OLNEY—Several people are expressing disappointment in their most recent choice for mayor after the July 8 Olney City Council meeting, wherein the mayor, in a display of churlish immaturity, shut down a citizen rightfully expressing his opinion in the public input session…and it wasn’t Brian James O’Neill.
Several people were in attendance at the first Olney city council meeting for the month of July (July 8th) due to high interest in the topic of discussing ‘rezoning’ of a property, so plenty of people were on-hand to view the display.
Representatives of the property in question, which is located at 902 E. Locust in Olney, are seeking rezoning in order to allow an eye clinic to be placed on the property.
Area attorney Jeff Fleming spoke on behalf of the eye clinic, stating that the place would only be used as a “medical facility” and it would be “restricted to medical use.”
A woman by the name of Amy Reed spoke on the issue saying, “It doesn’t need to be rezoned, when it could be used for something else.” Mayor Ray Vaughn put in his two cents at that point and asked Fleming if the property had been abandoned for quite sometime, noting that there wasn’t another option of ‘something else being there.’
Samuel Jenkins,(in the above photo with a cane) voices his religious objections on newly approved Sunday liquor sales in the city of Olney as mayor Ray Vaughn (left) and councilman John McLaughlin (right) note his objections.
Another woman by the name of Lee Laughlin (who was in attendance at the meeting to discuss any ‘attempts’ at fixing up the road for East Gate addition, which appears to be an ongoing project), asked Fleming, “Will there be enough room (referencing cars being able to park).
Fleming replied, “Yes, they (the people running the facility) plan to have only one to two cars at a time in the front, and the employees will park in the back.
After a vote was taken all of the council members voted ‘yes’ except councilman John McLaughlin who voted ‘no.’
The immature display
In the aforementioned shocking display of immaturity, mayor Vaughn was looking annoyed as Olney resident Samuel Jenkins was up in front of the council sharing his feelings on liquor being sold on Sunday.
Repeating again that “Sunday is God’s day” and that there is “not a valid reason for liquor to be sold on Sundays,” Jenkins, an older gentleman who walks with a cane, was in the middle of quoting from the Bible when Vaughn cut him off, stating, “I got lectured in church, I don’t need you to lecture me. I will give you one more minute.”
Jenkins, hard of hearing and appearing shocked, asked, “One more minute?”
Vaughn stated ‘yes’ and when Jenkins finished up Vaughn addressed the room announcing, “There are 9,000 people in this town and we will not be spending 10 minutes on issues that aren’t directed towards this council.”
Brian James O’Neill was about to be called out of order by Vaughn when he piped up about Vaughn violating the people’s freedom of speech, which was the very topic O’Neill had just finished getting heated about in his presentation, along with his other topics he didn’t really touch upon such as ‘unequal treatment’ and ‘separation between church and state within government.’ But O’Neill simmered down quickly when he saw Vaughn raise his gavel and point it in O’Neill’s direction.
While people voted in overwhelming numbers for Vaughn in the April election (he defeated former mayor Mark Lambird two-to-one), it’s a pretty sure bet the people didn’t think they were going to see this kind of behavior out of their mayor.
Whether they let it continue or not remains to be seen.
The expensive radios
A topic that was tabled at last month’s meeting, being a resolution to accept a quote for the purchase of a radio communications for the water towers, was taken back up.
The problem last month was that there was no indication of what kind of warranty they were getting for the bid they picked. The warranty was made clear this time for the low bid from Business Electronics, Inc. (BEI) communications, being three years, and costing a total of $13,839.50.
City manager/city attorney Larry Taylor also said the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulations for ‘narrowbanding’ had to make the communication system compatible (for the EMS and police, who are the only ones that can communicate with each other. If anyone else were wanting to get on with narrow band it would cost that person several hundreds of dollars to get a scanner to listen…which is likely the appeal for the city, as Richland County, as an entity, enjoys operating in as much secrecy as they can). Only the antennas, cables and man-hours are not included in that cost.
A concern arose about Washington tower, because it will need to be painted inside and out before any communication system gets put on it. That little painting task will cost the taxpayers around $450,000.
The reason for the cost being so high is the water tower has lead on it, which causes a disposal problem.