Tag Archives: Paul Harpole

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Expression of ‘regret’ is good enough, Mr. Manager

childers

Amarillo Mayor Paul Harpole said it quite well last night.

Interim City Manager Terry Childers’ expression of “regret” over the way he handled a 911 call is sufficient. It’s time to “move on,” Harpole said.

Public weighs in

For those who might not know what happened, here it is:

Childers called the Amarillo emergency call center to report a “stolen” briefcase. He became agitated when the dispatcher — acting in accordance with established protocol — began asking a series of questions. Childers wanted the cops to arrive at the hotel. He threatened to “shut down” the hotel and search for the briefcase.

He also bullied the dispatcher, telling her she didn’t know who she was “dealing with.” Actually, she knew that Childers is the city manager, as he told her so when he placed the call.

Well, Childers ended up misplacing the briefcase. It was recovered. Childers said the tone he used with the dispatcher “was not consistent” with the standards he sets for himself and those who work at City Hall.

The recording of at least three phone calls, though, went viral through the city, prompting a lot of questions about the way Childers treats other public employees.

This has been an embarrassment for the city.

I have commented on this matter in this forum, but I am more than willing now to move on, as the mayor has suggested.

The city made some changes effective immediately at the call center as a result of the call. I am not going to comment on whether the changes are justified. I only wish that the city emergency services hierarchy had let it be known before now about alleged problems with the call center operation.

As for the interim manager and his relationship with the folks who hired him — the five men who serve on the City Council — let’s hope they work this out among themselves. They do, after all, work for the rest of us.

Let us also hope that the city proceeds with all deliberate speed in finding a permanent manager.

Now, Mr. Manager, get back to work.

 

business news, local news

DAI keeps its public money after all . . . good!

downtownamarilloinc1

The facts . . . just the facts.

The fictional police detective Joe Friday would say that on the TV show “Dragnet” a long time ago when questioning principals involved in a criminal activity.  The admonition applies, it seems, to local media seeking to report on the status of a non-profit organization charged with shepherding downtown Amarillo’s revival.

Downtown Amarillo Inc., it was reported, was losing its revenue source from the city. Not so, DAI officials have said. Ditto, according to Mayor Paul Harpole.

A TV station reported that the city had decided to “defund” DAI. Turns out the story was a bit off the mark.

DAI failed to meet a deadline set by the City Council to come up with strategic action plan on downtown revitalization efforts.

The council, though, did not pull the plug on DAI. It extended its deadline, giving the organization a little more time to finish its work on the strategic plan. Harpole said DAI is going to present its plans at the next City Council meeting.

DAI has been the subject of a fair amount of criticism from those who dislike the effort being put into reviving downtown Amarillo. I happen to think DAI provides a service of great value to the city and want it to continue operating at full speed.

From my vantage point, it appears that the City Council and DAI need to become more familiar with each other’s move. Think of them as a dance team learning how to move in sync.

There might be more hiccups along the way as DAI and the City Council — with its three new members still feeling their way through a sometimes-complicated process — move forward . . . hopefully together.

My admonition to DAI would be to ensure that meets all the deadlines required in the future by the bosses at City Hall.

Meanwhile, it’s incumbent on the media — given the occasionally overheated rhetoric that has punctuated the recent community discussion on downtown’s future — to ensure it gets it right the first time.

 

 

local news

Amarillo council sets down rules of conduct

ama city council

Does a governing municipal council really need to be told — in writing — how to behave when it’s conducting the public’s business?

I guess the Amarillo City Council needs such rules spelled out.

Whatever. It’s good to know the council has accepted the rules on how to behave in public.

The council adopted a set of rules that requires council members to, um, act like adults. Interesting, yes?

The new rules require council members to: maintain order and decorum at council meetings and obey the mayor’s edicts; treat each other and city staffers with courtesy and respect; refrain from using their position to obtain special privileges; and refrain from condoning illegal or unethical behavior.

It fascinates me in the extreme that the council felt the need to adopt these rules and codify them in writing.

Every single one of those guidelines seems as though they always would be understood from the beginning.

A lot of things changed when the City Council took office this past spring. Three new guys joined the five-member council. They promised “changed,” and delivered it in spades. Some of it was good. Some of it was, well, not good. One of the not-good elements emerged quickly as at least one of the new council members began arguing publicly with Mayor Paul Harpole about this and that policy matter.

What’s more, the call for former City Manager Jarrett Atkinson to resign right out of the chute was seen as, well, far less than respectful  . . . not to mention the demand that the Amarillo Economic Development Corporation board be fired summarily.

Change? Yeah, we got it, all right.

Now, though, the change that voters said they wanted has been tamped down a bit to require a level of decorum.

The Amarillo City Council is acting like a collection of grownups — even as it puts its rules of behavior in writing.

 

local news

Some of Amarillo’s ‘change’ has been good

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ama city council

Change came to Amarillo City Hall this past spring with the election of three new City Council members.

Some of the change wasn’t so great, such as the call from two new members immediately upon taking office for City Manager Jarrett Atkinson’s resignation and the firing of the Amarillo Economic Development Corporation board.

Atkinson, realizing that he couldn’t work constructively with the new council, eventually did quit; the AEDC board is still there. Atkinson’s departure was a definite downer for the city, but the council has hired a capable man, Terry Childers, to serve as interim city manager.

One or two of the new guys got into public spats with Mayor Paul Harpole. That wasn’t good, either.

The council, though, has implemented a new procedure that I find quite appealing. It moved its regular Tuesday meetings to 5:30 p.m., rather than at 3 p.m.

The idea was to enable more residents to attend council meetings after work hours. The 3 p.m. meeting time was inconvenient for a lot of residents. They expressed their displeasure many times over the years.

The council did begin meeting occasionally later in the evening; it took its meetings into neighborhoods, giving council members a chance to hear residents’ concerns while sitting in their constituents’ own back yard.

I like the notion of meeting at 5:30 p.m. I also like the idea that more residents will be able to attend these sessions, to see and hear their elected representatives and to engage them personally during the “public comment” portion of the council meetings.

Perhaps with more people getting engaged in these proceedings we can stop hearing the constant carping — from the vocal minority of gadflies — about the bogus “secrecy” that allegedly shrouds so many of the council’s actions.

Now … let’s get busy.

 

local news

Amarillo: Dysfunction capital of America?

atkinson

I like to think I’m careful when I read critiques about places from folks who don’t live in or near the communities they’re critiquing.

When something comes across my radar, it’s good to check the background of the author. I did that when I saw a pretty scathing critique on a website called Route Fifty. The author is a fellow named Michael Grass.

His background? His “about” page says he’s a former copy editor for Roll Call, a reputable political journal that covers Capitol Hill; he also has experience working with the Washington Post and the New York Observer.

Grass has posted a pretty sizzling analysis of Amarillo. The bottom line? If you’re looking for a local government job and you want to move to Amarillo to fill one of the many openings posted at City Hall … think long and hard before you take the plunge.

Amarillo, he says, might be the “most dysfunctional city” in the country.

The city manager’s exit has caught Grass’s attention.

City Manager Jarrett Atkinson is soon to be out the door. The City Council has to find another person to fill the job. Grass opines that the council is going to have a hard time finding a competent candidate willing to step into what he describes as “a municipal circus.”

He’s done some homework. Three new city council members — Elisha Demerson, Randy Burkett and Mark Nair — took office this spring. Nair then took the unusual step in calling for Atkinson’s resignation right away. Burkett demanded that the entire Amarillo Economic Development Corp. board be fired.

Nair and Burkett backed off their initial demands.

Still, City Attorney Marcus Norris quit; Assistant City Manager Vicki Covey retired.

The new three-member majority then engineered a citywide referendum on a project that’s been in the works for years. The multipurpose event venue will be on the ballot next Tuesday and voters will get to decide whether the $32 million project should include a ballpark.

Grass writes: “While Atkinson’s resignation, which is to take effect later in November, may have surprised some on the City Council—Nair said he ‘didn’t see it coming’—Amarillo Mayor Paul Harpole said that conflict among councilmembers made it very difficult for the city manager to do his job, citing a handful of problems.”

The city is seeking to fill a number of senior administrative positions. The city attorney still needs to be hired. Same with an assistant city manager. The city charter gives the city manager the authority to make those decisions — but hey, we soon won’t have a city manager, either!

The council has been bickering over budget matters, the future of downtown redevelopment, the status of non-profit organizations set up to help the city proceed with its downtown growth.

You name it, the council has been fighting about it.

Grass’s article wonders: Who in their right mind is going to step into that maelstrom?

It’s a question many of us who live here have been asking.

 

local news

Mayor Harpole hamstrung by state law

harpole

I had the distinct pleasure today of watching Amarillo Mayor Paul Harpole pull his punches so tightly he almost hit himself in the face.

He stood before the Rotary Club of Amarillo and talked about all the projects that are on-going throughout the city that have nothing to do with downtown redevelopment. But then he would remind Rotary Club members that, yes, there’s this thing called downtown revitalization that’s got him all fired up.

Indeed, he seemed wound tighter than a cheap watch today as he blazed through his luncheon program talking about highway access improvements, Loop 335 expansion, utility installations, drainage excavation, improvements to interstate access.

But you see, state law is kind of quirky. As mayor, he is not allowed to advocate for issues that are set to be voted on in an election. He presented himself today as mayor, which meant only that he could give us information about downtown revitalization.

You could tell — heck, it’s been all over the media — that he’s solidly behind the effort to revive downtown Amarillo. The package that’s been presented will proceed with a downtown convention hotel and a parking garage. During his presentation today at the Rotary Club meeting, Harpole showed slides of what the downtown district will look like when it’s done. He believes a key component to the city’s effort remains the multipurpose event venue — in its proposed configuration, which includes a ballpark.

But that state law prohibited him from proclaiming loudly and proudly what he really thinks of the MPEV.

That’s OK, Mr. Mayor. I got the message.

local news

Amarillo City Council gets its own gadfly

When you mention the word “gadfly,” you ought to think of someone who annoys the daylights out of you.

I’m beginning to see a trend developing among the five members of the Amarillo City Council. It is that a gadfly has sprouted wings among them.

Randy Burkett got blood pumping apparently at a city budget meeting this week when he challenged a 3.5-percent budget increase for the Downtown Amarillo Inc., the non-profit organization with which the city contracts to promote our downtown district.

Burkett is one of the three new guys elected to the council in May. I guess he dislikes DAI Inc. He told fellow council members DAI should get a decrease in its budget or perhaps be eliminated.

That got Mayor Paul Harpole excited and the two men exchanged tense words, with Harpole accusing Burkett of “electioneering.”

OK, folks. Change has arrived at the City Council.

That ol’ trick knee of mine is throbbing once again and it’s telling me that we’re going to hear a good more from this new fellow as he seeks to get under the skin of his fellow council members.

I guess at this point I ought to mention the Facebook exchange he had with a member of a group called Amarillo Millennial Movement, a group of young residents who want the city to proceed with its downtown revitalization plans, which include the multipurpose event venue that the council voted 3-1 this week to refer to the voters for their decision on whether to build the MPEV.

I’ve lived in Amarillo for more than 20 years. I’ve spent most of that time commenting on policy decisions from City Hall, attending city government meetings, interacting with municipal officials. I’ve seen my share of contrarians holding elective office at City Hall. The late commissioners Dianne Bosch and Jim Simms come to mind.

But something is beginning to gnaw at me about the chemistry — or the lack thereof — that’s developing among the five men who set municipal policy. It’s palpably different than what we’ve been accustomed to seeing.

If this budget meeting exchange between Harpole and Burkett is an indicator of what’s to come over the course of the next two years, you are welcome to count me as someone who dislikes the change that has plopped itself down at City Hall.

And it’s fair to ask: Is this really and truly what Amarillo voters wanted when they elected this new majority, which includes an individual who seeks to become the City Council’s chief gadfly?

local news

‘Change’ set to present itself at City Hall

Amarillo downtown

Amarillo residents are likely to get a pretty good look at the “change” that arrived at City Hall with the election of three new City Council members this past spring.

It’ll occur Tuesday when the council discusses in public the fate of a proposed outdoor entertainment venue.

Will the council take the issue to a vote? Will it decide the fate of the venue by itself? Will it put the whole off for another day?

The change we’re about to see — as it relates specifically to downtown revival plans — is a divided council. Imagine that. We’ve seen a council — and before that a “city commission” — that spoke with a single voice on most issues large and small. Oh, occasionally we’d get a contrary vote from the late Councilman Jim Simms on, say, whether to ban texting while driving. But generally, the council voted as a bloc.

That’s not likely to happen with this multipurpose event venue matter.

The three new men — Elisha Demerson, Randy Burkett and Mark Nair — are speaking with a single voice among themselves. They were the agents of change in this year’s campaign. They could decide to send this matter to the voters in a November referendum: up or down on the MPEV. The other two council members, Mayor Paul Harpole and Councilman Brian Eades, are likely to vote “no” on a motion to send this matter to the voters.

There seems to be a good chance we’ll see more of these 3-2 splits on the council as it regards a whole array of tax-and-spend issues. Perhaps we’ll see it when the issue involves the Amarillo Economic Development Corporation, which fairly regularly presents economic incentive issues to the council for its approval.

Suppose we get a tax abatement request from a business seeking to expand its operations. Will the council split on that as well.

There’s always been an unwritten rule at City Hall — and at the Amarillo Independent School District board — that when the governing board approves an issue, all members line up behind it.

“Change,” as presented by the winning candidates for this year’s City Council race, very well might not allow council members to abide by that rule.

City Hall once prided itself on its unanimity, unity and cohesiveness.

I’m betting something quite different is going to unfold this coming week.

 

local news

Mayor offers residents another chance to speak out

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There’s been so much talk — much of it unfounded — about secrecy, lack of communication and even some nefarious motives associated with downtown Amarillo’s revitalization.

Well, tonight at 5:30, at the North Branch Library, Mayor Paul Harpole is going to expose himself — quite likely — to perhaps some more of that kind of disinformation.

He’s going to speak to residents who come to the library about some ongoing city projects. Yep, they’ll include downtown work, state highway construction, parks, perhaps some utility billing issues.

Then he’s going to open the floor up to questions.

I’m pretty sure residents will come prepared to pepper the mayor with questions about downtown, which likely will dominate the nature of the inquiries from the public.

I mention this because Harpole has taken some unfair criticism in recent months.

It’s come from individuals who haven’t been paying attention. The mayor, City Council members, senior city administrators, business leaders, civic leaders and anyone else involved in trying to move the downtown project forward have been talking to us about their vision for the city and trying to sell us on the notion that they have the city’s best interests at heart.

The naysayers haven’t listened. They don’t care to listen. They care instead to hear their own voices and aren’t going to be persuaded of anything that goes against their ingrained opposition to the kind of change being discussed for our city.

I understand fully that the contention of closed-mindedness goes the other direction as well.

For now, I am willing to give the mayor credit for seeking to push the city toward something quite different and exciting as it looks toward the future.

I also am willing to salute him for exposing himself to the barbs that are sure to come flying at him.

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To the woodshed … perhaps?

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harpole

Texas open meetings requirements are pretty strict. They allow public bodies to meet in secret only for specific reasons, with personnel discussions being one of them.

And when the body shuts the door, it keeps the public out so that its members can speak freely about the issue at hand.

Tuesday, the Amarillo City Council had a lengthy closed-door meeting. No one outside the room knows what was said when the council shut the door to talk about City Manager Jarrett Atkinson and the Amarillo Economic Development Corporation board.

They went into the meeting to talk about the “status” of both — Atkinson and the AEDC board.

When the council came out, Mayor Paul Harpole announced that Atkinson’s resignation and the resignations of the AEDC board members was off the table. The city is moving forward, he said.

OK, so what the heck happened in that room?

Harpole and the rest of the council won’t say specifically. They papered over the discussion, calling it cordial, businesslike … all the things you might expect to hear. Perhaps it was all of that.

Councilman Mark Nair had called for Atkinson’s resignation on the day he took office. Councilman Randy Burkett, another council rookie, called for the AEDC board to quit.

Then they changed their minds.

Hmmm. Interesting, yes?

Since the public is left to speculate on what happened in that City Hall room, I think I’ll do a little speculating right here — about what I think should have occurred.

Harpole should have given the two brand new council members the tongue-lashing of their lives, much in the manner that President Reagan took then-Office of Management and Budget Director David Stockman “to the woodshed” for steering too far off course during the early years of the Reagan administration.

We don’t know what Harpole told his council colleagues. We do know, though, that he scolded Burkett strongly in public over Burkett’s assertion that he demanded Assistant City Manager Vicki Covey’s resignation when Covey’s retirement already had been in the works. Burkett wasn’t present to hear Harpole’s harsh words, although I’m quite certain he heard of them soon afterward.

It’s also instructive that Burkett left the Tuesday meeting quickly and fended off media attempt to question him as he exited the building.

So, all the principals say they’re happy with the way the direction the city is headed. Councilman Nair spoke of the need to pull together.

Good for all of you — and especially to Mayor Harpole, if he did what I hope he did behind closed doors.