City Council Hears, but Never Listens

As a musician it took me decades to learn the difference between hearing and listening.

Sure, you can hear that another musician might be rushing or dragging a phrase, but are you adjusting to that? Are you also making a change to help?

That’s what listening is all about and it’s a huge difference.

• You hear what is going on around you and adjust to make it better.
• You choose to make a change musically not because you have to, but because it helps someone else and creates a more beautiful piece of music.

Great musicians automatically listen and it’s wonderful to experience. Average musicians hear the same music, but do nothing. They don’t change what they are doing. They just play the notes on the page. Then there’s Columbus City Council.

They hear what you’re saying, but do nothing. Hearing is easy. Listening demands effort and empathy; two things missing from the halls of City Hall.

Why Don’t they Listen?

Easy. They don’t have to.

There are no repercussions to not listening.

The system to elect City Council is broken and they love it that way; it gives them the permission to ignore your questions and ideas, but still get elected anyway.

They are automatically elected thanks to voters not asking questions, not expecting better, and never having another choice other than those on the sample ballot. It’s a “perfect storm” that King Sexton (Chair of the Franklin County Democrats) depends on every day.

Council only has to sit in those comfortable leather chairs and hear your ideas, criticism and challenges. Listening is not required for City Council (have you ever watched City Council when residents testify? Nobody takes hand-written notes; never).

The members of Council sit and daydream about what they will do after the meeting. They aren’t embarrassed by not doing their jobs and the Council President doesn’t expect much from anyone anyway. Never forget: Council has no job description or attendance policy and that’s how Shannon Hardin likes it.

What Do They Do Instead of Listening?

Propaganda.

City Council bombard Facebook and Instagram with so much information that you begin to tune it all out and stop caring. The frequency of useless information is a beautiful part of successful propaganda (learned from the marketing firm hired during ZoneIn).

Remember when Trump was running for office? Every day he said or did something, anything, that would propel him to the top of the news cycle.

There are nine members of City Council and they all support each other without question. Plus, they each have at least two full-time administrative aides who do all the work of setting up Instagram videos and approving each useless media statement.

Where else would you see a City Council spend time and energy on celebrating their own birthdays; instead of trying to fund the fire department, helping to lower the number of homeless deaths every month, or adapting to climate change?

The Goal of City Council Isn’t to Solve Problems.

Every useless online post is meant to exhaust your attention. The hours lost to the daily Instagram and Facebook posts are staggering. We are what we repeatedly do.

Columbus City Council have become actors meant to distract us from their secret meetings and decisions made behind locked doors. Their offices are always locked and they are never available.

If you’re exhausted then City Council are doing it correctly.

This is manufactured propaganda and it’s not an accident; it’s by design. Their goal is to continually distract us from the real challenges of Columbus that they ignore by choice.

It’s a steamroller of media.

It works perfectly and those that fight against it are swamped to a point where most surrender. There is no debate of ideas inside Columbus City Hall. There is only obedience to those that are in control (and it’s not the people who live and work in Columbus).

City Council Wants You to Give Up.

I was writing for the Columbus Free Press on a regular basis until my wife realized that it was having a negative effect on my health. Writing about it for the Columbus forced me to recognize how City Hall has failed so badly. To evaluate Columbus city government on any level is to come to the conclusion that it is a failed democracy.

• Defunding the fire department and not hiring enough police officers.
• Giving away McCoy Park (and 25 million tax dollars) to a billionaire.
• Forcing a rezoning crusade without a master plan, ignoring the comments of citizens, and gifting developers with everything they wanted.
• Ignoring the serious threat of climate change by not investing or planning for the future.
• Awarding tax abatements to developers and real estate investors. Property tax cuts for the rich that starves city services and the Columbus City Schools.

Columbus is a failed democracy at its worst.

I love my wife. She also noticed my decline because I think the people of Columbus are fantastic, yet their city government has been failing them year after year.

Not responding to their lack of motivation or empathy had the effect they wanted. I cared and I tried to challenge them to make better decisions. I failed.

Not because my begging them to seriously address climate change or to help the homeless were bad ideas, but because they don’t listen.

City Council has lost the ability to listen to the citizens of Columbus. They work for themselves first and the people last (if you’re rich they listen all of the time).

Democracy is Worth Fighting For.

Our City Our Say have put in the work to collect enough signatures to be on the ballot. It’s a simple proposal. Allow each district to elect their member of Council; and, allow that specific district to recall their member of City Council.

Not everyone within Our City Our Say agrees with each other on every issue, but they all agree that we deserve democracy. None of the problems of Columbus will be solved until we actually have democracy.

Not the controlled and manipulated version promoted by City Council which guarantees a forever hold on their part-time jobs for full-time pay (plus golden health care and a pension).

Unlike City Council, Our City Our Say has been listening to the voters and have a simple solution to the current un-democratic city government. Over 23,000 other voters agreed and signed their petition.

Our City Our Say has given me hope for the future of Columbus and for that I will always be thankful. I challenge you to expect more from your City Council and Mayor.

They might not want you to remember, but they are supposed to work for you.

This constant lying is not aimed at making the people believe a lie, but at ensuring that no one believes anything anymore.

A people that can no longer distinguish between truth and lies cannot distinguish between right and wrong.

And such a people, deprived of the power to think and judge, is, without knowing and willing it, completely subjected to the rule of lies.

With such people, you can do whatever you want.

Hannah Arendt
German historian and philosopher (1906-1975)