Findlay Council Lays Heartland Forward to Rest

BY JEFF SKINNER 

FINDLAY - On Tuesday, March 3, Findlay City council proceeded with their regular session with a dense but silent air of unease near penetrable for all in attendance. While the regular session progressed, most were silent with many wondering if anyone would mention the Heartland sized elephant in the room. However, with only a single lamentation from a member of council, the Heartland Forward project was officially laid to rest. 

TOR had previously reported when council released their agenda over the weekend that the Heartland Forward think tank had announced they were withdrawing their offer to Findlay to engage in their 30 by 2030 citizen data collection initiative. The initiative was fraught with controversy, first because of its overlapping utility with contracted economic developers already on city payroll and then from its overt connections to globalist institutions like the World Economic Forum and Rockefeller foundation as well as its publicly available pro immigration philosophies.

Over the weekend council released their agenda with an attached letter from Mayor Christina Muryn announcing that with the organization's withdrawal from the city meant the resolution connected to it would need to be removed from the agenda. During the discussion period, council member Kevin Cullen made a comment regarding what he felt may have been a loss to the administration. 

Cullen lamented the financial benefit of having a citizen-based data dashboard with undisclosed information available only to the Findlay city government, stating similar dashboards would cost the city significant amounts of money while the one provided by a globalist-linked think tank would be much more cost effective. Cullen additionally asked that this situation be looked at as a teachable moment for all involved parties such that they be ‘well on board’ when the next opportunity comes. 

“At the karate school and the university, we never let a teachable moment go by, and this is truly a teachable moment,” Cullen said. “We need to do things better we need to be well on board and fully knowledgeable about things that come across our desk in the future and that will save all kinds of council time and it also will provide council people with the knowledge and ability to research so that they are not swayed by gossip or hearsay or misinformation and then they can make knowledgeable votes and comments based on that.” 

Mr. Cullen did not specify what he felt quantified as hearsay, gossip or misinformation, though he followed the comments up with a figurative strawman, assuming some discussion was had regarding a proposed ‘takeover’ of the city. 

“So if this heartland situation was a data situation only and no one is trying to take over Findlay and we are not doing a pipeline for immigrants which they definitely were not according to what I researched, then we might have passed up a really good opportunity for a data center we could move forward with. Cities either move forward or they move backward and data is getting more and more important so I just think next time, we will approach it differently on our end and make sure that we all know what’s really going on.”

Cullen did not specify what research he conducted into Heartland Forward which would counter controversial value statements from copious and easily available publications and symposiums by the organization itself, such as its ‘Secret Sauce’ award winning cities in 2025 and their presentations on limiting unemployment rates with refugees. 

In other business of council, during the meeting, there was minimal discussion over a significant concern brought by city auditor Jim Staschiak. According to a letter submitted to council, a member of city employ, Safety Services Director Rob Martin and his time keeping for payroll. According to Stashiak, Martin is not keeping accurate records of his time as an employee of the city who accrues vacation and sick leave based on hours worked, leading to inconsistencies in things he may be eligible for as payouts. According to Staschiak, Martin is refusing to use the city's electronic record keeping system and has even attempted to report Staschiak to the auditor of states office when Staschiak has attempted to direct Martin to use the city's system so accurate records can be kept of his accrued benefits.

Mayor Muryn wrote a counter letter in defense of Martin, stating Martin is in full support of using 'record keeping systems' but argued Martin should not need to effectively track his hours as he is on call every day and works varying hours far beyond the required 40. According to the city auditor, Mayor Muryn effectively missed the point of the issue, that being a lack of record for accrued balances Martin is potentially eligible for based on hours worked outside of 40, which he is not tracking according to the city's standards.

In what many considered a strange commentary, council member Daniel DeArment commented on the idea of time cards and 'punching a clock' as potentially insulting and denigrating, an activity most working class citizens across the country must do on a regular basis.

"I think about punching a time card and as an example I'm gonna start with Ginger our deputy auditor, she has an accounting degree and is a certified public accountant," DeArment said. "That's a very difficult credential the highest you can get in her business and she has been with the city for 30 years and has done a remarkable job, has a stack of awards and at the end of her career we are gonna make her start punching a time clock. To me that is such a slap in the face. Its terrible. It feels like a demotion to an employee and I don't think that's the culture we are trying to establish in the city."

Many considered it a very strange commentary as an attempt to appeal to the idea that record keeping is denigrating to city employees. DeArment added his issue was that certain employees needed to punch a timeclock like a "factory worker."

Some residents felt the question of the discrepancy of whether SSD Martin should be allowed to continue to accrue sick and vacation allowances based on hours worked outside of 40 that are not being tracked would be very simple to rectify for educated officials. Council voted to send the matter to the finance committee for further discussion.