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GO TO OUR NEW BLOGS AND COMMENT ON OUR ARTICLES AND ON THE CHARTER COMMISSION. WE WILL PUBLISH NEW MATERIAL BOTH HERE AND ON OUR NEW BLOGS, shelbywatchdog.blogspot.com and chartercommission.blogspot.com. Click here to go to our new blog and comment on articles. Click here to go to our new charter commission blog and comment on needed changes to the charter. WE PLAN TO PUBLISH DAILY NEWS ITEMS ALONG WITH YOUR EMAILS AND OTHER COMMUNICATIONS. WE NEED YOUR HELP AS REPORTERS TO KEEP US INFORMED AS TO WHAT IS GOING ON IN THE CITY ADMINISTRATION, THE CITY COUNCIL, THE MLG&W AND OTHER BRANCHES OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT. WE WANT TRUE FACTS NOT JUST RUMORS. GIVE US WHAT YOU HAVE AND WE WILL PUBLISH IT HERE DAILY. WEBMASTER  October 24, 2006 The above statement was in a CA article this morning. Watchdog has been publishing examples of how the City of Memphis can save money. They should implement these savings and sources of revenue before they consider any new taxes. Here are some examples of big hits on local government by Herenton and city council 1. Linebarger contract- 5 million savings per year, cancel this stupid self serving contract and let Bob Patterson collect delinquent taxes. 2. Mata trolley system- 3 million loss per year, do away with this money losing system. 3. January 2001 pension resolution-over 60 million in present and future costs and current cost to date $3.6 million. This is an example of how the Mayor and the City Council threw away our scarce tax money. 4. Convention Center contract-60 million cost overrun over the initial bid, another example of how they wasted our tax money. 5. Fed Ex arena- 32 million left in pyramid debt and what happened to the extra floor of the parking garage and where is the intermodal transfer point and what happened to the original plans and specifications that no one can seem to find to compare with the “as built” drawings and specs? Some people should go to jail for this scam. 6. Appointed people over and above what is needed or allowed by the City Charter. Lay these people off and save $5 million per year. 7. Pilots and exempt properties $52 million per year. We desperately need independent oversight on this program and the City Council taking it over will not provide it. 8. Professional contract given to friends of the Mayor. Change this provision of the City Charter, really get competitive bids and save millions. 9. Don't build the Beale Street Landing as it is not needed and will save $27.5 million. October 20, 2006 Watchdog asked for the racial makeup of the City of Memphis employees and also their names, dates of employment and salaries. We have studied the results and we find that the racial makeup of the full time employees fairly matches the 2000 census figures for racial makeup of the City of Memphis. However we do find a discrepancy that is interesting. Maybe there is an explanation and we will check and report. • These reports show 6458 full time employees and 1751 temporary employees. However the 2007 budget shows 5578 employees. This is quite a difference. Click here to see a list of full time City of Memphis employees with their salaries, hire dates and their ethnic designation. Click here to see the list of temporary City of Memphis employees with their hourly rates or flat job rates, hire dates and their ethnic designation. October 16, 2006 The CA published a recap of this case brought by the partnership of Flautt and Mann against the City Council. The case is long running and complicated but what is clear is that Allan Wade, the well paid attorney for the City Council and recipient of lots of highly paid City legal work has cost the taxpayers of Memphis $1.8 million and counting at $1500 per day because he has flouted the court and is in willful contempt. But what does he care, it is only taxpayers’ money, not his or the City Council’s. The article was published in the CA on October 13, 2006 in the local news section under the heading “City’s tab: $1,000 a day”. This is just one of many incidents where Allan Wade has cost the taxpayers money. Take the case of William L. Thompson and his pensions from the MLGW. Larry Thompson was an employee of the MLGW and one of the most capable and respected employees at the Division. He should have succeeded Herman Morris as President but instead the Mayor appointed the failed director of Finance for the City, Joe Lee. Then Joe Lee forced Larry out at MLGW and in the process two of the board members talked privately and illegally about the severance agreement that the Division had with Mr. Thompson and they admitted this. (Rev. Netters and Olin Morris). Mr. Lee was trying to get rid of Mr. Thompson without honoring the severance agreement. Mr. Thompson took them to court and has won the case at this point. To date this has cost the taxpayers $73,645.68 of which $44,406.55 has been paid to Allan Wade to represent Mr. Lee. The balance of $29,239.13 has been paid to the Bogatin Law Firm. This is what it is costing the taxpayers to not do the right thing and honor a legal agreement. But who cares, it is only taxpayers money. Click here to see what the MLGW, Joe Lee and Allan Wade are costing you in a losing legal battle that should have never been brought. October 11, 2001 One of the worst decisions of our city government, both the Mayor and the City Council, was the unanimous approval of the January 2001 pension resolution allowing elected and appointed officials to retire after 12 years of service, regardless of age. Recently, watchdog asked for the cost information of this decision in an open records request. Here are the results. • The current annual cost of the pension payments as of august 2006 is $1,292,862. • The current annual cost of the medical premiums by the City is $393,000. • The total cost to date from the start date of January 16, 2001 is $3,653,503. • The total cost until all the eligible people have retired under this program is unknown but this is only for 56 people and there are hundreds more that are eligible. It will be well over $60 million dollars. Click below to see those who are receiving this largess and note some familiar names. • Roland McElrath, Director of Finance, who is now back working for the City. • Rick Masson, former Chief Administrative Office, who is now chairman of the MLGW board. • Robert Spence, former City Attorney, and now doing lots of City paid legal work. Click here to see who retired under this very expensive plan proposed by Mayor Herenton and voted for unanimously by the City Council in January 2001. October 11, 2006 Even a watchdog has to take a break now and then and this one just got back from a 19 day vacation. However I am back on the job and have some juicy items for our readers. Hold onto your hats. Regards, the Memphis Watchdog September 18, 2006 On next Tuesday, September 19, 2006 there is an item approving $50,000 to the Mid-South Minority Business Council. This is MLGW ratepayers’ money and that is not the only public taxpayers’ money the MMBC has received. Click here to see the agenda item (page 5, item 17) giving $50,000 of ratepayers' money to the MMBC Click here to see the previous payments to MMBC from MLGW with rate payer money. In April of this year watchdog asked in an open records request to see their records. They arrogantly refused to open their records. Read below to see the open records request and their answer. Watchdog again calls on them to open their records and if they do not do so voluntarily, then watchdog will file a lawsuit to open up this can of worms. AN OPEN RECORDS REQUEST TO THE MID-SOUTH MINORITY BUSINESS COUNCIL May 10, 2006 Watchdog has sent the following open records letter to the Mid-South Minority Business Council. April 28, 2006 Mr. Luke Yancy III President & Chief Executive Officer Mid-South Minority Business Council 158 Madison Avenue, Suite 300 Memphis, TN 38103 Dear Mr. Yancey, Since the Mid-South Minority Business Council receives public rate payer and tax payer monies and as a taxpayer of the City of Memphis and Shelby County I would like to inspect the municipal documents and records in accordance with the Tennessee Open Records Law that contain the following specific information. 1. The records and documents that show the names, yearly salaries, birth dates, job titles, years of completed creditable service towards retirement for all employees of the Mid-South Minority Business Council including the Board Members. 2. The records and documents that show which of the above employees listed in item 1 receive car allowances and which receive cell phone services and the cost of car allowances and cell phone services (whether paid for by Memphis or Shelby County or by some third party other than the employee) for each person who receive these benefits. 3. The records and documents that show the benefits and perks, including life and medical insurance, that you and the employees and board members receive. 4. The records and documents that show the operating budget for the Mid-South Minority Business Council for the fiscal years 2004 and 2005. 5. The records and documents that show all legal fees paid for the above fiscal years showing who they were paid to and the purpose of the legal expense. 6. The records and documents that show how companies apply for certification, and that show for 2004 and 2005 those that applied and those that were approved and those that were not approved. Also I want to see the list of those currently approved for minority business participation. I trust that you will inform promptly whatever department and personnel are necessary to make these documents ready for my inspection. In accordance with the open records laws I may want copies of some or all of the documents after inspection. Since I assume also that the documents containing the information requested should be available readily in file or on a computer, I should like to inspect the documents on Monday, May 8, 2006 at a time on that date at your convenience. If you need additional information or have questions about this request, I am available during working hours at 754-0699. Sincerely yours, We received the reply shown below by courier within a few days. Also take a look at the 990 tax return for the “NON-PROFIT” MMBC showing that in 2004 they had $684,301 in net assets (page 3, line 73). Why do they need ratepayer and taxpayer money? What are they doing with this money? Good questions. Click here to see the IRS form 990 for 2004 for MMBC, page 3, line 73. Click here to see the reply from Luke Yancey to watchdog's open records request to see how our tax money is being spent. September 15, 2006 Congratulations to Dedrick Brittenum to speak about cutting back on the obscene number of PILOTS in Memphis and Shelby County and to consider it is time to cutback and lower spending and property taxes. However, it will be a difficult process because when you look at who is getting the reductions, you see a reflection of who contributes the most to the Herenton Administration and local politicians. Click below to see who is getting the meat while the taxpayers are getting the bone. Click here to see what companies and individuals are getting the juicy PILOTS while the taxpayers get the bones. What is really needed is honest oversight on the PILOTS. Are these people living up to their promises of average salaries and job creations that they promised initially when they got the PILOT. I can guarantee that there is no honest and effective oversight. Click below to read the report that Mr. Brittenum read which indicates that these PILOTS are a giveaway and do not achieve what they promise. Also look at the following property tax rates for Memphis and Shelby County versus surrounding counties and Davidson (Nashville) county. Click here to read the report on PILOTS in Memphis and Shelby County. Property Tax rate comparisons • Memphis $7.4732 • Germantown 5.63 • Collierville 5.37 • Shelby County 4.09 • Nashville 4.69 • Davidson County 4.04 • Fayette County 1.74 • Tipton County 2.85 September 11, 2006 Watchdog was pointed to some statistics showing the State of the City (Memphis) and in some cases comparing Memphis to other similar cities. The statistics were provided through the Hope Christian Community Foundation. The full website is found at www.hopeccf.org. Click here to see the statistics about Memphis and Shelby County General Demographics- The population of Memphis and Shelby County are down for the period 2000 through 2005 by 1.2% for Memphis to .8% for Shelby County. In contrast, the population of the Memphis Metro Area (Tennessee, Mississippi and Arkansas) increased by 2.6%. So obviously people are moving out of Memphis and Shelby County. Memphis is 62.9% African American, 30% white and 7.1% Hispanic, Latino or others. Shelby County (including Memphis) is 50.9% African American, 42.4% white and 6.6% Hispanic or others. Labor Market- The labor force went from 441,250 in 2000 to 432,400 in 2005 with the unemployment rate going from 3.9% in 2000 to 6.4% in 2005. 16.1% of those employed work for governments in some form or another. Education- Memphis graduates 66% of its students whereas Shelby County graduates 89% and Tennessee graduates 78%. However the average expenditure per student in Memphis is $8602 versus $7007 for Shelby County and $7366 for Tennessee. FBI Statistics- The crime rate per 100,000 population for violent crimes is 1009 for Memphis versus 872 for Nashville and 554 for Dallas. The murder rate is 9.7 for Memphis versus 6.0 for Nashville and 7.3 for Dallas and 25.5 for New Orleans. Burglary is 1600 for Memphis versus 805 for Nashville. It is obvious that Memphis has problems and that some changes are needed to address these problems and propose some solutions. September 3, 2006 The rush to a living wage ordinance is hard for a politician to resist. How can you be against it? Don’t you believe in helping your neighbor? In church yesterday, my pastor requested that we sign cards urging the City Council to pass the ordinance. He said that all recipients of PILOT’s (payments in lieu of taxes) also toe the line and be included. He gave anecdotal evidence of other cities that had passed such ordinances and said that the City of Santa Fe had passed a city wide living wage ordinance. (He did not mention that Santa Fe is one of the wealthiest cities in the country). My problem with the fast passing of this ordinance is this. Has anyone done an analysis of the cost and benefits of this ordinance? I ask the following questions and think that these should be answered before passing this ordinance. • What is the annual cost to the taxpayers of this ordinance? How many permanent and temporary city employees now receive less than the proposed living wage and what is the annual cost to bring them up to the living wage? • How many city contractors paid less than the living wage last year and what would have been the cost to the taxpayers and the budget for the last fiscal year if the living wage ordinance had been in effect? • How many PILOT recipients pay less than the living wage and would they have accepted the PILOTS in the past if the living wage ordinance had been in effect? • Who is going to do the oversight on City contractors and PILOT recipients to make sure that they live up to the ordinance? Oversight, or lack of it, has always been the problem with all government programs, particularly City of Memphis programs. Only after these questions have been answered, can a informed decision be made on this proposal. Without the information, it is a feel good decision made on the basis on anecdotal evidence and stories. September 7, 2006 Shown below is an example of an open records request asking for clarification concerning watchdog’s request concerning how many Memphis vehicles have passed the required inspection test in order to buy car tags and how many vehicles did not pass the test. That seems to watchdog to be a fairly simple request. The answers are shown below. If any reader can answer my question, I would appreciate an answer. My guess is that 353,206 passed the test and 73,906 did not pass the test and did not pay their taxes and are still driving around on Memphis streets. That is over $2 million dollars in taxes not paid plus unsafe vehicles driving on our streets. HERE IS THE ANSWER FROM TAUYNA FALKNER MOTOR VEHICLE INSPECTION BUREAU FY 04 DATA SUMMARY The United States Environmental Protection Agency requires the City of Memphis Motor Vehicle Inspection Bureau to submit emissions inspection data on an annual basis (calendar year). The data reported in the City of Memphis Budget book is on a fiscal year basis. Listed below is the description of the FY04 data. A. Initial Tests – This data represents the first time a vehicle is inspected for emissions on an annually. Initial Tests for FY04 is 353,206 B. Total Tests – This data represents all the inspection test performs (initial, retests, safety, fleet ). Total Tests for FY04 is 427,112 C. Percent fail for emissions – This data represents the number of initial vehicle failures for emissions. The emission failures for FY04 is 11.5%. D. Percent failed for safety – This data represents the vehicles failed first time for safety. The safety failures for FY04 is 11.85%. The data supplied to Mr. Saino by the Jayne Cresson’s Shelby County Clerk’s Office is the current registration data and has so many variables that it cannot be compared to City of Memphis FY04 data. From: joseph saino Sent: Sunday, September 03, 2006 10:22 AM To: Falkner, Taunya Subject: RE: various open records matters HERE IS MY REQUEST TO THE CITY ATTORNEY Thank you for your reply. What I want to know and I think I asked for is the following. How many individual cars passed the test in FY 04 and how many other individual cars never passed the complete test and did not receive their certificate in order to make them eligible to buy their license renewals? I would appreciate an answer to these two questions. Regards, Joe Saino Here is the answer to the above request. According to the Public Services Division, the City of Memphis Motor Vehicle Inspection Bureau does not have access to this information nor generates a related report. Thank you! Taunya Falkner City of Memphis - Public Records Coordinator 125 N. Main Street, Room 336 Memphis, TN 38103 ________________________________________ August 31, 2006 You may remember the sad story of the indictment of Michael Hooks and his admission of guilt. His wife, Janet Hooks, was a member of the City Council and she resigned her position to take a job in the Herenton administration in order to make a better salary than she was receiving as a City Council member. She was appointed to the position of Director of Multicultural Affairs and Religious Affairs. See the attached letter from the Mayor appointing her to this post and also see the link to look at the website for this position. If there ever was a made up patronage job, this is the poster child for these positions. The former holder of this position, who was making a similar amount of money, was Ms. Naquinta Sims. Because of the January 2001 pension resolution allowing elected and appointed people to retire regardless of age after 12 years of service, she is now receiving a pension of $24,797.52 per year regardless of her age. She is also entitled to the generous medical benefits of retirees where the City pays 70% of the premiums. This pension will cost the taxpayers well over one million dollars over her lifetime. But consider the improved situation for Janet Hooks. She will now be able to retire from this position should she choose to do so with a pension based on her new salary ($74,263.08) calculated on the basis of 2.5% of monthly compensation times the years of service. She has been on the City Council for about 15 years and may have other creditable years of service somewhere else in the system. This will end up costing the taxpayers several millions dollars over her lifetime. This scenario runs through the list of appointed positions and needs to be changed. Hopefully the taxpayers will demand that the Charter Commission vote for this change so the taxpayers can put a stop to this abuse. Click here to see the webpage for the Director of Multicultural and Religious Affairs for the City of Memphis Click here to read the Mayor's letter of appointment for Janet Hooks and the details of the pension of Ms. Naquintas Sims. August 30, 2006 I just received an email from a brave soul with knowledge of Shelby County government. Thank you for alerting watchdog. The message points out an upcoming bid package for the County BID NO SB I001230 for Dell Computers. The bid due date is September 12, 2006 at 2:30 PM. The whistle blower points out that the County can buy Dell computers off of a State contract for a very cheap price with a considerable savings over the likely winner of this bid, Thomas Consultants. Click here to see the County bid sheet. Watchdog has posted a lot of information on Thomas Consultants in the past pointing out their successful contracts with the MLGW, the City of Memphis and the County. Here is a partial list of Thomas Consultants deals. • MLGW for $1,974,572 • MLGW for $1,420,812 • City of Memphis thru the ACS contract for $2,351,055 • Shelby County Government for $934,856.21 We have been told that Thomas Consultants does a good job. The point is what is it costing the taxpayers for these minority contracts? We do not know although the Shelby County contract appeared to cost more than a quarter million dollars over and above the Gateway price. The success of Thomas Consultants raises the question of whether this firm should be graduated. I refer to a letter dated April 20, 2004 to the Mid-South Minority Business Council from Carlee M. McCullough, Esq., Contract Compliance Officer. In this letter she pointed out the graduation of Gipson Mechanical. Surely Thomas Consultants more than meets this requirement and no longer deserves special consideration at the expense of the taxpayer. Click here to read about Gipson Mechanical's graduation from the minority preference program. July 31, 2006 Yesterday the Commercial Appeal quoted Mayor Herenton in connection with the Charter Commission as follows. “There is a hidden agenda among some charter commission candidates, inspired by a movement originating outside the city limits, to upset the balance between the legislative and executive branches. The Mayor-Council form provides for a strong chief executive officer with sole contracting authority and they want to change that. They want to put limitations on the authority and responsibility of the mayor. That’s what ther’re really getting at.” Watchdog admits to wanting to stop this Mayor and any future Mayors from being able to award contracts without any other oversight or approval, contracts and actions such as the ones shown below. • The Linebarger contract for the collection of unpaid taxes which the Mayor gave to law firm buddies in Dallas which provided for a 20% commission rate whereas Bob Patterson, the County Trustee was willing to do the same job for 2%. This has cost the taxpayers $5 million dollars per year. Can you think of any legal reason why someone would do this? • The ACS contract for computer services and supplies which provides in the contract for no bid purchase orders to certain favored firms run by supporters of the Mayor. Reginald French (Integrate Technologies) $1.4 million, Marvell Mitchell (Mitchell Technology Group), $1.8 million, Darrell K. Thomas (Thomas Consultants), $2.3 million and others for a total of $11 million. This has cost the taxpayers at least $2.75 million over and above competitive bids. • The Oracle contract in which the City refuses to reveal the connection of Reginald French with Oracle and the amount of any commission on this $9 million dollar contract. • The over 281 appointed employees over and above that allowed by the City Charter. By laying off only 112 of these people, we could save $5 million per year in salaries but the Mayor has refused to consider laying off his patronage employee friends and the City Council has done nothing to correct this situation. So, Commercial Appeal, we do have an agenda but it is not hidden. It is to bring fiscal sanity and discipline to City Government regardless of who is the Mayor, now or in the future. August 29, 2007 A thoughtful and informed reader of watchdog has sent in the following email in response to this article. The problem is weak laws and lack of enforcement of those laws we do have. The result is a loss of tax income and unsafe cars on our streets. This is an enforcement issue. If the failed inspection cars are still on Memphis streets, they are operating with expired, or bogus, tags because, if you live in the city limits, you can't renew your registration without proof of inspection. The solution is stepped up police enforcement. These are people who don't give a damn about most laws ... much less, vehicle registration laws. The cops need to be pulling over every car they see with expired, or no, tags and arresting / citing the driver & impounding the "illegal" vehicle. These vehicles are on the streets illegally and most are probably not insured. I see cars all the time with no, or expired, tags. It's simply "one more thing" the police tend to ignore (unless it coincides with a traffic stop). Kind of like parking in handicapped spots, litterbugs, loud exhausts & stereos, etc. The city, or the county, could easily develop a list of unregistered / uninspected vehicles in the city ... but, what good would it do with no enforcement. Are they going to bill these scofflaws???? Will they pay??? I hardly think it's worth the effort. Look at the mess with Thomas Long & the city court fines. In that situation, as I wrote to your city council & Long, a while back, there needs to be a state law that automatically suspends a driver's license for unpaid motor vehicle fines. Very simple to implement & a very effective policy. In fact, without state assistance, the city could bar a vehicle inspection for any resident owing traffic fines ... which would prohibit them from registering their vehicle ... and, would make them very "visible" to law enforcement. Awww .... why even mention anything that makes sense???? Then, you have to consider enforcement. You're in Memphis. The problem is with the very weak state vehicle registration / auto insurance laws and the lack of local enforcement of the existing law. Tennessee has "third world" laws with regard to motor vehicles. "When an individual's registration, or auto insurance, expires, they should be required by law to return their tags to the state before the expiration date (s). If they do not comply ... their driver's license should be revoked. That, my friend, is how the civilized world handles the scofflaws. August 27, 2006 Watchdog has become involved in a search for knowledge about car tags and the taxes on these tags. It started out with a question which was “Do we really need or want a new auto inspection station in Memphis?" It has blossomed since then and here are the facts as we know them to date. We call on our readers who may be knowledgeable about this situation to provide information. • Only Memphis cars require yearly inspections. Shelby County cars do not require inspections. • On my Memphis car I pay $108.00 per year of which $28.50 goes to the City of Memphis ($30.00 less $1.50 collection fee), $24.00 goes to the State of Tennessee, $50.00 goes to the County as a wheel tax, $2.00 is an electronic processing fee and $2.00 is postage. • We were told by the Shelby County Clerk that they reported in an EPA report that there were 962967 vehicles registered in Shelby County of which 594,733 were registered in Memphis. We were also told that of the 962967 vehicles registered, 163,000 registrations have expired. • In the City of Memphis budget document, it says that 427,112 vehicles were inspected in FY2004. It also says that 11.74% failed the emissions test and 11.85% failed the safety inspection. Presumably only 376,000 actually passed the test and 51,000 never passed the test. • The financial statement of the City of Memphis for FY2004 states that the income from auto licenses was $10.47 million which divided by $28.50 per license equates to 367,000 vehicles which is about right. • I asked the Shelby County Clerk the following hypothetical question. “What if I register my car in Memphis originally and then I move somewhere else out of Shelby County. How do you know about this.” Their answer was, they do not know and have no way of knowing, which I assume accounts for the 163,000 expired registrations. I know that I am rambling on about this subject but I wonder about the 51,000 cars that failed the test or at least did not pay the fee. This is over $5 million dollars not collected. Also I wonder how many autos in Shelby County do not pay this tax and how can we find out and collect these unpaid taxes. There has to be a better way and I am asking readers of this website and the general public to suggest a way to know how many vehicles are in Memphis and Shelby County and to assure that all taxes are paid and collected. That is not happening now. August 24, 2006 Here are some of the most important items that need to be addressed by the Charter Commission in the upcoming discussions with the public. There will no doubt be many more issue and questions, the following issues illustrate the most egregious problems that certainly need solutions. • TERM LIMITS- Prevent elected officials from getting the tenure that gives them the position to sell their influence to developers and other buyers of political influence exhibited by Tennessee Waltz. • NO SALE OF MLGW WITHOUT VOTER APPROVAL- Because MLGW is piling up cash at the ratepayers expense, politicians want to get their hands on the cash. As of December 31, 2005, MLGW had $167 million in unrestricted cash, up from $111 million in one year. The law says that any surplus remaining after establishment of proper reserves, shall be devoted solely to the reduction of rates. SEE HOW MUCH OF YOUR UTILITY BILL IS BEING HELD IN UNRESTRICED CASH BELOW. • THIGHTEN ETHICS RULES- No election official should be able to serve if he benefits from any contract involving City taxpayer money even if he recuses himself from voting on that particular contract or issue. • PENSION REFORM- the January 2001 pension change has cost millions of dollars to date and will go on costing millions more as these elected and appointed officials retire. Since hardly any of the taxpaying public has a defined benefit pension plan anymore, a defined contribution plan should be instituted in the future for all newly hired public employees. • OPEN RECORDS- Only by putting all important contract bids, purchase orders, personnel salaries and benefits on the internet and by making open records access easier, can we keep the sunshine on government practices which politicians like to conceal. The current no bid purchase orders given under the ACS contract shield is an example of gross abuse and lack of transparency in bidding and awarding contracts. • APPOINTEES- There were over 400 appointees whereas the charter, according to Sara Hall’s reading, only allows about 110. This needs to be defined and limited to much less. The January 2001 pension resolution allowing elected and appointed officials to collect pensions and health benefits after only 12 years regardless of age has already cost millions and has the potential to cost $60 million if all of the current eligible elected and appointed people retire under that provision. SEE BELOW A LIST OF APPOINTED CITY OFFICIALS. • RESTRICT ELECTED OFFICIALS FROM VOTING MEMBERSHIP ON CITY AND COUNTY BOARDS AND COMMISSIONS- This is where the influence peddling starts and needs to be stopped. As an example, Rickey Peete is chairman of the Center City Commission and is on the Center City Development Board and on the Pilot committee of the Industrial Development Board. Barbara Shearengen Holt is on the Center City Commission board. Scott McCormick is on the Pilot evaluation committee. There are so many boards and commissions that it is difficult to get a full picture of all of the members. • CONTRACTING AUTHORITY- Prohibit the Mayor, any Mayor, from signing any contract unless it has been approved and funded by the City Council. The Linebarger contract given to a firm charging 20% commission for the collection of delinquent taxes when the County Trustee offered to collect the same money for 2% is a good example of abuse. Click here to see how much cash from your utility bills is being held by the MLGW in unrestricted cash as of December 31, 2005. Click here to see who had been appointed by Mayor Herenton as of March 2005 and what their jobs were and how much they were making in salary. August 21, 2006 Watchdog has been informed that last Thursday, August 17, 2006 at the MLGW board meeting, that the long standing anti-nepotism policy at the MLGW was revoked. It was not on the regular agenda but was an add on item that the public did not know was coming up for a vote. This is outrageous but not unexpected at the MLGW. After all the MLGW is run by Mayor Herenton and his appointees on the MLGW board. This is the final nail in the MLGW coffin and is a fitting epitaph on the MLGW headstone. This will cause the morale and performance to go down even more as more and more of the Mayor’s friends and relatives come down to the MLGW job bank with their lack of skills and talents. Last one out turn on the lights, if you know how. Watchdog saw this coming and we printed the article below in April 2005. ANTI-NEPOTISM POLICY AT MLGW. IS IT HERE TO STAY? April 21, 2005 The MLGW has a very strict anti-nepotism policy as shown in the download page below. The City does not have such a policy as is shown by the many related people working for the City. I have been told that Joe Lee would like to see this policy changed at the MLGW to be like the City. As you may remember, he hired his cousin at the City to a $70K per year job before he came to the MLGW. Makes you wonder. Click here to read the MLGW anti-nepotism policy. Also read a story about nepotism at the City of Memphis which has never had an anti-nepotism policy like the MLGW had for years. This is the result on no anti-nepotism policy. Click here to read what happens when your policy is to hire your relatives. August 16, 2006 Watchdog has been pursuing the question of vehicle inspections and car tags. What we have found to date is that no one really seems to know how many cars have not been inspected in Memphis and more importantly, how many owners have not paid their fees and taxes on their vehicles. Ms. Susan Henning who is in the deputy administrator in the office of the Shelby County Clerk, Jayne S. Creson, has told watchdog that 594,733 vehicles were registered in Memphis. However, according to the City budget, only 427,000 vehicles were inspected. Click here to see the motor vehicle inspection budget and the number of vehicles inspected. This leaves about 167,000 vehicles uninspected. Now there are some city vehicles and some business trucks and heavyweight vehicles that are not inspected but not in that number. Therefore the question is why would someone not have his car inspected. The obvious answer is that the owner does not want to pay the fee to get the sticker to make his license legal. This could mean that the City, the County and the State are losing up to $10 million or more. How could we correct this situation? If we have the registration and we have the inspection information, we could cross check the two lists and find out who is not having their vehicles inspected and then follow up and demand that they pay up or be fined. Modern computer technology could make this an easy job. We need to find the cheaters and make them pay up. August 14, 2006 One of the most important issues that the new Charter Commission should consider is adding new provisions to our open records sunshine laws. Watchdog has published previously information on the huge Oracle contracts with the City of Memphis. It is a contract that was supposed to cost $42 million and is above $70 million now. Also in a recent open records letter to MLGW on their dealing with Oracle, we find that they have spent millions on Oracle contracts also starting in 1999. The rumor all along has been that Reginald French, acting as a business agent or a commission agent for Oracle, has been receiving payments from Oracle on these huge contracts. This is public money and the public is entitled to know if this is true. Therefore we asked Sara Hall for this information. She replied that the City of Memphis does not maintain Oracle records or documents. Watchdog then requested the same information from Oracle and we pointed out the Tennessee Supreme Court Decision in the case brought by the Commercial Appeal in the Cherokee child care case which decision stated that if it was public money spent with a private firm that the public was entitled to know. However Oracle’s lawyer stated in a reply as follows, “The case cited in your letter and email found that Cherokee Children's and Family Services was acting in a governmental capacity and therefore was subject to the Open Records law. Oracle, however, is not acting in that capacity and therefore has no obligation to respond to a taxpayer's request for documents or information. Further, the court stated, "We caution that our holding clearly is not intended to allow public access to the records of every private entity which provides any specific, contracted-for services to governmental agencies. A private business does not open its records to public scrutiny merely by doing business with, or performing services on behalf of, state or municipal government." Click here to read the open records letters requesting Oracle commission information and the negative replies. The MLGW’s answer is in the same nature. They state “MLGW’s contract with Oracle does not request Oracle submit copies of payments to subcontractors or commission agents to MLGW.” Therefore we have both the City and MLGW stonewalling on this request and it appears that they are covering up something. In another request to Sara Hall watchdog stated that the City of Memphis could ask Oracle for this information and Oracle would comply. No answer was received to that suggestion. The only alternative is a lawsuit against the City of Memphis to finally get this information to which the taxpaying public is clearly entitled. If this kind of information and transparency was required by the City Charter, we would not be going through these legal gyrations. If there is nothing to hide, why stonewall? August 7, 2006 Every time I get in line to have my car inspected, the temperature of my car’s engine goes up but not nearly as fast as my blood pressure. I sit there burning up $3.00 per gallon gas for up to an hour and finally a bored city employee sticks a lance up my tailpipe and hopefully tells me everything is OK or maybe not. There has to be a better way. The City’s solution, build another inspection station and hire more employees. Out of frustration I wrote the open records letter shown below to start to gather information on this process. Click here to see the open records requests about car tags and inspections. We are all aware of all the cars that we see on the streets of Memphis with temporary tags. What is going on? Who is paying and who is not? Click below to see the answer that I got from my open records letter from the Shelby County Clerk, Jayne S. Creson. Click here to read the letter from Janyne Creson in answer to my open records request. I talked to Ms. Henning, a very courteous and knowledgeable person. In spite of the fact that all motor vehicle records contain a municipality code and therefore they record motor vehicles within the Memphis City limits and outside of the City of Memphis, she could not give me the information I wanted because the County Attorney said that they would have to spend some time getting this information and that the open records law did not allow me to request information that was not readily available. However she eventually got back to me with the information from another source. She said that there were 594733 vehicles registered in Memphis and 962967 in Shelby County which includes the 594733 that are in Memphis. With my Certificate of Vehicle Registration Renewal in front of me I asked her about the charges. My bill was $108.00. I live in Memphis. • $30.00 goes to the City of Memphis less $1.50 to the County Clerk as a processing fee. • $24.00 goes to the State of Tennessee • $50.00 goes to the County as a wheel tax. • $2.00 is an electronic processing fee. • $2.00 postage The people in the county do not have to pay the $30.00 to the City and they do not have to get their vehicles inspected. How do they know if someone lives in the County or City? They require two items, a picture ID, a MLGW bill, a telephone bill, a voter’s registration, a credit card bill etc. etc. I call on the public to submit new ideas for auto inspections and for the whole process of vehicle registration. My own various thoughts are as follows. • Do away with the inspection stations and license service stations to inspect cars so that they could be inspected when you get your oil changed and your tires rotated. • Inspect all cars, city and county. • Keep the current inspection stations but allow the public to reserve a time and charge for that reservation, say $25.00. The last time I went through, it took about 5 to 6 minutes to inspect once I got to the head of the line. The wait in line was about 1 hour. • Start stopping cars with temporary tags to see if they are legitimate. It is very easy to duplicate temporary tags. • Is there any way to verify that the sticker on the license is real and not some computer generated false copy? • Does anybody give a damn? Watchdog will be glad to publish your thoughts and suggestions. August 2, 2006 If there was ever an example of the need for changes in the City Charter, it was illustrated yesterday by the above vote. Only under pressure of the charter commission vote did the City Council even take up the issue of term limits and you see the result. The City Council is overwhelmingly Democrat and the others are Republican or Independent. Brent Taylor, a Republican, said the dumbest thing. He was quoted saying “that term limits would cause too much institutional knowledge to be lost.” He voted against term limits. If the present City Council is an example of institutional knowledge, then we can only hope that the majority of them and their so called knowledge will be lost either to term limits or to the next election. Time after time, this City Council has made the wrong decisions and together with a really terrible Mayor, has brought this City to financial ruin. The tax paying public clearly wants term limits. They also want voter approval of any proposed sale of MLGW, ethics reform, pension reform, restricted contracting authority for the Mayor, tougher open records requirements and other changes. Only the Concerned Citizens of Memphis slate (the CCM is solely responsible for giving the voters this opportunity) can be counted on the do this without fear or favor. The following statement which ran in the Commercial Appeal yesterday and the Flyer today says it all. Vote for all seven CCM candidates tomorrow. Click here to read who really wants changes in Charter and who wants to keep things just as they are. Just in time for the August 3rd 2006 election, the City prepares to give more IT business to their friends and supporters. Watchdog has been alerted to the following two RFP’S that will end up with one of their friends such as Reginald French, Darrell K. Thomas or Marvell Mitchell. Under the cover of the ACS contract, the first one for Dell computers and other equipment has a distribution date for the RFP of 7/24/06 and a proposal due date of 8/4/06. This is the type of equipment that consistently HAS been given to the following firms under the cover of the ACS contract. Click here to see the favored firms under the ACS cover. Click here to see the RFP proposal. Note the short time period. This absolutely discourages competition and ensures that certain firms will end up with the business. The other one is the Oracle Professional Resource contract which has a June 27, 2006 issue date and a July 7, 2006 response date. This is also obviously a set deal with no real competition. Click here to see the set up Oracle proposal. An interesting point also is that Carlee McCullough is the Contract Compliance Officer for these contracts. The same Carlee McCullough who is running for Chancery Court Judge against Judge Goldin. July 14, 2006 Henry Kissinger once said that corrupt politicians give the other 10% a bad name. Many people have asked watchdog for voting recommendations on the huge ballot for which early voting starts today, July 14, 2006. The one sure recommendation that I recommend to you is concerning the Charter Commission race and here I recommend the “Concerned Citizen of Memphis slate” as shown below. Position 1 Joe Fox Position 2 John Malmo Position 3 Charles J. “Chuck” Strong Position 4 Fred L. Davis Position 5 Rusty Hensley Position 6 Patsy Turner Position 7 Anthony (Tony) Milton These are all non political (not politicians and no political ambitions) and they do not represent democrats or republicans. The slate is made up of men and women, democrats, republicans and independents, African Americans and whites and they are all concerned taxpayers and upset with the current Herenton administration. They want real change and if you want the same, vote for them. As far as the democratic or republican primaries, watchdog does not have any dogs in that fight but if I was voting in the democratic primary I would vote for Steve Cohen for the District 9 House of representatives. He is honest and part of the 10% that Kissinger mentioned above. One greatly overlooked question is the YES/NO vote which you only get every 8 years for the Supreme Court and the Appellate Court judges. I am recommending the following three judges for a NO vote. David Farmer NO-Voted against term limits and voted against allowing a 2004 vote on the charter commission. Alan E. Highers NO-Voted against term limits Holly Kirby NO-Voted against allowing a 2004 vote on the charter commission The following are suggestions for the best candidates for the confusing ballot of judges, clerks, sheriff, trustee, etc. Circuit Court Judge Division 2 James F. Russell Circuit Court Judge Division 6 Jerry Stokes Circuit Court Judge Division 8 No recommendation Chancellor Part 2 Arnold Goldin Chancellor Part 3 Kenny Armstrong Criminal Court Judge Division 1 Paula Skahan Criminal Court Judge Division 4 Carolyn Wade Blackett Criminal Court Judge Division 5 Jim Lammey Criminal Court Judge Division 6 W. Fred Axely Criminal Court Judge Division 7 Larry Nance Criminal Court Judge Division 9 Mark Ward District Attorney General Bill gibbons County Mayor John H. Willingham Shelby County Bd of Commissioners Dist 5 Jane Pierotti Trustee Bob Patterson General Sessions Judge Div 3 Charles McDonald General Sessions Judge Div 4 Deborah Means Henderson General Sessions Judge Div 5 Evan Nahmias General Sessions Judge Div 7 Ann Pugh General Sessions Judge Div 11 Karen Lynn Massey General Sessions Judge Div 12 No recommendation General Sessions Judge Div 13 Louis J. Montesi, Jr. Juvenile Court Judge Curtis S. Person Probate Court Judge Donn Southern Sheriff Mark H. Luttrell Circuit Court Clerk Jimmy Moore Criminal Court Clerk Bill Key Juvenile Court Clerk Steven Stamson Probate Court Clerk Chris Thomas County Clerk Debbie Stamson register Tom Leatherwood July 24, 2006 MLGW IS DEAD LAST IN THE PRESTIGIOUS JD POWER RATINGS OF PUBLIC UTILITIES!! WHAT IS THEIR RESPONSE? THEY REPORTED THAT THEY WERE RATED VERY HIGH IN THEIR OWN SURVEY. GO FIGURE. Ever since Joe Lee took over from Herman Morris in 2004, MLGW has been going downhill at an ever increasing rate. Low morale due to unfair promotion selections, new job hires and salary levels for unqualified candidates. Watchdog has been reporting on this since the beginning. But the biggest unreported news, other than in the watchdog website, is the pile of cash that MLGW is sitting on which should be returned to the ratepayers in rate reductions in accordance with the law. You will see the unrestricted cash at $167MM as of December 31, 2005 compared to $111MM as of December 31, 2004. You will see the net working capital (current assets less current liabilities) of $233MM versus $188MM at the end of 2004. Click here to see the essential figures from the MLGW 2005 Annual Report. Watchdog asks the following questions. • Why does the MLGW keep piling up net working capital and retained earnings when it is supposed to be a non profit organization devoted to providing the lowest utility rates to its customers? • The MLGW is a monopoly with no competition and the law says that any surplus remaining, after establishment of proper reserves, if any, shall be devoted solely to the reduction of rates. • The MLGW says that their policy is to have enough cash to pay one month’s bills. They are keeping millions more than that, in the order of over $100MM. • And do not forget that the MLGW water division will pay $60MM through the year 2026 to retire the bonds for the benefit of the Grizzlies and the FedEx Arena and Parking Garage. The MLGW ratepayers should demand that this pile of cash and cash equivalents be returned to the ratepayers in the form of rate reductions or mitigations of future proposed rate increases. The MLGW should operate as close to zero profit as possible for the benefit of the rate payers who are suffering while Rome is having public games in the new Memphis Coliseum. Also remember that by reducing this honeypot to close to zero, the bear at the other end of Main Street will not come sniffing around. July 18, 2006 WHAT IS WRONG WITH OUR TWO PARTY ELECTION SYSTEM? THE FACT THAT THERE ARE ONLY TWO PARTIES!!! The lawsuit threatened by LaSimba Gray and the Rainbow coalition is ridiculous. Article XI, section 9 of the Tennessee Constitution says the members of the Charter Commission shall be “chosen at large”. It was the City Council that, in an effort to try to block the charter commission, passed ordinance #5079 to dictate that one member of the charter commission could be elected from each of the seven council districts. However because of the “chosen at large” provision of the Tennessee Constitution, they knew that every voter had a constitutional right to vote for a candidate in each of the seven positions. Both the local Democrat and the Republican parties do not want to see an independent charter commission like the slate proposed by the Concerned Citizens of Memphis. The Democrats actively opposed the formation of the charter commission and filed a lawsuit to oppose the early voting for the election of the members. The head of the Shelby County Republican Party actually told John Lunt that they did not want a charter commission and they liked the charter just as it was and did not want to disturb it. Now both the Democrats and the Republicans are running a slate of candidates. Neither actually want any real changes. If you look at the total Shelby County Democrat Unity Ballot you will see that there is only one local white candidate, Gail Mathes. Prominent of the top page is a picture (not a candidate) of convicted criminal Rickey Peete. On the Shelby County Republican ballot there are two or three blacks, mostly in the judicial election posts. It is obvious that these two parties are playing the race game to the detriment of the tax paying public. What this country (and especially this county) needs is a third party and watchdog proposes creating one now called the Taxpayers Party. After all we, the taxpayers, pay the bills, we furnish these lush top jobs, salaries, pensions, health benefits, great vacations, sick leaves, free days and other perks that very few of us who pays the bills get in private industry. Watchdog is sick of hearing City Council members cry about laying off someone when the job of the City Council, the MLGW, the County Commission and both Mayors should be to run public services as efficiently as possible, not create and sustain public service jobs. It is time that the taxpayers unite under a common cause and that is to support candidates that want to truly serve the public with the most cost efficient service and not view the elected job as a means to line their pockets, get a great pension or have influence in development or land use decisions. Good elected officials come in a variety of shapes and sizes and the qualities of good public officials have nothing to do with race, creed or gender. It has to do with education, experience, talent and ethics. The top jobs of Mayor, City Council and the County Commission should be for a maximum of an eight year stint of public service and then they should go back to private industry or private practice. The idea of the value of institutional memory in long serving politicians like we now have in the City Council is greatly overrated and actually dangerous to the public purse. Therefore watchdog recommends that you vote for the Concerned Citizens of Memphis slate of seven candidates. Joe Fox, Position 1, John Malmo, Position 2, Charles J. “Chuck” Strong, Position 3 Fred L. Davis, Position 4, Rusty Hensley, Position 5 Patsy Turner, Position 6 and Anthony (Tony) Milton, Position 7 August 23, 2006 Here are some of the most important items that need to be addressed by the Charter Commission in the upcoming discussions with the public. There will no doubt be many more issues and questions, but the following issues illustrate the most egregious problems that certainly need solutions. Term Limits- Prevent elected officials from getting the tenure that gives them the position to sell their influence to developers and other buyers of politicians as exhibited by Tennessee Waltz. No MLGW sale with voter approval- Because MLGW is piling up cash at the ratepayers expense, politicians want to get their hands on the cash. As of December 31, 2005, MLGW had $167 million in unrestricted cash up from $111 million in one year. The law says that any surplus remaining after establishment of proper reserves, shall be devoted solely to the reduction of rates. Click here to see who had been appointed by Mayor Herenton as of March 2005 and what their jobs were and how much they were making in salary. Restrict Elected Officials from voting membership on city and county boards and commission- This is where the influence peddling starts and needs to be stopped. As an example, Rickey Peete is chairman of the Center City Commission and is on the Center City Development Board and on the Pilot evaluation committee of the Industrial Development Board. Barbara Swearengen Holt is on the Center City Commission board. Scott McCormick is on the Pilot evaluation committee. There are so many board and commissions that it is difficult to get a full picture of all of the members. Contracting Authority- Prohibit Mayor from signing any contract unless it has been approved and funded by city council. The Linebarger contract given to a firm charging 20% for the collection of delinquent taxes when the County Trustee offered to collect the same money for 2% is a good example of the abuse by the Mayor. July 10, 2006 Recently watchdog reported on the ACS contract and all the no bid subcontracts embedded in the overall 533 page ACS contract. Click below to see some of the favored companies who have received over $11 million in no bid subcontracts under the cover of the outsourced ACS contract. Many of these no bid subcontractors are close supporters of the Administration. This contract along with many other outrageous City of Memphis contracts and mistakes (think Linebarger, Beale Street Development, Cannon Center, FedEx garage, Riverfront Development, January 2001 pension resolution) explains why there is no money left for raises for the police, firemen, sanitation workers and other lower paid city employees. The ACS contract and the recent Oracle contract are good examples of no bid contracts that eat up millions of dollars of taxpayer money so that at the end of the day, there is no money left for those that do the actual day to day work of providing city services. But there is always plenty left over for the top officials and their supporters. Click here to see how successful certain minority vendors were under this City/ACS contract. Now click below to read some of these actual no bid contracts given to Memphis Networx, Ewing Moving Services, Mitchell Technology, Integrate Technology, Lesure Computer Service and Oracle. Click here to read the Memphis Networx Contract under the ACS no bid umbrella. Click here to read the Ewing Moving Services Contract under the ACS no bid umbrella. Click here to read the Mitchell Technology Group Contract under the ACS no bid umbrella. Click here to read the Integrate (Reginald French) Contract under the ACS no bid umbrella. Click here to read the Lesure Contract under the ACS no bid umbrella. Click here to read the Oracle Contract under the ACS no bid umbrella. July 13, 2006 Watchdog decided to see who in Memphis has contributed to Mayor Wharton’s campaign, how some of the money was spent and how much is left over. ($283,369.06 as of 2/21/06). It is very revealing to see the same contributors come up again and again.Quickly going through the list we see the following familiar names. Note the payments to Roscoe Dixon, Michael Hooks and W. W. Herenton. Expenditures Committee to Re-Elect Mayor W. W. Herenton 5/14/03 $2,000 Roscoe Dixon, Contract Services 5/27/03 $3,000 Friends of Roscoe Dixon 9/03-9/04 $1,000 Friends of Michael Hook 9/03-9/04 $1,000 Roscoe Dixon Senate Campaign 9/03-9/04 $1,000 Yo! Memphis 9/03-9/04 $500 Robert J. Lanier, Salary 9/04-9/05 $23,345 Robert J. Lanier, Salary 9/05-12/05 $9,338 Contributions Ron Belz 9/02-9/03 $333.40 Jack Belz 9/02-9/03 $666.60 John and Lisa Bobango 9/02-9/03 $2,000 total J. Bayard Boyle Jr. 9/02-9/03 $500.00 Charles E. Carpenter 9/02-9/03 $500.00 Gregory M. Duckett 9/02-9/03 $250.00 Federal Express Pac 9/02-9/03 $5,000.00 James F. Huntzicker 9/02-9/03 $500.00 Jim Rout for County Mayor 9/02-0/03 $500.00 Autozoners for better government 9/03-9/04 $1,000 Jack Belz 9/03-9/04 $1333.20 Ron A. Belz 9/03-9/04 $666.80 J. Bayard Boyle Jr. 9/03-9/04 $1000.00 Committee to Elect Dr. W. W. Herenton 9/03-9/04 $1000.00 Reginald French 9/03-9/04 $1000.00 Arnold E. Perl 9/03-9/04 $1000.00 Darrell K. Thomas 9/03-9/04 $1000.00 Henry M. Turley 9/03-9/04 $1000.00 Dan B. Turley Jr. 9/03-9/04 $1000.00 Ricky E. Wilkins 9/03-9/04 $1000.00 We have posted the contributors and the expenditures. Take a look and you will see many of the same contributors as on the Herenton list. Click here to see who contributed to Mayor Wharton. Click here to see who got paid from Mayaor Wharton's war chest. June 28, 2006 Watchdog decided to see who in Memphis has contributed to Mayor Herenton’s campaign, how some of the money was spent and how much is left over. It is very revealing to see the same contributors come up again and again.Quickly going through the 2003 list we see the following familiar names. Boyle, Duckett, lots of Heisleys, Lenderman, Less, Getz and Lipman, Masson, Meadows, Spence, First Tennessee Bank, Wharton, Fogelman, Turley, Hyneman, Tate and on and on. Take a look at the list below. Click here to see who contributed to Herenton campaign pot. Now take a look at how some of the money was spent. It takes money to get elected. You have to pay poll workers, van drivers, travel expenses, parties, printing, billboard ads, radio and TV ads.Two names are of special interest as shown below. Reginald French • 8/11/03 Campaign Consultant Services $9,000 • 8/20/03 Supplies $181.14 • 8/20/03 Office Supplies $340.60 • 8/29/03 Various Expenses $239.79 • 9/5/03 Reimbursement $52 • 9/18/03 Reimbursement $126.10 • 9/26/03 Software/Computer Work $150 • 10/2/03 Office Supplies $150.38 • 10/23/03 Consulting Fee Campaign $9,000 Total $19,240.01 Dewey Clark: • 8/20/03 $1,000 • 8/29/03 $500 • 9/5/03 $530.96 • 9/12/03 $500 • 9/18/03 $500 • 9/25/03 $500 • 10/2/03 $500 • 10/17/03 $500 Total $4530.96 In addition to the over $19,000 above, French got $23,400 paid to his Idalis Enterprises LLC for campaign consulting in the 1999 Herenton campaign. Dewey Clark was a witness in the corruption trial of former Atlanta mayor Bill Campbell and said that he gave Herenton $9,000 — in Herenton’s office. A wiretapped audiotape on which Clark said such was introduced into evidence at the Atlanta trial. Campbell was later convicted of tax evasion. Clark testified he also gave a $1,000 campaign contribution to Herenton. He said he also gave $1,000 each for Reginald French, a former aide to Herenton now in private business, and French's wife, to put in their names as campaign contributions to Herenton. Click here to see who contributed to Herenton campaign pot. How much is in the pot now or as of 11-25-05. Well, how about $450,378.00. Not bad. Seems like a lot of people have a very keen interest in seeing that Mayor Herenton stays in office. Wonder why? Good Government? NAH!!! July 5, 2006 CITY AWARDS $42 MILLION CONTRACT By CHRIS PRZYBYSZEWSKI The City of Memphis awarded a $42.1 million contract for outsourcing the Division of Information Systems to Systems and Computer Technology Corporation (SCT), ending a ten-month search. Mayor Willie Herenton announced the decision to City Council members Tuesday in a session marked by unusual secrecy plus some heated remarks from Councilman Janet Hooks. SCT, a publicly traded company headquartered in Malvern, Pa., won the bid over Electonic Data Systems and Affiliated Computer Services. Herenton said a key factor was SCT’s commitment to award 10 percent of professional services contracts and 50 percent of vendor contracts to “certified minority vendors.” The seven-year contract should be finalized next month, according to City Finance and Administration Director Roland McElrath. Herenton had told the city council during a planning session in January that he planned to outsource the Division of Information Systems, which handles telephones and computers. He said Tuesday that it had already been outsourced Òfor all practical The mayor acknowledged that there has been intense interest in the contract award, which featured lots of lobbying of both the mayor and council members. He said that was one reason he took the unusual step of asking to be placed on the council agenda without specifying his reason. “It’s almost like this needed to be a secret,” complained Hooks, who said she needed more information to respond to queries from her constituents. “I’m glad to hear that,” Herenton repeated several times as Hooks continued to vent. Herenton said the contract will cost a bit more than the city had been spending in the short run but should save money in the long run. All employees in the division -- approximately 40 people -- will be hired by SCT if they desire jobs. Herenton went to unusual lengths to vouch for the integrity of the selection process. “I know the various groups (that were interested), I know the rumors going around,” he said. Originally there were 18 firms that expressed interest in the job. “Evidently there is a lot of money on the line here,” said Councilman Tom Marshall, who said the selection committee, of which he was a member, was fair. The city hired a Germantown firm, SCB Computer Technology, for $467,000 to help it evaluate the contenders. SCT, the winning firm, has nearly 3,400 employees and serves more than 2500 clients worldwide. What has actually happened to this contract of which Tom Marshall said was fair. • SCB Computer Technology, a Germantown Company, had a $467,000 contract to help choose the outsourcing firm but was involved in various legal problems such as its own admission of overstating earnings and lawsuits alleging stockholders were defrauded. • In late 2000, just prior to the City awarding the IT outsourcing contract, Reginald French purchased Associated Softworks (ASW) from Ronald Jung for roughly $100,000 and Jung is now suing French claiming French funneled company money to start a new IT firm called Integrate Technologies. • The City awarded Systems and Computer Technology (SCT) an IT outsourcing contract for $41 million in November 2000, which would be purchased by ACS six months later. • Due to a recent watchdog open records request the cost of the ACS contract as of May 22, 2006 was $69.4 million. This contract which was to cost $41 million over seven years has cost $69.4 million in 4-1/2 years. At this rate, the seven year cost will be $108 million. See the attached memo confirming money spent so far. click here to see the memo confirming $69.4 million spent so far on the ACS contract. Does this sound like the Memphis you know and love to pay taxes to? In addition to the above boondoggle, there is the Oracle contract on top of the ACS contract. The first part of this was purchased in 2004 and was supposed to cost $7.2 million. Click below to see the City Council resolution increasing the cost of this to $9.3 million. It is rumored that Reginald French is receiving a commission on this huge continuing contract but that is yet to be verified by Oracle. Carol Chumney was quoted as follows on this matter. Court transcripts obtained by Action News 5 suggest that Reginald French, a former city administrator and aide to Memphis Mayor Willie Herenton, parlayed years of city experience and contacts into millions of dollars in city contracts. "You try not to have people making decisions on contracts who are related to somebody or who have affiliations that might taint their judgment," said City Councilwoman Carol Chumney. Chumney worries about a nine million dollar city deal to buy Oracle software that sent a two-million dollar commission to French. click here to see the beginning resolution to a very costly Oracle contract costing much more than originally planned. But what is not in doubt is that the following firms and some others were imbedded in the original ACS contract and continue to receive no bid purchase orders as shown in the attached file. Click here to see some familiar firms and supporters of the Mayor who continue to get no bid minority contracts. The question which continues to be asked and not answered is “What are these no bid contracts costing the City and the County in the name of minority purchasing.” If you have no bid contracts, how do you know how much you are paying over and above competitively bid market prices? June 22, 2006 One of the readers of watchdog kindly sent us a copy of the recent raises given to city employees from January 2, 2006 to April 29, 2006. (Lick below to see the list) These raises contrast with the zero increases to the balance of the city employees. In looking through the list some are interesting due to the size of the increases. • Robert M. Knecht Mgr. Drain Maint $43,212 to $62,320 • Chandell W. Ryan Mgr. Labor Rel_EEO $58,349 to $95,516 • Thomas Earl Morris Oper.Spec Equip II $30,743 to $53,834 • Steven R. Cole Chief.Polic Svcs.Dpty $67,420 to $100,617 • Michael Lee Smith Chief.Polic Svcs.Dpty $78,772 to $100,617 In all, 170 raises were given during the first half of this year. Many were step increases, outlined in city policy. Others involved changes in job titles, a favorite ploy by politicians to reward their loyal supporters and some were given based on pay rates in other cities. The last is another favorite excuse given by politicians to inflate their salaries. Salaries should be based on merit and results and there is precious little in good results in the handling of city business. Click here to read the list of the lucky raise winners amongst city employees. June 26, 2006 Watchdog has been trying to find out the rules and the true cost of minority purchasing requirements in Memphis City government, Shelby County government, MLGW and other branches of local government. Here is an interesting example. Click below to read the recent open records request to the Shelby County government. Click here to read watchdog's open records request to Shelby County government. Last Friday, watchdog went to the Shelby County Office building and met with various personnel. They were very competent, friendly, open and cooperative. Watchdog was trying to find out what the cost of minority preferences was on various contracts. First we went to the finance division where we looked at various invoices over the period requested. We found no invoices from Reginald French or Integrate Technologies, no invoices from Associated Softworks or Affiliated Computer Services, No invoices from Monguinn Enterprises and a very small amount from Mitchell Technology Group. However we found lots of invoices from Thomas Consultants (Darrell K. Thomas) starting in 2003 and running through 2004. The total for this period as we calculate it is $934,856.21. But the important fact about this revelation is how it came about. We were trying to determine if Thomas got this amount of business through competitive bidding. There was in fact a sealed bid process as shown on the documents below. Click here to see the paperwork and bid evaluations of this multi million dollar bid on computers for the county. It was sealed bid No. I000745 dated 3-25-03. There were 17 RFB’s sent out and 7 bids received. The total pricing is shown on the attached documents and it shows that Thomas Consultants bid $7299.00 versus Gateway Companies bid of $5383.00, a 26% difference for desktop computers. There is a point award process that awards 50% of the points to price and the balance to other factors as shown. The selected companies were Gateway at 97.13 total awarded points and Thomas Consultants at 76.23. On the basis of this analysis each company was awarded an estimated annual expenditure of $3MM over a three year period, $6MM total. This decision was signed by Sybille S. Noble, Administrator of Purchasing on 7-7-03. What actually happened? In response to watchdog’s open records request, we found that Thomas Consultants received purchase orders for $934,856.21 and Gateway received orders for $39,572.00. At 26% price differential, this means that the taxpayers paid $232,773.00 extra over and above the Gateway price. There is no explanation and no justification for this split of the orders other than what you can read on the attached documents. Shown also is an example purchase order to Thomas Consultants for 50 A-OPEN computers at $1231.75 ea. These orders went to most branches of Shelby County government including but not limited to the following. • Shelby County Election Commission • Shelby County Sheriff’s Office • Shelby County Regional Service • Shelby County Support Services • Shelby County Public Defender • Shelby County General Sessions • Shelby County Code Enforcement • Shelby County General Sessions • Shelby County Fire Department • Shelby County Corrections Center • Shelby County Health Services • Shelby County Attorney • Shelby County Housing • Shelby County Assessor and of course the Shelby County Mayor The initial contract was renewed for another year until June 30, 2005 and probably beyond. Obviously the word has come down that the orders are to go to Thomas Consultants, not Gateway. In addition Mayor Wharton nominated Darrell Thomas to the Shelby County Healthcare Corporation. Thomas Consultants also sells medical billing software. Again, our question is “What is the cost of minority set asides? The taxpayers need to know what these programs are costing and are these extra costs being fairly and evenly distributed in the minority business community or just to a favored few.” Here are other Thomas Consultants deals. • MLGW for $1,974,572 • MLGW for $1,420,812 • City of Memphis thru the ACS contract- $2,351,055 It is obvious that Mr. Thomas is well connected to all branches of local government. June 19, 2006 After more than 5 months we get the financial statement posted on the internet by the MLGW. Still no budgets posted as do the other branches of local government. Click below to see a spreadsheet showing the essentials of the report. Click here to see the essential figures from the MLGW 2005 Annual Report. You will see the unrestricted cash at $167MM as of December 31, 2005 compared to $111MM as of December 31, 2004. You will see the net working capital (current assets less current liabilities) of $233MM versus $188MM at the end of 2004. Watchdog asks the following questions. • Why does the MLGW keep piling up net working capital and retained earnings when it is supposed to be a non profit organization devoted to providing the lowest utility rates to its customers? • The MLGW is a monopoly with no competition and the law says that any surplus remaining, after establishment of proper reserves, if any, shall be devoted solely to the reduction of rates. • The MLGW says that their policy is to have enough cash to pay one month’s bills. They are keeping millions more than that, in the order of over $100MM. • And do not forget that the MLGW water division will pay $60MM through the year 2026 to retire the bonds for the benefit of the Grizzlies and the FedEx Arena and Parking Garage. The MLGW ratepayers should demand that this pile of cash and cash equivalents be returned to the ratepayers in the form of rate reductions or mitigations of future proposed rate increases. The MLGW should operate as close to zero profit as possible for the benefit of the rate payers who are suffering while Rome is having public games in the new Memphis Coliseum. Also remember that by reducing this honeypot to close to zero, the bear at the other end of Main Street will not come sniffing around. Click below to see the 2005 balance sheet from the MLGW financial statement. Click here to see the balance sheet from the MLGW 2005 Annual Report. June 16, 2006 Some time ago someone sent an email to watchdog and asked how many appointed positions were in Shelby County Government. Since we have written a lot about the appointed positions in the City of Memphis Government and the fact that around 110 positions are allowed by the City Charter but the Mayor has over 400 and the fact that the City Council passed the January 2001 pension resolution which could allow them all to retire after 12 years regardless of age and start receiving their pensions and health care benefits immediately, we thought we would ask the County the question. As usual, the County was very prompt and cooperative and gave us the information. First let me say that there is no similar January 2001 pension resolution that applies to these county employees but I was surprised at the number and the dollars involved. The county charter does not have any restriction of appointed employees like the City Charter supposedly has, and they have a lot more elected officials so the number is probably not surprising but it is a lot of dollars and people. We have attached below a list of all the appointed employees in the following offices. • TRUSTEE • SHERIFF • REGISTER • PROBATE CLERK • PROBATE JUDGES • JUVENILE COURT JUDGE • JUVENILE COURT CLERK • GENERAL SESSIONS JUDGE • GENERAL SESSIONS COURT CLERK • LEGISLATIVE • COUNTY COURT CLERK • CRIMINAL COURT CLERK • CIRCUIT COURT CLERK • CHANCERY COURT CLERK • ATTORNEY GENERAL • ASSESSOR • MAYOR The total annual salaries of these 573 employees is $33,501,341.86 of which 47% is in Mayor A. C. Wharton’s office. Looking at the employees in Wharton’s office we see some familiar names such as • Ricky E. Wilkins • Dedrick Brittenum Jr. (Now also on City Council) • Monice H. Tate • John L. Ryder • Martin W Zummach • Mark E Beutelschies • Gordon B Olswing Lots of legal talent there mostly on a part time basis. Also one other point we note is that county employees are employed for 37.5 hours per week, not the normal 40 or more hours of the taxpaying stiffs who work in private industry. Click here to see shat your taxes are paying for in Shelby County Government. June 13, 2006 Watchdog has been following the controversy of the FedEx parking garage and it has been fascinating. More and more information is coming to light. There is a certain odor that is beginning to emanate from this project but everyone is denying that they had anything to do with it and that everything is OK. Watchdog has obtained a summary of expenses by vendors which is shown below in the attachment. Watchdog does not pretend to know all the firms and individuals who had their fingers in the plum pie but a few stand out. • Charles E Carpenter $345,660.70 • Hoops, L.P. $5,191,321.32 • Mid-South Minority Business Council $49,999.98 • Monguinn Enterprises Consulting $239,624.97 • The Ingram Group $291,569.53 These all may be legitimate expenses but each of these expenses need to be explained and invoices need to be furnished to verify what services were performed for these billings. The expense for the Mid-South Minority Business Council at 2 cents less than $50,000 is interesting. So far, it has been very difficult to get this information as the powers that be have not been very forthcoming. Also remember Heidi Shafer and her campaign for a referendum on the Arena construction. The law allowed a referendum on a project of this size when it was financed by ad valorem (property taxes) taxes. At the last minute, when the City and the County realized they were going to lose on the referendum, they changed to revenue taxes to finance the $250 million dollar arena. BUT REMEMBER THAT THESE REVENUE BONDS ARE STILL FULL FAITH AND CREDIT BONDS AND WHEN AND IF THEY FAIL TO PRODUCE THE NEEDED REVENUES TO PAY THE BONDS, THE CITY AND THE COUNTY WILL BE COMING BACK TO THE TAXPAYERS AND RAISING OUR PROPERTY TAXES BUT SAYING THAT IT IS NOT BECAUSE OF THE REVENUE BONDS. DON’T BELIEVE IT. Hopefully that will not happen but recent attempts to sell the Grizzlies do not give watchdog any great confidence in the future income for these revenue bonds. Click here to see who feasted on the FedEx arena banquet. June 14, 2006 On April 11, 2006 watchdog sent the following open records request to the MLGW. April 11, 2006 Ms. Amy Burch Coordinator of Access to Public Records Memphis Light, Gas and Water 220 South Main Street Memphis, Tennessee 38103 Dear Ms. Burch, In accordance with instructions and as a taxpayer of the City of Memphis I would like to inspect the municipal documents in accordance with the Tennessee Open Records Law that contain the following specific information. 1. The records and documents that show any and all contracts and/or payments to or with Thomas Consultants Inc (TCI) and any contracts or payments to Mr. Darrell K. Thomas from January 1, 2000 to the present date, April 11, 2006. The records and documents should show the bidding process, the date of the bid openings and the losing competitive bids. I trust that you will inform promptly whatever department and personnel are necessary to make this information and documents ready for my inspection. In accordance with the MLGW policy concerning copies and cost of copies, I may want copies of some or all of the documents after inspection. Since I assume that all the information requested is on computer or in an available file and should be available readily. I expect you should have this information by April 21, 2006. If you need additional information or have questions about this request, I am available during working hours at 754-0699. Sincerely yours, Joe Saino 6560 Kirby Forest Cove Memphis, Tennessee 38119 On may 26 we picked up the follwing two sheets from MLGW concerning the open records request. One memo was from Jim Moncrief, the Supervisor of the Contract Management Department saying that there did not have any records of contracts with Thomas Consultants or with Darrell K. Thomas. There was another sheet which we received which showed $1,169,359.29 in purchase orders issued to Thomas Consultants since the year 2000. Apparently purchase orders were issued to Thomas Consultants without benefit of competitive bids. Nice work if you can get it. Click here to read how much Darrell K. Thomas got in no bid purchase orders from MLGW. June 12, 2006 We hope that this is not true but in Memphis you have to wonder what with all the waltzing going on. The recent stories in the CA and the media about the FedEx parking garage is a good example of you scratch my back and I will scratch yours. All parties to this scam claim that it was a misunderstanding and they do not know how a non profit intermodal transfer facility transformed into a for profit parking garage for the Grizzlies. TDOT, Mata, the City, the County, the State, the Feds etc. etc. all cannot understand how it happened. Well, we understand and here are the facts. Everybody knew all along that it was to be a parking garage which was to be given to the Grizzlies and that part of the garage would be turned into an office for the Grizzlies which the taxpayers would pay for. All the intermodal talk was just eyewash in order to get the money. Now the administration is trying to spin it to say that it no big deal. Don't believe it. Here are the facts. • Letters dated March 25, 2002 from the Tennessee Department of Transportation to Mayors Herenton and Rout committing $20 million to build an intermodal transfer facility with 1800 parking spaces which turned out to be 1500 parking spaces plus the Grizzlies office. • City contract #N16219 dated October 30, 2002 for the same facility but now it is for 1500 cars, not 1800. Memphis is to pay 20% of the cost or around $4 million plus. Please note the language intended to clothe the project in its intermodal disguise. “The Project will be operated so as to provide public parking during workday periods to relieve traffic congestion in the Memphis central business district.” “A public transportation system will be available for those persons wishing to use the Project facility, consisting of the MATA bus service which will serve the site along Third Street (SR 14) and the MATA light rail line nearby on Main Street.” • What happened to the missing 300 parking spaces. Guess What!! The Grizzlies have their offices in that space and, according to one source, also got $1 million plus in office furniture and equipment. • And on top of all that largess, they get all the income from the garage under the Memphis Arena Use and Operating Agreement. What a deal. See below some of the documents concerning this scam. Click here to read to read the letters that started the parking garage incident. Click here to read how an 1800 car garage became a 1500 car garage plus the Grizzlies office. June 9, 2006 To: Friends and supporters of memphiswatchdog.org From: Joe Saino Subject: An opportunity to change Memphis City Government On August 3rd, 2006 there is a unique opportunity to change the City of Memphis political situation for the better. It is the election of seven members of the Charter Commission. Watchdog has been working hard since the petition drive in 2004 to expose the failings of the Herenton administration, the MLGW, the City Council and a lot of other related boards and commissions. It has not been easy and only the availability of the Tennessee open records laws has made a lot of information possible to obtain and post on watchdog. Watchdog has become a popular website with thousands of hits but we need to expand this unique treasure trove of information to more Memphis taxpayers and make them voters on August 3rd of this year. Therefore we are asking you to contribute to memphiswatchdog.org. We have formed a PAC (memphiswatchdog.org) and we are asking you to help us raise money for two purposes. • For the support of the Concerned Citizens of Memphis slate of seven candidates who are listed in the next column named "THE SLATE TO ELECT." To donate go to the following column, "CHARTER DOMMISSION DONATIONS" in order to donate by credit card. Or you can donate by check to the PO BOX listed below. • For the support and advertising to promote the website of memphiswatchdog.org to continue to make public all relevant information about local government. Only by making government transparent can we hope to get a more honest and responsive government. Watchdog will make public all accounting and expenditures of money raised and will take no salary or benefits from this money. It will be strictly used for the above purposes. We will take contributions up to $1000.00 from individuals but no cash contributions (checks are OK) and no contributions from corporations. The law requires that any contribution over $100 (either in a single or a cumulative contribution) from an individual must be posted in a quarterly report with the name of the individual. To make a contribution, send a check to memphiswatchdog.org to PO Box 172301, Memphis, Tennessee 38187-6141 or you can make a contribution by credit card on the website. We also want your help and support during the campaign. Talk to your neighbors, your church, neighborhood and civic groups and if you want a speaker, contact us at 7540699 to make arrangement. With your help, we will make a permanent change for the better in Memphis and Shelby County. June 7, 2006 In a March 19th, 2006 Commercial Appeal article involving Reginald French’s contracts with the City of Memphis, French made the following statement, “This was strictly done by a fair process, who said he got no help from the mayor or anyone else in landing the city work.” Herenton was even quoted as saying about Carol Chumney, who made the inquiry, “I know what people are suggesting, who called Chumney's inquiry “crazy” and said he's never assisted French in any way to win city business. ‘This lady is a loose cannon.’” On Monday, Watchdog showed you just how much of a misstatement these two made with Carlee McCullough’s request to have Integrate Technologies’ minority application pushed through the process. Click here to read the fax from Carlee McCullough to Lillie Alford demanding immediate approval for Integrate Technologies (Reginald French) so he could get a contract that was already approved. Also there is the question of how qualified Mr. French was concerning the highly technical area of computers and programs. Click below to read parts of a deposition given by Mr. French concerning his technical qualifications. Click here to read about Reginald French's technical qualifications to handle a technical contract with the City of Memphis. Today we will show you just how much more help Integrate Technologies (among others) received. Below is page 440 of the SCT/ACS contract with the City of Memphis. In it, it shows the City of Memphis’ directive to assure purchases for minority procurement by SCT/ACS were limited to a handful of select vendors, namely: Thomas Consultants – owned by Darrell Thomas, candidate for the Charter Commission Mitchell Technologies – owned by Marvell Mitchell, director of minority development at the Regional Chamber of Commerce (the originator of the MidSouth Minority Business Council) and candidate for Harold Ford’s 9th District Congressional position. Integrate Technologies – owned by Reginald French, candidate for Shelby County Sheriff, former campaign manger for the mayor, and former city administrator. LeSure Computer Services Trinity Technologies Click here to see a provision of the City of Memphis contract with SCT (later becoming ACS) directing them to use certain minority vendors. Click here to see how successful certain minority vendors were under this City/ACS contract. Over 90% of all hardware and software purchased, over $13MM by SCT/ACS during the life of this seven year contract were made through the above vendors. The attorney who approved this contract was former city attorney Robert Spence, which a source has informed Watchdog now represents ACS regarding contracts with the City of Memphis. The City procurement code states that any monies spent in excess of $50,000 must be procured through competitive bid. In 2000, Herenton stated in a Memphis Flyer article that one reason why SCT was selected was because of their commitment of 50% of all monies spent be awarded to “certified minority vendors.” Is that the reason for French’s push for certification by Carlee McCullough? Was that also the reason why he was added to the list of the select few vendors? That seems like a considerable amount of help for someone who claims to have not been helped at all. June 5, 2006 Watchdog has been going through only a portion of the mountains of paper obtained in open records requests from the City of Memphis recently. Over the next several weeks we will be posting what we find on the website. We have been shocked by the extent of the effort to award minority contracts without bids. The question is “How do we know what these contracts are costing over and above the competitive market price if there are no competitive bids?” We post below two revealing items that shows the intensity of the effort to award these no bid contracts. • One is a memo from Carlee M. McCullough, Contract Compliance Officer for the City of Memphis, dated December 27, 2004 to the Mayor, Keith McGee and Sara Hall. In it she complains about Mel Scheuerman, BDC-Administrator but brags about the $8 million dollars doled out to Allan Wade, Ricky Wilkins, Banks, Finley & White, Marvell Mitchell (Mitchell Technology), Darrell K. Thomas (Thomas Consultants), Reginald French (Integrate Technologies) and others. More than half of the $8 million was through ACS and the other $4 million was through the City direct. • The other is a fax dated October 29, 2002 from Carlee McCullough to Lillie Alford of the Uniform Certification Agency (UCA) asking for an expedited review for Integrate Technologies (Reginald French) saying that they had a contract on the table and they needed the classification immediately to validate the contract. Mr. French started receiving contracts through ACS in July of 2003 and to date has received about $1.5 million total. Draw your own conclusions as to what this is costing the taxpayers and who is benefitting. Click here to read the memorandoum from Carlee McCulough to the Mayor about M/WBE Accomplishments FYE 2004. Click here to read the fax from Carlee McCullough to Lillie Alford demanding immediate approval for Integrate Technologies (Reginald French) so he could get a contract that was already approved. May 31, 2006 Watchdog has been investigating this subject in order to bring out the cost of the stated policies in the various ordinances. If these policies perform the stated function of teaching minority and women firms how to compete in the business world and then graduate into the normal competitive business world, that is good. However, if it is merely a means of rewarding friends and supporters, then that should also become public information along with the cost to the rate payers and taxpayers. Recently watchdog picked up a number of papers from the MLGW and the City of Memphis in response to several open records requests. At MLGW there were several large bids for computers. For years MLGW, being a large user of computers, has been buying direct from Dell and other suppliers. However on these two contracts a different method was used. One was a 36 month contract for Rackmount Servers in accordance with MLGW specifications dated January 12, 2004. Another was a 60 month contract for laptop and mini-tower personal computers also in 2004. The details are listed below and you can read about the results. Dell Marketing L. P. bid as did Thomas Consultants, Inc. (Darrell K. Thomas, owner). Dell was low at $1,356,357 with Thomas at $1,420,812. However Thomas Consultants was awarded the job for the same Dell computers at an additional cost of $64,455. The other contract was more interesting for 1725 computers. Trinity Technologies, Inc was awarded the contract at $2,468,215 whereas Dell was the lowest of the complete bids at $2,398,005. However in February 2006 Trinity Technology advised that there were unable to furnish the computers in accordance with MLGW specifications and the job was given to Thomas Consultants for $1,974,572. They in turn are furnishing Dell computers with apparently a 5% (about $100,000) markup for Thomas Consultants. The interesting thing here is that the MWBEC City Code states that if a minority subcontracts 50% or more of the work, the minority contractor shall be presumed not to be performing a commercially useful function. See the code below. Click here to read the part of the City Code concerning subcontracts. Click here to read about the Thomas and Dell bids on contract 122510. Click here to read about the Thomas and Dell bids on contract 127120. As the headline indicates, this is only the tip of the minority contracting iceberg. Click on the two items below and see what watchdog has received from the City of Memphis. We have the ACS (Affiliated Computer Services) Summary Reports for Minority/Women Enterprise Participation from July 2002 through March 2006. It reports on all the minority purchasing done through ACS during this period. We assume most if not all of these contracts were non competitive bids given to these firms. We have asked for the details of these contracts and are awaiting the information. Look at the spreadsheet shown below. We have concentrated on those firms whose owners are good friends of the Mayor and who ended up with a large amount of contracts. This is only the City of Memphis through ACS. The MLGW, MATA, The Airport Authority, the Memphis City Schools, Shelby County and others are also involved. On the spreadsheet we have concentrated on Lesure Computer Services, Integrate Technologies, Mitchell Technology Group, Thomas Consultants, Trinity Technologies and Small Planet Works. There are many others. Click here to see how much each of these firms received in contracts under the City of Memphis ACS program. Click here to see the full ACS monthly reports and how much each of these firms received in contracts under the City of Memphis ACS program. What is the cost to the taxpayers and rate payers. Frankly we do not know because there are no competitive free and open bidders. We need to make this process transparent and open so that we know what this process is costing.  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 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 million 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.  |