Steve Homoki to run for City Council at-large Seat-
You are invited to attend a rally in the Alley behind City Hall tomorrow morning July 15th at 11:30 am to meet Steve Homoki. Steve will formally announce his intention to run for an at-large seat on City Council and present his platform. I hope to see you there.
In case you did not see the Aiken Standard news article today concerning the forthcoming city elections go here
Posted by Dick Smith 071409
Posted by Dick Smith 071409
SC POLICY COUNCIL RECOGNIZES CITY OF AIKEN
Jane Vaughters has been an outspoken and effective champion of transparency in all government activities and our colleague Dick Dewar suggested the excellent idea of posting the details of the city finances on-line. All City Council members supported the idea and City staff made it possible in an economical manner. Unfortunately our state government does not have the same dedication to transparency. Our legislators are even unwilling to have a recorded vote system. They say it would be too costly and perhaps they are right. It would cost many of them their election if voters knew how they actually vote on issues. We need to send a message. The following letter from Jane Vaughters is self-explanatory. I hope you will attend.
Dear Friends of Responsible Government,
On Wednesday, July 22, at 11 a.m. in the Alley behind the Aiken Municipal Building , the South Carolina Policy Council, a non-partisan research and educational foundation devoted to honest accounting in government, will hold a press conference recognizing the City of Aiken
PLEASE COME, for we will not only discuss what we have achieved so far at the city level but what we need to do to achieve this transparency at all levels of government. WE WILL NOT GET TRANSPARENCY LEGISLATION ON EVERY LEVEL IF WE CITIZENS DO NOT DEMAND IT.
State Comptroller General Richard Eckstrom will tell of his efforts to be on-line source for state agency transparency information --he is so informed and so interesting and so tenacious. Policy Council President Ashley Landess, also a terrific speaker, will tell how their research on transparency relates to online spending accountability and share some of the important statistics compiled by the Policy Council this year—(did you know that even with the new rules, our lawmakers failed to record votes 75% of the time)! Local city officials will tell how they placed government transactions online and available to the public free of charge. State and county officials will bring us up to date on the status of transparency legislation at those levels.
Our goal is to have all this presented in about 30 minutes--I hope!! What is needed most by these good people is YOU supporting their efforts. We want to get as much coverage as possible for this event, so BRING YOUR FRIENDS, GET EXCITED ABOUT WHAT IS POSITIVE IN OUR CITY AND STATE, AND DO SOMETHING GOOD FOR THE DOWNTOWN AIKEN ECONOMY WHEN YOU ARE THERE.
Please call me at 270-3881 if you have any questions. Hope to see you on the 22nd.
Thanks,
Jane Vaughters
For more information about the South Carolina Policy
Citizen John Wade made a good comment on the Aiken Standard blog concerning elections and I completely agree with him. See his comment below:
ReplyDeletePosted by: John Wade On: 7/14/2009
Comment Title:
All parties that filed or plan to file for a seat on City Counsel should have several joint public meetings these meetings should also include a question and answer session. Hopefully this would give the public a better understanding on who they are and how they may vote.