MR MAYOR

Ed Adrian and Andy Montroll have announced their candidacies as Democrats in the Burlington 2009 mayoral race. No doubt Repbublicans plan to run, too, against Bob Kiss.

Speaking of Mr Kiss, there's a recent letter in the BFP about his inattentiveness to constituent issues, over at the Local Action Works! blog. Regarding the slow handling of the waterfront director's 15-week suspension (still unresolved):

... Stowe resident Debbie Normand, who docks her 45-foot cruiser at the boathouse, complained that repeated calls to Mayor Kiss about this issue had gone unanswered. To the Normands, I would have them understand that Mayor Kiss does not respond to his constituents, let alone out-of-towners. Even friendly "hellos" on Church Street are met with stony silence. He does smile a lot when he's marching in parades, but otherwise he is generally unresponsive.

His lack of response could be snobbery, but if so he should take a lesson from Bernie, who always grunts a hello when he is greeted at Hannaford

I can relate to the answering of phone calls by the mayor. When I first read about the mayor's recruitning of citizens to serve on the environmental task force in the Free Press, I immediately called the mayor's office and left him a message about my desire to serve. After several days (nearly 2 weeks) I phoned again and many days after the second call, I received a phone message from Bob Kiss saying there were no places on the task force: all the spots had been filled. (I was invited to come to the meetings, however.)