Mayor asks library board why it allowed Occupy Bangor to break citys after-hours park rule

Mayor asks library board why it allowed Occupy Bangor to break city’s after-hours park rule
Five months after the Occupy Bangor movement occupied Peirce Park and the Bangor Public Library grounds for almost a month, the library’s administration and board faced some tough questions during a City Council budget session.

April 25, 2012 by Uncategorized 3

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3 Responses

  1. Anonymous says:
    April 25, 2012 at 9:04 pm

    Just how is Bangor’s city government organized?
    So, the mayor — presumably the chief executive and therefore in charge of law enforcement in Bangor — is asking the library director why she didn’t enforce the park’s closing time? One commenter on the newspaper’s site says that the library closes at 5:00. And it’s the library director’s job to come back after dark and try to disperse a crowd of squatters?

    If the mayor didn’t want them there, why didn’t he recruit his police force to break up the party? I’ve heard of librarians being asked to wear many hats, but this is ridiculous. I smell a political stunt in an election year.

    – Suspicious

    Reply
  2. Anonymous says:
    April 26, 2012 at 11:59 am

    Obviously a political issue but there is a fair point behind it
    Sounds like it is the Libraries property so they have the responsibility to call the police and they didn’t do it.
    Of course it’s obvious that the mayor could have done it for them but then there would be more people bemoaning the fact that the Mayor was bypassing the proper procedure, regulations etc and that that property is their responsibility first and foremost. You can’t have it both ways. It’s either yours and you have controls or you don’t and you are at the whim of politicians.

    So the Mayor isn’t innocent of course (and really this just shows them trying to dodge responsibility) but then nor is the Library board if they didn’t follow the procedures that they are responsible for.
    So really there is still an answer to be had from the Library. Why didn’t you call in the police?
    Day one they could have called them in and now they wouldn’t be arguing now as proper procedures would have been followed. Someone is responsible. Even if that answer is ‘freedom of speech’ they have to take the immediate consequences. The mayor will take that on at the next election. The library board has to deal with it now.

    Reply
  3. Anonymous says:
    April 27, 2012 at 11:47 pm

    Proper time to ask
    I don’t think the 5 month wait in questioning is odd or wrong considered the forum the questions were asked in and I am not sure if the Mayor could have done anything during the protests if it was on Library property (not knowing who owns the Library and Maine’s laws although presumably he could have done something about the public park but that may have forced a fight between the library and the city). In this case it is timely to ask. The library is asking for funding during the budget process. Budgets are tight everywhere in this economy. If the library board made decisions that caused the city to have to spend money in other areas that it otherwise wouldn’t have, it is a valid question to ask when discussing budget allocations. Hopefully it won’t cause an issue with funding by the library board should have thought about the possible ramifications at the time and fully explained their position.

    Reply

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