Saturday, September 25, 2010

For politics junkies

For readers who care about the details of how things are shaking out nationally for the general election, I recommend Electoral-vote.com, which monitors polling and provides an interactive map of state races as well as daily news for political geeks. It's mastered by an academic statistician and it's been operating since the 2004 cycle.

Elks Opera House shake-up prompts city investigation

Cindy's story on the blow-up at the Elks Theatre* carries about a quarter of what's circulating in the theatre community, and some of the 'facts' presented are in dispute. Tip: Dawn Castaneda is not necessarily the target of the City's legal "investigations," despite the implication in the story. If there's any justice in this process, Mic Fenech has some 'splaining to do.

(He's the Director of Administrative Services, a mini-empire created by Norwood just for him some years ago. It appears an editing error cut out his first reference.)

I love that the City Manager is quoted as commenting on a personnel matter, then says that City officials do not comment on personnel matters. This is just the sort of snaky/incompetent move that drives so many people crazy in dealing with Norwood.

As background, Castaneda had taken on a job that paid a part-time salary for the work of what would normally be five skilled full-timers. Everyone who's seen the RFP on the job and knows anything about theatre management agrees it's an awful deal that sets the employee up for failure. City staff has been living in la-la land for years about the theatre's revenue possibilities, and no one in City Hall has a clue about how theatres are managed since Bob Bell left the building.

*: Is not, never has been and never could be an opera house.