Letter in response to the guest column “Present facts of corruption or resign” published March 25
The facts of alleged municipal malfeasance called for in your guest editorial that also rebuked Councilman Bruce Silverstein actually was what he and Steve Uhring also were seeking in their proposal for transparency, accountability and ethics, only to be sabotaged by the city manager-manipulated majority.
If the editorial screed revealed anything more than the failure to recognize the majority’s machinations and to grasp the need to cleanse City Hall, beginning with the removal of the city manager, Reva Feldman, was the embarrassing sour grapes of each having lost their bids for council seats.
As for the facts they seek, Malibu has been rife with rumors for years of a scheming city manager, connived consultancies, embellished expenses, favoritism and other questionable indulgences, as well as compromised past and present councilpersons.
However, to uncover these facts if true frankly requires a hard-nosed investigative effort, which would include a thorough combing of logs, expense reports, contracts, emails, plus probing personnel interviews, and that takes experienced individuals and time.
Sometimes that effort prompts the surfacing of a whistleblower, perhaps a present or past city employee, who has witnessed a malfeasance or been a party to it and, for the sake of conscience or self-preservation, comes forward.
And sometimes if the call for a true investigation is loud and clear those guilty just might save themselves much embarrassment and possible expense, and resign, as City Manager Reva Feldman has threatened to do, and that the council has been mulling over for several closed sessions?
Sam Hall Kaplan