Theo’s still on the job
Last October I wrote in this column how Theodoro Rosario announced to his co-workers that he was no longer the City Engineer. That was Columbus Day Weekend but on Tuesday, he was back at work as usual.
Mayor Rivera was planning to appoint him Special Projects and Planning Supervisor and it probably fell through when realizing the big difference in salary that job offers. Justifying a huge stipend would be nearly impossible with the eyes of some council members on that issue.
I am clarifying this now because several people have told me that I made a mistake. Theo is still there as city engineer performing his non-city engineer duties as usual and still collecting the same pay.
I’m sorry; they fooled me!
Human Rights Commission
I have just been notified by Rev. Victor Jarvis that he has resigned from the Human Rights Commission in a long letter to Mayor Daniel Rivera. He gave a lot of details about the years spent in that organization, working under three administrations, pointing out the achievements such as a decrease in police brutality cases but he is very blunt in his criticisms of Mayor Rivera. In fact, he took a position in the David Camasso’s case blaming the mayor for violating workers’ rights.
He then goes on to mention “the attempt to silence the voice of police officer William Green for using his rights of expression, hit the nail in the wound.”
Why didn’t he speak up while the violations of workers’ rights were on-going?
Then, in typical Jarvis fashion, he goes on to praise the mayor’s actions pledging his support, thanking him for “your treatment and your administration has been great to the commission, which I appreciate, but it was a decision I had taken some time ago and at your request I stayed in the position and postposed my decision.” His letter was very confusing to read.
This board has been so dysfunctional for many years that I have tried getting information under a Freedom of Information Act Request to no avail.
Since September 3rd I have been trying to get certain documents from the Human Rights Commission again, with no results. I have been meeting with Asdrovel Tejeda, its president who is equally frustrated as I am and he showed me some of the documents he had available but very few and unimportant.
I am looking for a roster of their membership, copies of meeting date announcements, minutes of all meetings and annual reports. This committee is supposed to meet 11 times each year and so far they have done so only 5 times in 2015 because of lack of quorum. If the reason is for not having sufficient board members, it’s time to pressure the mayor into appointing some; if they have enough but don’t take their responsibilities seriously, it’s time to replace them. This is a very important board that could be doing a lot of good work, but only if the community can bring their concerns to them.
“We have to make changes,” said Mr. Tejeda. “Perhaps the answer lies in having the city councilors find someone in their respective districts volunteer for this board.”
The Human Rights Commission has been short of members for a long time and Mr. Tejeda’s term expired long ago; his last board meeting will be in January. This scenario is repeated with almost all the city boards. Some committees have not met for many months because they don’t have sufficient members and their decisions are vital in many cases for our government to function properly.
Crime is NOT down!
From October 1 2014 to December 13 2014 there were 90 stolen cars in Lawrence. For the same period this year, the numbers are up to 129.
