Nurse Amanda and the Men of Principle (Jack Bog's Blog)

One unflattering trait of Portland city commissioner Amanda Fritz is her tendency to lay it on thick when she's fibbing to you. When the city's new 911 computers got negative reviews last year from the police officers who had to use them, she not only denied the problem but actually asserted that the new system was "close to perfect." Uh huh.

Yesterday she tried to spin her vote, against concerned neighbors and in favor of cell phone corporate hacks, as some sort of gift by her to the people whose livability she just trashed. On reversing a hearings officer's decision that had gone in favor of the neighbors -- just as she did in October with the SoWhat immigration jail next door to a grammar school -- she gave this account:

Commissioner Amanda Fritz, who voted to overturn the Hearings Office’s decision, said that even though the code is unclear, the city has interpreted it this way for hundreds of other applications and is maintaining consistency. She also said that federal health guidelines suggest that the code is referring to antenna ERPs.
However, she added that the appeal would force the council to re-examine the code and regulation of cellphone towers.

"The fundamental, big-picture question is: Do we still want to put the antennas on the right-of-way preferentially? Or do we want to look at industrial sites or other sites?" Fritz said. "Within the federal mandate, we can't stop any company from providing service anywhere it wants to, but there are some potential changes that we could make."

That splashing on your shoe? It's raining!

But perhaps the best example of the Nurse's posing came recently when she was asked an obvious question about the influence of campaign contributions on City Council members' votes. Here she is in the Huffington Post, discussing the current taxi-limo licensing flap:

Portland City Commissioner Amanda Fritz denies the accusations. "Even though my colleagues are funded by traditional (campaign donations), they are very principled men and I don't believe they would be voting on the basis of who gives them money."

This from the poster child for "clean money," who preached for years about the corrupting influence of campaign money so that taxpayers would front more than a half million tax dollars to put her in office!

It's a little too much for us. Which is why we're now casting our own principled vote -- for Bruce Altizer.

Comments (7)

Methinks the unpricipled nurse is in no position to render judgement on the question of whether her colleagues are principled or not. The auditor is the only elected official in this town who has showed consistent adherence to principles.

Posted by Bilbo | May 1, 2012 9:49 AM

HAH! LOL on that one!

Posted by Portland Native | May 1, 2012 10:30 AM

Here she is in the Huffington Post, discussing the current taxi-limo licensing flap:

Can't have it on the national scene via Huffington Post that Portland City Commissioners are not principled, can we!!

Go Amanda, go, way to go and cover for your "principled men." Thank you so much for keeping our city "clean and principled just for the world to see."

By the way, don't take this to mean I would like to see Nolan either.
In my view, clean the slate, do we really need political careerists?

Posted by clinamen | May 1, 2012 12:02 PM

Sam Adams was on HuffPost the other day too, preaching the wonders of Portland's city planning. Maybe his local job prospects aren't looking too good.

Posted by Ex-bartender | May 1, 2012 2:18 PM

Could it be that the word is getting out what is really going on in our "City That Works?"
Need good PR and only "principled men" on our council in order to lure more people in so that Metro can tell us more and more are coming!!

Yes folks, I am upset about having lived in a nice community for years and to see it go in a downward spiral, apparently some people like what is going on, I don't like the way our city has been fleeced!! Look at the debt meter. Look at the quality of life matters, that cannot be metered as easily as dollars and cents. Only some neighborhoods have been ruined, others are falling in line, next to go. The congestion alone is unacceptable, if ever an emergency or need to flee the city, not possible, instant gridlock.

Posted by clinamen | May 1, 2012 2:46 PM

More like "Nurse Amanda and the Meh of Principle"..

Posted by Mister Tee | May 1, 2012 3:54 PM

A 659K fine for offering some Groupon action to people for a frikin' taxi ride? That has Admiral Randy written all over it, or Sam is getting some "help" with those mortgage payments... Amanda might be a political weakling, and out of touch when it comes to this kind of thing, but I'm pretty sure she's honest and that means a lot in this town.

Posted by Usual Kevin | May 1, 2012 9:17 PM

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Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Nurse Amanda and the Men of Principle

Comments (7)

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