{"id":1320384,"date":"2020-06-07T15:10:38","date_gmt":"2020-06-07T21:10:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/?p=997077"},"modified":"2020-06-07T15:10:38","modified_gmt":"2020-06-07T21:10:38","slug":"criticism-for-council-on-executive-session","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/local-news\/criticism-for-council-on-executive-session\/","title":{"rendered":"Criticism for Council on executive session"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure class=\"wp-block-image p402_hide\">\n<div class=\"caption-container\">\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"691\" height=\"443\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.postindependent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2019\/10\/PI-Glenwood-Springs-News-2-2.jpg\" class=\"attachment-large size-large wp-post-image\" alt=\"Glenwood Springs Post Independent news graphic\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.postindependent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2019\/10\/PI-Glenwood-Springs-News-2-2.jpg 691w, https:\/\/cdn.postindependent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2019\/10\/PI-Glenwood-Springs-News-2-2-300x192.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 691px) 100vw, 691px\"><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>Glenwood Springs residents expressed concern and disappointment Thursday about the City Council\u2019s conduct during a May 14 executive session.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou all acted and sounded like a bunch of clowns,\u201d Mike Wolny bluntly told councilors during their regular meeting.<\/p>\n<p>Wolny was joined by Native Son owner Ricky Rodriguez, whose business was mentioned several times during the executive session.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI heard my name and my business come up,\u201d Rodriguez said. \u201cIt hurt my feelings.\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"row\">\n<div class=\"col\" readability=\"6\">\n<div class=\"row gspi-donation gspi-donation-mobile p-0\" readability=\"7\">\n<div class=\"col-xl-4 p-2\">\n<div data-bg=\"url(https:\/\/cdn.postindependent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2020\/03\/PI-logo-white.png)\" class=\"p-0 mt-2 mb-2 h-75 text-center rocket-lazyload\">\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.postindependent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2020\/03\/PI-logo-white.png\" class=\"logo m-0 p-0 invisible\"><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><h3 class=\"d-inline mr-3\">Support Local Journalism<\/h3>\n<p><button class=\"btn d-inline\" type=\"button\" onclick=\"handleDonationButtonClickMidArticle()\">Donate<\/button><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/news\/in-wide-ranging-executive-session-glenwood-council-discuss-county-commissioner-sheriff-and-enforcement-of-health-orders\/\">The council met for an executive session on May 14<\/a> \u201cto discuss the purchase, acquisition, lease, sale or transfer of real property,\u201d determining positions relative to negotiations and a \u201cminor COVID-19 update.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Colorado state law permits local governing bodies to hold executive sessions behind closed doors as long as the meetings are conducted for the \u201csole purpose of considering any of the matters enumerated\u201d by Colorado Revised Statute 24-6-402 (2017).<\/p>\n<p>Those matters include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Purchase, sale or lease of property;<\/li>\n<li>Conference with the board\u2019s attorney;<\/li>\n<li>Matters required to be kept confidential by some other statute;<\/li>\n<li>Specialized details of security arrangements or law enforcement investigations;<\/li>\n<li>Determining positions relative to matters in negotiation;<\/li>\n<li>Personnel matters involving \u201cemployees;\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Consideration of documents required by law to be kept confidential;<\/li>\n<li>Discussions of individual students.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>It is unclear which of the statute\u2019s permissible topics for executive session a \u201cCOVID-19 update\u201d fell under, but the conversation revolving around the update lasted about 45 minutes.<\/p>\n<p>Council received public record requests for the recording, including one filed by former Ninth Judicial District Attorney Sherry Caloia. Whether or not the \u201cminor COVID-19 update\u201d was announced as part of the executive session publicly was also a matter of dispute, which led to the decision to make the recording public.<\/p>\n<p>While discussing COVID-19, councilors made remarks about Native Son\u2019s potential non-compliance with state health orders, suing the Garfield County sheriff for not enforcing pandemic-related orders and taking a \u201cheavy handed approach\u201d to enforcing state health orders in Glenwood Springs.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t believe in these new rules and regulations,\u201d Rodriguez said Thursday. \u201cBut, that doesn\u2019t mean I\u2019m going to break them.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Following the executive session in which Councilor Tony Hershey said he called Martin about the session, the council wrote a public letter asking Hershey to resign, which he declined to do.<\/p>\n<p>Wolny told the council Thursday their resignation request was misplaced.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhy is one of your own, Rick Voorhees, allowed to keep representing the city of Glenwood Springs after he threatened a Garfield County commissioner,\u201d Wolny asked. \u201cDo us all a favor: Keep that letter you wrote to Tony Hershey, change the name to Rick Voorhees and re-date it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Voorhees had criticized Commissioner John Martin in the executive session after hearing allegations the commission might not enforce Gov. Jared Polis\u2019 health orders.<\/p>\n<p>Furthermore, Wolny said he took offense to the council\u2019s comments about enforcing health orders with a heavy hand.<\/p>\n<p>Not all Thursday\u2019s public comments were negative, however; former Glenwood Springs Mayor Leo McKinney called in to offer the council his support.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou guys are doing the best job you can do,\u201d McKinney said. \u201cKeep it up.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s not common for City Council to respond directly to public comments offered on non-agenda items, but during the council comments portion of the Thursday meeting, Voorhees addressed negative perceptions toward the council.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis council has contributed many things to this community,\u201d he said. \u201cI would say the ledger is 90 percent positive and 10 percent negative.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>When it came time to publish the executive session audio, Voorhees said he advocated for making the recording as public as possible.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe community depends on us for integrity,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd, we demonstrated that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em><a href=\"mailto:ifredregill@postindependent.com\">ifredregill@postindependent.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/news\/criticism-for-council-on-executive-session\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">via:: Post Independent<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Glenwood Springs residents expressed concern and disappointment Thursday about the City Council\u2019s conduct during a May 14 executive session. \u201cYou all acted and sounded like a bunch of clowns,\u201d Mike Wolny bluntly told councilors during their regular meeting. Wolny was joined by Native Son owner Ricky Rodriguez, whose business was mentioned several times during the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[160],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1320384","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-09-03 19:30:29","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSKE Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1320384","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1320384"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1320384\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1320384"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1320384"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1320384"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}