Tag: BGR

Local good government groups in the news: Say what?!!!

Jefferson Parish activists demand action on proposed contracting reforms ~ Manuel Torres

Welp folks, it looks like Councilman at large/River Birch Landfill errand boy Chris “Mini-me” Roberts has not had enough 5am potty visits to fully learn about the procurement reforms recommended month ago by the BGR. Look no further than the Performing Arts Center debacle to understand the need of getting corrupt politicians outta the government procurement biz.

LANA NOONAN: Expenditure of public funds should be discussed openly ~ Letter to the editor

It appears the editorial police at the Sun Herald are now allowing mention of the Bay Tech Building swindle on their pages, which is progress.  While Slabbed never has a problem properly attributing third party sources certain old line media outlets such as the Sun Herald’s editorial page folks can’t seem to tell certain stories without weaving in some tall tales as well. The Seacoast Echo and Bay Tech? Now that’s funny. 😆

Monday Links: The implosion at Jim Letten’s hastens

Lots of good stuff this afternoon from NOLA’s JP beat team.  First up is Manuel Torres and his piece on the problems with Jefferson Parish procurement that features the Citizens for Good Government.  Next, Drew Broach gave us a hat tip in his piece on Jefferson Parish Councilman Chris Roberts being sued for a business loan on his Quizno’s. I thought that was nice.

Next up is the ghost of Ronald Bodenheimer continues to haunt the court system as Paul Purpura covers a case of outrageous prosecutorial misconduct by Bodenheimer when he was still a prosecutor in Mamou’s office involving a capital murder that landed Manuel Ortiz on Angola’s death row.

Jim Letten is the news gift that keeps on giving as the crash and burn of his office has attracted the attention of the New York Times Editorial Board, who are calling for an independent counsel to investigate the prosecutorial misconduct in his office. This editorial comes exactly one day before Letten admits in a letter to Judge Hayden Head that Jan Mann fibbed earlier in USA v Broussard regarding the online activity in his office and manned up that Jan was indeed “eweman”.  Next up, who is Martyfed?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XynIMOmFxF0

Post holiday news miscellany

I guess it is time to crank things back up after Thanksgiving. I had the dessert cart this year and kept things kid friendly making Lemon squares, Blonde brownies along with the traditional pumpkin pie.  Since Pizza buns were a hit with the kid set last year we tried Stuffed pizza this year and it is a keeper.  While everyone works off all the good eats here are several links of interest:

Wanna work people up and get them good and mad?  Kill and mutilate a few dolphins as the Sun Herald editorial board explains.  The panel of marine experts in the Slabbed nation seem to think a local shrimper has gone postal.

Next up is another editorial from the Sun Herald that is extraordinary in respects on the taxpayer funded land graft at the DMR where they joined Slabbed in calling for a federal investigation.  Judging from the murmurs coming from the peanut gallery we’re both a bit late to that party and that is not a bad thing per se.  The DMR withholding public documents from reporter Karen Nelson is beyond disgraceful but about par for the course. That said where there is a will there is a way as the information is out there.

Next up we go way back to early November for the fake cover of Paula Broadwell’s book on former CIA director Petraeus as reported by ABC affiliate in Denver.  The Youtube embed below is thus worth the watch.

Next up is Hurricane Sandy as people are still yammering about it in the news and social media.  Slabbed is feeling the love too as google is leading people who are now being shafted by their insurance companies to our exhaustive Katrina wind water legal dispute archives. That topic after all, is where the Slabbed’s moniker originates so the extra traffic fits. But alas these days hazard mitigation is on my mind and the post Sandy media landscape is having that discussion as well so along those lines I chuckled when a reader emailed this New York Times story on Sandy featuring Dauphin Island Alabama, the undisputed repetitive loss champion of the US.  The piece featured all the usual suspects and special interests that Slabbed has skewered from time to time along with former skeweree turned friend to the Slabbed Nation Western Carolina U professor Rob Young.  This snippet from the story sums things up on the topic: Continue reading “Post holiday news miscellany”

In light of the Broussard Era bribery schemes coming to light this email blast from CFGG is timely.

Supporters of Good Government:

At the September 19th Jefferson Parish Council meeting, Citizens for Good Government again spoke about the reforms to service contracting recommended by the Bureau of Governmental Research, which we intend to continue speaking about until the Jefferson Parish Council gives serious consideration to these recommendations which are, after all, based on best practices research.

The following is an excerpt from the speech by CFGG Vice-Chairman Margie Seemann at the end of the Council meeting:

“Some issues are of such extreme importance to Citizens for Good Government that we devote an enormous amount of time and effort to call attention to these issues, and we attempt to bring pressure on the council and our government to take action on these issues.“
Continue reading “In light of the Broussard Era bribery schemes coming to light this email blast from CFGG is timely.”

Jefferson Parish Corruption Omnibus: Broussard conspirator to cop plea while the T-P goes on the record supporting the CFGG’s efforts

Folks I have a couple of things going on that will prevent me from posting anything substantive for the next couple of days but there has been lots of news rolled out of late that needs to be examined here.

First off is Bill Mack has scheduled a date with Judge Brown to plead guilty to conspiring to bribe Aaron Broussard.  This is not a good thing for Team Goatherder but we already knew the Goatherders were on the run so there is no major surprise there as the prosecution witnesses to the crimes alleged to have been perpetrated by Broussard roll on to the double digits.

Second is professional services contracting pay to play style, which is the Jefferson Parish Council way.  After an early misstep or two the new JP beat team at NOLA appears to have found their sea legs on this issue and gets why the CFGG is squarely behind the BGR’s procurement reform recommendations.  Along those lines on Saturday the T-P editorial board chipped in with their two cents and they now back the CFGG’s efforts.

I don’t know about the local noise makers and the misguided talk of boycotting the new T-P etc in favor of new media ventures like the local version of Tiger Beat but the new team at NOLA.com led by Ricky Mathews appears very content to take thoughtful suggestion and good advice and this folks is a good thing.  There is something else going on behind the scenes involving the JP beat that I will not discuss here beyond saying it appears that certain reporters are bringing their A game to the party in Jefferson Parish and this is a good thing.  If it is true competition insures the best 53 players make an NFL roster and I think it is, then the same is likely true in the journalism biz.

The question of whether or not blogs like Slabbed are competition with media conglomerates like those controlled by the Newhouse family is still an open question.  I view this from a bigger picture standpoint but since I used the football anology how about I end this post with a nice video embed.  Keep bringing it guys because it will only make us all better down the line. ~ sop

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P4tPpqfdt9Y

sop

Louisiana briar patch: Changes at the Times Picayune adversely impacts coverage of Louisiana’s second most populous Parish

First was this stinker laid down yesterday by Rich Rainey sourced mainly by JP Council pay-to-play king Chris “Mini-me” Roberts.

Then John Young chipped in his two cents worth yesterday afternoon via this Bob Ross T-P story.

Then the reaction began pouring in from the citizenry after the second story ran from people that actually attend or watch the Parish Council meetings.  People that have pretty much been ignored by the T-P and even occasionally attacked by the T-P Yenni beat team in days of yore.  It is good the gang took a second shot at the apple but the second article missed too according to the JP peeps that speak with Slabbed.  The new NOLA.com JP political beat team is still a work in progress folks and it is showing.  Like Pres said yesterday in comments Rainey is already on the NOLA City beat and it appears Ross is filling in best he can but he has no institutional knowledge of the subject matter.

The good news is Ross contacted CFGG as they are folks that are urging all the procurement reforms recommended by BGR be enacted.  IMHO more talking needs to happen.  And maybe instead of genuflecting before area politicians perhaps Ricky Mathews should meet with the good government crowd in Louisiana’s second most populous Parish, the largest of the 7 Parish metro area.

Finally one way to force this issue on the Parish Council is via the Charter Change committee, which has been meeting for several months now.  I understand there is a meeting of that body this evening at 7 over at the Yenni Building.

sop

CFGG urgently needs your help

Supporters of Good Government:

Does it upset you that our councilmen are permitted to select the winners of service contracts for which the winning contractors have donated significantly to their campaigns? Or that our councilmen are free to ignore the rankings of evaluation committees and make their own selections in awarding service contracts, such as the case of the Jefferson Performing Arts Center? Or that price does not have to be considered in awarding service contracts? These are among the many reforms addressed by the recently-released Bureau of Governmental Research report, “Reforming Jefferson Parish’s Unusual Approach to Service Contracting.”

Among BGR’s recommendations is that firms be selected for service contracts because they rank the highest in an evaluation committee’s scoring of relevant, weighted criteria. And the BGR report suggests that the role of our councilmen should not be to select contract winners, but should be limited to approving or rejecting the evaluation committee’s recommended contractor or terminating the procurement. And BGR recommends considering price in the evaluation of service contracts when permitted by law.

Does it upset you that the significant effort of the Bureau of Governmental Research, in responding to the request of our government to write a report on contracting in Jefferson Parish, is being ignored by Jefferson Parish’s Council. So far, the council has refused to invite BGR to present their thoroughly researched and well-documented report on service contracting at a council meeting or to give any consideration to BGR’s recommendations. The only public comments by a councilman about the BGR report which we are aware of were made by Council Chairman Lagasse and reported in the Times-Picayune as follows:

“Council Chairman Elton Lagasse dismissed BGR’s conclusion, saying he wouldn’t cede the council’s authority to select contractors. ‘I’m not going to abdicate all of my authority to the administration,’ he said. ‘This is a councilmanic form of government.’” Continue reading “CFGG urgently needs your help”

Citizens for Good Government calls out Councilman at Large Elton Lagasse over his support of pay to play

From the latest CFGG email blast:

Supporters of Good Government:

Citizens for Good Government is distressed at the Jefferson Parish Council’s apparent dismissal of the Bureau of Governmental Research’s recently-released report on service contracting entitled, “Reforming Jefferson Parish’s Unusual Approach to Service Contracting.” When at the May 23rd Council meeting CFGG Vice-Chairman Margie Seemann asked the question:

“Has BGR been invited to present their report to the Council, or will they be invited?”

Councilman Lagasse responded, “No Ma’am.”

We were flabbergasted at this lone response to our question. Although he did not clarify his response, it appears that Councilman Lagasse intended to indicate that BGR will NOT be invited to present their report. Councilman Lagasse’s response was outrageous and unacceptable. We do not believe that he should have the final word about having the BGR report presented at a council meeting, particularly since he was quoted in the Times-Picayune as objecting to some of the conclusions of the report. Continue reading “Citizens for Good Government calls out Councilman at Large Elton Lagasse over his support of pay to play”