Tussing on trial

I spent most of today at the due process hearing for Police Chief Ron Tussing. I won't take time to report on it now, but here are a couple of general observations:

1. If it's fireworks you were after, forget it. Kristoff Bauer didn't appear, sending an assistant instead. Tussing was there, but his lawyer, Michael Rapkoch, did all his talking for him. Tina Volek, sitting in for Bauer, showed less animation that a Hanna-Barbera cartoon. Rapkoch, who has been ill, wore down as the day went on, although he got off a few good shots, mostly in defense of the chief's First Amendment right to speak out. But at one point, about six hours into the proceeding, he acknowledged that for spectators the hearing must have been about as exciting as watching paint dry. At the instant he said that, a glorious image of a picket fence, covered in bright paint, glistening in the sun on a warm spring day, drying to beat the band, leapt into my mind.

2. I was amazed at how weak the city's case seemed to be. It really did seem that, as Tussing's written introductory remarks indicated, that Bauer is just out trying to cobble together evidence to justify a decision he already had made. When I wrote this column about Tussing's atheism remark, it bothered me that I might be blowing a pretty small matter out of proportion. But after sitting through five or six hours of the hearing, the atheism stuff seemed to be the strongest material the city had. It was one of the very few things Tussing admitted to having done wrong, and he apologized for it.