Concern of the Mayor of Venice using social media to spread partisan vitriol and post “fake news” about a fellow council member

 

 

 

Th first posting was on the City of Venice email server, where the Mayor is spreading misinformation about a council member missing a meeting.  Not only did he do it on social media, he made  an off handed remark about Council Member Pachota and Neunder missing the special meeting that he called in his third attempt to mandate mask.  I do not recall the exact comment, but it was phrased in a manner that would lead people to wonder if their absence was coordinated to disrupt his attempt to mandate mask.
 
I do want to note that Council Member and Mayor position are considered to be more part-time than full-time, hence the low salary of between 10k and 12.5k. Many of the council members have jobs and they work them around their duties, such as regular meetings. This meeting that the Mayor referenced was a special meeting and not part of the normally scheduled meetings. It was a meeting the Mayor called to try and pass his ordinance for the third time and something he knew would be difficult to get all members of the council together to attend.

 

Below that is an email that was sent to me by Melissa, where she notes concerns with his political active social media postings during working hours.

Joseph Neunder <[email protected]>

Lori,
Ron’s claims that I told staff that My absence today was because I had something better to do. (See my attachment) Of course as you know, I work M,W,F and would never say a thing like that. Just curious why he would try to create “Fake News”. How can I address this at a future meeting and perhaps highlight another “teaching” moment. Thx

 

 

 

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Melissa

 

 

The City of Venice prohibits political activity during working hours and what Feinsod is doing IS political activity. It is a form of activism. Here is the exact verbiage from the employee handbook.

1.43 POLITICAL ACTIVITIES
No city employee shall participate in any political activity including the solicitation of contributions during working hours. At no time will an employee display in their work area any type of literature or signage that might be construed to support a particular candidate. Violation of this policy may be subject to disciplinary action.

You can look at his posts… he is posting anti-Trump, anti-GOP, anti-conservative posts off and on all day long Monday thru Friday. I figured out how to find the time stamp. Is the Mayor not subject to the policies the city laid out in the employee handbook? Ironically, the people he bashes are likely the ones paying the bulk of the taxes and I don’t think anyone is paying taxes to be insulted by their Mayor while he is on the clock.