Mayor Randy Rapp
609-29th Street
Vienna , WV 26105
Re: No Online Published Agenda
Mayor Rapp,
While I am looking on the http://vienna-wv.com/portal , I do see a Special Council Meeting for January 19th, 2017. I would like to know why there, HAS NOT been an online published Agenda??
When I read the WV Ethics Commission page, I do read the following,
Time requirements for posting a meeting notice
· Special meetings - When a governing body meets on an irregular schedule, or needs to meet before the next regularly scheduled meeting to address matters that do not involve an emergency, these are considered special meetings. Notice must be posted two business days in advance of the meeting. You have succeeded by publishing that there will be a special meeting, on your city calendar.
Time requirements for posting an Agenda
· Regular meeting - three business days before the meeting.
· Special meeting - two business days before the meeting.
· Emergency meeting - as soon as practicable.
HERE is where you have NOT succeeded, in publishing an agenda. Of course, your answer is going to be that it is posted on the front window of City Hall.
Under the ADA, I am entitled to see it published online. I have a disability, which keeps me from getting to the City Hall, just anytime, to see if you are doing your job.
Under the ADA, I am requesting that elevated seating be placed in the council chambers, and any other office/meeting room, where a person, with a disability, might have to meet with any city officials/employees, would have an issue in using the general seating you provide.
YOUR attention, and REPLY, to these matters, are expected.
Sincerely,
Richard Uhl Jr.
I have been a staunch defender of the ADA since it was signed into Law in July of 1990. In the day when I was a puppy, It was known of me to find someone in a Handicap space without a placard/ license plate. I would just pull across behind them, lock my car and go in to conduct my business. It was quite common to find a very angry person when I returned to my car. Now in those days, I was quite healthy and in good shape. Once in a while there would be a bit of a dust up, but usually just using my charm, :-), the other person got the idea on what could happen if one used a space they should not be in. So I have a long history of believing in the ADA even when I was not entitled/ needed.
Today, while entitled to use my placard, I do not have the presence to protect those spaces. Here the offenders are usually from Ohio and sadly, the local authorities refuse to enforce the violation of those spaces when they occur. City Sales Tax pennies, are seemingly, be they off the eyes of our deceased or from sales in a box store are much more important than a silly Law? Coming to Vienna to do business if disabled and even living here in finding a spot to use not filled with non disabled is a crap shoot?
The request from Mr. Uhl to Mr. Rapp has not been responded too up too now as I post this (Monday evening). It does not take a Rocket Scientist to understand a request for accommodation. But unless if is a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), Mr. Rapp does not respond per Mr. Uhl to his telephone calls or e-mails. I too have the same results from Mr. Rapp. He is on his best day, a P*** poor Mayor and is one in name only. Ergo my comparative of a seemingly surrogate versus a de facto Mayor. Who is the real Mayor?
The Open Government Meetings Act does note that a notice may be posted on a governing body's internet website if it has one. But even in this age of instant email, the City only allows a limited amount of notice other than in the paper for a couple of areas and a paper notice in the window at City Hall. I do not remember ever seeing one at the VUB except IN the meeting. And as noted by Mr. Uhl and even by myself, driving to City Hall several times a day to see if a notice has been posted can be for a fully mobile person an issue let alone one with a disability that limits mobility. Depending on the mood of Himself/ Apostles, some notices are on the Web Site.
The providing of somewhat more "comfortable" chairs for disabled people is also a "no brainer" if a person has any real interest in the ability of disabled people to attend meetings. There were some chairs that allowed me to be better seated and avoid the numbness in my legs that I suffered along with Mr. Uhl at last Thursday's Council Meeting. But because one of Mr. Rapps sycophants got upset one night because I sat in the same seat I had for most of the past few years and that person took whenever a once or twice a year attendance and claimed that I had "taken" his/her seat, he moved them all and stacked them in the back of the Meeting room.
Where am I going with this? Mr. Rapp through his disregard for the elderly in the Senior Center's safety whether disabled or just elderly combined with his disregard for the Provisions of the ADA Law as requested by Mr. Uhl and earlier by myself for more proper seating, is most likely Illegal? And his constant use of any means to prevent people from even knowing the Agenda for the meetings restricts attendance to only those he actually wants there. Posting on the City Web Site in a timely manner allows ANY person to know the Agenda and to be able to make a rational decision on being there or not? Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. 'nuff said'.