Thursday, June 21, 2018
Janesville City Manager Wants To Spread Good News, But Not To Everyone
You gotta' be kidding.
The term "patently offensive" is honestly a bit too harsh but comes to my mind after reading this article from the Janesville Gazette about Mark Freitag, the city manager. His latest idea is creating a talking points bulletin, a special city "optimists" newsletter for those he automatically deemed as privileged "stakeholders" in the city of Janesville.
Apparently, Freitag feels it's necessary to have two city newsletters. One specially prepackaged for Janesville elites (about 200 of them) and one for the taxpayers.
Flying inside the radar of this story is a secondary eye opener: The fact that those considered as Janesville's caring stakeholders by the city manager haven't a clue what's going on in the city beyond their directives of lobbying government for tax credits, tax cuts and TIF District kickbacks for themselves.
The title of the Gazette story, "Janesville launches new email newsletter for city stakeholders" pretty much says it all. Except, if you visit the city Website, you can't submit your email address to request the newsletter. Instead, you'll have to call city hall and speak to one of his assistants to get clearance.
Because spreading good news as he sees it - isn't for everyone.
4 comments:
Freitag was a military colonel. They're "yes men" surrounded by yes men and writing reports superiors expect to see while ordering his lieutenants to write motivational claptrap to keep the troops inline. This dual reporting fits that culture perfectly.
That's the best explanation I've seen yet. Thanks for that.
As it states in the article, ANYONE can sign up to receive this newsletter.
"Others who are interested in joining the list can call management information specialist Molly Nolte at 608-755-3094."
So, previous commenter, why would it take a phone call to join an email list? I believe LK and the first commenter are spot-on.
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