Findcate

Some more light has been shed on the firing and eventual re-hiring of Burlington Parks supervisor Adam Cate. Inappropriate access to emails was the main issue.

City officials have remained silent on the circumstances surrounding Cate’s firing in October, following a six-month investigation into Cate’s conduct and actions as the person in charge of the city’s waterfront operations. Personnel matters and discipline are supposed to be confidential.

In the meantime, Channel 3 News has learned that Cate was accused of hacking into the city’s email system in an attempt to find out what top city officials were talking about. There was also an allegation involving improper handling of cash derived from Parks and waterfront fees.

At issue was a proposed reorganization of the Parks department and its possible merger into the Public Works Department. The city’s Parks commission later re-instated Cate, but also handed him discipline — two weeks of suspension without pay, and six months of probation on the job.

The matter is expected to be discussed at Monday night’s City Council meeting. Council president Kurt Wright, R-Ward 4, says he’ll introduce a resolution calling for a full accounting of the money spent on an investigation of Cate’s alleged wrongdoing and the procedures that were followed. Wright has acknowledged that certain details of Cate’s case must remain confidential.

Tags: accounting, allegation, burlington parks, channel 3 news, city officials, council president, discipline, email system, job, merger, monday night, money spent on, personnel matters, probation, reorganization, six months, supervisor

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Poor, struggling Della thinks the perfect Christmas gift for her husband, Jim, would be a chain worthy of his heirloom watch.

That’s right. Director Bob Hensley finally gets to open the present he’s wanted for so long the chance to bring “The Gifts of the Magi” to the stage.

Based on a short story by O. Henry, “The Gifts of the Magi” introduces a couple in the early 1900s who have “come to the city and not done well. They’re very poor, and they want to find a way to celebrate Christmas for each other,” Hensley said. “Everyone knows the story, and I think almost everyone loves the story.”

“Representing everyone else in the city of New York are the City Him and City Her, played by Bill Lipski and Dana Feigenblatt,” Hensley said. “We see them as normal citizens, shopkeepers, a policeman, of course, a butcher at one point.”

Yes, and they’d probably have to portray someone who accepts jewelry in a pawn shop and someone who buys hair to make wigs – but let’s not give away the whole plot.

Tags: butcher, christmas gift, citizens, dana, director bob, early 1900s, gifts of the magi, hensley, holiday spirit, jewelry, pawn shop, perfect christmas, policeman, short story, wigs

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The poetic justice of the situation is that the city councilors seemed to have discovered this right to know only after their own quest to find out what’s happening in the Cate affair was ignored and trampled as if they have no role in running city government. You know that openness is becoming an issue when a councilor complains of being “spoon fed” information by the administration.

It is reassuring to hear elected officials actually claim there is a public right to know, rather than the too-often demonstrated propensity of those in power to withhold anything they choose to.

Now the City Council must make sure the information doesn’t stop with them, and that the voters of Burlington also get the full story behind the Cate affair. If the councilors are frustrated by the lack of disclosure, imagine how residents who must foot the bill with their taxes feel.

There are enough examples of less-than-full disclosure in the history of local government to make anyone believe that many of those who hold power truly do think they can do what they please, when they please, without ramification.

We have mayors who prefer to manage in secret, ruled by the advice of lawyers who fear the wrath of lawsuits rather than the wrath of voters. We have city councilors and Selectboard members who too often are reluctant to challenge the administration, and fail to speak up for the voters who elected them.

The Burlington City Council has stood up for open government, for their right to know. The councilors need to make sure this is no exception, but the rule, and that the right to know goes beyond council chambers.

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