Wednesday, April 27, 2005

Bi-partisan Elected Women's Club?

It was reported last week that democrat Regina Moore, City Clerk and republican Sue West of the County Council held a press conference to announce the formation of a group made up solely of elected women from our community. Supposedly this group was created to work on improving cooperation between various governmental entities by setting aside all political differences for the good of the community. The formation of this club brings several questions to mind. Obviously when they get together there will be discussion about topics and issues that affect our local government. What happens when Joyce Poling and Iris Kiesling, two of the three Commissioners get together, wouldn’t this be considered a quorum? Apparently political caucuses are allowed under Indiana Code, however no provisions presently exist for a bi-partisan caucus, what category does this group fall under? Since a bipartisan, inter-local government committee doesn’t exist at this point wouldn’t a committee have to be established and approved by both the city and county before they could legally meet and furthermore can you legally exempt men? Are they presuming that only women posses the voice of reason and cooperation? What about an elected men’s group getting together, would that be considered sexist or would it be tolerated in the name of good government? Not knowing what topics were going to be discussed at any given meeting, will the meetings fall under the Open Door Law? Why only women, do they feel too intimidated talking in front of men?

The whole concept seems rather contrived and poorly thought out. What possible purpose this group would serve at this point is unclear. Obviously it is unlikely that all of the elected women, both democrats and republicans from the city and county government will ever get together and do a group hug just before breaking into a spirited rendition of Kum-bye-ya, folks it just ain’t gonna happen. I’m just not sure what they were thinking? There are laws in place to discourage this kind of “secret” meeting from occurring, why this group feels they are above the spirit of the law is not clear. Elected officials should leave the posturing to the public meetings where, at the very least, the political process can occur in the light of day, regardless of however dim that light may be.