Decision to Rescind, Preamble

The disapproval of my actions in the first 36 hours after taking office earlier this week has been loudly communicated by many. The timing of the events, along with Council and non-Council duties, made it difficult to address these concerns before our Council meeting Tuesday night. I tried to be perfectly clear and forthcoming during the Council meeting about my motivations and reasoning behind my actions, perhaps to a fault. A few people were present for the three-plus hours of discussion that occurred at the end of the almost seven-hour meeting. I know several more watched from home. I invite everyone else to watch the video, but I realize that it is unreasonable to expect the general public to wade through all of that and that I need to explain myself more concisely in writing in order to communicate effectively.

I've been working on this since 5:30 am Wednesday morning, but, again, duties have made it difficult to finish in a timely fashion. I've decided to break my explanation up into different aspects so that I can focus on finishing and releasing each topic while I continue to write about other aspects.

I appreciate the restraint some have shown from drawing conclusions before my side of the story was presented, but I understand the frustration of others at my near silence on social media. Believe me, it's not been from a lack of trying to get this written. I should also acknowledge the support and appreciation that some have expressed for the actions I've taken.

I do not seek to convince anyone that I made the right decisions. Reasonable people can disagree. I readily admit that I made mistakes. I do ask you to read with an open mind, though. Even if you still disagree with my decisions, I hope you will understand the reasons I made them.

Past experience suggests that most of the conversation about what I post will be held on Facebook groups. If anyone wants to join the conversations, I suggest trying Our Provo and Provo Forward. I ask that you keep the comments to the aspect that I'm discussing, and I commit to post about every aspect that people have interest in. Feel free to comment directly on the blog posts themselves. To avoid spam, I have to clear comments before they show. Again, I ask commenters to stick to the topic of the post.

Thank you for your interest and concern in the way Provo is governed. Thank you for caring enough to speak up, pay attention, and seek information. Thank you to the residents of District 5 for the opportunity to represent you on the Council. Please stay engaged and hold me accountable for the job I'm doing.

The first topic should be posted very soon.