Letter to the Editor: Slant in Common Council Article

Letter to the Editor,

I attended the Common Council meeting last night in Peekskill, where I overheard a citizen say that your reporting was not very objective. I heard your response that it was. I hadn't read the alluded-to article, so I came home and looked it up.

I found for September 13 and read the opening sentences carefully. I looked to see if there is a slant, and I believe there is. I have changed the color of the words that would lead a reader to believe that Darrell Davis is a problem. (The words that were changed to red in Margaret's original email appear in bold below).

"Disruption" is the position that the council is taking. The citizens might have words like "appeals for justice" or "attempts to shake up the council after a year of non-responsiveness." 

You also state that the activity has led to an increased police presence. There has been no violence or threats that I have heard against the council...the police presence has been extremely intimidating to people who came to talk.

So I invite you to read your article again and see if you can perceive that someone unfamiliar with any of the proceedings might take it to see that the citizens are a problem. If you don't agree, I invite you to have someone completely uninvolved and not familiar with the activities to read it--ask what impression they are left with.

Respectfully intended,

Margaret Rubick

The City of Peekskill passed a resolution last night that requires public speakers at Common Council meetings to follow a spelled-out  “Rules of Decorum,” now added to the city code.

The resolution comes after over a year of disruptive meetings that have included personal confrontations, threats, personal attacks made against city officials and fellow citizens, and other similar occurrences that have led to an increased police presence at many meetings.  

Much of this behavior has been demonstrated in the name of social justice by activist Darrell Davis, who was born and raised in Peekskill and now resides in Mt. Vernon, his group members of the Committee for Justice, the Cortlandt-Peekskill Anti-Racism Coalition, as well as by residents who disagree with those two groups’ agendas.