Your commentator, Ralph Nichols, says he is conservative but he supports only liberal city council members and candidates in Des Moines because of "process."
When a majority of conservatives were elected in 2001, one of them, Don Wasson, apparently did not report some campaign contributions. He was punished.
The Public Disclosure Commission is now going after the people making independent contributions in that election because they did not report them.
The other three council members elected in 2001 have now had their cases dropped by the PDC.
In 2003, three conservative candidates were running for Des Moines City Council. We (I was one of them) knew Don Wasson or we knew someone who supported him. That was not because of something sinister but because conservatives support conservatives and liberals support liberals.
Because of the actions by one conservative in Des Moines all conservatives were branded as dishonest, even two years later. What kind of "process" is that?
Mr. Nichols says the conservative majority in 2001 was dysfunctional. Mr. Wasson certainly needed training in parliamentary procedure, but much of the dysfunction was because of the liberals.
Liberals claimed that Gary Petersen had a conflict of interest because he ran a towing company that the city sometimes hired to have cars towed.
One of the reasons there was no conflict of interest was because there was no contract between Mr. Petersen's company and the city.
The liberals clever idea? Create a contract. That way Mr. Petersen would have to resign or lose business he already had. Did that enhance the functioning of the council?
Liberals sued the conservative council members wasting their time and money for attorney fees to defend themselves. Did that increase the functioning of the council?
Now that the conservatives have won in court the liberal majority on the council will not reimburse them their attorney fees as required by law.
Maybe they are waiting until after the election this year is over. Wouldn't want some of those funds used to promote conservatives.
Jeanette Burrage
Des Moines
