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It is clear that you love your city manager, but what is it about Ms. Rakestraw that you disagree? Is it that she is trying to clean up the corruption in your city hall that you disagree with, or is it some personal beef?

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The key words in this letter are "once again"! She does this everywhere she lands.

Does anybody remember Rakestraw covering her mouth, giggling, and laughing along with Phyllis Gibbs during their terms on the county commissioners meetings? Not one meeting but tons of meetings! Then she comes out with some bizarre talk on Dusty Dunn, trying to link B.J. Barnes with the mysterious, yet unsolved, death of Ed Pons. She gives women a bad name in that she has never had an original idea in her life. She and Wade have formed their little "Tea Party" now on the City Council--guess they can laugh and play while some of the adults do the business of the people.

Everybody remembers Trudy Wade "losing" her seat but refusing to give it up. Seems wherever these former commissioners go, they end up costing the taxpayer in wasted time. These two make quite a pair on our board. They deserve each other.

I agree with the writer. My own personal opinion is that the Wray matter is one for the legal system, and not for Mary Rakestraw, in her short period on the council, to post blame. We do not need to go without a School superintendent and a City Manager at the same time. What do you tell businesses, you are trying to recruit, when they see such shenanigans like Rakestraw plays? We need to quit putting the throwaway "clowns" from the County Commissioners on our city council.

Holy cow! Does this guy even know what's going on?

I suggest everyone check out the local blogs like Joe Guarino, Ed Cone, Ben Holder and others for extensive discussion from several view points on the issues.

Accountability in government. Who'd have thought it would cause such a ruckus?

TLC,

You, Perkins, Matheny, Melvin, and the rest of the economic development crowd need to understand that economic development interests are not the most important thing to many residents. Some of us are concerned about honesty in government as well as safety and security in our homes. Ms. Rakestraw has the support of many residents in this city to clean it up.

Oh, Mr. Graham, are you the Graham that works closely with Mr Matheny? You wouldn't be biased would you?

TLC,

Don't worry what you tell businesses that you and the economic development interests are trying to recruit, just offer them several million dollars of taxpayer money as an incentive. That'll do it. No problemo.

Wow! If you live in Oak Ridge, why are you so concerned about the City of Greensboro? Too Funny.
Just saw where Rakestraw and Wade had no one schlepping with them.
They look like Rhino Times Stool Pigeons--especially since the Rhino predicted Mitch was going down!

Guess the council got a reality check, and realized the bloggers and the Rhino do not drive the agenda.

Prediction: Mary and Trudy will twist in the breeze, being ostracized by the rest of the members.

I don't claim to know much about Rakestraw, but her response is just another knee jerk reaction without reason. Johnson may not be a great city manager...I don't really pay attention to all city business. However, if there is a call for his job over David Wray, allow me to re-post this from another thread...

Wray lied to Johnson about what was going on, justification or not. When he got called out on it he quit. You can't lie to your boss and expect to keep your job, no matter what the circumstances. I highly doubt there were any racist intentions behind the photo book, but Wray handled that and all things Hinson very poorly from a procedural point of view. He tried to push a chancy criminal investigation when he could have disciplined and demoted Hinson all along.

In addition, he alienated the vast majority of street officers and created a chaotic divide among upper level supervisors, across all racial lines. He caused a 'with me or against me' atmosphere which turned yes men against those that stood by their principles. Morale dropped like a rock as he moved to a rotating schedule, with no regard to the upheaval of officers' personal lives due to family and childcare issues. The idea was to put more officers on the street, but the easiest way to accomplish that is to eliminate some of these alphabet soup special units that Wray was so bent on. Put these veteran officers back on patrol where rookies can learn from them while working together with flexibility to react to the call load. Go back to a fixed schedule and simply assign more officers to the 4pm-3am shift when crime is higher. This stuff is not rocket science, but for some reason the simplest solutions are ignored in favor of somebody's pet project or idea.

Racial controversy or police operations, one way or the other the GPD is better off without Wray. Get over it and get used to it.

rb2dye,
Just because it's in print doesn't make it so. If you're depending on Jerry Bledsoe for your "facts" then I'll count on Barney the dinosaur for my 401-K advice!

There was a guy in a sandwich board walking around the courthouse today with all sorts of funny things about Mary Rakestraw. I wanted to see if he was the John Graham that wrote this letter, but someone came up to me and I didn't get to ask him. Older guy with gray hair but I've never seen him before--probably mid sixties to seventy years old.

Let me add that Wray bumbled through these issues with an almost comical (but sad) self-obsession. Whether it was his 45 minute hairdo, the lengthy mid day jogs with yes men partners all around downtown (if only street officers could work out on the clock like that), the over dramatic poses, head nods, and facial expressions of concern during public functions (all completely fake), or the really creepy collage of photos of himself in the hallway outside his office (taken by a captain that he turned into his self-appointed PR photographer), Wray was a phony, vain, and condescending person who cared more about the form of his office over the function of street officers. I imagine that this was due to his paltry amount of experience on the street before getting fast tracked up the chain of command. Generally though, he considered himself smarter than anybody else, and never gave due consideration to the concerns or ideas of street officers and even his upper level commanders. He was not a leader, he was a divider, plain and simple.

TLC,

I don't like the sleaze that is moving outward in the county that has taken hold in Greensboro, and from what I read here on this blog, no one there cares about it, because we can't let someone trying to clean it up screw-up your economic development.. And, that's fine, just keep it there in Greensboro. That is why some of us have decided to get out of Dodge there while we can. Perhaps when you and your ilk have been a victim of the sleazey criminal factor in Greensboro, you'll want to get to Oak Ridge as well, but we'll have the bridge up over the moat.

One other thought for TLC and the other economic development types to consider is that as we watch how Greensboro mishandles these matters, it only convinces those of us in the county to consider where we spend our discretionary dollars, because we may not live in Greensboro, but we do spend our money there. If this disaster is allowed to continue unabated and the environment continues to deteriorate in Greensboro, there are many of us who will choose to take our dollars westward to Winston Salem. So, you can thumb your collective noses at those of us in the county, but you'll so it without our dollars being spent in your economy.

Unbiased,
I overheard a conversation where a man said, "I don't know if David Wray is a racist or not, but I sure know that the people supporting him are". That was a profound observation.
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OakRidge,
Greensboro stepped up today and hit the ball out of the park. They pushed Rakestraw and Wade to the margins and made the Rhino Times look irrelevant.
If you haven't gotten a copy, then go get one! They had Mitch Johnson in the grave, and they even thought Sandra Anderson-Groat and Mike Barber would join the "giggly girls" for a coup. What was hilarious is they tried to use a cartoon to shame Zack Matheny into voting with the "giggly girls" and they figured WRONG.
When the dust settled, it was Rakestraw and her sidekick twisting in the breeze. I still think Wade will ditch her 'Rasputin' and join up with the mainstream. She's got more gray matter than Rakestraw.

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TLC,

Thank goodness for Trudy and Mary - they're doing exactly what their constituents who voted them into office want them to do.

Good for them!

Angie,
That may be true with Wade, but Rakestraw will be tossed in the next election. She makes a mockery of every board she sits on. Besides, as the letter writer says, her behavior is quite bizarre. That Ed Pons/B.J. Barnes thing was about as crazy as anything I've heard since Calvin Hinshaw and Robert Moores were elected officials. She's toast. Even Wade will "decouple" from her soon.