TenHaken Voicemail

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I guess since Pitty Pat decided to put this up, I will to. I was unable to use the audio file.

Here is the transcript;

“Hey Theresa it’s Paul it’s about 4:15. Uh, say we had a discussion a while back when we were talking about water reclamation and your desire to go on my Facebook page and stir up comments and I told you how I didn’t appreciate that and I see it’s happening again and I think last time you mentioned it was to defend yourself. I see no reason for you to be using my page, my forum to advance your agenda in your position you have a Facebook page feel free to use it accordingly and not canabalize mine so we’re gonna have to block you from my page if that continues. So I would ask that you would show some respect for that. Thank You. Have a good day.”

To tell you the truth, I really think it is a lot of nitpicking, on both sides. I think it is sad when the mayor is telling councilors how to behave – then lying on FB about it. They are independently elected, just like him. But I have seen this in past administrations to. The last mayor would scold the councilors all the time. In fact one time he even threatened a councilor in a text message. The council is a separate legislative body, they SHOULD be a check to the mayor. There is of course a simple fix to this – STOP POSTING ON FACEBOOK and hold more public meetings and town halls and answer questions from constituents about issues in that forum. I still don’t understand what the mayor and certain councilors are so afraid of when it comes to meeting with citizens in public? Are they scared they can’t answer the questions? Or is it just an incredible disdain for transparency? I think it is a little bit of both.

UPDATE: Mayor TenHaken tells councilor Stehly he will block her from FB

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Theresa played me a voicemail tonight that had our mayor telling her he would ‘block her from his facebook page’.

I heard the message. It was him. No doubt. It had something to do with water reclamation and posting comments on his FB page.

But he was on FB last night proclaiming he didn’t do it;

‘There are no mean emails, voicemails, or the like here.’

While I would agree he wasn’t mean (he was actually pretty calm) he did say he would block her. I guess as an elected official if someone was accusing me of something and I was in doubt about it, I would get on the horn and ask for the proof. Then if I truly did do it (the VM is from January I believe) I would apologize and move on.

“It’s Better to Beg for Forgiveness than to Ask for Permission”

Now this happened. I commented on the page this morning that they should remove SF Politics from FB and start a blog where they can moderate comments like I do here. Apparently they are taking my advice.

Metro 911 meeting this morning

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According to councilor Stehly on FB and local media;

Happening Now: Metro 911 wants $9-11 Million for a new facility vs $6-8 Million to remodel. Unfortunately,the meeting was not recorded.

She also told me that she was chastised at the meeting by another city councilor for posting that information on FB. This was a public meeting, so I’m not sure why that was an issue? Oh, because without the media there they can try to keep people in the dark. I’m not sure why our public officials like secrecy so much. I have often argued that if you keep the public informed from the beginning they can never come back and say ‘You never told us about this.’ That is why the Bunker Ramp has been such a disaster, too many behind closed door deals.

Well looky there, a quorum of leaders in a public building, wouldn’t that be considered a ‘public meeting’?

Councilor Stehly gets it done without even voting

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As I have mentioned in the past, Councilor Stehly has gotten a lot of things done without the votes, but by just simply putting on pressure.

She did it again this afternoon at the Audit Committee Meeting.

She asked for several things from the podium during the 2020 Audit Plan presentation;

• An external audit of the Parking System (Theresa mentioned that she found it odd that the city wants to keep building or subsidizing parking ramps downtown yet wants to sell off flat parking lots).

• An audit of the CMAR (Construction Manager at Risk) process.

• Travel expenses of city staff (I guess that during the current administration, city directors and staff, and mostly the mayor, have been taking a lot of ‘junket trips’ but not really giving a report to the public as what they are doing on the trips. Recently TenHaken put up a short column about his trip to China, but never really told us what was really discussed. We also get a lot of updates on FB from the Innovation Manger and all the different cities he has been drinking in.

• A study of City Director salaries in comparison to other cities. Something I pointed out the last time the HR department did a wage study, but did NOT include city directors. How convenient.

The committee argued the merits of all the items. Councilor Brekke mentioned that maybe the city council budget analyst could look into the last two items and do a presentation on those findings – which I agree.

Audit Manager Nelson suggested that the CMAR audit would have to be done externally due to it’s speciality of the audit.

But they got into a long discussion about the external parking ramp audit. Councilor Kiley said he didn’t want to put it on the audit plan because they are in the middle of litigation, but other members argued that there was nothing wrong with putting it on the agenda, and if they have to pull it in the future, they can. The amendment to add it passed with Kiley and Chair Neitzert voting against it. Councilor Stehly doesn’t sit on the committee so she couldn’t vote on it.

T.J. TypeOver said they won’t audit it until it is done;

T.J. Nelson, deputy chief of staff in the mayor’s office, said City Hall isn’t opposed to a review of the parking system or the ramp, but not until the ramp project is complete and the dust settles on any lawsuits surrounding it.

“The administration will complete a comprehensive review of the process that led to the prior approval of this project by the Huether administration. This will take place following the ramp’s completion and resolution of any outstanding legal matters,” he said. “At this time, the administration supports a financial or construction audit consistent with the time frame outlined above.”

Yeah, after we have f’d up in every possible way we can, then we will tell the public how that f’k up occurred. WHAT!? Wouldn’t it be wise to figure that out BEFORE we move ahead with another developer or even litigation? Wouldn’t this help our case? Sometimes I wonder if putting money in a burn barrel would be a better way to spend money then paying city communication staff.

There was also a presentation on the Landfill Audit. There was a lot of problems going on out there where basically employees were not following procedures and not doing proper inspections. You can listen for yourself. My view is the city is missing out on a lot of landfill revenue due to the laziness of the employees. I think they were warned about these things in past audits. I think it is time to start handing our pink slips, then maybe they will get the picture.

Chair Neitzert mentions at the end they are going to start the process of hiring another staff auditor (which they do need). I wonder if this time they will actually put an employment ad in something besides Tidbits and the City Hall’s lunchroom?

PUBLIC TRANSIT MEETING

I still haven’t heard all the details of what happened, but I guess a committee member got a little irate about how the public is being left out of the decisions they are making. More to come.