"Petty Politics" in East Ft. Worth

So some our really caring neighborhood activists like Mike Phipps, Don Young and Jerri Horton are really up in arms about Chesapeake considering gas drilling on the eastside, neighborhood street of Scott Ave. (Beach St. & I30) and I agree, we don't need all those heavy industrial trucks tearing up our neighborhood streets that we pay for out of our hard earned tax dollars! Funny thing is, Don Boren & Wanda Conlin (married couple in charge of the Neighborhood Association and Neighborhood Newspaper) hold the following positions:

Don Boren, President of West Meadowbrook Neighborhood Association
Wanda Conlin - editor/publisher/owner of "Greater Meadowbrook News"

Neither are no where to be found on the issue of gas drilling on Scott Ave in the neighborhood (Chesapeake tearing up our neighborhood streets and disturbing Tandy Hills Park), why? My guess would be Chesapeake has bought many expensive ads in the "Greater Meadowbrook News" (Wanda, Don and family paid) paper that Don & Wanda own, produce and distribute throughout Meadowbrook Neighborhoods. Our Councilperson, Kathleen Hicks loves Don & Wanda, in fact, Kathleen calls Wanda, "Mama Wanda." Sickening, Disgusting and causes me and many others to turn away from WMNA (West Meadowbrook Neighborhood Assoc.)...politics at its' best!! YUK!! YUK!! YUK!!

Why are City Council members paid $25K/year?

I don't understand the job of a City Council member in Ft. Worth. I mean, come on, they make $25,000 per year off us taxpayers. That is not a salary for a full time job, that's part time salary, IMO, if that!! So, what is the purpose of a City Council person? How many hours per week are they suppose to work for the voters? Are they just there as a pawn for a hidden group of people w/in their District, how much of it is strictly about money, in other words did some Corporation "put" them there thru thousands of dollars for campaigning? I'd love to have a neighborhood activist named Mike Phipps run for Council in District 8, but hell, who can live on $25K per year? Only the rich? Only the well connected and paid by perks people? Kids of politicians, who? And who exactly do they represent?

The Whited Sepulchre - "Why I'm Liberal"

This blogger, the Whited Sepulchre (http://www.thewhitedsepulchre.blogspot.com/) has a fabo post titled "Why I'm Liberal," lots of great links for this continued educational, exciting (?) election season in our country of America. We are a country right?

" I think people have the right to do what they want with their property and lives, but the second they affect my property and life, I have the right (and we have a collective right) to put limits on them through legislation or just a good old-fashioned ass-whuppin. I think we need to educate people that the everyday things they do are destroying our environment,..." Pete Wann

http://thewhitedsepulchre.blogspot.com/2008/07/why-im-liberal-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh.html

Exactly, Pete, I could not agree more, except for the "ass whuppin," I'm not up for that but "putting limits on them legislatively" and more education....I'm in and agree with you wholeheartedly which is refreshing to me. It's nice to find passion and agreeability, IMO.

So when you are one of the local drug addicts, prostitutes, drug dealers, pimps, or lazy free loaders, and you camp on my property, or our collectively tax paid property, when you trash it, when you dis-respect it, when you commit crimes on it, I have the right, we have the right to put limits on you. I agree with Pete Wann on the claim that people who affect our property and lives should be limited (http://www.westandclear.com/ http://www.cowtownchronicles.com/ ). However, I think Pete was referring to Energy Companies trashing the land and I'm referring to the pimps & hoes -- still the complaint is the same.

Street Outreach by the non-profits. Where is it?

I have always thought that there was not enough street outreach for the homeless in Ft. Worth. Where are the messages that your life doesn't have to be this way. Where are the messages that say, "You can do better, You can change the direction of your Life, You don't have to live like this," etc. While sitting in a meeting the other day, I asked Beckie Wach, Director of Operations, The Salvation Army, if they had info for GEDS, AA Groups and all the things we were discussing in the meeting available for people to see on the bullentin boards at the Salvation Army. Becky seemed irritated that I would ask such question and said Yes there was info posted. After the meeting, I went to the Salvation Army and took the above pictures of their bulletin areas. IMO, this was a false statement by Ms. Wach. She told me a lie. I suppose one could argue this point, I mean there is some info on the board; however, it's not the kind I was talking about and it sure didn't include the groups and services we were discussing in the meeting. Beckie Wach gets paid her salary whether the neighborhood is clean or regardless of how many drunks they help off of the streets. Same for the Executives, Managers, Supervisors, case workers at MHMR. Those are jobs and it's a business just like the for profits plus the large ones are bureaucracies full of mis-managed jobs and workers.

Homeless Tom, part II

Remember Tom from an earlier post? So he comes up to me the other day (in the afternoon blazing hot sun) and asked if he could mow the grass which was about 12" high (against City Code). I have to respect Tom because he has always been one of the "good guys" in our homeless population who has always been willing to "work" for the dollars. I've never seen or heard of him hurting anyone, he has never just come up and ask for money. This particular day, he didn't look well -- said he had just got out of the hospital the day before (still had bandaids on his arms). I said, "Tom you can't mow grass in the heat of the day, especially in the condition you are in, you may have a heat stroke and die." Tom says, "Oh, I'll be ok." I said, "Tom if you don't change your choices, you are going to die." He says, "Yhea that's what my doctor told me." We batted around those words for a while and I got the impression that indeed Tom may be ready to create a healthier, "better" more safe life for himself. He said he had been going to Billy Gregory (Detox place) every morning and "there is never any beds available". A shot of adrenaline hit me inside and that's about all it took for me to get on the trail of tracking down some services and sounding some bells in the beaurocratic offices of such agencies and people around town who claim they are doing their jobs (at the taxpayer's expense, I might add). I asked Tom to check with me every single day because I am unable to get in touch with him any other way. Tom fullfilled this request, everyday he came by like I had asked. That honesty and dedication to at least be as good as his word spoke millions to me. I sent out emails asking for help getting a bed in detox. One late afternoon during this time, Tom came up to my door drunk as hell, could not walk straight, hung on to poles trying to leave my sidewalk, saying he was ready to change his life "right now". It was about 5 - 5:30pm, I knew there was no way he could get in Billy Gregory Detox Center right then. I told him to sit down in the shade, gave him a coke and made phone calls and sent urgent emails for help with Tom. It came down to two choices for Tom:

1. Let me take him over the North Ft. Worth where there is a 24/7 AA meeting place. (NON of these in EAST FT. WORTH -- NOT EVEN AT THE SALVATION ARMY WHOSE ORIGINAL MISSION WAS TO "rehabilitate alcoholics."!)
2. Call an ambulance.

He choose the ambulance because he said he had "heard everything they would be saying at the AA meeting and he had tried that way).

I called the ambulance, they could/would not take him to hospital because he didn't meet the criteria to be taken. I was leaving to go home so Tom had to walk away to his camp to go sleep. It was bothering/worrisome to me, it wasn't a good feeling for me to leave work that day. A few hours later, I was going to work again and saw Tom walking the streets, I stopped and we talked for a mintue. He seemed better, less intoxicated and ok for then.

Long story short, it took someone knowing who to contact to get Tom some attention, otherwise he was just a number and "a nobody" in the circles of the Ft. Worth's Homeless mess because Tom, like many, has no one who offers encouragement/support/care/concern for him. (opportunity for CFW). This is where it gets expensive to truly "help" the homeless individuals who desire better for themselves. It takes people to personally care or be able to make the person think they care. It's called mentoring, counseling and various other nice words. It's basically "the human connection" that people need out here. There is not enough, if any, street outreach. The agencies are not real big on "street outreach" as I have found when asking about it in various meetings with some of the non-profits.

Does this mean FREE water for Chesapeake?

I noticed this long hose running from the drill site just of I30 in East Ft. Worth. I wondered where it lead from or to and what purpose it was serving. I happened to notice that it was hooked directly into the water hydrant as the picture above indicates. So, tell me, is Chesapeake paying for this water? What's up with this rigging on the fire hydrant? Ironically, I was down at City Hall today seeing how much it will cost me to get water available to a piece of undeveloped land, it will cost me $1950.00 to get a 1" water tap with 3/4" irragation meter. I happen to see on the City's price list that it cost $126,000 for a 10" (size may be wrong, but it was the largest one on the list that I saw). So why didn't Chesapeake just hook up a water meter at the drill site instead of the way we see in the pictures. Please someone help me out here.

Irresponsible Parenting & City Councilmembers

It really interesting to pay attention to what our City Councilmembers do and don't do, attend and don't attend, what they choose to speak out on and what they don't, what they have passion about and what they don't have passion about, etc.

As I was listening to a pre-council meeting on our local cable channel, I hear Sal Espino (District 2 North Ft. Worth), say something along the lines of ...taxpayers need to pay for a JPS Health Clinic be placed in FWISD schools to help lower the Infant Mortality rates (since Ft. Worth has some of the highest in the nation). ( need to source this, I know, but you can research it yourself if you want proof, and I feel sure it will prove itself). In other words, disregard teenage (many times underage) sexual promiscuity, it's up to you the taxpayer to cover that tab. Mr. Espino also gave an example of a mother of three at 19 who's family had "kicked" her out so the taxpayers need to build four walls and a roof for this child and her 3 children.

What about Irresponsible Parents? Don't they have a responsibility? Aren't we going to hold them accountable to any degree so that they build some self esteem? How much can we as a Society really put on the taxpayer? IMO, we are at our limit. It starts locally. I don't see Councilmembers taking a strong stand and really reaching out to discourage teenage sex, etc. Our Councilmembers are too "safe" too "political" in Ft. Worth, IMO. Not enough guts for the people. Weak & meek and severe lack of leadership when dealing with "sensitive" race based or cultural based issues like Infant Mortality, Abuse of Dogs, Teenage Pregnancy, High School Dropouts, where the statistics represent a high percentage in their base constituency.

What exactly are our Ft. Worth City leaders doing?

After finding myself with a business right in the middle of the homeless shelters and really digging in to the issue, I found that the municipal courts were a inefficient, ineffective mess because the criminals running around town who declared themselves "poor," suffer absolutely no consequences, not even community service, nothing that would serve as a motivating factor to improve their lives. I wrote many emails to the Mayor and to the City Council members about this. I'm so glad to see the Star-Telegram reporting the sloppiness of our court system. And we wonder why our taxes are going up!! It amazes me to see the opportunities for good that politics in our City, block, and/or suppress. All but maybe a couple of our City Council members are so caught up in big money politics, redevelopment and personal political advancement that they are ineffective as a leader.

Posted on Thu, May. 29, 2008

Municipal fine collections not fine and dandy
Star-Telegram


Fort Worth's sloppy, inefficient municipal court system is sending a terribly wrongheaded message to people who receive tickets for offenses ranging from speeding to illegal dumping.
The message, in essence, is this: You're a chump if you pay your fine quickly. If you wait long enough, you might not have to pay at all.
Abysmal record
The court system has one of the sorriest fine-collection rates -- 43.7 percent -- among Texas' biggest cities, according to an audit by the state comptroller's office.
A report by the city's internal audit office shows that the court system has management and operational problems, dating back at least three years, that have hindered its efforts to collect fines.
The system's worrisome warts were outlined in a story in Sunday's Star-Telegram by City Hall reporter Mike Lee.
The city potentially is facing its toughest financial crunch in more than a decade as the City Council works in coming months to adopt a budget for the 2008-09 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1. The city can ill afford reductions in revenues resulting from a haphazard, Keystone Cops fine-collection effort.
Revenue reversal
The city's internal audit report showed that, from 2005 to 2006, the number of citations rose from 366,000 to 423,000 -- a 15.6 percent increase. But the money collected from fines fell 2.4 percent, from $20.3 million to $19.8 million.
Thousands of people simply didn't pay after they had received permission to pay off their fines over time, the audit showed.
What's needed
City Manager Dale Fisseler and new court administrator Deidra Emerson (who replaced the retiring Elsa Paniagua last fall) must put a high priority on making the system and its employees function more effectively by keeping better records and aggressively birddogging those who don't pay fines on time. Emerson appears to be making some progress.
The City Council must ride herd on Fisseler and Emerson, requiring regular updates until operations are up to snuff.
Ironically, the system has had difficulties with a new $1.7 million CourtView system that was bought to improve operations. As an example, CourtView apparently was programmed improperly and therefore was miscalculating the amount that the courts owed to the state for its share of revenues from traffic cases. Better employee training appears to be needed.
The city needs to hire a law firm to go after those who haven't paid fines. It hasn't had such a collection agent since the city's contract with the firm of Linebarger Goggan Blair Pena & Sampson expired in 2006.
The city's 12 full-time and nine part-time municipal judges need to reassess the practice of giving people extra time to pay fines, because it obviously isn't working in numerous cases. If a person can't afford to pay, perhaps community service requirements could become a more frequently employed alternative.
Ongoing problem
The problem will only grow if more and more violators find that they don't have to pay their fines. They'll be more likely to continue breaking the law. Why play by the rules if there's no punishment for breaking them?
The court system needs a major overhaul, the sooner the better.
ONLINE
www.fortworthgov.org/municipalcourt

http://www.star-telegram.com/225/story/669684.html

Posted on Sun, May. 25, 2008

Fort Worth issues more tickets but sees revenue drop
By MIKE LEE
Star-Telegram Staff Writer

Fort Worth's Municipal Court has one of the lowest collection rates among big cities in Texas, according to the state comptroller's office, and a report from the city's internal auditor shows an array of management problems going back at least three years that have kept the court from collecting money it is owed.

From 2005 to 2006, the number of citations that passed through the court went up 15 percent to 423,000 from 366,000, according to the internal audit. The money collected went down 2.4 percent, to $19.8 million from $20.3 million.

http://www.star-telegram.com/news/story/662728.html

Please email your Mayor and City Council members and ask them to do a better job at managing our court system and quit taking the road of least resistance by asking the taxpayers to foot the bill for their sloppy work.

The Renewable Energy Roundup - Fredricksburg, TX

Might want to mark your calendar for Sept. 26 - 28th for this Green Living Fair -- music, beer, familiy activities, etc. 3 Day Affair.

http://theroundup.org/index.php