DID CoMo DEVELOPER GROUP: Snub 5th Ward candidate Tootie Burns?

 Did she forget to kiss the ring?

COLUMBIA, 2/4/13 (Beat Byte) -- A candidate forum invitation to members of the Central Missouri Development Council (CMDC) -- a local lobbying group for developers -- appears to have snubbed 5th Ward Columbia City Council candidate Tootie Burns. 

The invitation -- to a February 4th meeting moved from February 5th to accommodate the 5th Ward special election -- invited 5th Ward candidates Mark Jones and Laura Nauser to speak but left Burns out.

"Was It Something That I Said?" Burns asked on her Facebook page, adding she first heard about the "CMDC-sponsored Fifth Ward Candidate Forum" last Friday. 

"At every other forum, ALL candidates have been invited to participate and ALL have," she wrote.  "I am offended that I was not asked to participate."

 

Asked about the omission, CMDC director Don Stamper said his group responded to an inquiry from Burns.  But Stamper declined to provide that response.  "You should probably ask her," he emailed.

 

Stamper told Burns supporters, "Tootie did not reach out to CMDC for support and the other candidates did, and the other candidates had previous relationships with CMDC," Columbia resident Nancy Harter told the Heart Beat.

But previous relationships haven't mattered with any other forum invitations, Harter explained.    

 

"Tootie commented to me that all the other groups in Columbia such as The Fire Fighters, Union Labor Leaders Union, Pachyderm Club, and Muleskinners invited her to speak, and she did not have previous relationships with them," Harter explained.  

 

"It is sad to see a such a powerful group like the CMDC demean Columbia city elections, play favorites, and use 'dirty politics' to keep one of the candidates in Ward 5 from being heard."