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 June 20, 2006 Here is a report from channel 5 put on the internet at 05:54 PM on Monday June 19, 2006. Council member ready to push for term limits June 19, 2006, 06:54 PM A push is on put term limits on all elected officials in the City of Memphis, including the City Council and the mayor. The push is coming from a long-serving City Council member who says this is what his constituents want. Jack Sammons has been on the City Council for 15 years, and is nearing the end of his fourth term. But now, Sammons is preparing to lead the push to bring term limits to City Hall. "This community has had a history of people who were entrenched in power going back to the days of Boss Crump,” Sammons said. According to the councilman, the community is on fire over the issue and his constituents have been calling. His resolution, to be pitched in committee Tuesday, will limit all city-elected officials to eight years of service. While Shelby County has a term limits law, there is nothing on the books in the City of Memphis, and many city leaders have served more than a decade. "There's a huge advantage to incumbents in a community, mostly because of the vast media resources that we all share and the fact that we're on television on a regular basis,” Sammons said. “You become a household word. Whether it's a negative or positive, people know who you are, and sometimes maybe they go with the devil they know rather than the one that they don't know." The resolution won't be a slam dunk. Limiting incoming officials to eight years would mean they couldn't earn a pension through elective office, and some rely on their salaries as full-time income. But it wouldn't keep them from running for other office either. Sammons says the past few years have done damage to the public's faith in local leaders. "It should be a job that we look up, to and not one that is disdained as it is often is in this community,” he said. “Perhaps this will add a little salve to that wound and maybe move that forward." If the Council ultimately approves the resolution, Memphis voters could see it on a ballot in November. The Council will hear the resolution tomorrow in a committee meeting. As it's written now, sitting officials will be grandfathered. They could serve another eight years, if this is adopted now. The resolution needs three readings before the Council and the Mayor's signature. If those things happen, it would show up on a November ballot as a referendum. Here is the worst offender on the City Council in terms of the things that the Concerned Citizens of Memphis want to change. He has served for 14-1/2 years on the City Council. Only Tom Marshall has served longer. Here is his record. • He voted for the Fed Ex arena and for the one sided contract that Mayor Herenton and Mayor Rout signed. • He voted for the $60 million dollars that the MLGW water division will pay for the Arena until the year 2026. • And worst of all he voted for the January 2001 pension resolution that allows elected and appointed officials to retire after 12 years with full pensions and health benefits regardless of age. • When the charter petition got the required signatures he voted for the revoking of the January 2001 pension resolution but only for future people which qualified himself for the pension under the 2001 resolution. • He has not called for an investigation and an audit of the Beale Street Development Corporation and the fact that John Elkington has not paid one cent since 1982 to the City of Memphis. • He has voted for the Riverfront Development Corporation Budgets and for the light rail budget busting budgets. Now when it is apparent that the Memphis taxpayers want term limits, ethics reforms, open records reform, MLGW reform and it is possible to happen by the election of the Concerned Citizens of Memphis reform slate, all of a sudden he has a heavenly vision and wants terms limits. His cynical reform at the last minute deserves the contempt that he has earned.   May 30, 2006 It is good to look back on some watchdog articles which still apply. This week we were witness to the antics of the City council as they argued about which piece of pork they would get. Here are two comments from a Commercial Appeal editorial. "In my district, it looks like they cut everything out," Councilman Edmund Ford said. "We need to find some money -- I don't care where you get it from." Councilman Joe Brown, another of the malcontents, suggested that certain neighborhoods in his district were being targeted for cutbacks. Here are two comments from John Malmo, a lifelong Memphis resident and business leader. • Memphis is in dire financial condition. The primary reason is because all city council members are elected by district. No longer does any council member have to run city-wide. No longer does any councilman or woman have to answer to the entire city. • So we’ve had a couple decades of pork barrel spending. This year you get a community center, and I get a swimming pool. Next year your district gets a golf course, and I get a community center. That’s why the city’s so deep in debt. That’s why your taxes keep going up. That’s why people are fleeing Memphis. Here is a January 17, 2006 article concerning the results of this pork barrel attitude spending and budgeting. Add to these two, the recent closing of the Davy Crockett golf course. January 17, 2006 In view of the Mayor saying that the budget deficit of the last three years was an aberration, I decided to go out and look at two projects that the pork loving City Council and the City did in the last few years, the Whitehaven golf course and the Riverside golf course. I have reprinted below an earlier article posted on the park department portion of this website along with the pictures taken last Friday. Both of these courses are closed and not likely to reopen and we have $6 milliion dollars down the drain due to the City Council, the Mayor and particularly Tajuan Stout Mitchell and Edmund Ford. City Council Pork Barrel Since no city council seats are elected city-wide any more, each council member concerns himself/herself primarily with what is good for the district in which each is elected. It makes it easier for them to get re-elected. As a result, council members divvy up pork barrel projects for each one’s district with little regard to real city needs. Here are some recent examples of poor use of taxpayer money to benefit individual council members. • Whitehaven Golf Center $4 million for a golf course nobody will play plus $700,000 a year to maintain it. When the city council eliminated the Memphis Park Commission they said it was because the citizen-board disregarded the council priority list for park projects. One such project was the board’s refusal to rebuild the recently purchased Whitehaven Country Club property into a city golf course, as desired by council woman Tajuan Stout Mitchell. The board refused to do so because the $200,000 master plan for Memphis parks submitted by the park board (and approved earlier by the city council) called for that property to be turned into a multi-use, neighborhood park to replace McKellar Park, which had been sold to the airport authority. Outside experts who prepared the master plan recommended against any new city-owned golf facilities. The council approved the golf center in Ms. Mitchell’s district and allocated more than $4 million for a nine-hole golf course and community building. The parks division has included $700,000 in next year’s operating budget for maintenance and operation of the facility. After revenue from operations, this new center should place an additional half-million dollars a year burden on the city’s operating budget. When one former councilman was asked why it was approved, he answered, “Oh, we just had to give Tajuan her four million dollars.” • Riverside Golf Clubhouse $1.5 million for a “Taj Mahal” at a little-played golf facility After Mitchell got “her $4 million” for Whitehaven Golf Center, Councilman Edmund Ford then demanded a new clubhouse for Riverside Golf Course in his district, and the council, of course, approved. A new $1.5 million, 5,000-square-foot club house and snack bar will open soon at Riverside.That is more than twice the size of the clubhouse at the 18-hole golf course of the most expensive private country club in Memphis. Maintenance and operating costs, which already exceed revenue at Riverside, will now go up annually for taxpayers.   March 21, 2006 My name is Joe Saino and I have been active in open records requests in Memphis and Shelby County. After filing a suit in Chancery Court in February of 2005 as a result of a refusal to open the records of the City of Memphis, I have been able to get many records that needed to be reported to the public. I have been regularly reporting the results of these open records requests on memphiswatchdog.org. In my opinion, nothing is more important in keeping politicians and governmental bodies honest than good ethics laws and open records laws. I hope that local and state governments will propose strong ethics laws that apply statewide and also apply to local governments such as Memphis and Shelby County. However politicians hate tough ethics standards and tough sunshine laws. Concerning open records laws I have some proposals based on real world experience that I think should be part of any ethics and open records proposals. a) Local government units and boards should be required to post on the internet the following basic information and be required to keep it up to date. These postings will cut down on the number of open records requests. • Names, job titles, salaries, benefits, job descriptions, pension information such as years of completed pension service. • All contracts and bidding results on those contracts should be posted and payments based on those contracts should be posted. This would include HCD and MHA contracts and personal service contracts. • Audits of governmental units and pension plans should be posted. • Personnel policies, pension rules and job postings should be posted. • Pilots granted should be posted and all active Pilots and dates that they end should be posted. • All studies and outside governmental recommendations should be posted. • All agendas, minutes and ordinances should be posted. b) The person requesting the information should have the option to get the information in an electronic form (on a disc or email) if the documents that are presented to be reviewed came from a computer. If the documents are not in an electronic form, then the cost of the copy should be the same as any office supply shop (currently 6 to 8 cents per copy for an 8-1/2 x 11 black single sided copy) and the governmental unit should not be able to set any price they choose. (They are currently charging 25 cents to 1.25 per copy). They currently refuse to furnish it in an electronic form even though it is obvious that the offered copies come from a computer printout. The disc cost, if offered, should be the raw cost of the disc and not include labor and research. (See a recent email from Brian Kuhn, the Shelby County Attorney to see their attitude concerning this subject). c) Email records are increasingly important and should be made available on a disc with the same cost provision as above. Rules should be set to prevent destruction of email. d) Police records are a problem in Memphis and Shelby County as the police department is very hostile to records requests and require a front end fee before they will do anything. They should be subject to the same rules as any other unit of government. e) The requested records should be provided in a timely manner and this should be made specific with a maximum of one month from the date of request. f) Penalties should be harsh for a refusal to provide the records if the refusal requires the person asking for the records to file suit. It is apparent today that newspapers and TV media do not have the resources to do the research necessary to turn up governmental waste and fraud and it is up to the citizens through strong open records laws to take up the slack and to prevent further Tennessee Waltz type incidents. Governments generally like to operate in darkness. Taxpaying citizens want sunshine and transparency. Click here to read emails back and forth in order to get public records from Shelby County Government and they are one of the best in this regard. March 7, 2006 Recently in looking over my utility bill I noted the charges that are on the bill over and above my electric, gas and water charges. I pulled a bill from my records for January 12, 2005 and compared them to the most recent bill dated February 13, 2006. Here are the results. Non-MLGW charges Sewer charges 2005-$8.80 2006-$6.18 (this is based on volume of water used) Solid Waster Fee 2005-$7.50 2006-$19.00 Mosquito/Rodent Control Fee 2005-Nothing 2006-$0.75 Now the drainage fee is up for a second reading today at the City Council. This is to charge $2.18 per month starting in May and rising over time to $4.02 per month. These fees are in fact property taxes and the question must be asked how much in property taxes do they amount to over and above the property taxes we now pay. Remeber that a property tax increase was voted last year by the City Council. Well the sewer fee brought in $35 million in 2004 and is projected to bring in $50 million in 2006. The garbage fee is projected to bring in $43 million in 2006. We do not have a figure for the mosquito/rodent control fee or the new drainage fee but figure 250,000 households times the fees times 12 months or a least $10 million per year. Your property taxes are projected to bring in $189 million in 2006 to the operating budget, $66.5 million to the capital improvement budget and $85 million to the Memphis City Schools. This is a total of $340.5 million. So these fees add about 28% on average to your property taxes.This is a total of $95 million over and above your property taxes. Surprised? Me too. December 7, 2005 On this the anniversary of the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor are you aware that there was a substantial tax increase passed recently at the City Council? It is a new ordinance creating a STORM WATER ENTERPRISE FUND. We have attached below a copy of the ordinance. The cost is shown on page 4 and it goes from $2.54 per month for up to 3147 square feet of property in 2007 and will rise to $4.02 in 2011. Again, exempted properties will not have to pay the fee so it goes mostly again to homeowners. We do not have an estimate of the amount of money to be billed for this new fee but we estimate that it is a minimum of $12 million in 2007 and rising to $20 million in 2011. We will check further and let you know. Click here to see the new tax put on you by the Memphis City Council. November 6, 2005 There is a great article today in the Commercial Appeal about ethics in our City Council and local government. Click here to read this great CA story about local ethics or lack of ethics. October 17, 2005 Recently in an open records request to the City Attorney we asked for the following information. I want to inspect the documents and records that show the amount of payments from 1992 to the present time from the City of Memphis for legal services or for other services to Mr. Ricky Wilkins and Mr. Robert Spence. This would include but not necessarily be limited to the Lottery, the Convention Center, MLGW bonds or FedEx bonds and other matters. The answer gives great encouragement to struggling young lawyers. The partial answer I received is Spence received $310,912.44 from 4/1/04 to 7/1/05. Ricky Wilkins received $472,703.03 from 9/16/03 to 8/31/05. They are still compiling what was paid to the law firm of Burch, Porter when he worked there. In addition to this, look at what he got on the convention center dispute. Here is a portion of a letter from Sara Hall, the City Attorney. “Beginning July 1, 2004, the City and County entered into a flat monthly legal fee arrangement as to defense of the City in the Cook Convention Center litigation and all payments were made to Less, Getz & Lipman. Under this arrangement, Ricky Wilkins received $30,000 monthly from the flat amount paid to Less, Getz & Lipman for his representation of the City and County in this case.” Do the math. $30,000/month times 12 months equals $360,000/year. What a deal. Mr. Spence was the former City Attorney. Let us not forget that Spence, in his capacity as city attorney, signed off on the FedExForum deal, non-compete clause and all. Wilkins has close ties to the Mayor as his former campaign manager. We have earlier reported on Allan Wade, the attorney for the City Council and his additional private practice. They are all doing very well at the tax payer’s expense. Click here to see what legal services are costing the tax payers and who gets the benefits. Also check out the sweet deal Robert Lipscomb is getting in his dual jobs. October 13, 2005 As you pick up your morning paper or possibly you heard it on the news last night, Janet Hooks has resigned from the City Council and is taking the position of Director of Multicultural and Religious Affairs. Talk about a useless high paid job, this is the posterboy of jobs that goes throughout the Herenton administration. Narquenta Sims used to have this job and we have not heard where she is now going. The Mayor raised this job substantially last year and it is currently paying $74,263 annually. To this you can add 40 to 50 percent benefits. Please note that Ms. Sims, since she is in an appointed position, can retire based on the current salary under the January 2001 pension resolution and so can Ms. Hooks if she serves a year in the slot. This is what you current City Council voted for and it is costing millions, millions that we do not have. Ms. Hooks can be long remembered for her saying in City Council meetings that we do not have a spending problem, we have a revenue problem. This is further evidence that we need to replace the Mayor and the majority of the City Council before we can bring any semblance of fiscal discipline to this City. Also read below a recent article written by Carol Chumney. Click here to see what Carol Chumney has to say about the fiscal incompetence of the Herenton administration. October 5, 2005 Recently we sent an open records request to the Riverfront Development Corporation which is shown in a pdf file below. We received an answer also as shown below. In that answer Mr. Lendermon claims that RDC is not subject to the Tennessee Public Records Act, this in spite of the fact that on their website under financial highlights, they show a City Grant of $250,000 and receive City Money for Park Operations of $1,311,463. Also they show Contract Revenue of $3,557,996 which is undefined as to source. Sure sounds like taxpayer money to us. However, Mr. Lendermon graciously offered to sell us some information at 40 to 50 cents per page which we accepted. The RDC plans for our riverfront can be seen on their very nice website. Click here to see what RDC has planned for your riverfront. The history here is that the RDC had meetings on proposals and the overwhelming sentiment of the public is that the excessive taxpayer cost of public money (General Obligation Bonds) and the loss of public property does not justify the proposed projects. The City Council has approved the RDC plan and the Capital Improvement Budget from 2006 to 2010 has $52 million dollars scheduled, $39 million of which is financed by City of Memphis General Obligation Bonds. And furthermore, just this morning the Commecial Appeal said that the RDC is moving ahead on the $27 million riverboat landing at Beale Street (if the city council OKs $500,000 next week for dredging). No mention, of course, of operating costs vs. revenue or the bound-to-be-extraordinary maintenance costs of the sophisticated dock designs for river fluctuations. This is another example of an out of control Herenton Administration and a City Council that has a majority that goes along with these financially unsound schemes. Click here to see our open records request to the Riverfront Development Corporation. Click here to see RDC's answer to our open records request. Click here to see RDC financial highlights. Click here to see the CIP budget for the City of Memphis for the Riverfront. October 4, 2005 There was a recent editorial in the Commercial Appeal (September 20, 2005) which asked questions about the proposed light rail system which has been proposed by the Herenton Administration and the current City Council. The 2006 Capital Improvement Budget has $280 million dollars between 2007 and 2010 already listed for the light rail system. Whether a light rail system is right for Memphis and Shelby County is something that needs to be discussed in light of the high gas prices that the USA is currently experiencing and is likely to continue in the future. But there can be little doubt that a light rail system between the airport and downtown Memphis makes no sense at all. A light rail system between Germantown and/or Collierville and downtown might or might not make sense. But no one could make a reasonable case for a system between the airport and downtown except the downtown interests who own property there. I would make a guess that 80% or more of the people going to and from the airport do not come to or from downtown. And then there is the question of the cost of running and maintaining the system after it is installed and we have gotten all those Federal and State dollars that the City Council loves to tout. Well just look at the MATA trolley system which cost the City over $10 million dollars (and an overall cost of $104.5 million dollars) and is currently losing $3.5 million dollars each year. It is time we take the Herenton Administration and the current City Council to task and make them see the light of day and where their CIP projects are leading this financially strapped City. Joseph N. Saino  August 10, 2005 This letter shown above is particularly appropriate and timely as this new hire and salary will come before the City Council next week for a vote. It is hard to justify an additional $98,000 salary for another communications person when you see what is already in place. Remember that in the Sunday edition of the Commercial Appeal (July 24th, 2005) there was an 8 page insert (puff piece) with lots of pictures of Joe Lee and very little real needed information. I have asked for the cost of this piece and will publish the information when I receive it. The same information could have been conveyed in a billing insert. Also click below to go to Channel 13's news report to see two items about the MLGW concerning the hiring of Odell Horton Jr. as general counsel and the near riot concerning utility assistance. Click here to go to channel 13's website to see information on utility assistance and Lee's choice for general counsel. July 15, 2005 Yesterday I sent a email to Carol Chumney and received a reply as shown below. What ever happened to the City Council investigating MLGW Bond deal where the Mayor forced use of certain lawyers/finance people? I think Tom Marshall was to “lead”. Can you provide an update? Joe Saino They closed it down last fall without getting the answers to many of the questions. Here's a copy of my letter to Tom Marshall sent prior to the decision by his Committee to again shut the investigation down. Carol Chumney See below her letter to Mr. Tom Marshall. Click here to see Carol Chumney's letter to Tom Marshall asking questions about the Herentons, father and son. July 27, 2005 We have been aware for some time that the Grandmother of City Council member Ricky Peete is having a house built for her as part of a government program that assists citizens to repair or rebuild their homes. As you can imagine, many people are interested in obtaining money through these programs and the waiting list is very long. Ms. Lizzie Jones, the Grandmother of Ricky Peete, used to live at 268 Bethel. Now she is having a house worth around $70,000 built for her at 500 N. 6th. Ms. Jones's old house was repaired under this program which would ordinarily disqualify her for further assistance. However, she somehow moved to the head of the line and is now having a completely new house built for her with her moving costs and storage costs paid in the meantime. We have put a link from channel 24 with a video story of how Ms. Jones moved to the top of the list. Ricky denies any influence in this matter. Click here to see Jenny DiPrizio's great story on abc24,com July 25, 2005 There was an article in the Sunday, July 24th 2005, issue of the CA with the heading “Retirees get sweet deal on insurance, government jobs pay off in premiums”. This article pointed out things that we have been talking about on this website for some time, the fact that local government jobs are great jobs with better salaries and benefits than are normally available in the local private sector jobs. The article pointed out many problems ahead and mentioned a new government accounting requirement that will soon require governments to report their long term obligations associated with post employment benefits. The reason for the problem seems obvious as does the solution. Local governments generally allow retirement after 25 years regardless of age. This allows people to retire at age 50 to 55 and then start receiving their health care benefits with most of the premium cost paid by taxpayers. This should be changed to require those not eligible for medicare to pay a much higher percentage of this premium, if not all of it, to encourage them to not retire early and work on to a medicare eligible age like the general taxpaying public. This will keep experienced people working and hold down the numbers in the retiree population. This early retirement benefit is generally only available in the public employment sector and should be changed to make the public employee benefits more like the taxpaying private sector. June 9, 2005 After the circus at the City Council meeting the other day, the question remains "Was the law followed on setting the tax rate?" Here is an explanation of the law. My question is this. Here is the procedure that is supposed to be followed in setting a tax rate above the certified rate. Was this followed the other night? Certified tax rates Higher values during a reappraisal do not necessarily mean higher taxes. The law requires the counties and cities to reexamine property tax rates after a reappraisal to make sure higher taxable values do not automatically result in a tax increase. Known as the certified tax rate law or “truth-in-taxation”, the law requires local governments to conduct public hearings before adopting a property tax rate that generates more taxes overall in a reappraisal year than were billed the year before at the previous year’s lower values. If the new tax rate following a revaluation does not exceed the certified rate, the average tax bill may actually remain the same. If the property value increased as the result of the revaluation more than the average, the taxes may be somewhat higher, while if the value increased less than the average, the tax bill may actually be lower in a revaluation year compared to the year before. Once a certified rate is calculated by the assessor and chief executive of the tax jurisdiction, and reviewed by the State Board of Equalization, it is submitted to the jurisdiction’s governing body for formal determination, usually for consideration with the budget. If the budget will require an increase above the certified rate, the governing body must publish notice of a public hearing on whether to exceed the certified rate and then may proceed to adopt an actual tax rate after the hearing. If the certified tax rate is exceeded, the jurisdiction must send the State Board of Equalization an affidavit of publication for the hearing notice, and a certified copy of the final tax rate ordinance or resolution. Questions about the certified tax rate law may be directed to the State Board of Equalization at (615) 401-7883, or e-mailed to sb.web@state.tn.us. June 8, 2006 PROPERTY TAX INCREASE I went to the extended City Council meeting yesterday and it was not pretty. The Mayor recommended a 54 cent increase but we ended up with a 27 cents increase. The base rate of 3.2304 was first reduced to 3.16 (only a 2.8% decrease whereas the assessment increase since the reassessment was 11.5%. Apparently the law allows the current rate to be reduced less than the assessment increase due to possible future appeals for appraisal reductions). The 3.16 rate was then increased by 27 cents to 3.43, a 6.1% increase. If you include the the full 11.5% assessment increase, the true increase in property taxes was 18.2%. The Council vote was 7 to 6 which was interesting. Voting for the increase were Ford, Jones, Holt, Hooks, Lowery, Mitchell, Peete and Jones. Voting against it were Chumney, Sammons, Brown, Marshall, McCormick and Taylor. The entertainment was furnished by the Trio of Mayor Herenton singing with Janet Hooks and Tajuan Stout Mitchell singing their favorite song, WE AINT GOT NO SPENDING PROBLEM, WE GOT A REVENUE PROBLEM. The words go as follows. We need more tax money So we can buy more honey Our task is to make more city jobs And shut our ears to taxpayer sobs So get your checkbooks out quick Write out a check and don’t be sick We’ve been here for ever and a day And expect the voters to keep it that way. May 15, 2005 In Sunday’s May 15th Commercial Appeal there were the following quotes from long term City Council members which shows how unqualified they are for this important job. Speaking about the City of Memphis’s almost 1 billion dollar debt, 13 year veteran City Councilman Myron Lowery said “I think anytime somebody’s debt increases 300 percent in a 10-year period, it’s time to take a serious look at your spending.” CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS! WHAT THE HECK WAS HE DOING DURING THIS PERIOD. E. C. Jones, a 10 year veteran said “If the city had slowed its spending five to seven years ago, it would be in much better shape. But projects supporting Downtown development and others pushed by Herenton took precedence. He’s come down with projects and people just went along with them.” And then he went on to highlight the real problem with City Council that is mostly elected by districts. He said “He would have no problem delaying each council district’s projects for one year, but I’m not going to delay all of mine while everybody else is getting theirs.” IF YOU GET YOUR PORK, I HAVE TO GET MINE IS WHAT HE MEANT. As of June 30, 2002 general obligation debt out standing for the State of Tennessee was $1.14 billion in bonds and $110 million in commercial paper. Shelby County has $1.7 billion and Memphis has $917 million.  Political ethics are very much in the news today what with John Ford, Tom DeLay and others. The Tennessee legislature has recently upgraded its own ethical standards and we feel that it is about time for the Memphis City Council and other branches of local government to do the same. The new state ethics law applies to county and city governments also but we need to change our own local ethics laws in the City and County Charters to apply to local situations. Recently during our open records request to the Memphis City School System, we obtained a copy of the O.T. Marshall contract for the Central Nutrition Center dated December 12, 2000. It was for $630,500. We also obtained an agreement dated July 23, 2003 for E.F.S. (Educational Facilities Solutions, A Joint Venture with Tom Marshall as a managing partner) for Construction Consultant Services for $600,000. Additionally we obtained a payment print out for EFS starting in 2003 to 2005 for $2,729320.45. Also another one for Self Tucker Architects (Jimmy Tucker is also a managing partner of E.F.S.) starting back in 1998 to 2003 for $563,984.08 and yet another for O. T. Marshall starting in 1998 to 2003 for $1,903,797.98. The city council provides more than $80 million funding for city schools. Whether a council member (Tom Marshall) recuses himself or not, we do not believe that anybody would think it is not a conflict of interest for a council member to be doing business at any level, much less these huge amounts, with any "customer" that is so dependent upon the council's actions. Even upon voting recusal, such a member can have great influence on other members. Marshall is the senior member of the council (19 years), and, as such, is bound to have great influence on other members. If Councilman Joe Brown's janitorial firm had the cleaning contract with city schools, but recused himself from school votes, we'd think that stinks. Where's the difference?. Does this pass the smell test?  ANALYSIS OF THE COST OF THE JANUARY 2001 PENSION RESOLUTION
Analysis of the Real Cost of the City Council Decision to Adopt the January 2001 Pension Resolution Allowing Elected and Appointed Employees of the City to Retire After 12 years Regardless of Age. 27 people have already retired under this pension change as of November 2004. These people are currently costing the taxpayers $675,000 per year and as of March 2005,the total cost to date is 1.6 million dollars. They retired with an average length of service of 13 years and under the pension system before the City Council passed the resolution, they would have had to work for another 12 years to receive the normal pension after 25 years. The true cost of this change for these 27 already retired will be $6,143,000. This is the amount that would not have been paid in the future had the City Council not passed this change. There are another 281 appointed employees who have not yet retired under this resolution and their combined salaries are $16.1 million dollars. If they all retire at 12 years, it will cost an additional 4.8 million dollars per year and the cost over the following 13 years that they would have had to wait if the City Council had not passed this resolution is 62 million dollars. How do you like that for astute leadership and a financially sound decision from the Memphis City Council? And this does not take into account the paid insurance and other retirement perks that these retirees get. Also consider that they are retiring at an average age of 50 years old. WE WILL BE PAYING FOR THIS MISTAKE FOR MANY MANY YEARS !!!! THE MEMPHIS CITY COUNCIL, PAST AND PRESENT  Our present mayor-council form of government was created in a November 1966 election referendum by a vote of 56,808 to 39,211. Downing Pryor led the long and often bitter fight to adopt the new form of government. In a debate before the election, former Mayor Henry Loeb argued that any change would be a change for the better and that the proposed mayor-council form would be more economical than the City Commission form. Mayor William B. Ingram charged that the mayor-council form was a political move by people who want to gain control of your government and furthermore that the change would result in a tax increase. Well Mayor Ingram certainly called that one correctly. The first City Council was sworn in on January 2, 1968 and consisted of Tom Todd, Downing Pryor, Philip Perel, J. O. Patterson Jr., Rev. James Netters, W. T. McAdams, Bob James, Billy Hyman, Lewis Donelson, Fred Davis, Wyeth Chandler, Jerred Blanchard and Mrs. Gwen Awsumb. Henry Loeb was Mayor. The new City Charter prescribed the following rules for the City Council. It was composed of 13 members, 7 elected from districts and 6 elected at large. The Council was to perform legislative functions including passage of ordinances, approval of budgets submitted by the Mayor, conduct hearing on matters of civic interest, approve appointees proposed by the Mayor, hear appeals from the Planning Commission and review operations of administrative departments. The Councilmen were prohibited from dealing directly with administrative personnel. The Memphis City Charter makes it clear that except for the “purposes of inquiry or investigation” council members shall deal with city administrative officers and employees only through the mayor’s office. The charter declares: “Neither the council not any member thereof shall give orders directly to the mayor’s subordinates or otherwise interfere with the operation of the administrative departments through such means as directing or requesting the appointment or removal of any of the mayor’s subordinates or by suggesting or promoting the making of particular purchases (from) any specific organization or by applying for special services not available to all citizens. The charter says any councilman convicted of violating this section will lose his office immediately. The next major shift in the formation of the Memphis City Council came in 1991 with a federal lawsuit against the Memphis City Government asking that all elections be barred until city runoff elections and the six at-large City Council seats were abolished. The Federal Government charged that the runoffs diluted the voting power of blacks. In a consent decree, it was agreed that there would be in addition to the seven districts, that there would be two super districts with three seats each for a total of thirteen councilman. This virtually assured the african americans of a majority on the City Council. The City Council passed Ordinance #4382 by a 12-0 vote on December 19, 1995. This ordinance gave theCity Council members their first raise (from $6,000 to $20,100) in nearly 30 years. After a lot of debate they decided not to make it retroactive. The measure passed in the next general election, November 5, 1996. The really bad feature of this ordinance was proposed by Mayor Herenton who would make the council pay equal to Shelby County Commission pay which means that the City Council never has to vote for a pay increase in the future as every pay increase the County Commissions get, they get automatically. Real courage. LATEST OUTRAGE FROM OUR CITY COUNCIL
Just when you thought they could not do anything worse, the City Council proved us wrong. City Council Chairman Joe Brown (of Iraq security fame) raised the salaries of the 11 member City Council staff including one that was more than $17,000. Now we find that Mayor Herenton approved the raises which were done without a City Council vote. Then the Mayor increased the City Council's attorney's salary (Allan Wade) from $58,000 to $80,000. This is the same Allan Wade who sues the taypayers using the taxpayer's money. Then on top of this we find other raises that the Mayor has given. One that stands out is a $15,363 pay raise to Narquenta Sims (from $54,636 to $70,000) for the critically important job as the Multicultural and Religious Affairs manager. No wonder the taxpayers of Memphis are sick and tired of the Mayor and the City Council. P. S. January 18, 2005 Due to the publicity received concerning the raises authorized for the City Council staff, these raises were rescinded by the City Council. However, the mayor's raises for Allan Wade (a 36.7% increase from $58,527.00 to $80,001.00) and other raises for his assistants were not rescinded. I hope you did not miss the story of the $400 gift to the retiring chairman, Joe Brown, from the other members of the City Council, a beautiful Mont Blanc pen. The real question here is not whether Chairman Brown should be given a gift, but why the council used taxpayers' money for the gift. If they were so appreciative of his year long efforts, why did they not pay for it out of their own pockets. Never occurred to them. February 21, 2006 I thought that the MLGW policies were bad before Max Williams left but I ascribed that to Joe Lee and his penchant for secrecy. What would you expect from someone who came with his training obtained from City Hall. However, Odell Horton Jr. is now personally taking a hand in the obstruction of the public’s right to know about the company that all of the taxpayers and ratepayers own. I show below an open records request that I sent on December 21, 2005 to the MLGW. On item 3, I asked for the records and documents that shows all legal and other fees paid by MLGW in the case of the TVA electric bonds. The documents should show to whom the fees were paid and the dates of the payments and for what services. His answer lists I payment of $24,961,21. Also with the one sheet shown, I received a letter from Mr. Horton saying that was all that was paid. I guess I did not word my request exactly right and he took the opportunity to not tell the full story. However look at the answers obtained by City Councilman E. C. Jones from the MLGW to a very similar request, $8.244 million dollars. I suppose Mr. Horton would contend that the money was not paid directly from the MLGW but as a fee from the bonds. However in a letter dated July 24, 2002, the Memphis Light Gas and Water Division agreed to pay a fee of $7.5 million to J.P. Morgan and more to other participants. Mr. Horton takes every opportunity to tell less than the whole story. Included in the file is a number of interesting letters detailing how the Mayor worked to get a percentage of the pie for his buddies. Read and prepare to vote Willie out of office in 2007. Click here to see my open record request and the answer that was not a forthcoming answer. Click here to see who got the bacon on the mlgw 1.5 billion dollar electric bond issue. | HOW QUALIFIED IS OUR CITY COUNCIL? | MISTAKES THAT HAVE COST YOU MONEY | | Return Home | TODAYS NEWS AND MAIL | MEMPHIS CITY GOVERNMENT NEWS | MEMPHIS CITY COUNCIL NEWS | MLG&W NEWS | SHELBY COUNTY GOVERNMENT | CONTACT US | FAQ Page | MEMPHIS BRIDGE | |
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