Looking to the Future - League City 2017

Well League City, hopefully as you lay down to sleep and visions of sugarplums dance in your head tonight, you can all rest a little easier in light of the fact that our illustrious emperor mayor has closed out the year with his pride and ego secured.  Yes, his cronies on council have finally given him everything he ever wanted - the end of City Manager Mark Rohr's employment in League City.  Never mind the consequences, we'll sort those out later, right?  But let's take a look at this - we've protected our fragile emperor's mayor's pride, and what will it cost this city?  And while we're at it, let's put a little analysis in to see what forces are currently driving our city, and where the logical conclusion of the efforts of these forces will put this city.  And finally, let's take a look at future elections and consider the consequences of statements from some of the players involved in this round of the game of thrones.



How much did pumping up Pat Hallisey's already over-inflated ego cost League City?



Many of the armchair lawyers of the Edelman/Hallisey/Mallios camp for liberals, misguided simpletons, and half-wits on the Facebook/League City Politics is Full Contact Sport page have suggested that it's "just" a couple hundred thousand dollars that it will cost the city.  Here's the problems with this simplification:

1. The use of the word "just" here is rather laughable.  These are the same people who complained about the cost of implementing a "smart" sign at Hometown Heroes Park (~$70k if I recall), which is something that would contribute to the "improved communication" this group has stated they would like out of the city.  But now, spending "just" a couple hundred thousand dollars on Pat's ego is completely reasonable?
2. Much has been postulated as to the likelihood of Mark Rohr suing the city for what amounts to breach of contract.  Mick Phalen seems to think that Rohr's "track record" has indicated he'll take the severance pay and split.  Personally, I almost hope that he sues, if for no other reason than we can have actual judges and lawyers clarify for all of the half-witted amateur legal scholars in Mallios's fan club how the legal system actually functions.  Not to mention it'd be rather nice to put a final dollar tag on how much we have invested in the fragile ego of Mayor Pat Hallisey.  However, since I'm a resident of this city that will end up paying for this fiasco with my tax dollars, I have to hope that he doesn't sue.
3. All of these questions have ignored the bigger cost to this city - what does it mean for our future.  There's the immediate questions of what this means to projects that are already in work.  How much slower will these projects be accomplished as Mr. Baumgartner now has to divide his attention between his prior-to-firing duties and his new duties as interim city manager.  How many projects that the city has approved will now be cancelled/delayed due to failure in acquiring funding via grants (one specialty of Mr. Rohr's that we've now lost).  How hard will it be for the city to find a new Manager (or even a City Administrator, if Emperor Pat Hallisey gets his way and we return to a strong-mayor form of the good ol' boy system) - The reason we had such extreme severance terms in Mr. Rohr's contract was that our city has a terrible history of employing city administrator's and manager's for such short durations, and the way in which Pat dragged this entire subject through the mud in the local press will not help us going forward.  Furthermore, now that we've established our council and Mayor as bullies who rely upon their position of power to break contracts and go back on their word without so much as going through the motions of even trumping up a negative performance review (as John Bowen pointed out - this would've been VERY easy to do), how much damage will this cause in our city's ability to negotiate terms with businesses that are going to enter into contracts with the city?  Can we even put a price on that?  But hey, at least Pat doesn't have to tell his 29-year old daughter there's no "hanky panky" going on at City Hall.   (For those who missed the post-Executive Session portion of the council meeting where Rohr was fired, Emperor Hallisey used this as justification of his vote to also fire the City Attorney, which was based on the CA's processing, at Council's request, a letter to the Mayor demanding an apology for his use of the B-word in reference to a female council-member.  Now, while it was a stretch to send this to the ethic's board on the ground of sexual harassment, it's also a stretch that the Mayor's daughter was so out of touch with current events that she asked Emperor Pat what sort of "hanky panky" was going on at City Hall (as he stated she did), but hey, anything for a good story, right Emperor Pat?)
   

Who are the forces driving this city and the current council members?



So clearly Emperor Hallisey is on the throne at present, and he got some of his cronies elected (Dugie/Gripon/Millican), but who is really driving this liberal surge?  Clearly the people of League City aren't liberal - the latest national elections have shown that the conservative north part of Galveston County is strong enough to override the historically liberal island.  So why do we have a Democrat mayor and his allies in power?  First and foremost, we have the myth of non-partisan location elections to thank.  The Democrats are able to claim they're not liberal and apparently the public is willing to trust anyone who says that.  But more importantly, who was supporting these candidates?  Dugie gets a pass - he ran unopposed - let's hope that doesn't happen again.  While getting some youth on this council is a good thing, I think it's rather shameful in a city full of engineers, doctors, scientists, and business executives we have two landscapers on our city council, especially two who have shown that they have zero ability to objectively analyze a cost/benefit decision and instead simply back Emperor Hallisey.  But who else is backing these candidates?



Marc Edelman.  Outside of being a rather offensive keyboard warrior who has a personal grudge against actual Republicans that is so strong he's willing to align himself with Democrats to exact revenge, what are his qualifications to be a contributor to the discussions regarding the future of this city?  He's thrown money and support at forces that are clearly opposed to advancing League City, and he's used his particularly vile and nasty brand of vitriol to deceive the public.  Marc Edelman is a plague upon this city, and it's time someone calls this out.



Backing the Blue versus Union Bullying.  The deciding factor which saw the Green Team swept to a 4-4 split Council in the latest election was the influence of the League City Police Officers Association.  We happen to live in a very conservative town, and with liberals attacking our police at the Federal level by endorsing Black Lives Matter and other anti-police organizations, the backlash locally to show support for our police with blue line decals on cars, Blue Lives Matter bumper stickers, and in general showing up to support our officers has been a big deal in League City. The Green Team (rather skillfully) used this tide of support for our officers to seize power by capitalizing on a very unique situation with one specific police officer to gain the endorsement of the police officers union, and then win the election. But here's the problem with this – backing the blue does NOT mean backing the police officers union (LCPOA). We “back the blue” by living decent lives, by supporting our cops with good equipment, by enacting laws and choosing prosecutors who will punish criminals and defend the police. Backing the union means endorsing a financially unsustainable future by caving in to out of control demands for salary and pensions (look at what has happened in all those rust belt states where public employee unions have controlled elections for decades). It's even more sad to think that our union was out to get City Manager Rohr over a single isolated incident – and one that there was no reason to be upset with Mr. Rohr about to begin with. One child of an office was denied coverage in a terrible situation that was created by our city's attempt to provide better coverage at a better rate for the city to employees. The thing that the union failed to point out (or even accept) is that the CM and city staff saw the problems created by the change in insurance, and worked to find a new insurance provider to remedy the problem. In other words, they took action to look out for the best interests of the city, there were some unintended and unforeseen consequences, and they took immediate action to rectify the situation. However, the damage was done, and the union had made up their minds, so they got the Green Team elected by campaigning for them as backing the blue, and then they demonstrated classic union bullying tactics as they forced the completion of the quid pro quo situation by getting the action to fire Mark Rohr on the agenda prior to the end of 2016. Despite Nick Long's protest that the vote should be delayed until the city could at least analyze the potential impacts, despite Larry Millican's claim that he didn't really want to rush into this vote, the council voted to fire Mark Rohr. This is what happens when our elected officials are hostages held in debt to public employee unions to return the favor for their support in the election. This is why the rust belt cities are bankrupt – our city rushes into bad decisions and the taxpayers are left to pay the consequences.
A Look to Next Year and Reaction to Key People
So this all leaves us going well, what's next. Obviously we'll have to wait to see just how much Emperor Hallisey's pride and our Police Union has cost this city while we wait to see if Mr. Rohr decides to sue for breach of contract. But let's break down some key statements by people recently

1. Keith Gross – Mr. Gross, for the most part I've been impressed at your cautious and well thought out comments on council. You tend to be much more pensive than many other members of council. However, this time you've revealed something much more troubling, a short-sightedness that is rather disturbing (and that's giving you the benefit of the doubt). See, I say it's benefit of the doubt, because I'm going to assume that you truly meant and believe that you voted to fire CM Rohr because the relationship between the Emperor and the CM was irreparable. The problem with that rationale is that it's rather short-sighted. This mayor is only in place until 2018, our contract with the CM was for longer than that. In other words – the city could suck it up and figure out ways to work despite their differences until an election can rectify the mistake that is Mayor Hallisey. I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you're only being short-sighted, and that it wasn't simply you waffling to attempt to play both sides as you feel there is a rising surge of support for the green team and you're wanting to try to gain their favor now.
   
2. Brian Brown – I had given you the benefit previously of assuming you were just using the Green Team forum as a place to spread your campaign message because there really is no other place to discuss League City Politics in social media. However, I believe your true colors have started to shine. Here's my take now – you're an arrogant Yankee who simply thinks you can Monday-morning quarterback city government based on your extensive expertise in the field acquired by driving tug boats. You've completely bought into the mythology of CM Rohr's performance that has been spread by the Green Team, and you called for his and CA Doan's dismissals. Those having been discussed and acted upon, now you're going after P&D director Paul Menzies. Well, Mr. Brown – I think you have finally revealed, that in classic NYC fashion, you're headhunting and scapegoating like a champion. Please know that you and your friends in Mallios's clan can't continue to complain about city staff turnover and pin this as a failure of the CM, when y'all are gunning for everyone on social media.
   
3. Greg Gripon – Well well, Mr. Gripon – you pointed out that your vote against the CM was a result of discussion with city staff and you were afraid we'd lose more people if the CM stayed. However, did you talk to any of Mr. Rohr's actual reports? You mentioned the staff that was there to show their support for the action to dismiss the CM – but you failed to mention the staff that showed up to support the CM. Now we know – you're a puppet for the union. So is your debt to the union paid in full, or do you owe them more? Can we expect you to seek pay increases for the police officers to unsustainable levels? Can we expect you to bankrupt our future with pensions for the union? And will you EVER show independent thought and vote against Mayor Hallisey?
   
4. Hank Dugie – You ran unopposed once; hopefully never again. You're just a pawn for the Mayor, and it's shameful. You could've been so much more.
   
5. Byram Lass – Have you seen the error of putting your faith in the Green Team yet, as they've revealed they aren't truly concerned about the future of League City, it's simply another “faction” to replace the previous “faction”?
   
6. Tom Dill – Thank you for being a beacon of reason at city council meetings. You've pointed out the potential consequences of the Mayor's actions, and sadly, since Mr. Gross wasn't paying attention and took the path of least resistance, we'll now have to wait and see just how accurate you were. But thank you, for your honesty and your courage in standing up to Emperor Hallisey and his union-backed puppets.
   

What Next?
Well folks, now that the Mayor has his “pound of flesh”, can the city move forward in a reasonable manner, or will we continue to see more petty politics in League City? Only time will tell.