Editorial December 19, 2006
	The Administration and the Council are getting into a bad habit that potentially could have dramatic and disastrous consequences to the Town. The bad habit is adding last minute addendum items to Council dockets without proper attachments and acting upon these matters without proper review. As the old adage goes “haste makes waste”, so might the Council be speeding into a peck of trouble when the Public has not been apprised of an issue BEFORE the Council takes a final action. There is a wealth of knowledge and talent in the pool of the general public and to avoid tapping that pool of information before the Council renders a final judgment is a serious mistake. There is probably nothing wrong with the sole-source $519,000 contract, nor the company that was awarded the contract, that the Council approved at the last minute at the December 18, 2006. However, the general public was not privy to the details of the contract, nor even the fact that such a contract was going to be awarded. If there is something amiss with the contract or the company and if someone in the general public knew about it, the Council and Administration has committed a serious error and has no right to an excuse that “we didn’t know about it.” Even more important than avoiding potential mistakes by using the pool of public information, is the perception of wrong doing the Administration and the Council are creating. When the Council adds significant financial items (budget transfers and $519,000 contracts) as addendum agenda items without attachments, the Public is left to conclude that some “hanky-panky” is transpiring. This is not a perception that should be created nor fostered! The Middletown Newsletter suggests that the Council should avoid all addendum items to the agenda, except in the most extreme emergency.