Former Mayor Jeff Johnston Weighs In

Today, Friday, May 11th, I attended the “2012 Budget Ad Hoc Committee Meeting” attended by Chair Wadsworth, Mayor Tomlinson, and Councillors  Dingwall & Wills, along with 3 members of staff. This was not an uplifting experience;
1) my son accompanied me, attempted to video tape the proceedings for the benefit of those who could not attend, the police were called, and he was forced from the meeting under threat of arrest. Councillor Dingwall encouraged all committee members to file "personal criminal charges" against my son as well. Because he tried to video tape a public meeting.
2) Wadsworth’s husband and Tomlinson's friend Skelton were permitted to yell and holler "Sit down" and "Shut up!" while my son sat quietly, and nothing was said for their bad behaviour. Similarly, Chair Wadsworth allowed Mayor Tomlinson to yell out "Bullshit!" while I asked about the Town's finances and Councillor Dingwall was permitted to call out "You're disgusting!" Parliamentary Procedure only applied to me and my son. Chair Wadsworth ignored everyone else's outrageous behaviour but sternly warned my son that he could not speak unless permitted by her. My son, at the time, was simply trying to answer her questions to him.
3) then the financial bombshell. The Town of Kearney is in deep financial crisis, and this council, under the direction of Mayor Tomlinson, in 16 short months, has taken Kearney’s financial situation from a surplus position with healthy Reserves and minimal debt, to a depletion of Reserves by almost $1.3 million, leaving a scant $800,000 in Reserves by the end of the year. Even this won’t balance the 2012 budget so loans will not be repaid, critical road work will be deferred, Phase 3 of the Hwy 518 reconstruction was already deferred from 2011 ($642,000), and we are now stuck with a CBO whose incremental cost to the Kearney taxpayer during this term of council will be greater that a $1/4 million. 

No wonder Chair Wadsworth had the police remove my son when he tried to record the bad news.

Mayor Tomlinson is looking for someone to blame for the mess, and has started with our former Treasurer, for "accounting errors" and "failure to follow his orders". Then he blamed the previous council (although Tomlinson conveniently omits that he chaired that Council's Budget committee and blew an extra $50,000 on an expensive financial consultant to do data-entry for a few meetings). Then anyone else that wasn't there to defend themselves. Tomlinson admitted to the new consultant that he, Wadsworth, and some other members of council made a commitment to their supporters to reduce taxes at any cost. That is the only campaign promise they seem to be keeping. The tax rate was reduced by 9.5% in 2011 and a similar amount for 2012. With inflation that leaves the tax rate below where it needs to be by about 25%.

Councillor Dingwall captured the essence of the current council perfectly when he said "We need to get something out fast before someone else does!" In other words: We need to whitewash this fast before the truth gets out!

There is a lot more to this horror story, but right now this is about as much as I can stomach. Stay tuned.

Jeff Johnston
Resident of Kearney