The Gary Snyder Show

Tom Wall wins poll!

Tom Wall wins our most recent poll:

Which of the 3 County Commissioners would you prefer to see as a County Executive?

Tom Wall  50%

None of the above  26.7%

Jerry Helvie   23.3%

Kathy Branham  0%

This, that and the other.

I found this in the personals of the January 26th TAB.

LOOKING- White Male

5'10", blue eyes, age: 33,

weight 250 lbs.  Looking 

for female.  (260) 356-2030

_________________________

Maybe that cabin fever thing is no myth.

At Karaoke the other night, two women came up to sing.  The older of the two picked up the microphone and announced "This is my daughter and she is available.  Now show em' how good you sing."

Now I know what your thinking.  I will not go there, but I'll leave you with these words from my girlfriend, "It really gets yucky when it's icky out."  I can't wait for spring.

Ken Zuk

Cha Ching!

                                          

Back in December, Governor Daniels asked all state employees to forgo any pay increase due to them this year.  As I wrote earlier, I do not know how many employees took the Governor up on his offer, but according to the Legislative Office at the Statehouse, one state employee who did not take the Governor up on this offer was State Representative Daniel Leonard.  If you recall, the General Assembly voted in 2008 to increase their salary from just over $10,000 to almost $21,000 a year starting this year(2009).  Now don't feel too bad for Dan, he does receive a per diem of about $134 a day per diem when the General Assembly is in session and about $54 a day when the they are out of session, for a total of about $40,000 a year before the pay increase.  This doesn't include the 9.3% contribution the state makes to his PERF account.  Not bad for a part-time gig.  This may be the first time Dan has done anything other than what the Governor asked of him?

Are you kidding me?

Here are the results of the latest poll.  I guess the surprising thing is we actually had a hand full of people vote yes.  I'm betting they are Andrews residents?

Should local government officials and employees use government issued credit cards for personal use?

No  84.2%

Yes  15.8

Final Results

With our largest numbers yet, here are the reults of yesterday's poll:

Mayor Steve...

Laughing at him  81%

Laughing with Him  19%

9.3%

The Department of Workforce Developement (DWD) today released its monthly unemployment rate for December 2008.  Indiana's unemployment rate came in at 8.2% with Huntington County recording a whopping 9.3% for December 2008.  Mr. Wickersham, still think it isn't that bad?

Credit report

I received several anonymous comments and emails regarding the Town of Andrews and the possibility of some individual(s) using town issued credit cards for personal use, more specifically, using them at gambling institutions.  I did some research and found the Town of Andrews did pass an ordinance in December of 2007 basically saying it was okee dokee to use town issued credit cards for personal use, as long as they paid the credit card bill.  On Friday, January 23, 2008, I sent the following public documents request to the Town of Andrews Town Clerk.  I am editing out the name of the individual(s) until we receive the documents and confirm town issued credit cards were in fact used at gambling institutions.

The results are in!

The first www.garylsnyder.com poll is in the books and the results are as follows:

Which elected official has the least amoount of credibility?

1. Jerry Harvey 34.8%
2. Mayor Steve  30.4%
3. Dan Leonard  17.4%
4. Pam Updike and Kathy Branham  8.7%

Conventional wisdom

Conventional wisdom, and Pam herself, indicated Pam Updike would relinquish the reins of the Huntington County Republican Party in March when they meet to reorganize.  I now hear Pam may not be ready to ride off into the sunset just yet.  Sources say she is getting ready to make another run at not only the Huntington County Clerk position in 2010, but she will try to hang on to the Republican leadership reins.  Several Republican Precinct Committee people have been contacted and asked to support her for the Republican top spot.  And while most of us laugh at the prospect of Pam continuing to lead the Republicans, keep in mind she did appoint around 26 of the 34 committee members.

Huntington County Democratic Response

I really expected to quietly enjoy the start of this new year, with the inauguration of President Barack Obama, everyone in my family healthy, (wealthy not) but wise and the Pittsburgh Steelers going to the Super Bowl.  The Democratic Party in Huntington County when we last met, and every time that we met since I have been the Chairman, disagreed on some issue during our meeting.  A very healthy sign that we care about our community and our country.  In the end, we always agree on some basic values,  the equality of all individuals, the importance of education - no matter where the lesson may be taught, the dignity of work and the obligation that we have to each other.  The past couple of years have been extremely painful to almost all of us here in Huntington.  I say almost all of us.  It seems that the Mayor and his family are healthy, and wealthy,  but not so wise.  

For what it's worth?

I wanted to leave Mayor Steve some words of advice, maybe from one of history's great philosophers or thinkers.  After an exhaustive search for just the right advise that may serve Mayor Steve well in the future and keep him from embarrassing himself and all of Huntington County again; I came up with the wisdom and words of songwriter Toby Keith.  Please Mayor Steve, take Mr. Keith's advice:

Mulah Friggin' Omar responds:

It appears Mayor Updike is doing his best to pull his foot out of his mouth.  He promised us a retraction by the Herald Press and all we got was just another lame explanation labeled a "clarification" in Friday's paper.  On Saturday, we got another "clarification" in the Journal Gazette.  Mr. Updike indicates his terrorist and little taliban comments were taken out of context and only directed towards two or three individuals outside the city limits who opposed the Local Option Income Tax (LOIT) increase last year.  Well Mr. Mayor, just in case your wife didn't tell you, when you whine about raising the LOIT, you raise the income taxes on the whole county, not just the city folk.  And probably a more disturbing fact about your State of the Taliban, errrr, City address, you plan to push for another LOIT increase this year.  I was there when the County Council voted to raise our taxes, there were more than 2 or 3 individuals there opposing the tax increase, including some of your fund-raisers? Are they not terrorists too?  If you plan to push for another tax increase, we will be there to oppose it!  Your city business is costing the entire county, so we will not stay out of 'your city business."

You and your other recent county embarrassments epitomize what happens when people blindly vote for party and not the individual.  I do believe you though when you tell the Journal Gazette not many people have said anything to you regarding your comment.  Just think, you call us terrorists when we oppose your policies, I can only imagine if someone criticized personally?  Out!

If you missed it

Here is the Wane TV story on the Mayor's comments.  A couple of items to pay intention too; first notice there was no retraction in the Herald Press today and finally, pay attention to Huntington Common Councilman Steve McIntyre's defense of the Mayor's comments.  They are very similar if not identical to the Mayor's feeble excuses. 

Do you have video or audio?

I am putting a call out to anyone who may have an audio or video recording of the Mayor's "State of the Taliban", errr, I mean "City" address Tuesday.  If you have this audio or video, please contact me via email.  I believe we found a picture of the Huntington residents the Mayor was speaking about the other day?  Rumor has it, these two may have been involved in bringing down the plane in the Hudson River last week?  Who would have ever made the connection, maybe the Mayor knows what he's talking about?

Mayor Updike: If you don't have anything nice to say?