City Council Addresses Redactions and Ethics

By Dave Freneaux

The Central City Council stood by its previous motion, allowing City Attorney Sheri Morris to provide legal bills and a sumary of potential litigation to Attorney Steven Stockstill.  The process had halted when Council Members LoBue and Washington expressed concerns to Ms. Morris over the selection of Mr. Stockstill to review the records.  Those concerns have now apparently been satisfied.  Mr. Stockstill has again been asked to redact any information that could put the City at a legal disadvantage and turn the records over to Mike Mannino prsuant to his public records request.  Mr. Stockstill has not reviewed all of the legal billing records, but stated that in the records he has reviewed he has seen nothing requiring redaction.
 
Council member Aaron Moak, following through with Mayor Watts' request for the establishment of ethics guidelines, submitted a resolution outlining how a committee could be formed to accomplish this.  After much heated discussion and a lack of consensus Council Member Louis DeJohn offered an alternate approach to the issue.  DeJohn moved to hold a City Council workshop open to all citizens as a first step in establishing ethics guidelines.  The motion passed 3-2 with Council Members DeJohn, LoBue and Moak in favor and Messina and Washington against.