Votes Bought & Sold, and other City Hall Shenanigans - Trail Ridge, Part 3

Here is the final installment in the ethics disaster (or, as we in Jacksonville like to call it, "politics as usual") that has grown out of the Trail Ridge Landfill issue.

In the first installment, I told you a bit about the history of the Trail Ridge Landfill, the contract beteween the City of Jacksonville and Waste Management, and how Republic Services has tried to bid for the contract to manage an expanded Trail Ridge.

In the second episode, we talked about the long, ugly fight between Waste Management and Republic Services (and their hired army of lobbyists, power brokers, insiders, and PR people) over whether or not the City of Jacksonville should put the operation of Trail Ridge out to bid. Waste Management, you may remember, believes their contract from 1991 gives them the right to continue to operate the landfill. Republic (and just about everyone else) believes otherwise. Waste Management threatened the City with a major lawsuit if they did not renew the contract; Mayor Peyton came up with a plan to prevent the lawsuit by giving in to WM's demands; Republic launched a PR blitz to convince everyone that putting the landfill contract out to public bid was the best solution; and Councilmember Jack Webb became the most vocal proponent of the public bid.

Now, here's where it gets really nasty. Council VP Jack Webb spoke loudly and often against Mayor Peyton's plan and extolled the virtues of a public bid process, which clearly was to the benefit of Republic Services. That would have been fine, because a bid process in all likelihood would be the best for the City, too. But what Jack Webb never told anyone was that he was trying to get Republic Services as a client for his law firm. In April of 2009, when the City Council voted down the Mayor's plan to give in to WM, Jack Webb claims he was no longer trying to get Republic's business. Of course, it was a complete surprise to EVERYONE when, after months of pro-bid campaigning, Webb's firm is suddenly rewarded with business from Republic.

What makes this so problematic was that Webb had been appointed as chair of a committee that would administer the landfill bid process. At the same time that Webb was working for Republic as an attorney, he was also going to sit on the City Council committee that would ultimately decide on the winner of a bid - a bid that Republic was going to compete for. And neither he, nor Republic, told anyone about their cozy business relationship. No one told the City Council, no one told the press, no one told anyone. In fact, the only reason anyone found out about it was because journalists at the Florida Times-Union found documentation that showed that Webb was working a case for Republic in a local court.

Yes, you read that right: Webb courted Republic as a potential client. Then he spent months shilling for them, pushing for a competitive bid process that Republic would benefit from. Shortly after the vote, Republic hired Webb and his law firm to represent them. If that's not a clear case of public influence & a vote bought and paid for, what is?

And then came the aftermath. Webb (only after being publicly lambasted) agreed to step down from the committee and (after being publicly called out for bad behavior in the Times-Union) decided to stop working for Republic. Republic laughed into their sleeves, because no one thinks they did anything wrong.

So, where does this leave us, the taxpayers?

Well, Webb has been "invited" to maybe come by and chat with the utterly toothless Ethics Commission who'll probably tell him to stop being so blatant and showing such poor common sense, allowing himself to get caught. That's right - invited. The Ethics Commission can't even launch an investigation of their own volition, so Webb probably gets off scott-free.

Republic Services laughs all the way to the bank. They got what they needed - a "competitive" bid process. Competitive, my foot. Who's really going to compete with them? Waste Management? Please! After the threats and the lawsuit, as if WM's bid will be taken seriously. And there aren't any other players around that are big enough to handle the job. Nope, Republic's pretty much got this one in the bag. And what a bag it is...After all, this contract is estimated to be worth $750 million over 30 years. And what did this cost them? How much did they pay Jack Webb for his services as a mouthpiece and a shill?

The taxpayers are hosed. The City has to spend thousands and thousands of dollars to defend themselves in court agains the monster lawsuit that Waste Management has filed against us. Planning & execution of the much-needed expansion of the Trail Ridge Landfill is set back by months, if not years, while everyone tries to figure out how the lawsuit will end. The entire bid process is in question, as we as citizens don't know which - if any - city councilors we can trust to lead the committee.

This is waste. This is unethical. This is probably - if we really drop the pretense - an classic example of City Hall Corruption. And the culprits are going to get away scott-free. Unless we can convince the City to do a real conflict of interest investigation into the Webb & Republic's little arrangement, both Webb and Republic get to ride off into the sunset, with a whole bunch of our tax dollars in their pocket. So please, please SIGN THE PETITION FOR AN ETHICS INVESTIGATION.

So how the heck did we get HERE? Trail Ridge, Part 2

So, after a bit of a detour into all the other wonderful things wrong with Jacksonville politics, let's get back to the garbage.

Trail Ridge Debacle, Part 2

Where left off last, we were talking about how Republic Services had started the push for a competitive bid process in an effort to take the contract for the Trail Ridge Landfill, which was (and is still) managed by Waste Management.

As a quick recap, you may remember that the Trail Ridge Landfill needs to expand. There's 144 acres being used right now, and that's getting filled up. There's a total of 978 acres available. The City, which owns the landfill, is going to expand the operation to take up some more of the available space. At question , of course, is who gets to manage the landfill, and make tons of money - estimated around $750 million over 30 years or so - dealing with the tons of garbage.

Waste Management believes that their original contract from 1991 gives them the right to continue to operate the landfill. They believe it so much, they told the city to re-new the contract in a no-bid manner, or they'd sue the city for huge sums of money.

In the words of WM's lobbyist, mouthpiece (and known Jax politics insider & power broker) Paul Harden, "believe me...if you don't pass this [bill], it's retirement for me, because we will litigate it until the cows come home." No, really, their lobbyist actually said that. Smooth, Paul. Real smooth. Now, I've never been involved in trying to get a city to give me a multi-hundred-million-dollar contract, but I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that big threats don't help.

So WM thinks they're all set. Republic Services believes otherwise - well, obviously, there's $750 million at stake, of course they're willing to believe - they believe that the 1991 contract is only for the original 144 acres. So they put a bug in the ear of the city that going with Waste Management for the Trail Ridge expansion would be a mistake, that they could do a better job and the City really needed to look at other options. A competitive bid process was the answer!

And sadly, that's when the three ring circus began.

Both sides went out and hired the best local talent they could - power brokers (like the aformentioned, tough-talking Paul Harden, and PR man and former political operative Paul McCormick on the Republic Side) and all manner of other consultants.

Then came the big push - the PR blitz and the television ad campaigns.

And then came the shenanigans - at least, the obvious ones, like a Mayor's aide "unintentionally" giving help to Waste Management or former aides & friends of the Mayor suddenly ceasing to work for Republic. All the sort of sneaky, dirty, political baloney that we at Angry Jax Voters detest.

The sort of stuff that makes us - and my heroes over at Concerned Taxpayers of Duval County - really, really angry.

But while all this chicanery and unethical behavior was going on over Trail Ridge - looking like it was all on Waste Management's side - there was a deeper problem, one that would go unmentioned for a long, long time. City Councilmember Jack Webb was running around all over town talking up Republic and the competitive bid process, ostensibly because it would benefit the taxpayers.

We'd find out later that that just wasn't the case. We'll talk more about that next time, in Part 3. Stay tuned, kids. It only gets uglier - and more unethical.

Oh, so NOW Councilmember Webb Wants to Prevent "Abuse" of Power?

Jack Webb is co-sponsoring a bill to prevent 'abuse' at City Hall. Seriously? Come on, Jack - pull the other one! We know how you really feel!

The set up:

Have you ever met a City of Jacksonville employee with the title "Assistant Management Improvement Officer"? No? That's surprising. There's 200 of them running around Jacksonville right now. What qualifies a person to be an 'AMIO', you ask? Well, most appear to be middle management types, such as risk management experts or budget analysts, although there's (apparently) at least one veterinarian among them, but I'll bet the number one qualifications is "pals with the Mayor or his campaign manager!"

These AMIOs salaries all get paid by the taxpayers, I'm sure you'll be happy to know. Due to some weird wording in the laws of the City of Jacksonville, when the Mayor appoints & hires a person to the city payroll, if they don't fit into a specific civil service category, they get labeled as an 'AMIO' where there's no real job description and some pretty loose rules about pay scales. Sounds kind of fishy, doesn't it? Well, yeah - because it IS!

The Florida Times-Union points out that this is a pretty obvious example of 'cronyism and waste'. This is exactly the sort thing I created the blog to speak out against - it's a prime example of the politicians finding ways to help out their pals and hook them up with cushy jobs while the rest of us wonder why we pay taxes but there's not a lot of progress to point to...

Now, for a small bit of good news, Councilmember Glorious Johnson - who has a heck of a smile AND the best name of any city politician, anywhere, ever - has started work on a bill to deal with this problem. Good for her! I'm 100% in support! Maybe we can finally see an example of an ethical politician who's working in the voters' best interest?

But now, here's the punchline...

That paragon of virtue and champion of ethical behavior, City Council VP Jack Webb has decided to chime in on the topic. He's co-sponsoring Ms. Johnson's bill...get this...because "without organization, there is potential for abuse." Well, he'd know all about that, wouldn't he? This is the guy who spent months shilling for Republic Services while pretending to be working for the best interest of the city's voters & taxpayers. This is the guy who took legal work from Republic Services while he was sitting on the committee that would determine who got to bid on a contract...that Republic wanted! Who is this guy kidding?

I'm all for Councilmember Johnson's push to make City politics a little cleaner. I wish her, and her bill, all the luck in the world. I really hope it passes, because this city could use a push in the right direction.

But Jack Webb is part of the problem. As long as he's running loose in the City Council chamber, he and his pals at Republic - and just about everyone else in town - know that our Councilmember's votes are for sale.

Please SIGN THE PETITION and let's send a message to City Hall that we won't tolerate unethical behavior!

Illegal Aliens are Everyone's Problem, even Jacksonville's

Earlier this week, investigators discovered that 100 workers at the new Duval County Courthouse work site had given fake IDs.

That's right. Your tax dollars at work people! Our City Government's largest boondoggle in recent memory is now a haven for illegal workers. Faaaaantastic, as the man once said.

Turner Construction is the firm that had hired the illegals which was "strictly prohibited" according to there contract with the City. Of course it was! And, in the story mentioned above, our very own Mayor Peyton has said that he's looking into finding out if that qualifies as a breach of contract. A breach of contract? I'm sure that's got Turner quaking in their boots! Where are the fines? Where is the outrage? Where is the ACTION?

Abel Harding of the Times-Union said it best in his blog the other day, when he opined that, "Political leaders have "dealt" with the issue with a wink and a nod." He was referring to the State Legislature, but I'll take a bold step and apply this to the City Government as well.

If voters & taxpayers let this issue die, if we don't call for some action by the City against Turner, you can be sure that the City will continue winking and nodding at Turner and other vendors of their ilk. After all, if we don't care enough to take action, why should they?!

If you want to join me in sending a message to the City Council that we're watching them and aren't going to let them get away with their usual tricks, please sign the petition - http://www.gopetition.com/online/31796.html.

Forbes: Something stinks in Jacksonville (and they're not wrong!)

Forbes Magazine has ranked Jacksonville 8th overall in this year's "America's Most Toxic Cities" report. The Florida Times-Union noted in their coverage that City Hall is rankled by this report, claiming that they are in fact one of the cleaner cities in this fine nation.

I'm sure you'll be pleased to knoe that everyone and their brother has rushed to refute the claims in the Forbes article. FDEP claims that the study is flawed. Visit Jacksonville thinks the air down here is just fine. City Hall - via Mr. Ebenezer Gujjarlapudi (Director of environmental compliance for the city)  has pointed out that they city is working hard to clean up some of the sites around the city thar need remediation.

All that's great. But Forbes, whether their study was flawed or not, was correct in pointing out that there are hazardous waste sites leaking toxic chemicals into our environment, and that there have been a number of problems around the city that have required action by the EPA (you can see that chart here).

What would be REALLY toxic would be if our City government continues down its current path. As you've seen in this blog and in recent articles in the Times-Union, we need strong, ethical leadership in this city. While I'm glad to see (in this example) that our government is trying to defend itself from what it sees as flawed accusations, I think I (and the rest of the taxpayers in this city) would prefer that they actually go and work on fixing the problems.



Another one looms large: the Trail Ridge Landfill expansion. There hasn't been too much trouble there recently (well, relatively speaking anyway, it is a landfill) and hopefully, after the expansion there won't be. Of course, if the City Council hands the contract off to Republic Services, who knows? Some quick research shows that Republic has been in some environmental trouble recently. Is this the big business partner we really want when it comes to trying to improve the environment in Jacksonville?

Will the ETHICAL Leaders Please Step Forward?

Mr. Ronald Littlepage, in his opinion piece in Sunday's Times-Union asks for something we really need here in Jacksonville: leadership.

He claims that Jacksonville is stuck in the doldrums; Mayor Peyton is a lame-duck (and one who appears to have just had enough of politics) and our City Council's leadership cadre, in Mr. Littlepage's words "isn't exactly visionary."

Mr. Littlepage is a master of understatement. The fact is, from a leadership perspective, we are in pretty rough shape.

What shocks me the most about Mr. Littlepage's piece is that he ignores ethics completely. He calls for leaders to step forward, he discusses who some of those future leaders might be, and how they might address solving some of our problems, but he skirts around the real problem: the vast majority of our politicians seem to be out for themselves, and the Ethics Commission, the only watchdog we have, is chained up & muzzled so it can't protect our interests. Never mind that the politicians are supposed to be looking out for our interests.

I completely agree with Mr. Littlepage that we really need some leadership here. I do have to question why it is that he seems to be ignoring the ethics issue. Unless he doesn't see these kinds of things as a problem?

Whether he does or doesn't, I can tell you that I do. A number of my friends and neighbors do, too.

If you, like me, want to send a message to our leaders, please sign the Trail Ridge Petition, asking for a Conflict of Interest Investigation. If our elected officials won't act ethically, it's our duty as citizens to put them on notice.

Jacksonville's Toothless Tiger

Today's post is about Jacksonville's Toothless Tiger - Carla Miller, the City Ethics Officer (and her compatriots in ineffectivness, the Jacksonville Ethics Commission).

I'm want to make this clear up front - I'm NOT attacking Ms. Miller on any sort of personal level. I think she's made it clear that she takes her job seriously and believes in what she's doing. She's a fomer federal prosecutor, she's been all over the world helping cities develop ethics program...she knows her stuff. The problem is that she can't do her job properly even if she wants to! Because here in Jacksonville, "politics as usual" means that that last thing anyone wants is the Ethics Officer to go around enforcing any sort of decent standarss!

The Florida Times-Union has put out two interesting pieces in the last few days. I apologize, readers, for taking so long to get to them, because they're pretty important pieces. The first details an akward, embarrasing moment for this city and the second explains how we've come to this situation.

While you should absolutely read both of those stories, I'll sum up for you. The Jacksonville Ethics Commission is a 9 member board and the members are appointed by the Mayor, City Council President, School Board, etc. Each of those members owe their position to someone - the person who appointed them. The Commission has no full-time staff and no real budget. They don't have any real power to go initiate investigations. If the Florida Times-Union has it correct, Ethics Officer Carla Miller doesn't even report to the Commission - her bosses (plural!) are the Mayor and The City Council.

Even if - IF - either the Commission or Ms. Miller WANTED to do an investigation, they'd be stuck in the gates. No money, no staff, and the fact that at any given moment they have a natural conflict of interest themselves - do they serve their bosses, the city, the taxpayers? Or do they just do the best they can to cover their own behinds in an ugly situation?

Again we come to my favorite topic, Jack Webb and Trail Ridge. As I'm sure you know, City Council VP Jack Webb has done a real good job of making it look like he sold his vote - and his influential voice - to Republic Services, the billion-dollar waste management company that wants to operate the Trail Ridge Landfill. You'll see in various posts here and in all kinds of news stories at the Times-Union that both Webb and Republic look really bad - it's hard to see how this wasn't some kind of a premeditiated, back-room smoking-a-cigar kind of deal between them.

At the most recent meeting of the Ethics Commission, the best our theoretical "watchdogs" could do was resolve to "invite" Mr. Webb before them at their next meeting. INVITE? To come have some tea? And maybe a biscuit or scone, too?

Our watchdog is a toothless tiger. Impotent. Useless. Not because they're bad people, and not because they don't want to do their jobs. It's because the City of Jacksonville won't give them them the tools and independence to do their job. After all, they sure wouldn't want any investigations going on - politicians might lose their seats and big businesses with their lobbyist pals might lose their big paydays.

Mayor Peyton, City Council - give our Ethics Commission and Ethics Officer the tools and freedom they require to do their job!

Ethics Commission, Ms. Miller - please, 'invite' Mr. Webb a little harder and make sure you get to the bottom of this Trail Ridge story!

A Comment Worthy of Response

I received a comment from my old pal, "Anonymous". Normally, A's comments aren't worth the time to respond to, but this time Ol' Anon has actually come through with a good one.

The comment, which was posted under my earlier story "What Garbage" below, is as follows:

Why exactly should Republic withdraw from the bidding process ?

Leaving us the taxpayers what ? NO competition for a $750 "Deal" that Peyton would LOVE to see go to his pal Paul Harden's Client ? (i.e. waste management)

What problem are you trying to solve exactly ?

A transparent bidding process is the ONLY thing between Jax and the "Shaft" as you so eloquently put it.

So why would you want ANY potential bidder removed from the process ?

Okay, my old buddy Anon clearly has misunderstood me. I don't mind - in fact I'd say I support - a bid process. But as you say, Anon, it has to be a TRANSPARENT bidding process.

The all-too-cozy relationship between Jack Webb and Republic - which is CLEARLY spelled out in the Times-Union here, here and here has tainted that process.

If you read those linked stories, it is clear - I mean it is FACT - that Jack Webb was a very vocal proponent of the competitive bid process and a vocal opponent of Peyton's plan. It is a FACT that Webb was pursuing Republic as a business client. And it is a FACT that after Webb spent all that time working toward a competitive bid that would benefit Republic, Republic called HIM to hire him and his firm.

And then...Webb told nobody. Not the Mayor, not his colleagues on the City Council, not the Ethics Commission.

Republic told...nobody.

They kept it a secret. If there was really no conflict, if there was really no ethics violation, why would they keep it a secret?

There's no actual proof - yet - that Republic (in a premeditated and planned way) bought themselves a City Councilor to push their agenda. But it sure looks like they did, even to those of us who aren't rocket scientists or brain surgeons. In fact, in his story on JaxPolticsOnline.com (here), Abel Harding talks about how really bad this looks.

In answer to Anon's question, I'll say this. The problem I'm trying to solve is that I don't want politicians and big business getting together to further their interests rather than the interests of us, the taxpayers. Republic and Webb were doing just that, and the fact that they did it in secret (until the Times-Union found evidence of their misdeeds) just shows that they aren't interested in transparency or competition at all.

Republic should be disqualified from the bid process, both as punishment and as a warning to anyone who'd try to do what they did.

Stay tuned for more on this story...

Incentives, TARP and Abel Harding

I'm going to step away from Ethics & Politics for a minute (sort of) to give a shout out to Abel Harding.

Mr. Harding, you may know, is the editor and founder of the excellent blog, Jacksonville Politics Online. He is now working for the Florida Times-Union as a columnist, and I strongly urge everyone to check out his work. He's a smart guy and he's got some strong insight into both business and politics.

His post in today's Times-Union discusses not just the price we all (as US taxpayers) pay in the fall of CIT, but also the price paid especially by Jacksonville and Florida taxpayers.

Mr. Harding notes that the Jacksonville City Council approved a JEDC plan to award a $3,000 tax credit to CIT for every job created in Jacksonville by CIT. While I understand that a City needs to do what a City needs to do to bring in good jobs & industry (and this was in 2006), in hindsight, it seems like the JEDC & City Council's bet wasn't a good one.

There's no real ethical dilemma here - but this is a good opportunity for us to remember that it's a good idea to think twice before awarding tax breaks, cash incentives, or other deals to large businesses who may not be as strong as they'd like one to believe.

In any event, I hope you all check out Mr. Harding's columns in the Times-Union and check out his blog as well. He's a smart guy, and worth reading.

A Long Time Ago, a Landfill Not So Far Away

 As promised, here is Trail Ridge Debacle (The Quick Version) - Part One.

Trail Ridge, of course, is the landfill where all of the trash from Jacksonville goes. At issue is the question of who gets to operate the landfill when it expands. The whole site is 978 acres - but so far, only 144 acres have been used. The 144 acre portion is running out of capacity, so it's time to expand the landfill using more of the land on the site. Currently, the landfill is operated by Waste Management. Republic Services, a major competitor of Waste Management, would like to take over.

Waste Management believes that the contract they signed in 1991 gives them the right to operate the entire landfill, although that is disputed by a number of people.

Republic Services, along with a variety of people and organizations, contend that, when the city-owned landfill is expanded, the contract to operate the landfill should be put out to a public bid (and in the interest of fairness, I should probably state that I don't really disagree with a public bid).

Seems simple, right? How could this go so wrong? Oh, in so many ways. Each side lawyered up, hired big gun lobbyists, and lined up whatever insiders & influential friends they could to fight for their position.

As you'll see in future posts, both sides pulled some pretty nasty manuvers to try to get their way. As you'll see from those above links, this political horror story starts out just like so many others: a lot of money to be made, and a lot of money to be made off of deciding who makes that money.