He has placed yard signs in front of private businesses and homes without their permission. Who does he think he is? He is responsible for the action of his committee, led by his campaign manager Ben Shoval and mentor, Bruce Smith. He and his supporters are behaving like immature spoiled brats. They think they can intimidate his opponents by “marking” their property illegally. No candidate has a right to plunk down signage on property maintained by the owner without their permission.

This childish behavior has B.S. handprints all over it. Ensey is a shallow man as evidenced by his last campaign and hasn’t matured after 4 years on the council. It would be a travesty to have this guy reelected.

Educators teach our kids that government is representative of the people’s interest. Our current county system teaches us that one must be on the inside with the “right people” and the special interest groups like the home builders, realtors, and republican party, in order to be represented. The good old boys like things the way they are and think they know what is best for everyone.

Change is in the air!!

Home Rule will provide a more inclusive and representative government. Innovative and creative solutions will prosper. Home Rule will take awhile to actually happen. First of all the voters have to approve changing the county form of government in the upcoming Nov. 8 election. They must also choose 15 Freeholders. Then the Freeholders will draft a constitution or charter. That may take a year or more. Then their draft has to be approved by the voters, and then elections can be held for offices. Not easy, but well worth the effort and Yakima County and ALL it’s residents will be better represented.

So watch the show and see what you think.

Bruce Smith vainly and arrogantly ascribes the Fine as simply; “clerical errors”. These “clerical errors” included money paid to him for “campaign services” by his Treasurer, David Flink, who is also his employee. B.S. was Vice-Chair of the committee and their shoddy reporting included lumping printing services with money paid to Bruce to hide his payments. Let’s clear something up here. The PDC is a very user friendly group for campaigns to work with. They see “clerical errors” all the time and have no interest in Fining people for simple mistakes. They, will actually help the campaign reporting to correct these errors.

Bruce’s cavalier attitude toward the entire public disclosure process tells us a lot about his ethical makeup. 78 days late and 7 weeks after the election they report $5,454 in expenses and 38 days late and more than a month after the election they file 5 more expenses totaling $6,166. More than $11,000 AFTER an election! Maybe he didn’t want the public to see the $1,000 he received for “Professional Campaign Services, primarily yard sign maintenance”. There are several other entries that raise ethical questions.

He “snookered” the radio stations into providing almost $10,000 worth of radio ads for ZERO dollars exchanged. He had an ongoing trade agreement with the radio stations to trade ads in his newspaper for radio spots. This is normal business practice. But the radio stations were under the impression that these were business ‘trades”. As would be the case for everyone else in the world. But, Bruce turned around and in an email to Townsquare Media told them he wanted to convert them to campaign ads. Although Media outlets all have a policy of cash up front for any political advertising they succumbed to B.S.’s wishes after he told them he checked with the WA Assoc of Broadcasters and they said it was legal. The radio stations were under no obligation to honor such an unethical request, but they did. Ironically these decisions were made BEFORE Dave Ettl provided the 4th vote on the Yakima City Council to put the Strong Mayor on the ballot. This whole “free” political radio ads caper is murky and unethical, but not illegal.

All in all, I would say B.S. is deceiving the public and taking advantage of committee contributions to the campaign, and putting the radio stations in an awkward spot of appearing to support him. (No one else on the planet would or ever will get the $10,000 free radio ads that B.S. corralled.) Gotta hand it to you Brucie Boy, You’re one smart cookie.

In future shows Jim Winkenwerder and I will be commenting on the PDC complaint against the Strong Mayor gang. We’ll also have a lot to say about election results here locally concerning District Only Voting and Nationally concerning Wisconsin recall elections. And much, much, more!

The Drinking Liberally interview with co-founder, Justin Krebs is on at 5 PM July 7, 8, 9. Click here for schedule that is on the city’s website. The schedule usually runs 3 days at one time 3 days at another time and then always at 4 PM on Sundays. Enjoy the shows!

The other show features an interview with Justin Krebs, co-founder of Drinking Liberally and the author of “538 Ways to Live, Work & Play like a Liberal”.
That show is scheduled to run Wednesday, June 29th at 5 PM and then 9 AM on Thurs, Fri, Sat; June 30-July 2. It will also run all of next week. The schedule is posted on the city of Yakima website. Scroll down the left hand column and click the YCTV schedule.

By the way, the Yakima Chapter of Drinking Liberally meets on the 1st & 3rd Monday of each month at the Yakima Sports Center at 7:30 PM.

On the other hand George Pechtel is his own man and has been a mover and a shaker in the resurgence of Front Street and the Downtown. Pechtel has worked well with politicians of both parties and citizen leaders. He has very broad support and should be able to defeat Ensey.

Ben Shoval is listed as Ensey’s campaign manager and has donated $500 to his re-election. But we all know that the real manager will be Bruce Smith lurking in the background. Watch for his editorials in his newspaper to be highly flattering of Ensey. They will also be full of B.S., distortions and probably outright lies. We will be pointing them out as they appear.

There won’t be a primary in August for this race as they are the only two in it for that seat. There should be plenty to comment on between now and November 8th!