Civil or Uncivil Governance? You Decide.

Captions: 1. Incumbent Democratic Johnson County Supervisor, Rod Sullivan. 2. Kurt Friese, Democratic candidate for Johnson County Supervisor. 3. On left, Jason T. Lewis, also a Democratic candidate for Johnson County supervisor; on right, Mike Hull, also a Democratic candidate for Johnson County supervisor.

Updated and corrected. I was invited to a gathering of three progressive Democrats in Iowa City. Johnson County supervisor candidates Kurt Friese and Jason T. Lewis are featured guests together with incumbent Johnson County supervisor Rod Sullivan. I will not attend if Rod Sullivan is there. Based on past experience, I have concluded that he is just too rude.

Given Kurt Friese’s web statements about civil governance, I find it incomprehensible that he would appear at a progressive gathering that includes Rod Sullivan. Friese’s call for civil governance seems directed at the most uncivil supervisor we have, who is Rod Sullivan.

Is Friese a hypocrite? Is he suddenly more interested in political expedience than principle?

I liked his commentary on civil governance and said so on his website. I thought that Friese deleted my comment because I could no longer see it. Maybe I went back to the wrong conversation. In any case, when I ran into him and his family at Blackstone's on a bike ride Saturday, he asked me if my comment was in response to someone else's comment.

"No," I said. "I just said that I liked your comments on civil governance."

"I'll look into it," he said."

I looked for my comment when I got home, and whaddya know? it was there. It also had four "likes." I apologized to Kurt on line. How could I have not seen my comment before? It's not like I hadn't looked.

Then, back at Blackstone's, I asked Kurt why he was appearing at a political function with Rod Sullivan, who seems to be the best representative of uncivil government in Johnson County. Kurt said he'd been invited, and what was he supposed to do? Disappoint his friends?

There's no answer to that except to worry when a candidate who issues such strong statements in support of civil governance, comments seemingly directed at Rod Sullivan ("among others," Friese added when I talked to him in person), would choose to associate with Sullivan at a gathering of three "progressive" candidates for Johnson County supervisor.

At lunch earlier in May, I was amused when a friend who lives in Mosquito Flats told me a story about how Kurt Friese, a man named Biggers, and others plan to write a grant to plant paw-paw trees and a community garden for the residents of the flats to weed, eat from, and enjoy. She wouldn’t have known about the plan if she hadn’t read a note in the back of the city council meeting notes. She alerted other residents in her neighborhood to come to the scheduled meeting to represent their views.

Mosquito Flats resident and Iowa City attorney Greg Geerdes went to the meeting and said he preferred to buy his food at a grocery store.

Community organizers should certainly engage with the community they’d like to help, don’t you think? Holding a meeting without inviting the neighborhood and would-be participants/weeders seems not only elitist but unwise.

Pres. Obama was a community organizer. I wonder if he would walk into a community and make a plan for property in the neighborhood without informing or engaging the neighborhood.

I'm not sure who to vote for. I've seen a lot of Pat Heiden signs around the area. If only the people who seem to be the most civil were also the most progressive. Kurt Friese and Jason T. Lewis are civil and progressive. Heiden told me she supports the minimum wage increase sponsored by progressive Johnson County supervisors and lives her beliefs. Oaknoll employees all make at least $9.50 an hour. She's Oaknoll's executive director until June, when she retires. I told her that I think Rod Sullivan is a bully, and she said that she's heard that too. She seemed to agree.

I might target vote for Patricia Heiden and hope for the best. I'd like to see civil governance brought back to Johnson County government, so any friend of Rod Sullivan is no friend of mine.

Regardless, I don't regret my $25 donation to Kurt Friese, because his comments on civil governance are worth at least $25. Finally, somebody called out arrogant and rude incumbents in Johnson County government. It's high time.