By Eric Landau.
We know that (Fountain Hills Times Independent) frowns on back and forth letters between readers, but this one was really necessary.
The letter from Wendy Corry about “rewriting history” is grossly inaccurate, and can’t be allowed to stand unchallenged. I too was there at the 11/18 Town Council meeting. I spoke regarding three agenda items both before and after the mayor ejected the attendees. The audience had reacted spontaneously to his unjustified attempts to stifle its reactions to numerous outrageous pronouncements from the dais. This was not planned; these were simply inevitable responses to shocking behavior which he perpetrated and countenanced, including Ms. Larrabee’s gleeful announcement that she was “taking away your toy,” a reference to Call to the Public.
I’m sorry that citizens reacting to the stifling of free speech somehow allegedly threatened Ms. Corry and made her fearful, but this was democracy manifest, not some sort of near riot as she described. There was no “intimidation” nor anything “scary” on the part of the mainly 70-ish attendees. The only fear in that room was probably on the part of the mayor when he saw that his browbeating didn’t work. His low flash point has no tolerance for anything but instant obedience, but we would not be cowed.
Mr. Friedel’s displeasure that the audience did not submit to his dictatorial expectations caused him to repeatedly glare and threaten us, his constituents, eventually ordering the room cleared when he saw that he could not command unearned respect. The sheriff’s captain and sergeant were peaceable not only in executing his orders to have everyone leave but also in then successfully negotiating, in the highest tradition of diplomacy, for the meeting to reconvene and continue. The only one seeking to rewrite the history of what occurred is Ms. Corry.
