Board of Aldermen 11-13-2018 Page 18
calling him pretty upset. One of the homes went up an additional $200,000.00. When the letter came
out to the homeowners the second round, who none of them knew this was happening, there wasn’t
much of an explanation on why this happened. What do you mean. And they, of course, were no
longer to meet with KRT the process was done. You are in abating now. Some of them never went
forward because they didn’t have a problem and then all of a sudden the second round, their
assessments went up 15%. So that had no avenue and people were upset and | really believe that the
City would hang that on me.
| said to two of my friends, call into the assessor’s office ask them what happened and they were going
to call anyway. | said, “please find out what happened, ask them what happened”. And the message
that was given was someone on your street complained, and these assessments were raised. And |
was in the house of one of the people when the call was made and | just think that it is really
unacceptable for your assessing office to have that script for any of their staff to use. It shows me how
unwilling they are to accept responsibility for what is going on in there. You hang it on the public
instead of saying “Hey, we’ve got some issues over here, we’ve had some valuations get of whack,
we’ve made some mistakes and we are trying to correct them’.
My husband and | took a blasting call at 10:00 at night from a neighbor over that phone call. And | just
feel that that wasn’t handled correct and I’ve seen that happen to us before. So | think we can work on
how we treat people who come forward with a concern. It just shouldn’t torch your reputation. Thank
you.
REMARKS BY THE MEMBERS OF THE BOARD OF ALDERMEN
Alderman O’Brien
Thank you, Madam President. | just want to say | thank my good friend and colleague Alderman Dowd,
your words on Brian really echoed the way that | feel too. | lost a very good friend as we all did, a
mentor, I’ve known Brian for many years; his lovely wife Gloria, his kids and you know it is just such a
shock to us all but | do feel a hole in the heart and I'll miss a friend. | really thank the time that | had
that he was here and the special things that he did for me to help me along. | consider it an honor to
have known him.
The second thing is on the city elections, | like to compliment the City Clerk for a fine job. To all the
candidates that those that were standing with me in the pouring rain holding totems, and I’d really like to
thank the voters. It was pouring out and you got out the vote and it was one of the better turnouts in the
City history. Thank you, you showed that the process really works and that is key.
The third is | would like to congratulate you Madam President on your election Board President. As
your Vice President, | promise that | will try to do everything that | can to assist you in this endeavor and
| promise that before the Board. And | thank the Board for their support in electing me to this position.
Thank you very much.
Alderman Gidge
Yes | knew Brian for a long time and he was always the person that was playing not bridge but large
games where he could see everybody and what was going on. It is quite interesting, | was wondering
to myself, I’m saying I’ve got to know more of what is happening across over there, they should know
what is happening here because that is what Brian did. If we don’t pick that up something is going to be
missing. And also, my wife and myself obviously to his family it is awful really and I’m sorry.
To the individual the clerk who awful times during these elections especially this one it broke a record, it
was history and again standing and the people working at the elections, | mean come on, it was
unbelievable, in rain! I've never seen so many younger women with children coming in. | have never
seen that before.
