Reynolds and Lindsey Discuss Moving Forward

After allowing their differences of opinion to come between them at Monday night’s council meeting, New Carlisle City Councilman Ethan Reynolds and Police Levy Chairman Bill Lindsey met Wednesday evening to discuss the issues facing the city as well as sorting out the tensions that arose between them earlier in the week.

At Monday night’s meeting of New Carlisle City Council, Lindsey addressed a member of council’s postings on social media that seem to rail against the new levy, which would raise the city’s earned income tax by half-percent. Although Lindsey did not mention names, Councilman Ethan Reynolds suspected Lindsey was referring to him, and asked him about it. Lindsey then told Reynolds he was in fact speaking about him, and tempers soon flared.

Speaking with each other on good terms Wednesday night, Reynolds and Lindsey both agreed that they allowed their personal feelings to become involved in political dealings, and said they realized this too late after they’d already spoken. As Chair of the levy committee, Lindsey said he took personal offense to Reynolds’ anti-levy remarks on social media, as he was working hard to garner support for the levy while Reynolds opposes it publically.

Reynolds defended his vote against placing the new levy on the ballot, saying the city needs to make some cuts from within before it asks for more money. Reynolds said since he took office with the city in 2011, it has handed out almost $50,000 in pay raises, and also cited the notions of cutting the pool and splitting a deputy’s service with Bethel Township as possibilities for savings from within.

“There’s also a huge trust deficit with the city,” Reynolds said. “Many residents feel they can’t trust us because of our former City Manager...it is the job of council to oversee the City Manager and I feel that’s been lacking the past four years,” he said.

Lindsey agreed with Reynolds, saying he believed many of the issues currently facing the city stemmed from former City Manager Kim Jones. “I agree with the trust deficit...the City Manager only told council what she thought they needed to know,” Lindsey said. “I know (Reynolds) is against the levy for city reasons, and I don’t know, maybe he’s right and there are some areas that can be addressed.”

Lindsey and Reynolds also agreed on what they considered the poor execution of the last levy campaign, both citing the levy yard signs as being misleading and one of the possible causes of its failure. The last signs prominently featured the words “Safe Streets” and depicted a very small graphic of a police cruiser. Reynolds and Lindsey both said they felt the former signs to be misleading and more indicative of a street repair levy than for police purposes, even though the levy would have supported both. Reynolds cited the nearly 65-percent failure rate of the last levy, saying he “thinks it will be a lot closer this time with Bill in command.”

“I actually feel like it might have a chance this time,” said Reynolds. “This levy is going to be quite the battle now with Mr. Lindsey campaigning for it.”

Lindsey said he has been going door-to-door and to local businesses in attempt to drum up support of the levy, saying the city is currently without deputy protection 88 hours per week.

Lindsey said he simply allowed the exchange between himself and Reynolds to become “personal” Monday night, and said the two have talked extensively since that evening. “We have more in common than you might think,” Lindsey said of Reynolds.

“We’re both Pentecostal, we’re both Republicans, and we’ve developed a mutual respect for one another,” said Reynolds.

“Both of us are men of our word, and we’re not going to agree with each other one hundred percent of the time,” Lindsey said.

Reynolds agreed, saying:

“Forgiveness says a lot about a person’s moral character—when you discuss politics of any kind, you pretty much just have to agree to disagree,” said Reynolds.

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