Coppinger announces joint board meeting
As funding public education remains a contentious debate in Hamilton County, Mayor Jim Coppinger on Wednesday announced a joint meeting, planned for next month, between the county commission and school board members.
Coppinger’s announcement came a day after a group of teachers, known as Hamilton County United, invited all 18 commissioners and school board members to a town hall planned for Nov. 17 to discuss teacher pay. The same group was behind an open letter calling out five commissioners who have voted against increasing funding for public education this year.
“Dr. Johnson and myself have had quite a few conversations since our last meeting two weeks ago and we would like to host a joint meeting between the commission and the school board,” Coppinger said. “To have some civil conversations and not be confrontational, but to talk about some of the issues that I’m concerned about as it relates to schools, and I know you guys and gals will have some input into that.
“We have a number of things facing education out there and we can use this as an opportunity to engage in some dialogue that will be helpful going forward.”
The meetings come after a dramatic year of budgeting that left both bodies concerned about the future.
In public announcements, members of the county commission discussed a teacher’s recent call for a joint town hall meeting between the Hamilton County Board of Education and the commission to discuss funding.
“... we can use this as an opportunity to engage in some dialogue that will be helpful going forward.”
– HAMILTON COUNTY MAYOR JIM COPPINGER
The testimony of Taylor a career envoy and war veteran with 50 years of service to the U.S., is what Democrats want Americans to hear first.
Taylor has told investigators about an “irregular channel” that the president’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, set up for Ukraine diplomacy, and how the White House was holding up the military aid, according to a transcript of his closed-door interview released Wednesday.
“That was my clear understanding, security assistance money would not come until the president committed to pursue the investigation,” Taylor said.
He was asked if he was aware that “quid pro quo” meant “this for that.”
“I am,” he replied. Trump has denied any wrongdoing, and Republicans largely dismiss the impeachment inquiry, now into its second month, as a sham.
But Rep. Adam Schiff, the chairman of the Intelligence Committee leading the probe, said that with two days of hearings next week Americans will have a chance to decide for themselves.
“The most important facts are largely not contested,” the California Democrat said. “Those open hearings will be an opportunity for the American people to evaluate the witnesses for themselves, to make their own determinations about the credibility of the witnesses, but also to learn firsthand about the facts of the president’s misconduct.”
Along with Taylor, the public will hear from former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, whom Trump fired after what she and others say was a smear campaign against her, and career State Department official George Kent. Taylor and Kent will appear Wednesday, Yovanovitch on Friday.
To prepare for what’s ahead, the White House is beefing up its communications operations.
Trump ally Pam Bondi, the former attorney general of Florida, and Tony Sayegh, a former Treasury Department spokesman, are expected to join the White House team to work on “proactive impeachment messaging,” a senior administration official told The Associated Press. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal staffing.
The Trump administration has ordered officials not to participate in the House inquiry. But lawmakers have spent weeks hearing from current and former government witnesses, largely from the State Department, as one official after another has relayed his or her understanding of events.
The testimony from Taylor further connected Trump, Giuliani and the administration to a quid-pro-quo agreement that came to light after a government whistleblower’s complaint about Trump’s July 25 phone call with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Even before that call, Taylor said, he and other diplomats involved in Ukraine policy started having concerns about a shadow foreign policy being run by Trump and his private attorney.
Taylor testified that the concerns reached high levels at the White House. In a July 10 meeting with Trump’s National Security Adviser John Bolton, Trump’s ambassador to the European Union, Gordon Sondland raised the idea of Ukrainian investigations.
That “triggered Ambassador Bolton’s antenna, political antenna, and he said ‘we don’t do politics here,’” Taylor testified, noting that Bolton ended the meeting.
Bolton, who resigned from the administration later, has been asked to appear before the House investigators for a closeddoor interview this week. His lawyer said he would not come without a subpoena.
All three of those scheduled to appear in public hearings next week have already testified behind closed doors, and investigators in recent days released hundreds of pages of transcripts from their interviews.