MOORHEAD, Minn. (KVRR) – On September 15 Moorhead Mayor Shelly Carlson went on her official Facebook page to detail the happenings at that day’s City Council workshop meeting.
She mentioned Council member Deb White by name – a move White says caught her completely off-guard.
“I’ve been on council for eight years and I’ve never seen this happen before. I’ve never been singled out by the Mayor and another colleague on social media, and I’ve never seen that happen to anybody else,” said White.
Carlson says she was not targeting White in any way but simply recounting the events that had just taken place.
“This was a budget discussion, and I really just wanted to put it out there to see kind of what the community was thinking,” Carlson said.
Outside of simply being taken aback, White also says the post – and follow-up comments by colleagues like Council Member Lisa Borgen – completely misrepresented her stance on the issue of city subsidization of Moorhead’s two 18-hole golf courses.
“I have never asked for our two golf courses to close, I’ve never asked for them to be sold and used for low-income housing – I’m not even sure where that came from,” said White.
Carlson remains firm not only in her stance that this has been a long-running issue for White, but that White called for low-income housing to be built on the golf course land.
With Council Members Nicole Mattson and Sebastian McDougall commenting on the post, Carlson deleted it, saying she needed to be mindful of possible legal ramifications. Twin Cities attorney Mark Anfinson says that could have itself been a mistake.
“The law says that any data – doesn’t matter what the forum is, that includes electronic data – any data collected or maintained by a government agency in Minnesota must be retained, and it’s a public record,” said Anfinson.
Anfinson said government officials in Minnesota should be wary with their Facebook usage.
“Often, the government folks will think that this isn’t really the actual, official record because it’s just Facebook or just social media,” Anfinson said.
Carlson said she has no regrets about the post and only deleted it to prevent a quorum from forming in the comments.
White says she’s hurt, but hoping to continue progress in getting the most equitable budget possible for the citizens of Moorhead.
White added that the Moorhead Parks and Recreation Department has done a great job recently in cutting costs, reducing the expected subsidy for those two golf courses to $110,000 for next year’s budget. In the past, that subsidy has been as large as over $600,000.
Comments