Wednesday, May 10, 2006
Another step backwards ?
Is it true that the mayor will appoint his personal paid campaign mouth piece Onzelo Markum as his assistant drawing $ 70, 000 of our tax dollars a year keeping his partisan consulting business? Surely this has got to be false. Hiring your paid consultant on the taxpayer’s dollar? How long do you think the taxpayer’s are going to put up with that? Will the council rubber stamp this good ol’ boy deal for the mayor and his mouth piece? Or will they cut the position out of the budget and save the taxpayers a few dollars? I guess we will find out who is a true conservative looking after the citizens and city and who is in the mayor’s back pocket. You know he does “legal council polling” .
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From the job description posted on the city's web site:
" Additionally, the incumbent would not be allowed to engage in political activity while serving in the position, nor be allowed to work on/in any political campaigns, including the Mayor’s."
So, either Mr. Markum is going to give up his political consulting business for a good paying city job, not on the police force - or some other candidate will be considered. I question why this restriction on political activity is not already demanded of all our city employees.
Hey Chris,
I'll bet you could answer this question since you have been on City Charter Review Committee...
Besides considering single member districts, 'weak mayor' vs 'strong mayor' city government... what about LCTexan's question on placing restriction on political activity for city employees??? I understand what an employee does in their own time (whether city staff, police, fire dept, etc) is up to them, but I haven't read anything in the current charter about this??? What are your thoughts Chris??? (plus anyone else out there in blogsphere that's in the know)
DG - I'm not sure it is as cut and dried as you suggest. Certainly it seems inappropriate to have a city police officer being paid by the mayor and council candidates for political consulting services. Aren't our city employees supposed to be nonpartisan and insulated from the political process? And if not, what would be the legal basis for prohibiting political activity by the person holding the mayor's assistant position we are discussing?
LCTexan,
I think I get what you are saying... If a police officer, for instance, campaigns for a candidate on his/her own time... then why couldn't the mayor's assistant campaign, of course, on his/her own time, not on the perverbial clock... What one city employee should be held accountable for, they should all be equally accountable for... Am I close????
I Agree with that as well. The rules apply to all or none of the city employees.
Thanks to both DG and Chris - you understand my point exactly. Surely the new mayor's assistant won't be required to leave his or her constitutional rights of free speech at the door - except as part of a broad city policy applicable to every city employee. In my view, this policy would actually protect city employees from political pressure to support individual elected officials in fear of losing their employment.
From what I understand from my insider relative is that LC employees can not have their name officially tied to any LC candidate. This is because of the appearance that a particular LC agency endorses a candidate.
I once suggested that if I ever ran for council, my relative could be my treasurer. That way LC residents would see his name and think "hey XXXX knows this guy". Just about everyone in LC knows XXXX and likes XXXX. I'd be a shoo-in. But my relative told me it was against the rules. This is also why my neighbor in the police dept does not have politcal signs in his yard.
I don't think the same goes for LC volunteers. I have an EMS neighbor who does post signs.
Hey Mallios - How'd you feel about supporting a true Christian Conservative? Not one of the wolf-viper power hungry hypocrites.
BHL - I think you are correct about that policy, which makes me wonder how it is that a League City police officer can - to this day - be a paid political consultant to our mayor and to city council candidates. Certainly if a yard sign is not allowed, getting a check from the candidate clearly ought to be against the rules.
BHL,
I vote for a person based on what they have done or will do for our city. Not the person who is a clone or a person who may have a personal agenda. So if they are qualified I would have no problem with ANYONE !
OK. BHL for City Council. JCM treasurer. I could go for that. Get the GOP vote just off my church and community connections. Get the Dem vote with the JCM connections.
Presuming Keeney and Nelson are up for re-election and it's still at-large, I'll run against Keeney.
The issues will still be the same:
BLM - kill it. A bad investment will always be a bad investment. Why continue to throw money at it.
traffic - (west side 518 averages about 5-6 mph during peak hrs)/ Perform a real study (takes 3 days using a few high school kids and an engineer to study the data - can my council hire myself if I abstain from discussion and voting?) and assess solutions to achieve an average of 15 mph during peak congestion.
CCISD issues - Form permanent joint committee to study planned LC growth and impacts to CCISD.
Development - 1) New development must provide detailed assessments of traffic, storm drainage, water usage, etc. to enabling council to assess impacts to established neighborhoods. 1a) Developments need to provide real green space, like Magnolia creek is doing w/trails 2) Work to bring in low/non-polluting industries (shame about the guy who's about to go broke) to bring in non-city dependant revenues. 3) Bring in retail that will bring folks out of surrounding areas into LC. Reduce the size of LC resident sales tax $$ going to Webster.
Who wants to be my Campaign Manager?
BHL - so where will your platform differ from what every other candidate will be saying?
This sounds like a job for the Mallios Group ! "leadership for the city not personal gain" :-)
Did anyone notice, Jerry tried to game the system by calling the vote wrong on his P & Z appointment. He first said vote passes 4-3, Tommy Cones stopped him and made hime recount. Tricky, I wonder how many other times he has lied about what the vote totals were. He is the only one who can see the vote totals, other council members cannot. Seems like we need to have some visual way to know what the vote really is, a board that lights up behind the mayor and shows all the positions for or against, and one panel that says " He is lying" He cannot be trusted to call the votes fairly. Nice try Shults, but you are well known not to be trusted!! The only one who buys your BS is your wife!! :)
The mayor could be dyslexic. I hear that he will announce that he is accepting contributions to help with this affliction. Send all donations to Jerry needs money fund P.O.Box 666, Ignoramus, Texas No donations too small But the price gets higher when the train leaves the station. So take the early train and send now!
Sung to the tune of “The orange blossom special”
When the train pulls into the station
The mayor is there, with consultant in tow,
Turns contributors upside down,
For their large donations
If ya want to be the mayor
gotta pay for the smoke and mirrors in the show !
When you smell that familiar BS
Listen to him tell you what you want to hear
You know he is there
looking for more money
“cuz his consultant ain’t free
and he has to pay for all the pretzels and the beer !
LC - note that I have specified a goal for traffic which goes beyond what others are saying. As for development, the city needs formalized standards for studies that every developer needs to adhere to. Without standards it's possible for two different developers to say the same thing two different ways and have it understood two completely different ways.
Standardization is an effective tool to facilitate the consistent understanding of what the inputs and outputs are of any given process. It's why Honda kicks GM's and Ford's butts with respect to product quality.
As for retail, a Home Depot or Lowe's is great, but we already have that in the driving vicinity. Let's bring in something different that will cause Webster and Friendswood to come to LC to spend $$$.
That's all very impressive. Have you actually read our zoning ordinance and development standards?
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