Reminder: Oakley City Council Forum Tonight

Since the Oakley Chamber of Commerce has failed to promote their own event the way it should be promoted to Oakley residents, I thought I’d issue a little reminder of tonight’s forum from 5:30 to 8:00 pm. The event will take place at the Oakley Recreation Building located at 1250 O’Hara Ave, Oakley (map).

City Council Candidates in alphabetical order include:

• Randi Adler
• Ron Borland
• Diane Burgis
• Dave Hansen
• Doug Hardcastle
• Kevin Romick

If you cannot make tonight’s meeting, you can read Rowena Coetsee’s council overview article from Aug. 29.

I would also like to take a moment to clarify a statements I said in yesterday’s post regarding Charleen Earley where I stated the following:

Now onto the Oakley Chamber of Commerce Forum where they have not yet announced who the moderator will be with the debate to occur in less than 48-hours. Rumor has it the moderator will be Charleen Earley of Delta Living Magazine, but I have been unable to confirm. Earley is not the problem, the Chamber should simply announce who the moderator is.  This is actually pretty reckless of the Chamber because it puts all the candidates at risk of being embarrassed rather than in a situation to provide information to voters. This will likely have a low attendance with a Q&A session likely to get out of hand.

Some are questioning my use of the word “rumor” and claim that it’s not journalism while I was knocking Earley.  First off, I’ve been unable to confirm it, so yes, its a rumor! An email to city council candidates yesterday afternoon still did not even announce to them who was moderating the event–this is no fault of Earley, its just poor judgement on the Chambers part and is reckless.

Rule No. 1 for any candidate asked to participate in a debate is to ask who the moderator is, the rules, the format, the timing for each question, rules for Q&A,  time allowed for opening and closing statements, is it recorded, and the expected size of audience.  Since the Chamber is putting on the event, they should also provide a small packet to attendees on each candidate–such as a candidates guide.  They should also post forum rules on their website for all to see along with posting rules at the event.  This protects each candidate and keeps the event from turning into the wild-wild west as these events typically get heated.

As for Ms. Earley, I can only assume that from her communication with me last night that she is in fact the moderator. As I told her, I was not knocking her, I was knocking the chamber for their lazy effort on this event.  I believe she will do great based on her personality and will probably lighten the mood during this very serious event.  I also would like to add that I firmly believe if Ms. Earley was involved earlier in the process, she would have done wonders in promoting this event and getting butts in the seats.

If you remember back to August 31, I put out a piece questioning the fairness of the debate when they reached out to one candidate and simply set the date in stone. This prompted responses by Chamber President Doug Scheer and office manager Lynn Stahli to basically admit to the mistake which would have otherwise gone unnoticed.

The point is, Ms. Earley put out a great magazine for East County and is a solid choice, the chamber simply did her no favors with the handling of the event from the very moment it was announced.