Two conflicts played themselves out more than 1000 miles apart from each other last night.
In Burlington City Hall, friends and foes of the F35 were making their last-ditch appeals to the city councilors, who by the end of the night rejected two anti-F35 resolutions with 10-4 and 11-3 votes.
In St. Louis, Mo., two teams were both seeking their third win in the World Series. Ultimately, the Red Sox prevailed with a 3-1 win over the Cardinals.
But Councilor Norman Blais (D-Ward 6), probably wasn’t surprised by either outcome, because he managed to have his eyes on both the meeting and the game.
In a photo taken at the meeting and posted publicly on Facebook by a man named Ben Eastwood, Blais’ laptop screen shows a man swinging a bat. “I found it almost by accident when I was trying to zoom in on the map they were handing around the council and noticed what they were watching,” Eastwood writes in an email to Seven Days.
Could Blais have clicked on the browser window by accident, or was the councilor tuning out the F35 debate to watch the game? Neither, apparently.
“I didn’t do it accidentally, I wanted to find out what the score was,” Blais says candidly.
Elaborating, the councilor explains, “I didn’t even have to stop listening to the discussion. I clicked on [the window showing the game], looked at the score, and then continued listening to the meeting.”
Photo courtesy of Ben Eastwood.
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I think that was a foul…
…but never said that he closed the window (showing the game) afterwards. Does he admit then that he watched the game throughout the meeting? You know, that important meeting at which he was charged with listening to the public’s comments on a controversial issue? The kind of meeting where the whole idea is that by listening to public testimony, he may have had an opportunity to change his mind, learn something new about the topic, or find some empathy for people’s concerns? Yup, that meeting.
Instead, I bet he was completely distracted by the game (his beloved Red Sox!) while he was pretending to be giving his attention to the testimony. What a disgrace, Councilor Blais.
You bet it was a foul!
Maybe the foul was the Progressives misleading the F-35 opponents that it was possible to pass an anti-F-35 resolution? The Ps had to know that it was not going to happen, or they are politically inept.
Blais is exactly the kind of Councilor one gets when they vote for the letter next to a persons name rather then the person themselves.
He is a fringe element and one that apparently doesn’t even care about the issues presented to him by his constituents… unless it’s about gun control. Then he doesn’t care if it passes constitutional muster or not, ideallogically he supports it and it is after all about him.
Mr. Blais, if you really can’t give the residents of this City the time and attention that you are charged with then resign. Really, you wanted to check the score? I don’t care if you wanted to email the pope and ask for forgiveness, you are sitting in that chair for a purpose. If it’s too much to ask then let someone else do it.
It’s a freaking baseball game…
A while back in an effort to go paperless the council decided to go electronic and supply each councilor out of council funds(my taxdollars) with a laptop. If this was a laptop purchased out of council funds(my taxdollars), I demand reimbursement from all councilors that have used a city supplied device for non city purposes, as well as their resignation(s).
I urge the Mayor to examine these potential abuses as well. A few short years ago their was another laptop issue within Dept. of Parks and Rec., that did not turn out well for parks and rec. employees, and management, not that was the only deciding issue at that time.
Dale Tillotson
Actually, he had the screen open for an extended amount of time and also checked his gmail, and switched between espn and another sports channel. Councelor Paul also checked her email, stock market, burlinton free press articles, facebook, and, despite watching the scores on Blais’ computer pulled up mlb.com. At one point during the meeting she was texting while surfing while the meeting was going on. Tom Ayers also was watching the game though it didnt appear that he was actively surfing like Blais and Paul were. The mayor, and the city lawyer were also checking email and or texting throughout the meeting, and assistant clerk Scott Schafer was watching hockey, which perhaps explains all of the “technical difficulties” he had keeping time.
I did not set out to find a gotcha moment, I was there to cover the meeting and to offer my support to the folks trying to stop this white elephant from touching down in our great state. I really didnt pay attention to what folks were doing, I was using a camera I am not really familiar with so was snapping pictures all night hoping to catch some interesting shots. When I zoomed in to catch a shot of the map they were discussing during the airport commissioner’s testimony, I caught sight of baseball, and being a sox fan it caught my eye. Heck, I wanted to see the score too, but since the president was making such a big deal about not wasting our neighbor’s time, and being respectful, thought it would be tacky to turn on my cell during the meeting. I was shocked to see councilors exhibiting such behavior. I went around the balcony several times and each time I made it back to that corner of the room, Blais and Paul were hard at work on their computers instead of engaged in the debate.
When I got home and had a chance to look at the pictures on a computer instead of the viewfinder, even more images came to light, like the shot of mr. Schaffer’s computer screen, which was not even a picture I intentionally took, but a lucky floor shot over the balcony edge while I was figuring out the flash settings.
This isnt just about the f35, this is about what kind of government do we want in this state. Do we want politicians who make up their minds and then ignore the testimony and watch the big game instead, or do we want folks in government who will remain engaged, even when the sox are in the series. Don’t we deserve better?
I don’t care if you are a republican, democrat, progressive, anti gov’t tea partier… whatever. This kind of PUBLIC behavior by elected reps is disgusting. We all have busy lives but you were elected to serve on the city council, not just at times when it is convenient. If you were worried that you wouldn’t be able to keep up with the Sox or Pats or your Gmail account, while serving the residents of Burlington then you should probably step down. You know that the public is watching your actions especially during a high intensity debate on something like the F-35’s. I don’t care if you were able to listen closly to the debate or felt like taking a mental break or whatever. The mayor, the asst. clerk, any councilers playing on computer or phones at any time while the council was in session should be ashamed of themselves and owe the city of burlington and its residents an apology.
Hey Norm its time for the fist pitch
It was NOT impossible to pass a resolution. A resolution to simply PASS this round of basing was NOT ANTI anything, don’t be ridiculous. It would have been the prudent thing to do. THe BTVCC and the Health Board had not had all their questions answered by the Air Force, neither had Winooski or S Burlington. There was a huge difference of opinion Air Guard (who is NOT the Air Force) was saying the F35 would be safe and have 750,000 hours of operation time by 2020. Pierre Sprey saying, lucky if there would be 200,000 considering the contracted # buys between now and 2020. There were serious unanswered questions. The rush to base the plane here only proves that Leahy is the reason BTV is a preferred base. If he retired or passed away, there is fear it would never come here. Let’s call a spade a spade!
Paul,
your argument, correct me if I’m wrong, is that a resolution could have been passed because there are unanswered questions, and/or conflicting information.
Seems to me that is the best argument for not passing a resolution. It’s always a bad idea to pass resolutions if there are facts that are missing. It’s even worse to do so when it is meaningless. It’s clear that the City does not have the authority to choose if the plane is based here or not, so why should they take a stand on a clearly controversial and split opinion issue. If the residents put it on a ballot and got an overwhelming amount of support that’s one thing, however it would seem that neither side has a clear majority of supporters and elected officials are there to represent their constituents…. at least some are, some are just there to watch the Red Sox game and check their stocks.