Demanding Accountability

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Daily Courier Deceives
Promotes Recall Using False Information

By Edward Snook
Chief of Investigations

Grants Pass, Oregon – The Grants Pass Daily Courier has been on an obvious mission this past year. Their mission has been to support fired city manager David Frasher. This was done for the sole purpose of furthering the efforts of the individuals and entities attempting to promote their social engineering of Grants Pass on the financial backs of its residents. These people and their close-ally the Daily Courier must recall outstanding city councilors who stand in their way or their self-centered plans will fail. The Courier has been very cunning and deceptive in supporting these power brokers, but not cunning and deceptive enough.

Volumes could be written on this issue because similar issues of deception have been occurring for many years with the Courier, however for the purpose of the current recall let’s cut right to the chase and give you (our readership) clear examples of lies that have been published within the pages of the Grants Pass Daily Courier, in their obvious attempt to make sure their role in the recall of the “people’s city council” is successful.

Deception: In a Daily Courier Editorial by Dennis Roler, dated Tuesday June 9, 2009, Roler said, "The Council would be wise to disclose the reasons for dismissal (of manager David Frasher) even if it could be embarrassing". Fact: Roller knows full well that city manager Frasher threatened to sue the city and the councilors if they said anything about their reasons for asking him to resign. Four attorneys said "No, don't say anything." The city (comprised of the citizens) as well as the individual councilors would be at risk of Frasher suing them. The Courier was already fully apprised of this fact but failed to disclose it. – Why? – Read paragraph 2 of this article again.

Laurel Sampson

Laurel Sampson’s Current Contract:

Mayor Mike Murphy

Lie - The Daily Courier reported in its August 6, 2009 edition that City Attorney Doug McGeary, along with Mayor Mike Murphy and Laurel Sampson negotiated this contract. Fact: City Attorney Doug McGeary admitted publicly at the August 5, 2009 Grants Pass City Council public meeting that he had never seen the contract even though it had been signed by Mayor Mike Murphy. The contract is bloated, excessive and it certainly isn’t in the best interest of Grants Pass residents. The misguided people who are promoting the recall state, “the city council had the opportunity to pull the appointment of Laurel Sampson from the consent calendar because they pulled three other items from it.” The truth is: The Sampson contract consent item was slipped into the consent calendar at the last moment. It was factually not in the packet they received days earlier.

Deception: Daily Courier News Editor Dennis Roler, in an editorial on July 31, 2009, claimed the councilors ". . .have gone through three attorneys." In this Editorial, Roler is factually, once again, attempting to make city councilors who are facing a recall look bad when they are not.

Fact #1: City Attorney Kris Woodburn told Frasher, on January 5, two days before the councilors took office that he had decided over Christmas to accept a position at Evergreen Bank (Courier, Jan 13, 2009, page 1). The street talk is that Woodburn wouldn’t do Frasher’s dirty work to stretch the law and jeopardize his Bar license to practice law.

Fact #2: City Attorney Carl Sniffen: Part-time attorney. Two days after he was also “named” in a Federal Racketeering law suit, against Frasher and Finance Director David Reeves, he announced his resignation.

Fact #3: City Attorney Paul Nolte, who was part-time, said his wife had health issues, and the city needed a full-time city attorney.

Fact #4: City Attorney Doug McGeary (part-time) was reportedly fired because he gave his legal opinion the city needed that Frasher didn’t want to hear, which was: “As a result of your (Frasher's) insisting on ‘seizing office’ you are putting city and staff at great financial risk” (Courier - July 14, 09, page 1). Frasher reportedly told McGeary ahead of time that if he gave that particular opinion, he was fired. After McGeary went ahead and gave the legal and lawful opinion to the council, Frasher whispered, during the council meeting, “You’re fired.” Later, Laurel Samson reportedly carried out the dirty deed. McGeary gave the opinion during the time Frasher was fired but refused to leave. McGeary paid a high price for being courageous and honest. So much for the false statement that the city councilors facing recall are responsible for the dismissal of three city attorneys (by the way, there were four city attorney).

Courier Falsely Accuses Council of Violating Oregon’s Meetings Law

From City Attorney Doug McGeary - Sent to (attorney) Pat Kelly, the Courier and channel 10:
Finally, with the information the city has so far supplied in this matter, a recent article in the Courier implied, if not charged, that the city council members had violated Oregon’s public meetings law. Although I have not analyzed the records in the nature of whether or not public meetings laws were conducted, I reviewed the materials enough to seriously challenge the newspaper’s conclusions. I would ask as a courtesy that before any further like-kind charges are made that you or your attorney call me with specifics so that the city may at least consider any deficiencies in its policies and practices or even counter the charges instead of unfairly accusing or suggesting Council Members of violating the law regarding this volatile issue and time (From Doug Mcgeary 7-29-09).

The US~Observer has researched the public meeting law issue carefully with our legal experts and we conclude that there isn’t one shred of evidence that the councilors facing recall have violated any aspect of any of Oregon’s public meetings laws. Daily Courier Editor Dennis Roler has attempted to make a big issue out of this just as those promoting the recall are. Fact: City councilors haven’t violated any laws whatsoever – if they had, we can all be assured that the State of Oregon would have charged them. Another fact is that each and every reason for recall listed on the Recall Petition against Grants Pass City Councilors Warren, Pell, Kangas, Townes and Berger are vague and ambiguous, just as they are completely groundless accusations.

Emails From Daily Courier Editor Dennis Roler Very Telling

This writer could go on and on with factual examples of The Grants Pass Daily Courier’s twisted deceptions and lies, but we have provided enough for any prudent person to conclude that they have an agenda to see to it that the recall is successful. We can all rest assured that their agenda is all about money and control and not in the best interests of the residents of Grants Pass, Oregon.

A couple examples of emails written and sent by Daily Courier Editor Dennis Roler seem fitting to close this article with. Keep in mind as you read his 1st email that there is no question that former city manager David Frasher uses extremely foul language according to numerous witnesses. Also keep in mind that the US~Observer is factually accusing the Courier of deceiving the public with regards to the recall and in some instances we are accusing them publicly of out-right lying to the citizens of Josephine County and the City of Grants Pass. In Roler’s second email below he gives a very lame excuse to the US~Observer’s charges…

Email #1 From Dennis Roler:
From: news14@thedailycourier.com
Date: Tue, 23 Jun 2009 -
As far as Frasher's outburst goes, no employee who said "F--- you" to me or Dennis Mack would likely be employed anymore after that.

Email #2 From Dennis Roler:
From:news14@thedailycourier.com
Date: Tue, 23 Jun 2009 07:21:27 -
Unfortunately, charges that prove false sometimes run in the paper, because the "news" is charges have been filed. We don't have time as a paper to wait until everything is sorted out and a decision rendered. If that was the way it was done, we couldn't even report on what happened on the streets of GP, say, Sunday night, because we would be waiting months to see if the charges made on the scene were upheld in court. All we can try to do is report the conclusion when it occurs, which I'm sure Jim plans to do in this case. Dennis

After reading Roler’s emails and all of the facts presented by the US~Observer, every person in Grants Pass should realize that the Grants Pass Daily Courier is withholding crucial information from them, as they present many deceptions and lies.

Everyone who is registered to vote on the up-coming “Recall” had better get off their butts and vote No on the Recall if they are at all concerned with their pocketbooks. It would also be wise for them to educate their friends and relatives about the truth regarding the current Recall and the very real threat to their finances in the near future should those promoting this Recall succeed…

What is taking place in this Recall is no different than what is happening in Washington DC with our tax dollars – they are simply different issues.

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