police committing the crime (and admits to it) and a former Gilbert Town Councilmen (Don Skousen) rushes to:
a) talk with her (Bobbi Smith), and
b) manage to issue what amounts to a press release that tries to justify her illegal actions at the same time.
I imagine that if a "normal" citizen were being interviewed by Gilbert Police (before being arrested) and a "normal" bystander (in place of a former Gilbert Council member) decided to intervene into the situation that Gilbert PD might have ended up putting two of them in the back of the car, but perhaps I'm reading too much into the situation.
Skousen also told the AZ Republic that "he (Skousen) feels the negative signs are slanderous and that Smith made "a mistake in judgment because she (Bobbi Smith) was infuriated with these idiots."
First, Mr. Skousen is entitled to his opinion. Unfortunately, neither he nor Bobbi Smith understand that basic constitutional right of free speech. Ms. Abbott's detractors, and there are many to be sure, have absolutely every constitutional right to their opinions regarding Ms. Abbott's qualifications (or lack thereof) for any public office.
Mr. Skousen should also be keenly aware that claiming that the detractors (to Ms. Abbott's campaign) are "idiots" is quite possibly both slanderous and libelous as well (since he was aware that his statement would be quoted and printed), and since the Gilbert Police Department on scene had no trouble contacting the owner of the politcal signs in question (meaning that they were legal political signs). Thus the only reason Ms. Bobbi Smith actually had (in illegally removing the signs) was that she didn't like the political message contained on the signs. Fortunately for the rest of Gilbert, Ms. Bobbi Smith is not in charge of Gilbert's Sign Police.
Second, Linda Abbott's defenders rail against those that point out undisputed facts about her town council record, ignoring that Ms. Abbott's record is out there for all to see (if only they wish to look). I have not seen (or heard) anyone that's made fun of Ms. Abbott personally, or watch she looks like, or what clothes she wears, etc., etc. - no, every issue has been about her voting record, which is how it should be during an election.
Ms. Bobbi Smith may think Linda Abbott walks on water (and that's her right to have that opinion), but others also have the same right to believe that she doesn't, and the right to point out what they consider many past costly mistakes within her voting and spending record, plus political statements that simply weren't true (like laying off dozens of Gilbert Fire and Police if Prop 406's tax increase wasn't passed).
That's called democracy folks, and if your candidate can't take it, both she and her husband (if the allegations of him being photographed outside Town Hall also illegally removing campaign signs are true), should get out of the race.
Read more: http://www.azcentral.com/community/gilbert/articles/2011/05/12/20110512gilbert-community-activist-accused-stealing-campaign-signs.html#ixzz1MClawRMn