Mayor used hidden private Hotmail account to support Chief Williams

Despite a complaint from me about using his private email account to do city business (didn't we go down this road before?), Mayor Ed Martin has, so far, refused to release this email to the public record. I do not know how many other emails are equally hidden. The email below is printed as a public record, although the mayor has not made it an available public record yet.

From: "Ed Martin" edwilsonmartin@hotmail.com
To: "Jan McDermott Collins" pat_jan@comcast.net
Sent: Thursday, May 20, 2010 10:02 PM
Subject: Accurate info available

Jan, You know how much I appreciate your service on Council and your willingness to check things out. You need to revert to those tendencies and not believe everything you might read on the web, without asking for info.

If you want to write to me at emartin@ci.venice.fl.us I will provide you info on issues that are within my perogatives as Mayor/Council member. You might also write to my website, and I will forward them to the city email account if they deal with City business as they almost certainly will.

I believe you can be a voice of reason if you chose to be, but after recent postings by John and some others I no longer feel it is productive to write to that site as people read but do not reason.

Best regards,
Ed

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Of additional concern is the mayor's blind affinity towards the police chief based on clearly wrong and invented information, too much of which is being issued by him to be countered. According to Hizzoner, this is all the fault of a few cops who don't want to do things "by the book."

Below is just one of several emails I have sent in a futile attempt to bring His Dimbulbyness up to speed.

Ed Martin had previously written:
(START QUOTE) "Re Chief Williams, the City has not ignored any police concerns. The City Manager arranged for an outside consultant, one that the Council has used to facilitate priority-setting meetings, to interview as many police officers as wanted to, (interestingly, some declined to meet on a private and confidential basis-those with the most complaints.) The consultant's report has been available since its submission and it is reflected in today's HT story--most officers supported the chief while some suggested a more tactful handling of interactions. The department had recently won accreditation after a number of years before her arrival." (END QUOTE)

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To: Ed Martin, city council, Isaac Turner
From: John Patten
Date: May 24, 2010

The discussions with Ritcey were not and never could be confidential. The officers who refused to participate did so because their comments would be public record with their names attached to their comments. The officers feared retribution. I know this because many at the time told me so. Where you got the idea that their comments would be confidential, I don't know. I know that you have never looked through the report, otherwise you would have seen comments and attributions.

Here's what one officer posted anonymously to the web (spelling errors kept intact):

"The Mayor seems to think that Dr. Ritchey's study of the police department was confidential when he met with officers in order to obtain his data. Obviously the Mayor and the City Mangager have noline of communication. All information that was obtained by Dr. Ritchey from the officers who met with him is considered public record. Turner met with officers at the FOP lodge prior to Dr. Ritchey meeting with officers. He stated that all information provided to Dr. Ritchey is public record. Next thing the mayor fails to inform the public on is who actually met with Dr. Ritchey. Out of the thirty or so people that met with him only about seven officers met with him. The rest were employees who were promoted by the Chief. The data obtained is not an accurate assessment of the agency because the officers knew it was considered public record and were scared of retaliation."

The department winning accreditation -- FYI: this was on the back of much work done under previous chief, Jim Hanks. It was under Hanks early takeover of the department from ousted Chief Joe Slapp that the department initially lost its accreditation.

It should be noted that Chief Williams found obtaining accreditation impossible to do under the department's own steam, however, and a full-time outside consultant was brought in. I met him and spoke with him once. Cop from another jurisdiction in Florida. I have no idea how much it ended up costing the city.