New Council Member Appointment By Douglas J. Thompson December 18, 2013
The Ketchikan city council wanted the authority to appoint vacant seats and I do not necessarily disagree with that however with authority comes responsibility. In this case to do 'due diligence' on the prospective applicants was obviously not done (I can only hope they did not intentionally do this, we certainly don't need another Jack Shay!). The resumes should have been checked by the city manager. Newly appointed council member Mr. Wodehouse not only lacks morals and good judgement, he is quite disingenuous in his so called defense. He was charged, suspended, investigated and the charges were substantiated by the State of Washington's Education Department. His teaching credentials were revoked. He could not hold a teaching job in Washington without them. His school did not need to "fire" him therefore, he was automatically fired when his credentials were revoked. To maintain that no "legal" proceedings were directed at him is fallacious in the extreme. While this was not a court of law it certainly performed a legal function. By this official record, which if it were not true I am sure he would have fought in court (it would ruin his career as a teacher) and he did not successfully do so, his perversion (improper relations with an underage female student and other charges) is publicly documented. For him to state that he was not 'fired' or subjected to 'legal' action is intentional perversion of the facts. As we learned with ex-council member Jack Shay and other perverts, once the legal system starts digging there are almost always many more 'incidents' than what first triggers the system. Most have a life long history of such behavior. School systems are very conservative in revoking teaching certificates. For them to have done so is damming. That the Ketchikan city council would appoint such an individual is disgusting in the extreme. The council having made such a mess by not doing a competent job needs to clean this up quickly. I can only concur with the spokesperson from Kennewick who was quoted in the Daily News as "we were glad to see him go." Someone please tell me that this individual is not employed by our school system!! Congratulations to Mr. Dial for another letter right on the mark. I am of the mind that we will have to resort to the initiative process to get any fiscal sense. A good one would be to require the Ketchikan Borough's assessment department to, upon request, purchase any property at the assessed value. That would keep reality in the picture. Sincerely, Douglas J. Thompson About: "lifelong resident who would like to see some fiscal responsibility and common sense." Received December 16, 2013 - Published December 18, 2013 Related Document:
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