One of the most bizarre political web sites to pop up recently attempts to defend Sunnyvale Council member Patrick Meyering against a recall campaign by comparing Meyering with both Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King. The comparison is both absurd and offensive.
Elected in 2011, Meyering has spent his partial council term fabricating accusations of corruption against city workers, citizens, and his council colleagues. (Example: “Councilmembers took money from city employees, then approved substantial salary increases for those employees.”) After months of weekly public abuse by Meyering, city attorney David Kahn quit. The next year, city manager Gary Luebbers quit, after Meyering delivered a rant against Luebbers in the presence of his wife, shouting over the mayor when he did not have the floor. Meyering, a self-employed attorney, filed a personal injury lawsuit against the city, thereby essentially suing himself. His lawsuit was dismissed, but only after the taxpayers coughed up $83,000 in legal fees to defend the case. Meyering’s description of the situation at a recent meeting was astonishing. He stated that “a citizen” had “filed a claim” and that the city wasted $83K defending the claim rather than paying off the vexatious litigant, whom he managed to avoid identifying as himself.
Meyering has the distinction of becoming the first council member in Sunnyvale’s 100-year history to be publicly censured for continual and flagrant violations of the city’s Code of Conduct and Ethics.
Gandhi said, “Not being faultless myself, I won’t presume to probe into the faults of others.” King said, “We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline.” Meyering shouts over other speakers, is hateful and abusive, and spews false allegations of unethical behavior at colleagues, employees, and citizens. The idea that Meyering has anything in common with those two great humanitarians shows how crazy his few supporters are.
Twenty years ago, San Jose Council member Kathy Cole was recalled by her District 8 constituents on the basis of one offensive speech. Despite her multiple apologies, an almost daily drumbeat of coverage in the San Jose Mercury News publicized the issue to the point where a small citizen team was able to obtain the thousands of petition signatures required to force a recall election, which removed her. Pat Meyering has never apologized for any of his lies, any of his attacks, any of what he has cost the citizens and workers of Sunnyvale. Yet this time, there has been no news coverage in the Merc, and a similar citizen team struggles to recruit volunteers to get signatures. Those voters who have heard of the issue usually say, “Where do I sign?” But a sadly large fraction of them say, “I haven’t heard anything about it.” Anyone who appreciates the contributions of King and Gandhi to human affairs is urged to help the team gather the 9,000 signatures that must be obtained by September 17 in order for voters to have the chance to say “Enough is enough.”
Christopher Moylan is a former Sunnyvale City Council member.
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