Tiffin needs more "Raised Eyebrows"!

When I was a teenager in Tiffin, I had a handful of regular friends with whom I hung-out doing normal teen-age stuff. Visiting the home of one of our friends, her mother would always listen intently and sometimes join in the conversations. She was careful not to judge any of us publicly which I think caused us to trust her with conversation we would not have had with other parents. You would ALWAY know whether she approved of our conversation though. All you had to do was talk while watching her eyes.

If she approved of what you were saying, she would continue to listen intently. At the moment she heard something she disliked, or found suspicious, she would, without as much as a single word, raise her right eyebrow into a sharp arch! If that happened, you knew it was time to leave her home. We did so out of respect. We were "found out". The "raised eyebrow" would thus put an end to any nonsense. It was that simple. My friends and I never discussed the issue again. In the future, we would only occasionally chide her daughter for having the same innate skill of the "Raised Eyebrow".

With the Tiffin University's Miami Street Referendum on the ballot, I think we all need to use a "Raised Eyebrow".

Consider that the Tiffin University Officials and friends have recently hired an expensive political consultant. Large and costly advertisements are placed weekly in the Advertiser-Tribune. (and, NO, Congressman Gilmore would NOT have approved of the abusive aspects of his hard work!) Thousands of letters are being mailed to registered Tiffin Voters. Tiffin University's payroll is being used to send their own highly-paid Officials door-to-door to talk to Tiffin Citizens. Some of our own Tiffin City Council members are so flummoxed by the powerful political and economic influences of Drs, Marion and Grandillo, that (exept for Councilman Lepard) all of them voted to pass the Miami Street Ordinance...even though nearly 60 Tiffin Citizens, from every ward and beyond, showed-up at the cable-televised public Council hearing clearly voicing opposition to it. What happened to our democratic republic?

Isn't Tiffin University going through a lot of effort and expense? Should we put a "raised eyebrow" on it?

Tiffin University wouldn't have to take such drastic and expensive measures to ensure the referendum vote, if they simply stopped the abusive aspects of their plan! Close Jackson Street without property owner permission? Destroy 11 Shade trees? Cut-out parking on Miami and Jackson Streets? Improve a safety problem that they admit in their own Traffic Study "is insignificant"? Create jobs with NO committment as to how many? Spin..Spin...Spin...When will TU Officials Stop trying to Spin us?

Please practice your "raised eyebrow", now. Practice it with your family. Practice it in public places. Especially, practice it the next time you see President of Tiffin University, Dr. Paul Marion.

Tiffin Citizens oppose ordinance 07-70, not because they don't like Tiffin University, but because there are aspects of the Miami Street Project that are unnecessarily abusive to neighborhood residents. Add that to the certainty that TAXES WILL GO UP because the "Miami Street Project"will have to be destroyed and re-built to make way for the sewer separation. On November 4th, please use your own "Raised Eyebrow" and Vote 'NO' on the Miami Street Improvement project from Ordinance 07-70.

Thank you for your consideration,

Joe Monaco
Tiffin Ohio Voter


“Representative government and trial by jury are the heart and lungs of liberty. Without them we have no other fortification against being ridden like horses, fleeced like sheep, worked like cattle, and fed and clothed like swine and hounds.”

—John Adams, 1774