We Need To End The Corruption On The City Council

I wish to invite all of the citizens of Lake Forest to begin attending our City Council Meetings. We all need to see the corruption firsthand to understand what needs to be done to fix it. The only way to fix it, unfortunately, is by recalling Robinson, Voigts, and Hamilton. This is probably the only way to do it.

I realize that people want to get into politics, and the city council is probably a good place to start, but I always found it strange that tens of thousands of dollars are spent for a position that pays very little. I began to really follow local politics when then Mayor Herzog forced businesses to close for no reason other than vanity during the building of the Arbor. I learned how he ran the council, and changed the council away from the Robert’s Rules of Order which most local governments use as their parliamentary procedure in the way they conduct city business, and forced a majority vote to get any proposal on the agenda. This action nullifies the two other council members by effectively not allowing them to speak at council meetings, or put their proposals forward. Well Councilman Robinson is our new Herzog, and has done the same thing again. This is bad enough by itself, but Robinson and Voights ran against the Herzog machine, and then got a patsy named Hamilton voted into the council, and did the exact same thing they ran against. Usually you need to turn to a 3rd world country to see corruption like this, but unfortunately we have it here in Lake Forest.

The corruption is so complete that during the first city council meeting on October 6, 2015 Councilman Hamilton twice asked Councilman Robinson “what is your thinking on this, I need to know to know how to vote” or something very similar. I meant to ask the clerk if this was allowed, but when I asked for a second time about Mayor Voight’s to return to the correct parliamentary procedure, and he replied “I don’t have to answer your question”, I was so shocked I then spoke about his weak leadership regarding the road of horror, and how a real leader should have handled it.

I think it is time that everyone that can please attend the next city council meeting, and listen to the people that care ask questions of our city leaders and decide for yourself if it is time to punt them back into the real world. The problem is they will probably just go to work for the same developers that financed their campaigns.

We need real leaders that will not be corrupted by power or promises from donors, but instead select people that will keep this great city great. We need the developers to start building homes with yards again, not the current plans that will have children playing in the street. People should want to serve, but to do your duty and nothing more. The greed or power that these three people have been corrupted by is like a cancer that needs to be removed. Yes to the recall!

Eric Garretson

Lake Forest Resident