Dear Editor:

For public enlightenment, if there is a decision to fire Basalt Police Chief Roderick O’Connor, then there must be a Basalt Town Council hearing to decide it (“Police chief’s fate could land in lap of Basalt Town Council,” The Aspen Times, Saturday).

Such an employee hearing turns the Basalt Town Council into a judicial body, a court.

---

---

A government personnel/employee/civil service panel (board, commission) also adjudicates, so it has court rules and powers. Its sessions and agenda items are open to public attendance and scrutiny, while there are matters that are not.

Basalt might want to establish a civil-service commission to handle government-workers problems and matters. The appointed board members would get judicial experience, too.

---

---

The public can exercise its “call to the people” to exercise its will to recall elected government officials. This lets Basalt residents adjudicate rogue thinking and conduct, doesn’t it? Perhaps this might have a positive effect upon decision-making.

However, in this paramount case about Basalt Police Chief Roderick O’Connor, decent, civic-minded Basalt residents must make certain that a possible Basalt Town Council hearing is not corrupted or tainted. Ergo, some Town Council members might need to recuse themselves for various reasons that must be heard in public.

Emzy Veazy III

Aspen