Whuh Whuh Whuh Whuh What did you say?

Shortly after winning election, most likely while trying to balance her responsibilities as a law office comptroller and the new Supervisor-Elect, Mary Joyce D’Aurizio levied her opinion on a major issue affecting our Town in a November 9th WROC-8 story.

The issue at hand: the Rochester Broadway Theater League (an unofficial subcommittee of the Monroe County GOP), and possible new sites for a new performing arts center, something that the woman she had recently ousted, Mary Ellen Heyman, wanted in Irondequoit.
Here’s what she had to say:

“There's no doubt that the city of Rochester needs to be the heart of Monroe County," says Irondequoit Town Supervisor-Elect Mary Joyce D'Aurizio.

Both towns are contenders for a new performing arts center. A shake-up in leadership in Irondequoit is bringing caution. Supervisor elect Mary Joyce D'Aurizio says a downtown theater is what's best.

"We suburbs that surround the city will be much more viable and will grow so long as city center is as strong as it possibly can be."

You can only imagine how furious these comment must have made Arnie Rothschild, Chair of the RBTL -who by the way has donated more money to the local Republican party than a Robutrad worker on a strip club binge. It’s no secret that Arnie is still bitter at Mayor Bob Duffy for killing Renaissance Square and the RBTL’s hopes of a new PAC on Main & Clinton. Many believe the whole notion of a suburban site was concocted as a big “Up Yours” to Mayor Robert of Nazareth.

Thus, imagine how local GOP must have felt upon seeing the new rock star in Irondequoit siding with the likes of Bob Duffy and (gasp) Irondequoit’s own Joe Morelle.

Over the next several weeks, I’m sure that Arnie, Bill Reilich and a large quantity of Republican Party employees working in the Monroe County Office Building, educated our Supervisor-elect on how things really work in the Republican Party.
Fast forward about 2 ½ months. It appears our fair Supervisor has finally wised up, evidenced by an affirmation in support for a RBTL facility at Irondequoit Mall in a January 19th Irondequoit Post article:

“To me, it (Medley/Lake Ridge Centre) is the only place where the new (RBTL facility should go,” D’Aurizio said. “We feel it should be here; we have the plan and the infrastructure in place so that once the funding comes through, it can get started the fastest.”

She continued to carry that tune in a D&C article, dated January 27th, where she firmly states:

"There's definitely no place for a casino in the plans (at Lake Ridge Center), but there definitely are plans for RBTL, and I would love to see that.”

Nice to hear about the casino, but perhaps our Supervisor should explain why she had such a dramatic change of heart on such an important issue.
Maybe, in the November news story, she was so caught up in the moment, that she forgot what type of person she truly is, described in a post-election story on WROC-8:

“I tend to be more of an artsy cultural person so I’m hoping to bring more of those types of events into town."

Well, that’s noble. But if that’s the case, then why would ya say “Not in my (husband, Frank’s office park’s) backyard” to a theater only five days later. Yes, you’ve returned to your “artsy” principles in recent days, but all this waffling is making me hungry for IHOP – which reminds me: nothing would go better with a matinee performance of Wicked than some stuffed French toast right across the parking lot.

Yes, I know this is a lot of news stories, and I apologize for lack of chronological ordering. Nevertheless, it paints a picture of somebody who might want to do a better job at either: (1) staying consistent with her views on important town issues that may or may not affect development in our town and/or (2) explaining what may have caused you to change your mind, whether it be Scott Congel’s charm (lol); Arnie’s wrath or the ghost of Ethel Merman saying “if you build it, donations will come.”