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<DIV>COC/Keeper;</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I cannot speak to why elected officials get elected/reelected if they are
not in total compliance with the law, although I suspect it's because we don't
know whether they are in compliance or not. In this county,
however, it happens a lot; far more than I ever realized. The county,
including the county attorneys, is now dealing with a lawsuit that alleges
they are almost constantly in violation of the sunshine laws and many of
the county commission meetings are in violation of the law. I have heard
first hand that the county council had a system by which they would rotate in
and out of one of the councilmembers' offices in Upper Marlboro to "hold a
meeting"; since the office didn't have more than the number of council
members in the room AT ANY ONE TIME (that would put them over the limit that
would invoke the sunshine laws), they got away with holding meetings and
discussions that should have been publicly available. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I too was dumbfounded by the blatant nose-thumbing. It's very,
very common. I can't speak to any potential issues with the way Riverdale
Park works, but violations occur in this county regularly.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>By the way, the dismissiveness of your last paragraph was
disheartening.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Adrianne Lefkowitz</DIV>
<DIV>Madison Street</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>In a message dated 9/9/2011 8:00:20 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
towntalk-request@riverdale-park.org writes:</DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE style="BORDER-LEFT: blue 2px solid; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px"><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial>Ms
Lefkowitz, How dare you interject reason into this topic??</FONT></BLOCKQUOTE>
<BLOCKQUOTE style="BORDER-LEFT: blue 2px solid; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px"><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial><BR>In
this public environment with those apposed to the project watching, <BR>and
the advice (I'm sure) of the town lawyer, what do you think the <BR>answer to
your question is?<BR><BR>If people really think the Mayor and Council Members
are dumb enough to <BR>hold a meeting that is not in total compliance with the
law, how did <BR>they get elected/re-elected? Its not like this is the first
closed <BR>meeting that has been held in town. Not even the first closed
meeting <BR>about development in Riverdale Park.<BR><BR>So much noise about so
little substance. There are aspects of the <BR>Cafrtiz project that honest
people can differ on and we wast all this <BR>bandwidth and time on things
that aren't even a matter of opinion.<BR>-- <BR>I'm the Cranky Old Coot's
keeper, and I approve this message<BR><BR>Lou King<BR><BR><BR>Euniverz wrote,
On 9/8/2011 3:23 PM:<BR>> The bottom line is....<BR><BR>> Adrianne
Lefkowitz<BR>> Madison
Street<BR>><BR></FONT></BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></BODY></HTML>