The Cleveland County Board of Commissioners voted unanimously on appointments to five separate Boards at their June 20, 2017 Commissioners meeting. Not one word of discussion was uttered by any commissioner on any of the appointments. Actually, there was not one word of discussion about anything voted on in the meeting and every vote was unanimous (fixed-agreed upon beforehand). The meeting was adjourned in record time.
But, being in attendance in many Commissioner meetings I knew what was going on. The silence was deafening for what was not brought up, not being said and what was not on the agenda.
The first Board appointment was for the Cleveland Community College Board of Trustees. There was only one trustee up for re-appointment and that was the acting CCC Board of Trustees Chairman Greg Melton. Scroll on back a few articles and read about all the conflicts of interest related to Mr. Melton. Commissioner and a CCC Board of Trustee himself, Jason Falls, nominated Michael Yun Cheng for this four year term on the CCC Board of Trustees. The vote for Mr. Cheng was unanimous.
Mr. Cheng has no apparent conflicts of interest issues in regard to Cleveland Community College. Mr. Cheng owns and operates Chen’s Chinese Restaurant and he is well respected in the business community as well as involved with many business investments and civic organizations. On another note, Mr. Cheng has previously served on the CCC Board of Trustees as Vice-Chairman, along with Board of Trustee member Patsy Rose, who resigned. Scroll on back a few articles to read Mrs. Rose’s statement at the June 6, 2017 CCC Board of Trustees meeting.
Whether or not Mr. Cheng has been “conditioned” by his previous service on a Board that was letting things at CCC get seriously out of hand remains to be seen. Those were the days when things were going relatively well at CCC and before the scandals were exposed. Mr. Cheng also has a mild-mannered personality and a traditional background based on hard work, honesty and integrity that might find making the hard decisions necessary to right all the wrongs that are presently at CCC distasteful. We hope not and we will see soon enough.
Mr. Cheng was not in attendance at the Commissioner’s meeting tonight, but hopefully he will be able to give us an interview very soon.
As we stated previously, the “silence” at this meeting was deafening. Not a peep about pending DSS complaints, lawsuits and phony commissioner investigations. Not a peep about the sudden announcement that the Director of the Landfill, Animal Control and the Shooting Range was resigning in disgrace. Not a peep about this so-called “Media Report” that was unsigned by any Commissioner or County Staff member that was only reported to the public by me (as far as I can tell). The Media Report that stated there were “false and irresponsible allegations” but never answered or denied the basic question. Were there any cats released, shot and buried at the landfill??? Not a peep from county employees who were told, according to sources, to keep their mouths shut.
Actually the basic question is this. Why won’t the Cleveland County Commissioners just tell the truth??? About anything!!!
