More investigativevoice, Ed Norris, and the Baltimore Sun

Well, Scofflaws, we’ve got a promising week ahead of us, so let’s get everyone up to speed.

March 16th

- The follow-up story by Stephen Janis was posted on investigativevoice.com . I’m not going to spend anytime summarizing it because, well…..you should read it for yourself. Really great stuff. It’s interesting that a member of the City Council agreed with us in principle, but was told to drop it. Hopefully we can get more council members on board, then Councilman Henry wouldn’t feel so exposed sticking his neck out alone.

- I wrote a rough draft of our contact letter. If we’re going to communicate with elected officials in writing, I felt like we needed a standard letter that we can send out stating our intentions, our goals, and our hope that they join us in our fight. I’ve e-mailed it to a few friends of mine for some constructive criticism, and I’ll post it once it’s closer to a final draft. After I post it, I’m hoping everyone can pitch in with their ideas, critiques, etc. I really want to emphasize that this is our letter, not my letter.

- Turns out City Council was meeting that afternoon, so I swung by City Hall on my way home. I wanted to get a better idea of what we’re dealing with, and put a few names with their faces. It was really fascinating. I sat in the back for about 20 minutes, and I’m not sure anything was accomplished in the time I was there. Now, I understand they need to formally propose legislation, then recommend it to a committee for investigation and further discussion. There wasn’t much debate, and the majority of the motions were commonsense stuff. Consequently, most of what I saw was pomp and circumstance. However, I thought it was really fascinating when the topic of Verizon FIOS was broached. A number of the City Council members leapt up and emphatically supported Verizon, stating it’s the wave of the future, and we need to let Comcast know they’re not the only game in town. Maybe it’s the cynic in me, but nobody has to disclose whether or not Verizon has contacted or supported them financially? I had to wonder about the zeal with which these effusive statements were being made. I’m not suggesting Verizon is paying them off, far from it. But, wouldn’t these recommendations carry more weight if such a disclaimer was made? The practice of lobbying makes much more sense once you watch the machine work unfettered. Really fascinating.

March 17th

- Drove over to CBS Radio and did a quick spot on the Ed Norris Show along with Stephen Janis. Stephen has a weekly spot and was nice enough to bring me along to give our cause a little more exposure. I used a line from the letter I wrote yesterday, and Ed really loved it. Here’s the line from the letter: It is our opinion that with no incentive to settle these debts in a timely manner, the city has married incompetence with socially irresponsible law establishing a license to print money. Ed loved it. He really felt like that line encapsulates many of the problems this city faces. Maynard, his co-host, suggested we translate it into Latin and put it around the official city seal. He challenged the listeners to e-mail the translation, which was done in short order. Ed took a few calls, which were great, but unfortunately no one directly affected by this round of violations made it in. After the interview, I asked Ed off the air if he had any advice, to which he replied, “Yeah. Be careful.” Awesome. That’s exactly what I wanted to hear.

- About two hours after the radio spot, I received an e-mail from the Baltimore Sun. I did a quick interview over the phone, and the reporter said he’d get right on it. Also received an e-mail from examiner.com and they were nice enough to post an unsolicited link to this blog and our Facebook group.

So it looks like we’re gaining steam. We’re getting more stories from fellow Baltimore Scofflaws everyday now that we’ve gone multimedia. Maybe we can have a contest to see who has the highest fine? Sadly, the winner in this case would only be the biggest loser, but it could be fun. I think the frontrunner so far is $4,000, although I read a story from a few years past that someone got hit for $9,000, just not during this round of notices. If anyone hears anything about more Scofflaws, send them this way. If anyone receives more information about their case, post it here. When you hit the town this weekend, talk about our group. Every once in awhile, put our information in your status update on Facebook or your MySpace page. Get the buzz going. Now that our story is garnering some attention, these testimonials will matter more and more as we put a human face on this atrocity.