Canoodling voters

To paraphrase the words of Winston Churchill, those who are unable to learn from history are destined to repeat it. Or applying this theory to the city’s Public Safety commissioner’s race, those who can’t remember what they read in the past are destined to elect another partisan hack into office.

Looking back on what he wrote several years, it’s hard to believe that lame duck Commissioner Ron Kim is running for anything other than angry mob chasing him out of City Hall. He was elected in 2005 on a platform that turned out to be wholly different from the actions he took in office over the past four years. In fact, one is left wondering exactly what Ron Kim has done over the past four years when considering the statements he made before winning his first term in office.

And that’s the beauty of hollow campaign promises: They always seem to make it into print somehow. In Kim’s case, they made it to the Saratogian in the form of a point-by-point campaign letter promising the electorate he would right the wrongs wrought by his predecessor.

Probably the most egregious example of Kim’s failure to live up to his promises was his insistence that his office didn’t need a deputy’s position. In a July letter published in the Saratogian, he assured he would “redefine” the deputy’s roll or even “eliminate it altogether.” He also claimed he would examine the position with “input from critical decision-makers” to see how it would best serve the public’s interest.

Less than a month after taking office in 2006, Kim basically flushed this promise down the toilet. Instead of disbanding the deputy’s position, he asked the City Council to grant him a second one. Though he characterized the request as one made out of necessity, he made it to create a patronage position for Eileen Finneran, who headed the successful mayoral run of Valerie Keehn. Naturally, the more shrewd members of the council saw through this political hijinx like granny’s underwear and told Kim to stuff it.

That didn’t stop Kim from canning Dudla and importing Finneran two years later. Since that time, she has basically used the office as a way to further her own political goals. Those goals certainly didn’t include lowering the department’s budget expenditures or overtime, which has all exploded under Kim’s so-called leadership.

But let’s continue with his 2005 promises, many of which never included anything to do with the public safety operations in the city. For instance, he called to begin the charter review process and pledged to adopt “strong language that will forever protect this city's greenbelt from overdevelopment.” He also pledged to affect legislative changes that would “address the need for affordable housing” in the city. Not surprisingly, he failed in both cases.

Kim’s campaign diatribe does swing back to public safety issues briefly in the missive when he discussed the need to curb truck traffic rumbling through the city’s west side. Yet as of today, he hasn’t managed any of the enforcement goals he stumped on four years ago.

All this may sound like ancient history to the more fickle of voters. But when taken in context of Kevin Conolly’s recent letter to the Saratogian, Kim’s fallacies seem all the more pertinent. Connolly, who some may recall, is an ardent Kim and “Democrats for Change flunky who likes to take to the pen and rattle out missives to Lake Avenue. Last week, he authored his campaign promises, which sound ironically similar to those made by Kim four years ago.

In his opening statements, Connolly pledges his allegiance to the taxpayers, claiming “[t]he management of the Department of Public Safety is a public trust.” Yet nowhere in his screed does he mention the fact that police overtime and departmental costs exploded under his predecessor. Instead, he makes hollow references to “providing optimal service at a reasonable cost” without ever qualifying how he intends to do this. Quick FYI Kevin: The term ‘reasonable cost’ does not come without either scrapping plans for a new public safety facility or drastically reducing departmental overtime. Choose one or the other or both. Otherwise, your promise is meaningless and hollow.

Then, Connolly laments about the now-under-construction south-side rec center and how horrible a decision it was to build it. Like Kim’s letter four years ago, he delves into issues that he has no control over and will have little, if any, impact on his tenure in office. Even more laughably, he pledges he’ll spearhead an effort to sell the new building –to the YMCA nonetheless –even though such cause isn’t even remotely in the purview of his office. Another quick FYI Kevin: The city’s Recreation Department has nothing to do with public safety or the Public Safety commissioner’s duties. Do yourself a favor and learn a bit about the governmental position your seeking to occupy.

All these complaints may sound petty, but they’re issues that show a degree of ineptitude that will make this candidate every bit as ineffective as the current one. Connolly’s promises ring with the same fallacious tone that Kim’s did four years ago. Only this election season, voters can look back on history and see them for what they’re worth.