I ran into Michael Passero, City Council President, on Sunday during the Ribbon Cutting Ceremony for Emilie's Shady Spot and was shocked, shocked I say, at how relaxed he looked.
In the time that I've known him, it seems to me that he's always been wired, on the edge of some great discovery, about to do some wonderful thing and/or on his way to another important New London event.
I didn't know who Michael Passero was, didn't even know what he looked like, until he first ran for New London's City Council in 2009 and appeared on my lawn one day asking if he could put one of his campaign signs in my front yard. Say what you want about me, and plenty of people have, but I have one of the best sign locations in all of New London and I should have guessed how smart the guy was when he asked for a spot on it. He was the top vote getter in that election.
In 2011, Michael again appeared on my front lawn with the same request and, son of a gun, if he wasn't the top vote getter again and elected City Council President by his fellow councilors even being re-elected as Council President the following year.
Again, in this years municipal elections, Michael was the top vote getter but, if the cities rumor mill is correct, he will not be the City Council President the title going instead to Councilor Wade Hyslop.
That's okay and might be the reason for the more relaxed look on Michael's face and buoyancy in his step. It can't be easy being City Council President for two terms in a row although, God knows, I've tried to help him by giving him lots of good advice.
That hasn't been easy either; for me, not Michael, because the most aggravating thing about Michael (almost) to me personally, is that when he thinks he's right no amount of arguing about the political ramifications of decisions will talk him out of it. The next most aggravating thing is that he's usually right; even I have to admit that!
For example, when the question of the sale of Riverside Park first came before the city council, Michael, a first-term New London city councilor, got it in his head to take a stand and, in a Guest Opinion that appeared in The Day on May, 5, 2010, wrote, in part, “I simply resent the academy's current proposal involving the purchase of our park by an institution that already has much finer recreational facilities than the city can even dream of, so that the institution can provide even better resources to its own community and continue to fence city residents out.My vision for the future of Riverside Park is not a fenced-in government facility with beautifully manicured lawns and wonderful facilities that are not for us. Whatever the city's current failings as custodian of Riverside Park, nothing justifies selling off our children's birthright to a beautiful sweep of parkland overlooking the Thames River.”
Okay, I have to admit that I, along with other members of Friends of Riverside who were getting ready to do battle against the sale of the park, did admire a City councilor willing to stick his neck out but still it was a chancy thing for a politician, especially a new one, to do.
I've given him all kinds of advice on any number of issues like the budget, the finance director, the dog pound, police department, bio-diesel fuels, presidential elections, high tides, biting dogs, GMOs, IRAs, the CDC, relations with the mayor and others who I should probably not mention here but does he listen?
Well, sometimes he does but I very much suspect that's only because I happen to agree with his course of action rather than the other way around.
I have told him that he should not agree with the mayor because, using my reasoning, there are people out there who, because of their reasoning, will say that he is just another one of the mayor's supporters and you know what kind of explanation he comes up with? That sometimes the mayor has a good idea and he (Michael) has to put principles above personalities for the good of the city.
I just don't know. I've done the best I could to help him. As a matter of fact, as opposed to fiction, Michael's not the only one I've tried to help by offering my advice. I've given lots of good advice to Adam Sprecace too but, last year sometime, he told me I could stop because he wasn't planning on running.
I hope it wasn't anything I said.
