Larry Millican - League City Council Candidate - Platform Analysis

I really didn't want to write something about Larry Millican.  In watching the Council meetings his comments have been rather well thought out, calm, and collected, to the point that I wanted to believe he wasn't part of the "Green Team" machine.  Yet after seeing so many things associating Larry with the rest of Pat Hallisey's puppets, I can no longer avoid commenting on Larry's platform.  He has jumped in with both feet, and as Holly Shelden pointed out today, "When the character of a man is not clear to you, look at his friends."  So, it's time to look at what's wrong with Larry Millican's platform.  But before we get there, I have to question - as he put it, his wife is the activist, he's just been along for the ride, so why is Larry running now?  Perhaps the question is - what's in it for Larry?  Moving on - let's look at the four points of his platform.

1) "Restore respect and dignity to City Council"  Now, I've seen our Council be plenty respectful and act with appropriate dignity, up until Pat Hallisey snuck into the Mayor's office, finally winning an election for the first time ever after countless attempts, by running in a special election that occurred with a ballot where the mayoral election was the ONLY contested position.  Even then, Pat only won by less than 100 votes in a city of greater than 100,000 residents.  Pat campaigned on a promise to fight the rest of council and oppose them at every step of the way.  So one has to ask - with such a disrespectful position towards the will of the people who elected (by wider margins, in elections that saw a greater portion of the population vote) the rest of Council, how can one who has aligned themselves with Pat's Puppets actually restore "respect and dignity"?  Pat Hallisey's wife is on Facebook "liking" comments that describe candidates for council and council members as "cougars" and "hogs", is that the type of "dignity" and "respect" we can expect with Larry on council?  Pat's puppets are wasting their time attempting to get a recall election for councilman Dan Becker, and posting childish selfies at their coordination meetings, and seeking to waste our tax dollars on a special recall election - is THAT the kind of "respect and dignity" we can expect?  To that, I say, NO THANK YOU.  I'd much rather our city council respect the fact that I have worked hard to earn my money, and act responsibly by taking the necessary steps to reign in spending (more to come on that later) and attract businesses to our town so the tax burden can shift to retail and industrial instead of homeowners taxes.

2) "Restore open discussion and public decision making".  Really, Mr. Millican?  Public decision making?  Like when you asked council to resist seeking public approval to spend $10million on a new Animal Shelter (your wife's pet cause) simply because you were afraid the public wouldn't approve it?  Now you've aligned yourself with the Green Team, campaigning against the downtown revitalization effort, which is intended to increase retail sales tax through targeted investment in specific proposals that will increase the number of retail shops downtown while providing a public service with more parking available for events at League Park, that will skillfully bring in grant money to fund 80% of the cost (transferring federal tax dollars paid by our citizens from Washington back to League City).  This same Green Team campaign against downtown revitalization uses the justification that the parking garage should be put to the public for a vote, yet you resisted doing this for your wife's pet project, an extreme expense.  Now, I'm not saying I'm opposed to a new animal shelter, but the hypocrisy of this "restore open discussion and public decision making" plank in your platform is ridiculous.  Which is it Larry, do you want public decision-making when it supports your positions, but don't want it when it might rain on your wife's parade?

3) "Intentional approach to long term economic growth" - Please reference my post on Greg Gripon's identical position (https://leaguecityoutsiders.blogspot.com/2016/10/league-city-council-candidate-greg.html )  Ultimately this is liberal centralized control at it's purest, and Larry claims to be a "conservative".  Shame on him.

4) "City employees are our greatest asset".  Really Larry?  Is that why you support a Mayor who has driven away quality employees? Is that why your Green Team supporters are on a witch hunt to drive out our City Manager and City Attorney?  Please explain this contradiction.  Even if we ignore the way the Mayor has badgered and harrassed the city staff, at BEST, this line is a platitude, corporate-speak nothingness at it's finest.  What aspect of our city's benefits package, pay scale, or work environment do you plan to change?  Without specifics here, you're just paying lip service in an attempt to grab some votes.

I'm sorry, but I can't support a big-government, regressive, anti-growth, hypocritical Hallisey puppet for Council.