Nathan Diehl

Yesterday (Thursday, November 29), I attended a conference in Fort Wayne for newly elected municipal officers, hosted by the Indiana Association of Cities and Towns. There were all kinds of people there–professional politicians from second class cities (population 35K-600K) as well as Joe-Shmoe from a little 150-person town. (I almost got that many votes!)
A few thought and observations:

• The conference was at the Fort Wayne Hilton, just two blocks from my wife’s work at Lincoln Financial Group, so we got to carpool together. That was wonderful!
• The guy sitting directly in front of me was wearing a pager. Yes, an old-fashioned pager. I hadn’t seen a pager since I threw away my old pager three years ago. I didn’t know you could still get service on a pager. Interestingly, he got paged and left the room for about 10 minutes at one point. Gotta love pay phones, right?
• At one point of the conference, there were two lawyers talking. One of the two was an intellectual, and had issues speaking like a normal person. It was somewhat difficult for me to follow his thought pattern, as his every sentence was complex and difficult to follow. Well, one guy–the only guy in sweat pants and a t-shirt–Joe Shmoe from a very small town–said in a normal-volume voice, as he leaned toward his neighbor, ‘You can tell he’s a lawyer.’ This was quite amusing to everyone around us, including the IACT corporate attorney sitting next to me, who had a great sense of humor all day, anyway. It was a funny moment for those in the back of the room.
• I sat two seats down from the Leo-Cedarville Councilman-elect Gordon Liechty, Jr. I remember Gordon Liechty from Oakhill and Calvary Temple. Perhaps I remember Gordon Sr., I don’t remember. Perhaps I’ll ask my dad later today, as I’m sure he can satisfy the curiosity of my childhood memories.
• The proper term is councilmember, not councilman. I think this is Politically Correct. You can call me Councilman Diehl though. (Actually, until January 1, call me Councilman-Elect Diehl.)

It was a good conference. It was a wealth of knowledge and helped me to feel better about the undertaking ahead of me. Probably the most beneficial part of the conference for me was the legal stuff about what conducting Open Door Law-compliant meetings and what constituted a meeting, an Administrative Meeting or an Executive Session. It’s confusing stuff. Bob Knight was fired (legally) by Miles Brand holding individual meetings with a non-quorum group of members, while another non-quorum group was going on in the next room, and while a third non-quorum group was in the next room. He went from room to room (legally) and had closed meetings with each of the non-quorum groups. Once they all knew where the other trustees stood and after discussion, they held an open meeting and fired Knight, knowing the trustees would be in support.
This is confusing stuff, and was the start of popularizing and enforcing Indiana’s Open Door Laws.

But for the next month, I’m not a councilman, so I can meet with anyone I want. After January 1, that’s a different story!

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