An Apology to Bernie O’Hare
It turns out that Bernie O’Hare, at LV Ramblings, was right about Ed Pawlowski’s missing basement renovation permit, and even had an inside source all along to confirm the story. Pawlowski himself has acknowledged the need for a permit, since he acquired one in the days since O’Hare’s original post.
Compliments to O’Hare for a real investigative coup. The failure by Pawlowski to secure a permit until the original post made the issue public is inexcusable. We haven’t heard his side of the story yet–and there should be a Call follow-up with this and other details–but the sequence of blog-post, followed by a hasty permit acquisition makes it unlikely that there’s a valid excuse. I am also troubled by the seeming abuse of open-records laws, in order to make time to obtain a permit.
I stand by my criticism of the tone of O’Hare’s original post. I am also mystified by his omission of the anonymous city source in his first post, and also his failure to make a case for the necessity of the permit (since much repair work doesn’t require permitting). Instead, he could only point to the LC assessors’ office, which wasn’t watertight sourcing for the claims he was making. Apparently, the inside city source was there all along, and it’s unclear why O’Hare didn’t cite him or her too.
Still, I came out swinging too hard. It was good reporting, and produced a very troubling story.
July 26th, 2010 at 8:36 am
No worries, Jeff.
July 26th, 2010 at 1:48 pm
Takes courage to admit when one was WRONG – I’ll give you that, Pooley.
July 27th, 2010 at 5:39 am
An apolpgy to Bernie was due, but I am mystified there was no negative comment about the Mayor and his wife breaking the law? Or who is doing the work for them?
July 27th, 2010 at 8:37 am
Richard, I said it was inexcusable. And it is. Outrageous.
As for who is doing the work, I don’t think O’Hare knows yet. See the bottom of his post:
http://lehighvalleyramblings.blogspot.com/2010/07/embarrassed-pawlowski-gets-permit-for.html