As Niagara Falls City Councilman Charles Walker’s myriad conflicts of interest become more apparent to the citizens of Niagara Falls, jokes about him are becoming more common.
The former night shift lathe operator who now holds an executive position at Niagara Falls Memorial Medical Center, is known for repeatedly voting on matters large and small despite the obvious conflict.
He is also well known among his colleagues for always extracting a price for any vote he casts regardless of it inconsequentiality.
Last week he refused to accept a $1.6 million tax payment by the owners of One Niagara and waffled on the Dyster's mad garbage plan. Neither vote, we suspect, was based on good governance but on some scheme he had to make a better deal for himself.
Over the years, he has only rarely been called out on any of myriad apparent ethical lapses.
This is Niagara Falls, after all, and a politician’s behavior has to be pretty bad before it goes beyond the level of something to joke about.
Here are a few heard here and there around the Falls last week.
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Charlie Walker’s favorite TV show is Let’s Make a Deal, his favorite sport is dodge ball and his favorite food is pork.
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Over the course of Walker’s political career he’s done more shady horse-trading than your average Texas rustler.
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Charlie Walker’s political career is proof that some things just don’t improve with age.
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Charlie thinks Evasive, Sneaky and Calculating are a local law firm.
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If Charlie were a bird he’d be a buzzard, if he were a dog he’d be a retriever and if he lived in the ocean he’d be a barracuda.
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Charlie Walker…the human paperweight of city politics.
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Walker told reporters “I’m going to set my mind to fixing the trash program.”
Yeah, that’s what we were afraid of.
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White voters think Charlie Walker is too black.
Black voters think Charlie Walker is too white.
Most voters – black and white – think he’s too ineffective.
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You’d have better luck finding Sasquatch than locating Charlie’s moral compass.
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Walker’s been around city hall for so long he’s considered part of the furniture. Maybe that’s why he has the IQ of a floor lamp.
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Charlie said he believes in speaking his mind. That would explain all those short speeches.
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Charlie is so compromised and conflicted as a politician that he gives the average corrupt-back-room-deal-maker a bad name.
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Councilman Charles Walker has been in office so long that a child entering kindergarten when Charlie entered City Hall is now on their way to college.
"There is no week nor day nor hour when tyranny may not enter upon this country, if the people lose their roughness and spirit of defiance." - Walt Whitman |