Next week, the Fort Worth City Council may declare bankruptcy. Of the moral variety, that is.
Despite virulent opposition from a small handful of citizen activists, the council will consider a set of ethics code changes so shady and self-serving they make Monopoly’s Rich Uncle Pennybags look like a pinko liberal.
The changes would allow the council to prevent residents’ complaints from ever reaching the city’s ethics committee. Instead, the council would simply consult the city attorney (you know, the person they pay to sit with them at every meeting).
Residents wouldn’t be able to recommend who should sit on the ethics committee, and — get this — city boards and commissions would no longer be required to follow Texas open meetings laws.
Remember how the person who divvied up the Monopoly money always seemed to win? Well, this is kind of like that, only there’s real money involved.
That’s what happened in 2010, when the city’s ethics commission actually manned up and ruled against the city for allowing three gas company employees to sit on a committee deciding what company to hire for an air-quality study of drill sites. So Mayor Mike “Pennybags” Moncrief fired all three members of the ethics review committee and hired replacements without consulting the council or residents. Voila! Ethics problem solved!
Anybody who thinks government shouldn’t work like a rigged board game should probably show up at city hall at 7 p.m. Dec. 4.
THANKS TO THE FORT WORTH WEEKLY FOR THE HEADS UP! The Fort Worth Startle Gram is asleep at the wheel.....as usual.
FORT WORTH COUNCIL ETHICS?
ReplyDeleteMost on the Fort Worth Council seems content with the proposed Ethics Ordinance. The problem is that most of them have commented on it and demonstrated how little they know, or don't know. It doesn't provide more protection to the citizens, it only shields the Council members. It actually reduces the protection for the citizens.
Allowing any members on a Task Force that has a substantial interest, as in financial, is an invitation for corruption and wrongdoing. The new Ordinance fails to provide absolutely any safeguard against wrongdoing or manipulation by those who might benefit themselves and not the citizens. Does anyone think these individuals are actually going to provide information that could hurt their self-interest?
Ho-Ho-Ho