Say Anything Blog

Grand Forks Mayor Micheal Brown has a letter in to the Herald today promises changes and accountability at the Alerus.  I’d like to think that he’s being sincere here, but at this point I’m not going to give him a lot of slack.  The problems at the Alerus have been evident for years and he hasn’t done a thing to address them. 

I’ve been asking for 8 months why Venuworks got paid when they clearly didn’t live up to their side of the contract.  Mayor Brown has been silent.  Finally because of Terry Bjerke asking the right questions over and over we find out that the Alerus commission held an illegal meeting and in secret told Venuworks that they weren’t going to hold them to their contract.

So the public had every expectation of living by our side of the contract, but Venuworks was off the hook.  And where was the mayor.

Let’s hope the mayor has finally woken up and will see that these matters get fixed.  But then again he seems to be all one-sided:

It’s important that we also focus on the right actions and not the wrong ones, including personal attacks on commission members and Alerus Center staff. Commission members are community volunteers like other Herald readers, including Saturday morning soccer coaches, PTA volunteers and service club members who fry french fries, light fireworks and build parks.

Community service is our lifeblood and without it, we lose a fundamental part of our character. Those who provide it have our appreciation and respect.

Do you get that.  The mayor’s telling us we have to be polite to commission members.  That’s nice that he can call for civility now.  Where was he a couple months ago when his crony David Evenson, his campaign treasurer, was calling people that don’t agree with him “Morons.”

In fact David Evenson made all of these insults in one little speech at an official Alerus Commission meeting.

They are morons.

  (laughter) [Nice that the rest of the Alerus Commission thought that insulting members of the community is a laughing matter. ]

  David Evenson: They’re moronic.

  that is all their little minds are going to take in.

  There’s a lot of people that are not capable of comprehending that.

  they don’t understand it. OK?

I guess if you a buddy of the mayor you can dish it out and the rest of us have to take it.  Or how about the Alerus Chairman Curt Kruen lying to the public when they renewed the contract with Venuworks without anyone knowing it was going on.  Kruen said it was a good time to do so because the Britney Concert was close to breaking even.  Even after a late sales surge they didn’t come close to breaking even.

Mayor Brown, if you want us to show respect to the commission they’re going to have to stop lying and insulting us. 

And the mayor had this to say about the people that work at the Alerus.

I fully support the Alerus Center staff. Every report we’ve seen from the major events (as well as the hundreds of other events annually) have praised their professionalism. They are citizen ambassadors for Grand Forks, and they do a great job.

Every report has praised their professionalism?  How about the exchange with David Evenson when the Alerus’s executive director Steve Hyman also chimed in by calling us “Moronic.”

Steve Hyman: I like the word moronic.

Professionalism.  I think someone needs to take Mayor Brown aside and tell him what that word really means. 

And how about Hyman lying to this blog by saying that the information we wanted was available on the city’s website. 

He really is an ambassador for Grand Forks now isn’t he.

So Mayor Brown.  Now that you’ve chided the public and I suppose specifically Alerus critics such as myself to be nice are you going to talk to your cronies and employees?  Are you going to tell them to quit making personal attacks and are you going to do it in a public manner like the letter you wrote here.  Because frankly without doing so I think you’re just going to wait for the current flap to blow over so things can go back to the way it’s always been. 

And there’s MORE!

While we’re at it talking about professionalism at the Alerus Center I should bring up this post I did on a note on the Herald’s website.  It sounds like it came from an employee of the Alerus where she blamed the losses on the Britney concert on the fact that the public didn’t support it enough.  Then she went on to whine about how hard it is to run the Alerus with so much oversight (as if) and that she doesn’t care if the failed event center ever makes any money.

I love a professional defense of the job you’re doing.  Especially when it ends with calling members of the public ungrateful and ignorant.