Petition for Pocomoke Mayor's Resignation Temporarily Recalled
Posted: Jul 24, 2015 10:23 PM EDT
POCOMOKE CITY, Md. -- A petition calling for Pocomoke City's mayor to resign has been recalled temporarily by the group that requested it.
The Citizens for a better Pocomoke held a press conference Friday night at the House of Love Christian Center to officially call for Mayor Bruce Morrison's resignation.
Reverend James Jones, a spokesperson for the group, says the petition will be revised and released early next week.
WBOC also spoke to Mayor Morrison earlier today who says allegations of corruption and incompetence against him are false.
Morrison says he is not prepared to resign.
But Morrison and the group's leaders say they are willing to talk about a resolution.
"I would be willing to sit down with the mayor at any given time," said Jones. "We just want honesty. When he speaks, we want him to be straightforward and honest with us."
Mayor Morrison has declined to go on camera with WBOC but he did give a statement Friday about former police chief Kelvin Sewell, who was fired by the council weeks ago and prompted the group's formation.
Morrison says the "chief works at the pleasure of the council," the decision was made by the council and the council acts on behalf of the people in Pocomoke City.
19 comments:
The Citizens want the mayor to be straightforward and honest, which so far he has been honest. As far as strighforward, the mayor's hands are tied due to restrictions on speaking out about personnel matters. They know this.
If The Citizens are really interested in straightforwardness THEY would be calling for Mr Sewell to sign and give permission to have his employment file released and not let him hide behind the lawsuit excuse.
He has already said he was fired in retaliation for not firing 2 officers. Sewell made this accusation and if it's really honesty that is wanted make him prove this is true by releasing his employment info.
If The Citizens wish to remain credible then they need to fact check the info they are given before running with it.
Its going to court. Its premature for the release of his employment information.
Makes no difference that it ***may*** go to court 8:17.
"May" because that has yet to be determined until the EECO is done w/their investigation.
The bottom line is hiding behind a lawsuit that may or may not occur is an excuse. If a lawsuit is forthcoming the employment info will be opened to public scrutiny anyway.
Maybe you were born yesterday......... but I wasn't.
You best believe that if the employment information was pristine, Sewell would be running down Market St waving it in the air AND handing out copies to anyone who wanted it- all at the advice of his lawyer.
That's what lawyers do when they know they have a client that's really and truly being "railroaded."
Look no further than the defense in the Innocent Baltimore 6 railroading. They fought the state's request for a gag order, and won. They are free to release anything to the public that they damn well please. If the facts weren't on the side of the defense they wouldn't have bothered fighting the gag order.
Having a sitdown w/Morrison and expecting him to or thinking he can even be remotely straightforward should be called- A Study In Wasting Everyone's Time.
The Citizens group should realize that they can not make an informed decision about any of this without first viewing Sewell's employment information.
Then you have this elephant in the room that The Citizens and their supporters have chosen to ignore and sweep under the rug and not address so they already have no credibility.
From The Baltimore Sun Nov 14th 2001-
"Sewell, who described himself as a colleague and friend of Comma's, testified that he didn't tell investigators about Comma's confession for more than a month.
On Feb. 5, Sewell said, he was in an FBI office in Woodlawn for questioning. He had just failed a polygraph test when city police Sgt. James Hagin asked him whether he knew who broke into the office, he testified yesterday. "I said yes," Sewell said, adding that he then named Comma."
So what basically Sewell did was attempt a cover up/prolong the inevitable for a corrupt cop. With that as his background any reasonable prudent person isn't going to take his word as Gospel.
Pocomoke officials have swept things under the rugs for decades.
Just an FYI for y'all:
If you are a government entity, the general public may have a right to basic information about your employees. This may include employees' name, title, and perhaps disciplinary action and pay. Contact the MD Office of the Attorney General. They can advise.
Hiding behind the sanctity of personnel matters is an excuse. The police chief is a public official and the public deserves the truth. No I was not born yesterday. I have lived in Pocomoke for more than thirty years. There is a lot of history behind all this and it goes much deeper. If you think Sewell was bad, you should check out the police chiefs prior to him. Elections have been manipulated in Pocomoke for decades. In a town of 4000 there have been absentee ballots of over 150 at times. People would show up at elections and and ask councilmen who were not running in the election who to vote for. Voters have admitted to me their vote was bought.
The most recent election had only 2 absentee ballots. This is an improvement over other earlier times. Yes, the system has been revised. There are still more items to be addressed. Candidates can no longer get a stack of absentee ballot applications and take them to voters. Candidates cannot go to the nursing home and get people to sign the ballots. Absentee ballots are no longer numbered on the ballot. I still want the ladies in city hall to have thorough training and education on how to handle absentee ballots, how to send them promptly to voters who request them, and I want to see the ballots printed in such a way that they look official and have some sort of embossed seal on high quality paper. It is simply not acceptable to use cheap office grade paper with no official stamp. Absentee ballots & the voting process have been much improved in the last 2-3 years. It is a positive change. The people spoke and the city council listened AND ACTED upon the suggestions.
Yes the election in the 5th district was a vast improvement due in large part to the integrity of the candidates running. There is still much room for improvement. To start there should be a provision for write in votes. With a professional long term city manager one would think proper training should have happened long ago and the loopholes long since closed, unless, it was to someone's benefit not to do so.
And the city council would never have acted but for Stephanie Burke pushing the issue, for which she was made into a villian. She exercised her right to question the status quo as every citizen in America should be able to do.
I grew up with Reuben Campbell (Sonny) Morrison and his little brother, Brucie. I've lost track of how many times Sonny has been in jail and I don't think much more of Brucie but at least he has never served time. Somehow he got himself elected Mayor so I've got to respect that but the key is the City Attorney. If he's any kind of lawyer he would have advised and prevented the Mayor and Council from doing anything blatantly illegal. Questionable, maybe but definitely not illegal. Brucie may come out of this with a whole lot of stink on him but I doubt there will be any charges.
Your friend,
Slim
9:27-Not so sure that the system was revised. I think it's more along the lines of Honiss died and isn't around to organize a Stuff the Ballot Box drive.
I clearly remember the election where there were considerably more absentee ballots then there were more people who showed up to vote on election day.
Yep-only those born yesterday thought everything was on the up and up. Those low information people and people who knew it was wrong, but chose to ignore.
I can remember seeing Honiss and whatever other seating council member up for reelection walking through neighborhoods, their back pocket full of absentee ballot forms. This was done with the full knowledge of city hall. Had we had the professional city manager the former city manager claimed to be, this would not have been possible. It was his duty to see that elections were conducted ethically and he failed miserably by intention.
SBeyma, while the election was local, they are overseen by the State of MD. Any election issues then fall to that particular county's States Attorney's Office.
Anon 10 am, Agreed to a certain extent; that is how Stephanie Burke forced the last changes by taking her concerns to the States Attorney at the time. That still does not mean the town administrator did not have to do a better job of assuring the local elections are conducted ethically and properly and that the election board and town had adequate training, which they do not have so far. Why is there no provision for write in votes, for example?
Refer to http://thepocomokepubliceye.blogspot.com/2011/02/changes-made-in-pocomoke-election-laws.html
See also http://sbynews.blogspot.com/2009/05/wymzie-stephanie-burke-loses-election.html
In the Pocomoke 2009 election, before the absentee ballots were counted the results were dead even at 58 each. There were 178 absentee ballots. How many elections do you know of where the absentee ballot number exceeds the number of in person votes? Now if the irregularities with the absentee ballots had not existed it still may have turned out the same. I do believe there was voter fraud in that election.
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