Where Have Ballard's Backers Been?

Last weekend, Hoosier Access had this entry on the top of it's page for most of the weekend. In it, contributor Mark Warner praises Mayor Greg Ballard and all he has done for the city.

It's no secret to regular readers of this blog that my opinion of Ballard's administration is fairly low, and I have been public in that criticism. I've attended City-County Council meetings, political events, protests, and so on. I've sat down and talked with people who would be affected by the stricter parking regulations that Affiliated Computer Services will enforce, and have talked with normal citizens who, months later, were still fuming about the outright sale of the water utility.

So my question to those of Mark Warner and the others at Hoosier Access, who will inevitably be schilling for Ballard's re-election, where have you been?

I performed several Google searches of Hoosier Access for key words such as "ACS" and "water" and didn't find a single post advocating for the ACS parking scam or the water utility sale. I similarly didn't see the good folks at Hoosier Access at public forums or council meetings advocating for these two major initiatives that Ballard and his City-County Council pushed for. In fact, Mayor Greg Ballard has been a rare topic of conversation at Hoosier Access ever since he was elected in 2007.

And not to beat up on only Warner. No one, besides paid lobbyists and lawyers working on the deals themselves, showed up to those public forums and council meetings to advocate for these aforementioned deals. The citizens that did often were lukewarm on the deals at best (feeling they were rushed through and lacked a proper understanding and explanation from their representatives), and flat out against them at worst (from those who felt they fully understood what was going on).

So I guess this is the roundabout way of saying this, but welcome back, Mark Warner and Hoosier Access to the world of municipal government. We'd love it if you'd stick around after the municipal elections are over, and continue debating the issues with other blogs, readers, and the public. Municipal government, after all, doesn't go away after elections are held. It's always there, often being the form of government that affects average people the most.