His excellency, mayor for life
Art Madrid is the Mayor of the San Diego suburb of La Mesa, population 50,000+. It's my hometown and Madrid has been mayor since 1981. It appears that 25 years as mayor has honed Madrid's sense of entitlement and the idea that he's better than the rest of you.
The public-comment portion of a city council meeting is one of the rare opportunities people have to address their elected leaders face to face. For a few uninterrupted minutes, they can pester, praise or entreat a captive audience of those who represent them.
Few might expect those representatives to strike back with legal action, yet city officials in La Mesa are threatening to do just that.
The city attorney has sent a letter to resident Chris Tanner accusing him of defaming council members during a Jan. 24 meeting, when Tanner hinted that the city might be cozy with developers.
The city attorney sent the letter at Madrid's behest.
La Mesa Mayor Art Madrid stands by the letter.
“Any resident can come up there and speak on any issue, admonish the council, yell at the council or express their anger, but once they start making allegations of implied criminal activity, they've crossed the line,†Madrid said.
Madrid should probably take a deep breath, think twice about his threats against freedom of speech, and then resign his office. City Attorney Glenn Sabine should return his salary for month for his failure to explain the First Amendment to his boss and then sending out that silly letter. La Mesa taxpayers might want to head down to the next meeting and warn the council against wasting tax dollars on a lawsuit that they're gonna lose.
You've gotta love small-town politics.
*UPDATE* For those locals who are interested, the next city council meeting will be Tuesday, Feb. 28 at 5 p.m.
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I have lived in La Mesa for 17 years, and never felt the need to attend or speak at a CIty Council meeting, until now.
Feb. 21, 2006
Mr. Chris Tanner
(Address Left Blank)
La Mesa, CA 91941
Dear Mr. Tanner:
This letter is to provide you my individual, retrospective input and
opinion regarding recent events. This opinion may not be that of the La
Mesa City Council as a majority or as a public body.
I believe the City's January 31, 2006, letter to you was
inappropriate and should not have been sent, for reasons I will outline
herein. First, let me make it clear that I in no way blame City
Attorney Glenn Sabine, as I am sure he was responding to what he
believed to be the sentiment of the City Council. I must, however, as
an elected councilmember in the City of La Mesa, take responsibility for
the letter being sent, especially without demanding that a thorough
discussion of the ramifications first take place.
I believe the letter sent to you was inappropriate for the following
reasons. First, the letter had negative repercussions and a chilling
impact on the perception of freedom of expression in the City of La
Mesa. This by far negatively outweighs any intended message to you
about your comments during the January 24 City Council meeting.
Additionally, in retrospect, removing myself from the heat of that
moment, I believe that if any individual council member(s) thought they
were wronged by you as the result of your comments, a decision to pursue
some course of action in that regard would be a personal one, not a City
of La Mesa one. I have no intention of pursuing any such course of
action.
However, this does not lessen my hope that your statements during the
meeting could have been at the very least clarified to indicate that you
in no way were implying or suggesting that the City Council was
colluding with a developer in a conspiracy to lessen safety involving
blasting regulations. I still have that hope.
I can and will admit mistakes, but let me tell you where I will not
admit one. I have spent over 15 years as a public servant ensuring that
I am above reproach, doing everything possible to make certain I am
involved in absolutely nothing unethical, illegal or underhanded, either
by reality or appearance. Such is the case in my consideration of
changes to blasting regulations in the City of La Mesa.
I hope no one forgets what we are discussing is the use of explosives in
areas adjacent to residential areas, where we had some dangerous
fly-rock incidents. In fact, just such an incident was the very reason
that you spoke at the meeting, because the City Council had chosen to
place on the agenda the issue and to demand that our blasting
regulations be strengthened to ensure no such accident ever again takes
place.
Within that context, I hope anyone would understand why - personally - I
still believe that I am justifiably disturbed by any possible
implications to the contrary, even if free speech.
My personal apologies to you for the letter sent, as well as for the
resulting implication that La Mesa, the City Council or I are out to
stifle anyone's fundamental right to address their elected
representatives. I paraphrase what someone very succinctly said to me:
"La Mesa lost a terrific opportunity to be statesmen-like, even in the
face of what you considered unwarranted attack."
I would be more than pleased to discuss any of this with you personally.
You may reach me at [email protected].
Sincerely,
Barry Jantz
La Mesa Councilmember
Cc: Mayor and City Council
City Manager
City Attorney
[...] For those of you following the foolishness that is La Mesa Mayor Art Madrid and his threatened lawsuit against a critical constituent, it appears that at least one city councilmember has his head on straight. Councilman Barry Jantz submitted the following letter in the comments to last weekend’s initial post on the subject. Feb. 21, 2006 [...]
[...] Sanity prevailed Tuesday night and the La Mesa City Council retracted the threatening letter that they had sent to resident Chris Tanner after he had the audacity to suggest the council might be in the pockets of developers. (You can find my previous posts on this subject here and here.) At last night’s meeting, several people wore neon yellow stickers that said “We support Chris!†More than a dozen spoke, their words often punctuated by cheers and applause from the audience. [...]