MuniWireless

Vitriolic politics have erupted in Toledo, Ohio, where the city’s IT director first retired, then was fired, following an angry confrontation with the mayor. Two city council members have called her departure a serious setback for the city’s proposed municipal wireless network.Toledo, Ohio’s plans to build a municipal Wi-Fi network have rapidly devolved into a passion play of political and personal attacks. On Friday, Patsy Scott, the city’s IT director, handed the mayor’s office her letter of retirement, only to be fired hours later in what appears to be a particularly nasty exchange over a presentation on the network that was scheduled for a Monday council session.

It has little to do with the network and, evidently, everything to do with politics and personalities.

Accounts on either side of the dispute differ. Scott says she submitted her letter of retirement after the mayor verbally attacked her. Mayor Carty Finkbeiner claims he yelled but did not scream in expressing his feelings that Scott had failed to generate the necessary community support for the city’s propsed contract with MetroFi to build the network.

According to a report in The Toledo Blade, Scott said she walked out of a Friday meeting when the mayor verbally attacked her for refusing to threaten an upcoming library levy if library officials would not come to Monday’s meeting to support the proposed MetroFi contract. Finkbeiner denied making the threat.

The Toledo Blade gave detailed run-down of both sides on Friday. This is evidently not the first time that high-ranking Toledo officials have quit city jobs following unpleasant confrontations with the mayor. In a follow-up article Saturday, the mayor insisted he was not verbally abusive, saying “I have been a much, much more controlled, reasonable, thoughtful man, who has worked very hard, incidentally, to cuss a whole lot less than I did the eight years before‚Äö?Ѭ?”

“Cuss a whole lot less?” Excuse me. This would worthy of cartoon treatment if the implications were not so serious for the city of Toledo. Scott’s departure is sure to have an impact on the future of the proposed municipal Wi-Fi network which she has worked hard to bring to reality. She took what some local pundits thought was a dubious project from the start, shaping the mayor’s dream for a network into a realistic endeavor and she was out front in defense of the MetroFi contract when a local politician attacked it.

Scott has indicated she is willing to continue with it on a consulting basis if asked. But now without her leadership, it’s questionable it’s questionable whether the city will be in a position to move ahead anytime soon. Two council members have already expressed concerns about its future in light of this week’s events.

Click the link’s below for The Toledo Blade’s stories on the dispute.

Toledo Wi-Fi chief quits, then is fired in dispute with mayor

Mayor denies abuse of aide

Related posts:

1. The continuing saga in Toledo, Ohio
2. Toledo, Ohio, puts Wi-Fi on ice
3. Toledo, Ohio, delays approval of muni Wi-Fi contract