You can’t do what Clayton did

Jeff Green | May 24, 2012

Editorial by Jeff Green

When Bud Clayton was elected mayor of North Frontenac I asked him if he was going to step down from the Pine Meadow Nursing Home management committee.

He said that as soon as the shovel was in the ground for the rebuild of Pine Meadow, he would be resigning from the committee.

Eighteen months later the shovel still isn’t in the ground, although that should happen within a few days.

The reason that I asked Clayton about this is because Pine Meadow provides service for residents of North Frontenac, and the mayor of North Frontenac would be wise to sever ties with specific agencies that have a direct relationship with the township. I took it that he understood this when he said he was going to get off the committee when he could.

This week Clayton sat in the mayor’s chair and at the same time asked for a $100,000 commitment to the Pine Meadow rebuild.

Councilor Betty Hunter, a director with Land O’Lakes Community Services, the parent board of Pine Meadow, engaged in the debate as well.

Both Hunter and Clayton advocated for the spending. Neither of them declared any kind of conflict. Neither of them refrained from voting on the motion. Clayton did not even relinquish the chair. He presided over the debate on a $100,000 commitment to a project he has been identified with for over two years.

To my mind, both Clayton and Hunter should not only have stepped back from the table, they should have left the room. It would have been best if someone else came forward from Pine Meadow to ask for the money.

But that did not happen. There was not so much as a written request for support, much less a staff report prepared.

Were I a resident of North Frontenac I would have no problem seeing my tax dollars go to supporting Pine Meadow. The rebuild is something that Pine Meadow needs, local families need and the local economy needs.

Bud Clayton and Betty Hunter do not stand to gain financially from this $100,000 grant. They receive no benefit from Pine Meadow. In fact, they both take a loss as volunteer board members, so they had no pecuniary interest in the project.

It is also true that the project lay in the balance and time was of the essence. The commitment was needed immediately.

There is still a conflict, however, and both Clayton and Hunter were wrong to act as they did.

If anyone else wanted to secure a $100,000 commitment from North Frontenac Council for a project they supported, they would have to sit at the far end of the table, bring a lot of financial data and make a really strong case. If they were asking for money this late in the year, after the annual township budget had already been set, they would likely be told that council would consider the request as part of the following year’s budget deliberations.

Even if council were particularly sympathetic to the cause, the individual would be listened to, and then told that council would consider the request later on in the meeting. When the time came for council to debate the request, the advocate would have to sit in the audience, silently.

In all of the years I have attended North Frontenac Council meetings, no one has walked into a meeting and asked for $100,000 for any cause and received it on the spot.

Mayor Clayton stayed at the head of the table in this case, where he could speak at will, preside over the debate and call for the vote at the most opportune time.

Clayton should not have done it that way, and North Frontenac Council should not have let him.