This editorial is one of the more skillful attempts by the apologists for the Town Board to explain away the scandal which is rocking the Town of Rochester. Skill, however, is still insufficient to explain away the crass way in which the meeting was handled by the Board.
First, the author admits that "we have to question" whether or not the allegations made against Ms. Mihailescu are true. That, in itself, is a damning admission. Criminals are given the right to a trial by jury, where the charges against them are proven beyond a reasonable doubt. Given that a supporter of the Town Board says we "have to question" the charges against Manuela, it would seem they cannot be proven against her beyond a reasonable doubt. She should (at the very least) have the benefit of the same burden of proof as a common criminal.
The author goers on in several places to describe the townspeople as a "raucous mob" and an "angry mob". At the same time, he talks of the organization that went into bringing people to the meeting. A well-organized group of people is not, by definition a mob. Were we angry? No doubt, and justifiably so. Perhaps righteous indignation would be a better description of our attitude. Raucous? Not at all.
Our anger at the Town Board was well-justified and stems from the Board's refusal to live up to its Constitutional obligation to allow the people to petition their elected officials. If they had just listened to us, none of this would have happened. Listening would not have precluded a dialogue at a later date and might have given them some idea of what it was that most upset the people present. They chose to not only deny us our rights but to continue on in ignorance of what our complaints against them were. The author says it is "easy to criticize people for things they can’t respond to," but the point is neither criticism nor response. The point is the obligation government has to listen, like it or not, with or without the ability to respond.
The author states that according to the Republican Club's mailer Manuela "twice requested to see the material and was denied." Manuela told me that what she had asked to see was the address and name of the website. That is what, according to her, the Board denied her, not the smutty photos she says they shoved in front of her face. Of course, this is a clever twisting of words and splitting of hairs in order to make her and her defenders seem unreasonable.
"What is troubling is the inability of people with opposing views to discuss their differences in a civil manner." There I have to agree. However, we were not only willing but very much wanted to discuss this issue with the Board, leaving the choice of response up to them. They took that choice from us. They refused to allow us to present our side. They stated that "Public Comment is not a right, but a privilege, granted at the sufferance of the Board." They refused to move the venue of the Meeting to allow all interested residents the opportunity to attend. They did everything in their power to ensure that there was no discussion (civil or otherwise) of the issue at hand.
As for the honking of the horns, those relegated to the parking lot like second class citizens or exiles to the gulags did NOT begin sounding their horns when the Board was presenting its awards but quite a bit earlier. This claim is, in fact, imprecise at the very least. I cannot say for certain if Zali Win was the author of this editorial, as it is unattributed on the website on which it was published. However, I for one do not recall seeing him there last Thursday. No one I have spoken with recalls seeing him. Could he have been there? Sure, there was quite a bit of confusion. On the other hand, when he is present, he is usually fairly prominent. More than likely (assuming he authored the piece) he received information from others who were present, so his inaccuracies can be forgiven. Perhaps he needs to be more careful who his sources are.
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