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Joyce Clark Unfiltered

For "the rest of the story"

Sep 15

19

Above the law?

Posted by Joyce Clark on September 19, 2015
Posted in City issue and actions • City of Glendale • Glendale elected officials  | Tagged With: , , , , , , , , | No Comments yet, please leave one

It has been 17 years and 261 days since the city’s pledge to build the West Branch Library.

On September 17, 2015, the Glendale Star essentially offered Gary Sherwood the opportunity to explain away his driving suspensions and the active warrant. Here is the link:  http://www.glendalestar.com/news/article_2cb3cc58-5d-11e5-a1bd-b777ff1c7d23e9.html . His attempts to explain his remedial actions do not make the facts disappear.

No one is above the law…not a politician, not a priest. We are all accountable for our actions and must take responsibility for them. Stubborn facts remain. On 8/12/2013 Mr. Sherwood attended meetings at city hall. His license was suspended and it appears that he drove himself to city hall. The following day, in the St. Paul/Minneapolis area, he rented a car and presumably drove it while his license was still suspended. To compound his actions he used a city ProCard to pay for the rental thereby exposing the city to potential liability.

The fact that he disobeyed driving laws six times in ten years, had his driving license suspended several times, failed to appear in court and failed to take timely action to resolve his citations demonstrates his apparent belief that he is above the law. In 6 weeks, on November 3, 2015, the voters of the Sahuaro district will have an opportunity to decide between Ray Milnar and Gary Sherwood. Mr. Milnar has a finance background that will certainly be an asset to the city council. His community activities show that he is a man of principle and strong character. Sherwood has shown the voters of the Sahuaro district his apparent lack of principle on many occasions: Foothills Library, Becker billboards and the casino – to name but a few.

Sophocles once said, “Nobody has a more sacred obligation to obey the law than those who make the law.”

© Joyce Clark, 2015

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May 15

21

Is Councilmember Sherwood getting desperate?

Posted by Joyce Clark on May 21, 2015
Posted in City Council Actions • City issue and actions • City of Glendale • Glendale elected officials  | Tagged With: , , , , , | 21 Comments

It has been 17 years and 140 days since the city’s pledge to build the West Branch Library.

For the first time ever at the May 26, 2015 city council meeting the council will vote to set a recall election date of November 3, 2015. Councilmember Sherwood has got to be desperate. From the number of Sahuaro district registered voters willing and eager to sign a petition calling for his recall is a pretty clear indicator that he cannot win.

Instead of realizing his ambition to become Glendale’s next mayor he faces the humiliating prospect of a recall against him. Desperate people do desperate things. I am convinced that he, and most likely his strongest supporter, the Glendale Fire Union, will attempt some last ditch, legal maneuver to delay the election.  I wouldn’t put it past them. A legal effort to delay the election may cause some Sahuaro district voters to not participate if they know the regular election for that seat occurs in November of 2016. Sherwood hints of this prospect,“if there is this supposed ground swell of dissatisfaction with me, I’m up for reelection next nine months later in August ’16.”

Here is the link to the May 19, 2015 edition of the Glendale Star:  http://www.glendalestar.com/news/article_b6d4fd24-fe45-11e4-86a1-6f00d1c2d6ea.html

In an article written by Darrel Jackson entitled Sherwood faces recall, Sherwood states, “I’m very proud of my record and I have extended an inordinate amount of energy hoping to cover for the lack of leadership that has existed with my fellow policy makers these nearly past two and a half past years.” If I were the mayor or his fellow councilmembers I would be quite angry with Sherwood’s trashing of their performance. This is one seemingly arrogant fellow believing that he is Superman saving Glendale from 6 Jesters.

Sherwood in the Jackson article goes on to say , “he helped negotiate an agreement with the tribe (Tohono O’odham) worth more than $26 million for Glendale over 20 years.” He shouldn’t be quite so proud of that fact. That very same land had it not become a reservation and had been privately developed as offices, would have generated an estimated $4 to $5 million a year in various taxes. Since when is a little over a million dollars a year better than 4 or 5 million dollars a year?

Sherwood’s commentary in the Jackson article demonstrates that when Sherwood is backed into a corner, it seems he can be quite vicious as he blames the current council for the resignation of former City Manager Brenda Fischer (his buddy) and Assistant City Manager Julie Frisoni (another buddy). The current rumor is that Sherwood has hired Julie Frisoni’s new consulting firm as his campaign consultant. That shouldn’t surprise anyone as it appears that Sherwood met often with Frisoni on city business that met his agenda. We can add Frisoni to the list of supporters that appear to include the Glendale Fire Union, Mark Becker of Becker Billboards and Jason Rose of the Rose Law Group.

Look for Sherwood and his supporters to file something to delay the election before the council May 26th meeting and vote. How creative can they be? I expect we’ll find out shortly.

© Joyce Clark, 2015

FAIR USE NOTICE

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which is in accordance with Title 17 U.S. C., Section 107. The material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democratic, scientific and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law and who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use,’ you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.