Sounding like a broken record
You heard me say many times that I’m not going to talk about Lawrence Community Access Television and I always come back to it. I said that “I gave up,” “I threw the towel,” and “I’m done with that issue” yet, I keep coming back to it. And it’s all your fault!
Yes, all of you for not demanding to stop having your money stolen. That complacency is the reason that nothing gets done. We keep paying the cable companies (Verizon and Comcast) a monthly charge in our bill to maintain the two television channels for the community and the city government and they failed miserably.
The community access channel was meant for us to produce local programs and LCAT was hijacked by non-Lawrencians who have no interest in allowing us to express ourselves by producing our own shows. I fought them for 19 years and no one backed me up; what’s worst is that the local administrations seemed to be in cahoots with the management of the channels.
My hope was placed on Brian DePeña because he promised he would recover what we have been paying for. In January, the mayor sent a letter telling them that by March 31st they should return the keys and be out because the City was taking over the channel and the building. I wonder what they did to that letter because they dared to compromise by giving up the channel while they kept the building and all the equipment.
The City, in their proverbial ignorance, agreed but nothing was done. LCAT continues using our channel and we have no access to it. Months have gone by and I will not be surprised if I hear that the champagne is flowing there in celebration.
Now, I waited to watch the city council meeting of August 1st because they were scheduled to discuss some important items and the technicians couldn’t make the equipment work. While LCAT was buying lots of equipment each year with our money, they neglected completely the government channel which was their responsibility according to the contract with the cable companies and the city.
After Mayor DePeña send the letter to vacate, the situation got worse and the old equipment finally gave up. There was no transmission of the council meeting on Facebook or YouTube – and we keep paying!
Mayor DePeña has to stop pretending that he is a tiger on paper and act like one. He keeps saying that the city has a lot of money but does nothing to fix something as important as the transmission of meetings. Why doesn’t he use some of that money to hire a good lawyer to iron out the situation? LCAT hired attorneys to represent them against the people and pay them with our money. He also should finally find the courage to get the proper authorities to remove LCAT’s illegitimate management.
I wonder where the city council is in all of this. Why do they put up with this? They control the purse and when they want something built, something purchased, or changes made, they fight and get their way. Well, have some respect for us and defend what’s right.
And if they also fail to act as they should, it will have to be up to us to raise our voices.
What am I talking about? It has been proven that this is a city of weaklings.
When the cat is away…
A friend sent me a copy of a posting on social media by Jackie Marmol that read:
“Grateful our streets are getting fixed. However, VERY UNGRATEFUL for the city not notifying Museum Square residents who park in MSSG that it was closing this morning since 7:00 AM until 10:00. Everyone here cannot leave to work and appointments and Lawrence have nowhere to park because Appleton Street is closed with this being said I hope that the few City Officials who are still around and not vacation jump in top of this immediately!!”
Jackie clarified that Octavien Spanner and William Castro had no idea of what was happening and she is correct for complaining about such a mismanagement of authority and disregard for the residents of Museum Square and the operation of the Court House blaming DPW.
On Monday, I requested under the Freedom of Information Act the list of city employees vacationing with the mayor in the Dominican Republic and I was told that I will get it in ten days.
It’s my understanding that the following DPW employees took vacations last week among many accompanying the mayor: Director Jorge Jaime, Joel Chalas, José Durán Vásquez, and Luis Almanzar. I don’t know if they followed the procedure requesting vacation time due or comp time.
I’m curious to know because in Lawrence people have had a bad habit of not jotting down when an employee is on vacation and when they leave or retire, they claim that they NEVER took vacations because there’s no proof anywhere and they have to get it all in cash.
The mayor is responsible for what happened at Museum Square because that department should have had better supervision and made everyone aware of what was to be done, and not permitted so many workers to be absent at once.
Where’s Brian in all of this?
We have not taken a vacation, not even a weekend off since October of 2018. I understand the need for workers to take a break and recharge. What bothers me is that the mayor doesn’t listen to good advice and it has been proven that he doesn’t have the best in-house guidance.
He reminds me of William Lantigua who believed that in the end, the truth would exonerate him because he was doing an honest job and the people knew it. Brian thinks he’s doing a good job because the people around him tell him so but he has not learned about the power of the media.
Just because he thinks everything is all right, he should not make a mockery of the current situation with Linette Perez. This is a hot topic and the public is divided yet, the Eagle-Tribune published a picture of both together in the Dominican Republic that felt like a punch in the gut. I’m not taking sides or judging what she did but he was telling all of us that he’s going to do what he wants even if it puts the city in a ridiculous light. William Lantigua was like that.
He doesn’t have to listen to me and I’m not trying to run his administration; I’m just observing the mistakes being made along the way giving fodder for criticisms. He loves being in the media and being treated like a rock star. Just do your job!
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