Everyone's Opinion Newsletter

Local coverage of candidates running for offices and school board positions has been eerily non-existent from the Altoona Mirror; looks like they might set this one out. Guess they don’t want to have anything committed to a printed public medium, which could be referenced back to in the future regarding commitments made to voters on issues, especially the issue of reassessment. Your vote is wanted but you are not to know what you’re voting for nor do they want a paper trail, trick or treat. The mistake was made once of allowing reassessment to become an election issue and the politics of the situation are not about to let it happen again.

However, there was an interview on channel 14, via a local T.V. program called Weekend Wrap-up, where city council candidates were interviewed. The program’s usual hosts are Commissioner Tomasetti and local Democratic chairman Frank Rosenhoover. It was interesting but not a printed format and for the most part merely hot air, but still better than nothing.

During the city council candidates’ interview, Rosenhoover was true to his rosenhooverian form of portraying Chicken Little. Instead of whining that the sky was going to fall, it was his usual whine of, we need more taxes, we need more taxes…. how do you expect government to provide the “services” we need without more taxes? - And Tomasseti, always mindful of his lawyerly instincts, was careful to direct the program’s consideration to avoid any mention of reassessment, which seems strange since there were several articles the last few months in the Mirror regarding reassessment and the city’s future financial predicament. All said; it’s a good program to help one keep abreast of current issues.

During the program Mark Geis, democratic candidate for city council, mentioned two things that peaked my attention. The first was the political power of townships relating to annexation. The second occurred in the form of a remark at the conclusion of the show, which was a take-off of prior discussions concerning the consolidation of services with neighboring municipal entities such as Logan twp to cut costs (i.e. fire and police services); his concluding remark came in the form of a barb directed at Frankstown twp getting “a free ride” with their police “services”. Tomasseti abruptly went to the next candidate cutting Geis short as he sat there smiling like an impish child who just pulled a political one up your political butt out of his hat.

All well and good, as Geis has reinforced my assertions that the Democratic Party habitually misrepresents. It appears that Frankstown twp has an agreement with the state police where they receive a portion of the fines that occur in the townships jurisdiction; therefore, the state police are realizing revenues they would not otherwise have received if the twp had its own police force.

Despite the notoriety of the old money in Sylvan Hills, the new money that is now getting old in Hickory Hills, Stone Hedge, and Sylvan East, part of which is in Logan twp, - Frankstown twp is still 75% rural and due to its rural nature crime is not the problem as it is in Altoona or other boroughs. It appears that Geis wants the rural areas to subsidize Altoona’s police department in a round about way. Lets see what we out in the hinterland would be subsidizing.

A few years back there was an issue with drugs held as evidence in the Altoona police department’s evidence room being stolen. The culprit was one of their own police officers who confessed that he had a personal drug problem and was dismissed. Case closed. - Or was the theft of drugs a ruse for altering the nature of some other evidence in another case? Hard to say, but in either case if evidence can be pilfered from an evidence room how can any evidence be considered credible and just how credible is Geis’ thought processes to think that we out in the hinterland should subsidize this kind of “service”.

The problems get even larger for Geis and - for us. Not long ago we had the Thompson trial. The inconsistencies in evidence were rampant, causing a prior district attorney to revisit the evidence and even go to the extreme of digging up graves to grope around for more evidence to make credible the evidence introduced in the first place. Then on top of this, there were three trials of which two were mistrials and two out of town juries were used. All of this added up to great costs and the costs go way beyond money.

If this out of town jury had been made aware of all present and past slipshod practices and inconsistencies, who knows what might have happened. This county may have been subjected to a costly lawsuit and bearing this in mind the MOMENTUM to convict Thompson may have escalated for more reasons than the suggested crime. It leaves one with the terrible feeling that JUSTICE was prostituted to cover-up malfeasance. Was Thompson really guilty? These are the kinds of “services” the property owner is held hostage to pay for.

It has been related in prior Mirror articles and other venues that the city could undertake its own reassessment as a corporate entity but they don’t want the political heat. School districts have no mileage cap like the county; therefore their interest in reassessment is curious. Now if one considers these two discrepancies, one has to wonder just who is the Judas in this wood pile prodding the use of the city or one of the school districts as a hand maiden for reassessment. It appears to be a legal game that has its origins in the moneyed political interests from both republican and democratic parties of this county, not the people and certainly not a majority.

For us out in the rural areas it’s a no brainer. We would much rather have a visibly uniformed and armed trooper that has swore an oath to protect, preserve and defend the constitution of the U.S. and the constitution of the state of Pa. then a band of legalized vigilantes who kiss the hand or behind of a fascist godfather and promote his rule of law. On rare occasions when the state police can’t come or because of state budget problems where Fast Eddie won’t pay them and the Pa. Supreme Court agrees with him, which tells a story in itself, - we the people have every right to protect, preserve and defend our property with or without them and the same goes for the people in Altoona. This is a REPUBLIC and it’s time once again for a real TEA PARTY.

The Freeman

Blair County