The Power Of One

“I am only one, but still I am one.

I cannot do everything, but still I can do something;

and because I cannot do everything,

I will not refuse to do something that I can do.”

~Helen Keller

My dad, Joe Gatton, was only 50 years old when he died in a trucking accident three days after Christmas in 2006.

A lot of folks knew and loved my dad. Everywhere we went – even out of state – he always seemed to run into someone he knew. When he died, people stood in line for more than two hours at the visitation. And when we buried him on a cold, rainy New Year’s Eve, people showed up in droves at his funeral to pay respects to one single man who clearly touched the lives of thousands.

My dad was an avid Boy Scout leader. He was Scoutmaster of Troop 174 in Troutman for years before moving on to train Scout leaders. At a district Boy Scout banquet shortly after he died, a man said something about my dad that resonated with me. In a nutshell, he said that as a Boy Scout leader, my dad had impacted the lives of a vast number of boys in the Scouts program. But once he started training leaders, he had a direct impact on fewer people because, obviously, the number of leaders pales in comparison to the number of Scouts.

Then, the lesson: The man asked any Boy Scout leader who had taken a leadership training course under my dad to stand. And several people stood. Then he asked every Boy Scout who had been instructed by one or more of those leaders to stand. And almost every person in the room rose to their feet.

And that’s when it began to hit me – my dad touched the lives of countless people by touching the lives of a relative few. He lit one candle that went out and lit two that went out and lit five that went out and lit ten. And the number grew and grew and grew. But it all started with one single man. It’s not that he was any better, any more powerful, or any more righteous than anyone else. He just did what was his to do. That’s all.

I’ve come to realize in the past year that of all the traits my dad passed down to me, and of every lesson I learned from him while he was alive, perhaps the best thing he gave me – the greatest lesson he taught me – came after he was already gone.

The lesson is summed up beautifully in the words of Helen Keller, blind and deaf, who said: “I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; and because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do something that I can do.”

The name of this blog bears my name – my father’s name – but that’s not because I am any better, any more powerful, or any more righteous than any other single person on this planet or in our community. I am simply one person, doing what’s mine to do. Yet, the greatest lesson I ever learned from the greatest man I ever knew is the power of that number.

Morrison Plantation developers not listed as contributors to mayor's 2007 campaign

I mentioned in my last entry that I had not checked Bill Thunberg’s 2007 mayoral campaign contributions to see if he accepted money from Morrison Plantation developers.

I hate leaving things “open,” so I took a quick trip to the Iredell County Elections Office in Statesville today.

None of the Morrison Plantation developers who contributed to Thunberg's first campaign in 2005 were listed as contributors to his 2007 campaign. Additionally, per the suggestion in the comments that followed yesterday's entry (“Morrison Plantation: still a mess after all these years”), I did not see that anyone from Bristol, Va. or Bristol Virginia Utilities (operators of the M-I Connection cable company) contributed to Thunberg's 2007 campaign.

Morrison Plantation: still a mess after all these years

Do some town officials use selective leniency in dealings with developers? And if so, why?

Nearly two years after a Mooresville woman’s death triggered a public spat between developers and the Town of Mooresville over who is responsible for streets in the 483-acre Morrison Plantation development west of Mooresville, developers are yet to complete the repairs and improvements necessary for the town to take over maintenance of the development’s streets and utilities.

Pedestrian Janet Bush, 56, was killed on Sept. 5, 2006 when she was struck by a motorist while crossing Morrison Plantation Parkway and Plantation Ridge Drive, a dangerous intersection that, at the time, lacked stoplights or four-way stop signs.

The developers eventually erected a stoplight, but only amid public outcry and after playing a game of tug-of-war with the Town of Mooresville for a couple months.

Town government officials contended that developer Ed Kale of Carolina Income Management had not completed needed improvements and repairs to the streets in Morrison Plantation, including the addition of a stoplight at the dangerous intersection. The town said until that work was complete, and until the town accepted the streets for public maintenance, the streets were private and the sole responsibility of the developer.

The developers, on the other hand, argued that the roads were originally approved by the Town of Mooresville. And since the streets would eventually be publicly maintained, they stated in a Sept. 8, 2006 press release, “We’re limited in what we can do.”

In the end, the developers erected a stoplight, and folks were satisfied.

What was seemingly forgotten, however, were all the other improvements that the town’s engineering department – under the leadership of then-Engineering Director Richard McMillan – had been pushing Kale to complete in the development for several years before Bush’s death.

And as of one month ago, many repairs and improvements are still incomplete.

On Feb. 22, the town’s engineering department – now supervised by Tonia Wimberly – sent the Morrison Plantation developers a punch list of 41 repairs and improvements that need to be made on 10 different Morrison Plantation streets before the developers can submit a final request for town inspection. And until the development passes that inspection, the town will not take over public maintenance of the streets.

But why has the town continued to allow the developers to build and obtain certificates of occupancy (COs) despite their reluctance – or refusal – to bring their development up to town standards over the past several years?

Maybe we’ll never know the answer. But what we do know is that relationships that some current and former town government officials have had with Kale and other Morrison Plantation developers over the past few years provide more questions than answers.

Here’s a timeline, much of which I originally reported in a September 2006 issue of the Tribune:

Summer 2005
Issues arose from Morrison Plantation and its Meeting Street Homes residential development concerning the town’s release of COs and water meters. McMillan communicated repeatedly with Kale in public records about numerous problems within the development. McMillan told Kale that per state statutes, improvements would need to be complete before the town could release water meters.

September 2005
McMillan and the town’s then-director of utilities, Wilce Martin, continued to inform Town Manager Jamie Justice and Town Attorney Steve Gambill of problems within the Morrison Plantation development, virtually begging for the administrators’ help and support to push the developers to conform to town standards.

McMillan also repeatedly told Justice and Gambill that in his capacity as a licensed professional engineer, he could not agree to the town releasing water meters until Kale followed and completed state-mandated requirements in his development.

However, Justice “was insistent that (McMillan) release the meters in order to ‘help the developer out,’” according to the lawsuit that McMillan and Martin filed against the town after Justice fired them in February 2006. (The hearing on the town's request for dismissal of that case is scheduled for April 7, by the way.)

Ignoring McMillan’s protests, Justice signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Kale and instructed town staff to release the meters, telling McMillan that “If the developer and his engineer have not complied with the requirements, it (is) their butt on the line, not the town’s,” the lawsuit reads.

McMillan and Martin told Justice again that releasing the meters would violate state law since the project was incomplete and had not been certified by the developer’s engineer-of-record, as required by state regulations.

Meanwhile, McMillan and Martin called a meeting with officials of the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources (NCDENR), who told the two men that if the town released the meters before the improvements were complete, the town would be fined by the state.

McMillan and Martin relayed the state’s warning to Justice, who apparently chastised the two men for meeting with NCDENR. McMillan and Martin responded that it was their “duty to protect the Town and the health, safety and welfare of the public.”

October 3, 2005
Four developers – including two from Morrison Plantation – lambaste McMillan and the town’s engineering staff at a town board meeting. Kale, the most confrontational developer at the meeting, called the engineering department “incompetent, disorganized, unprofessional, unreasonable and out of control.”

He told commissioners that he had been called to speak at the meeting. Each developer who spoke that evening later stated they were called to attend the meeting, according to McMillan and Martin’s lawsuit. It states that McMillan and Martin later discovered that Assistant Town Manager Erskine Smith - who is now serving as the town's interim town manager - asked the developers to attend the meeting and “publicly disparage” McMillan and the engineering department.

Smith, according to the lawsuit, later told Martin that he was simply following Justice’s orders to summon the developers to the town board meeting.

It also states that Justice never requested a response from McMillan concerning the developers’ comments at that town board meeting.

But then-Mayor Al Jones asked McMillan to respond to the allegations, which McMillan did in a six-page public document dated Oct. 10, 2005. In it, McMillan stated: “Staff has been trying to get Mr. Kale to correct many problems in Morrison Plantation so his problems will not become taxpayer problems, being correct(ed) with taxpayer dollars. None of the roads in Morrison Plantation have been accepted by the Town due to the fact that they are all falling apart. Very little if any effort has been made to correct."

Also, McMillan stated in the response: “Over the years, Mr. Kale has made many comments to Staff concerning his relationship with the Town and Staff. Many times he has praised Staff for helping, next time calling Staff ‘liars’, next time offering tickets to golf championships, next time blasting staff about costing him money. Mr. Kale has been treated with respect, as any customer or developer. Staff always looks for compromises – win-win scenarios. But sometimes, when things are not being done properly, the answer the Town must provide is ‘no’.”

… Did he say golf tickets??? ...

Back to the Oct. 3 town board meeting: when the developers had completed their public remarks that night, then-commissioner Frank Owens – who was defeated the following month in his bid for at-large commissioner – told Kale, “Our administration and board will see that you’re treated better.”

Interestingly, another developer, Neil Kapadia of Faison, sent McMillan an e-mail on Oct. 7, 2005, stating: “I was embarrassed by the way you guys were treated in the public meeting by certain developers in the area. I believe you two have been good to work with, and while not always agreeing with our opinions, were willing to listen to reason. I want you to know that you have my support and if you need me to show up at a meeting and speak my mind, I’m willing to do so.”

November 2005
Bill Thunberg was elected Mooresville’s mayor in his first bid for the seat.

Records at the Iredell County Elections Office show that two weeks after the Oct. 3 town board meeting, which Thunberg attended, the mayor-hopeful accepted sizeable campaign contributions from several Morrison Plantation developers, including $500 from Pamela Rice, a receptionist for Ed Kale’s Carolina Income Management; $1,000 from James Flowers III, president of Carolina Income Properties; $500 from Sandra Anderson, a Morrison Plantation bookkeeper; and $1,000 from original Morrison Plantation developer Rex Welton. (As an aside, Thunberg was re-elected in November 2007. I have not checked with the Elections Office to see if his 2007 campaign was bankrolled by developers.)

McMillan sent a letter to Kale on Nov. 1, instructing him to make needed street improvements in the Morrison Plantation development and to install a traffic signal at the intersection of Morrison Plantation Parkway and Plantation Ridge Drive. He said work on the improvements needed to begin “immediately” and be paid for by Kale’s Carolina Income Management. (Just to provide a little perspective: Bush's death at this point in the timeline is still 10 months away.)

January 2006
Several town officials – including Justice, Gambill, McMillan, Martin, Thunberg and Commissioners Chris Carney and Frank Rader – met with Morrison Plantation developers to discuss the development’s problems and, specifically, the stoplight at the Morrison Plantation Parkway and Plantation Ridge Drive, with McMillan stressing the importance of Kale installing a traffic signal there.

“Mooresville staff was very much trying to find a way to help move the situation along,” recalled Carney. “Everybody was trying to find a way to be fair but still get the necessary improvements done – not just with that road, but all the other roads (in Morrison Plantation).”

Due to the number of improvements needed, Carney said the town decided to let Kale complete his work in phases, with the first phase being completed and approved within two weeks after the January meeting. Thunberg at that meeting appointed Justice the “go-to-man” for Kale. But nine months later, none of those improvements were complete. It is unclear how many, if any, of those improvements are included in the February 2008 punch list.

February 2006
Four months after the Oct. 3 town board meeting – and two months after Thunberg was sworn into office – and three weeks after most of the town administration and several commissioners met with the Morrison Plantation developers – Justice fired McMillan and Martin. In the separation notices, which were left anonymously on my desk at the Tribune, Justice listed several reasons for McMillan’s firing. Interestingly, one was “constant work issues with … the development community.”

But McMillan has contended that Justice fired him, among other reasons, for adamantly requiring developers to meet town standards and for refusing to violate numerous state laws despite the town manager's instruction.

Also in February 2006, Owens, no longer a town commissioner, urged the public in a letter to area newspapers to “listen to the developers” who criticized McMillan and the engineering department at the October town board meeting. Also, Owens wrote: "I have worked with and for many Town Managers and they all had their good traits and their bad ones. Mr. Justice, in my opinion, is the best Town Manager we have ever had. He stood up for what is right, knowing that your paper was going to bash him in print."

May 2006
Steve Allen, an independent consultant hired by the town in November 2005, told Mooresville commissioners that a barrier is needed between the town board and developers.

Developers, said Allen, should not bypass town staff and go directly to the board to seek approval for a project, either officially or unofficially, and no member of the board should respond to such overtures. “The seven most divisive words are ‘let me see what I can do,’” he said.

Allen’s report also concluded that while more staff members were needed in the engineering department, and the town’s technology and design standards needed updating, the engineering department, under McMillan’s leadership, had a quicker turnaround time for review than many towns in the region and a well-established plan review process.

September 2006
Bush was killed in the dangerous Morrison Plantation intersection.

February 2008
Justice resigned, per the request of the majority of Mooresville’s town board. About three weeks later, the town sent Morrison Plantation developers yet another punch list of items that must be corrected in their development before the town will take over the streets.

To bring it all home: A lady died. Yes, a much-needed stoplight was eventually erected at the intersection where she died. But many other improvements still need to be made in the development. And for some reason, the town and the Morrison Plantation developers can’t seem to get it together and move it along.

Why has the town continued to allow the developer to build and receive COs when he clearly has not completed his project? Are all developers in Mooresville treated this way, or only a select few?

Why would our town manager risk being fined by the state in an effort to “work with the developer?” Why would our town manager and Assistant Town Manager Erskine Smith – who’s now our interim town manager – ask developers to show up at a town board meeting and publicly blast our town staff? And why would one of our former town commissioners, who was a sitting commissioner during that meeting, promise those developers they would be "treated better"? Why, after that commissioner was ousted, did he write a letter to local newspapers, asking us, the Mooresville taxpayers, to “listen to the developers” instead of our own town staff?

Further, why would Mayor Bill Thunberg, two weeks after witnessing the fiasco that happened in that Oc.t 3 meeting, accept campaign contributions from the same developers who were there, publicly blasting our town staff – the same developers who in 2008 are still dragging their feet?

Why did our town manager fire the two men who were jumping up and down about this situation, clearly trying to look out for the best interest of Mooresville taxpayers?

And what the heck is up with those darned championship golf tickets???...

CBS' The Early Show will be in Davidson tomorrow

I'm gonna switch things up just for a moment to post this, from the President of the Lake Norman Chamber of Commerce:

The Lake Norman Chamber has been contacted by CBS News - The Early Show which will broadcast from the Davidson Campus on Thursday morning. We have been encouraged to contact the local business community and public and share the following invitation which has been sanctioned by the college:

Share your Wildcat spirit! The CBS Early Show will broadcast its national weather segments LIVE from the Alvarez College Union at Davidson College from 7 a.m. to 8:40 a.m. this Thursday, March 27. All are invited to attend and show their support for Davidson.

Free coffee and donuts will be served in the 900 Room at the Union beginning at 6:30 a.m., and the Union Café will feature a Breakfast Special. Mr. Cat, the Davidson Cheerleaders, and the Davidson Pep Band will attend.

Show your support for the Wildcats at this nationally televised event. Wear your red and black! Wave to your mom! Help make Davidson proud!

All are welcome. Go, ‘Cats!

Bill

W.E. "Bill" Russell
President
Lake Norman Chamber of Commerce
704-892-1922 (o)

Town continues discussion of MDC funding

Town commissioners, who were scheduled on Monday to discuss next year's funding of the Mooresville Downtown Commission, continued that discussion until a later date.

(For the full story, see the "Downtown Drama" blog entry, March 16, 2008.)

I'll keep ya posted...

Hellooooo, sunshine!!

Nope, I’m not talking about the weather.

This week, March 16-22, is Sunshine Week, which according to http://www.sunshineweek.org/ “is about the public's right to know what its government is doing, and why.

“Sunshine Week,” states the website, “seeks to enlighten and empower people to play an active role in their government at all levels, and to give them access to information that makes their lives better and their communities stronger.”

As a general rule, we, the people, have access to government information. N.C. General Statute 132-1(b) points out: “The public records and public information compiled by the agencies of North Carolina government or its subdivisions are the property of the people.”

The statutes allow government officials to meet and communicate confidentially, but usually temporarily and always for specific purposes only, such as to discuss economic incentives, personnel and ongoing lawsuits. (For specifics, see the Open Meetings law linked at right on the blog's main page.)

Care to see handwritten notes your town manager took while on a town-related phone call yesterday? Have at it. Curious about what your elected officials are discussing through e-mails? It’s all yours. Thanks to the N.C. Public Records Law (also linked at right on the blog's main page), all you have to do is ask. No one can even ask you why you want it.

That doesn’t mean, however, that the government will make it easy for you.

And, as you could probably guess, I have an entertaining story about that.

Somewhat surprisingly, I never had an issue obtaining public records from the Town of Mooresville in the few years I covered local government for the newspaper. Even when the information reflected poorly on the town, it was provided promptly – and for free. I recall one occasion in particular when I requested so many public e-mails that they packed three separate 3-inch binders. They were given to me within an extremely reasonable amount of time, and I don't recall the town charging me a penny.

Then came CH2M Hill and Town Manager Jamie Justice, who repeatedly took a beating in the newspaper because of his decisions involving developers, CH2M Hill, an overdue commercial water bill and on and on and on …

In August 2007, I reported the town's reimbursement of thousands of dollars in questionable CH2M Hill expenses, which, lo and behold, I had discovered through public records.

That story continued for some time due to the mayor calling for an “internal investigation” into the expenses. And we all know how slow government can move …

So maybe the town manager was still fuming on Oct. 24, 2007, when I requested copies of the previous three weeks' e-mails (including deleted ones) to and from town commissioners. The municipal elections were two weeks away, and any government employee with half a lick of common sense would have assumed (correctly) that I was looking for something in particular – and that I wanted it before the elections.

In my request, which I submitted to Justice, I asked him to “please let me know if these e-mails can be forwarded to me electronically or if I’ll need to pick up hard copies. If I need to pick up hard copies, please let me know where and when.”

A week after my request, I hadn’t heard from Justice, so I sent him a brief e-mail, inquiring about the status.

Another two days passed. Nothing. So on Nov. 1, I sent yet another e-mail to Justice and copied every town commissioner and the mayor, town attorney and town clerk.

Justice responded the following day, saying the documents were “undergoing legal review for compliance with the public records law.” Five days later, he e-mailed again, stating that the records should be ready the following day, Nov. 7 – the day after the municipal elections.

N.C. General Statute 132-6(a) requires that public records be provided “as promptly as possible.” Was two weeks prompt? That’s a matter of interpretation. But the town had previously complied with much bigger requests, much more promptly.

So back to Nov. 7, Town Clerk Janet Pope notified me via e-mail that the public records were ready – and for $136.50, I could have them.

In other words, instead of pushing a button or two to send the records to me electronically, as I had originally requested, the town government -- the stewards of our tax dollars -- chose to waste 1,365 pieces of paper and who-knows-how-many hours of staff time to make Xerox copies of the records.

I didn’t have to pay for the copies, thanks to N.C. General Statute 132-6.2(a), which states: “Persons requesting copies of public records may elect to obtain them in any and all media in which the public agency is capable of providing them. No request for copies of public records in a particular medium shall be denied on the grounds that the custodian has made or prefers to make the public records available in another medium.”

Citing that statute, I reminded the town that I had originally asked for the copies to be sent electronically. Additionally, I offered my own disk on which the records could be copied. Justice responded that the records were already copied on paper and that I would need to pick them up from the town clerk’s office. I responded, again, that I would be happy to provide my own disk, but that I wanted the records to be provided electronically.

(Amid all this, I was told that Justice had forwarded at least one commissioner, via e-mail, the records I had requested, so obviously the town was capable of providing the copies electronically.)

I guess the town didn’t need my disk after all because I soon received an e-mail from the town clerk that a disk of the documents was ready for me to pick up in her office. There was no further discussion about the $136.50.

I wonder if they recycled those 1,365 pieces of paper they wasted …

Another beef I have is this: N.C. General Statute 132-1(b) states that “people may obtain copies of their public records and public information free or at minimal cost unless otherwise specifically provided by law. As used herein, ‘minimal cost’ shall mean the actual cost of reproducing the public record or public information.”

In other words, the town can charge to make paper copies of public records. And while I have no idea what the “actual cost of reproducing” a record is, I found it interesting that Staples, a private business, charged 8 cents for a Xerox copy, but the Town of Mooresville, which is publicly funded, charged 10 cents.

Through taxes, Mooresville citizens have already paid for the paper the town uses for the copies, and we’re already paying the salary of the person who’s pushing buttons and watching sheets of paper whip through the Xerox machine. So why are we also being charged for copies, especially at a higher rate than a local private business charges?

Beats me.

Okay, so what’s the moral of my story?

First, though public records are called public records for a reason – because they belong to the public – some government employees might not make it easy for us to obtain them. In my most recent experience, as detailed above, it appears the town manager was trying to make it difficult for me, a member of the public, to access those records. But, hey, we have to pick and choose our battles. Justice resigned as town manager in February per the town board's request. Why kick a man while he's down?

Moving on, then, to lesson number two: despite what some government officials and employees might have you believe, you are the boss. Through voting, you are directly responsible for electing the commissioners of the Town of Mooresville. And those commissioners are directly responsible for hiring and firing the town manager, who is directly responsible for hiring and firing the government employees who will comply – or not – with your requests for public records.

Third, if you’re going to request public documents, first familiarize yourself with the Public Records law so you don’t unjustly get stuck with a $136.50 bill from somebody who would enjoy nothing more than sticking it to you.

And finally, if you ever plan to request public documents from the Town of Mooresville, please take my advice: ask for them to be provided electronically. Through my experience, we have learned that town employees are, in fact, capable of providing them to you on a disk for free – but that sometimes, for reasons unknown, they might choose to waste our town resources instead.

Happy Sunshine Week, everybody!

Downtown Drama

When decades-long public officials resign, retire or are fired – especially from positions that have operated for years under the good ol’ boy network – it’s like a scab being ripped off a wound.

We’ve watched it happen repeatedly in Mooresville, beginning about a decade ago when Joe Knox chose not to seek re-election after 33 years as mayor. Knox’s right-hand man, Town Manager Rick McLean, resigned five years later under fire from the public and, ironically, the town board, which was then made up only of commissioners who were born and bred in Mooresville.

That same board hired McLean’s replacement, Jamie Justice, in 2005. Justice – even to our current board, which includes commissioners with varying experiences and hometowns – was known as the “task manager.” In other words, he would do whatever the town board instructed him to do … which was precisely the reason the old board hired him. But the majority of our new town commissioners wanted a manager who stood on his own two feet and didn’t have to be told what to do, so they asked Justice to resign, which he did last month. That’s progress.

Similarly, shortly after long-time Mooresville-South Iredell Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Dan Wallace resigned in 2006, the South Iredell Community Development Corporation (SICDC) split from the Chamber and formed the Mooresville-South Iredell Economic Development Corporation (MSIEDC). And shortly after that, the MSIEDC board of directors asked its 13-year executive director, Melanie O’Connell Underwood, to resign.

So I guess it was only a matter of time before the scab was ripped off the wound in downtown Mooresville, where, unfortunately, it appears the good ol’ boy network is alive and well.

Wayne Frick, who has been executive director of the Mooresville Downtown Commission (MDC) since one year after the organization was formed in 1987, recently announced his retirement, effective in June.

And judging from e-mails that I’ve obtained, it appears that the familiar power struggle between the old guard and the “progressives” has begun.

Kim Atkins was recently elected chairman of the MDC’s board of directors against longtime Iredell County Commissioner and Mooresville resident Sarah Haire Tice.

But Atkins is now being lambasted in e-mails from longtime Mooresville attorney Brian Harwell who has an office on Main Street. And the gloves came off when another downtown investor jumped into the e-mail match.

Some background: The MDC created a bylaws committee last year because the organization’s bylaws had not been updated since 1990. The MDC apparently looked at the issue of membership in 2004, but it was never resolved. The bylaws committee at the MDC board’s monthly meeting in February submitted proposed new bylaws. Due to questions that arose at that board meeting about the slate of candidates for next year’s MDC board, the membership issue was placed on the board’s March agenda.

And here’s where the drama started: Atkins on March 3 distributed the meeting agenda, which included the membership issue as an amendment to the bylaws. The MDC board at its March 5 meeting adopted that amendment.

But Harwell sent an e-mail the following day to a host of people, including Atkins, taking issue with the board’s actions, pointing out that state statutes require a five-day written notice of any meeting wherein an amendment is to be voted upon. Additionally, Harwell pointed out, the statutes require that a copy or summary of the amendment be attached to the meeting notice.

It seems Harwell is right, though some questions have arisen about whether the statute is applicable to an organization structured like the MDC. Regardless, in addition to only providing a two-day notice of the meeting, Atkins apparently did not include a copy or summary of the amendment with the meeting notice. Noted Harwell in his e-mail: “The so called adoption of the bylaw amendment on March 5, 2008 by the Mooresville Downtown Commission is therefore invalid by virtue of non compliance with the North Carolina Statutes.”

In an e-mail that followed, Harwell copied to a large group of people an e-mail he had sent Interim Town Manager Erskine Smith, in which Harwell turned to more personal attacks: “In my opinion the whole purpose of Ms. Atkins’ amendment was to make one of the nomination committees’ nominees a member and to further legitimize the current nominations from the nominating committee,” Harwell wrote. “It is highly improper to change the rules in the middle of the election for Board Members of the Downtown Commission. To do so gives the appearance of shady dealings.

“Furthermore as to my personal feelings," Harwell continued, "the whole operation of the Downtown Commission needs to be examined. Kim Atkins should have resigned as President of the Downtown Commission when her husband was elected to the Town Board. It is a direct ethical conflict for her to preside over the Downtown Commission while her husband sits on the Town Board determining Town Budgets which may include the Downtown Commission.”

Kim Atkins’ husband, Miles Atkins, was elected At-large Commissioner last November against veteran commissioner and Mooresville resident Danny Beaver. The Mooresville Downtown Commission in recent years has received around $45,000 annually from the Town of Mooresville. At this Monday night’s town budget meeting, the MDC will ask for about $60,000, in part to help offset the salary of a new executive director.

Harwell’s definition of “direct ethical conflict” deserves a second look. If we are to use his definition, is it a direct ethical conflict that Frank Rader serves on the town board and his wife serves on the advisory board of the town’s public library, which receives public funding? Is it a direct ethical conflict that Chris Carney serves on the town board and his brother was recently hired as the industry and marketing manager of the MSIEDC, which also receives public funding? Is it a direct ethical conflict that Ron Johnson is the treasurer of the MDC and the MSIEDC and is also executive director of the Convention & Visitors Bureau? Further, is it a direct ethical conflict for downtown business owner Bill Thunberg to serve as mayor, secretary of the MSIEDC and on the board of directors for the MDC?

In other words, if the Atkins’ positions are creating a “direct ethical conflict,” then we’re living in a cesspool of ethical conflict right now.

Another argument playing out in the downtown e-mails is about the recent nominations for next year’s MDC board of directors. In the MDC's election, a committee nominates potential board members, then a vote is taken. But Harwell apparently wasn’t pleased with the list of six total nominees, so he himself nominated six different people.

Howard Kosofsky of Old Downtown LLC, a major investor in downtown Mooresville, took issue with that, stating in an e-mail to Harwell and others: “I believe no one person should be allowed to nominate 6 people for the board of the downtown commission. Each person should be allowed one nomination and I propose this change in the new bylaws if it is not presently in effect.”

Also, added Kosofsky, “If one thinks that Kim Atkins should resign then Bill Thunberg would also have a conflict if he (owns a) downtown business and votes on the budget that helps promote his business. I do not understand why people who donate (their) time and make a commitment like Kim and this board should be abused with comments like these. I believe these e-mails are vindictive and uncalled for. My partners and I have committed a lot of time and money to downtown and expect this to be a team building process.

“Mooresville is growing and changing,” Kosofsky added. “Those that think downtown is business as usual are kidding themselves. If we are to attract good business to downtown, we need to improve, and we all need to work together to achieve success.”

I couldn't agree more. With or without the naysayers and/or the powermongers, our downtown will progress and flourish.

Ah, the winds of change. It was seemingly a simple request to further the professionalism of the downtown commission – to amend the bylaws and define membership to make way for the upcoming MDC board elections. And then, this. Sure, maybe the meeting was called improperly, but that could have been handled with a phone call instead of a “calling out.”

We have watched this scenario play out time and time again over the past decade. And each time, we’ve seen positive change come of it because the person who the old guard said “boo” to didn’t tuck tail and run.

It’s a new day in Mooresville. We have people who are poised to lead us through the transition of a small town with small ideals to a thriving, eclectic community with natural small-town charm. I’m not suggesting that all the decisions to this point have been bad. I am saying that the town has outgrown them. As evidenced by recent elections and other personnel decisions across the board, it cannot be argued that the people of Mooresville have spoken. And we’re saying: We want change.

I hope that Atkins, and others who appear to be trying to make our downtown a more professional, energetic place to live and work, won’t be intimidated by the bullying tactics of a couple of people who clearly have a hard time accepting change. And I hope on Monday, when the town board considers funding the MDC, that it will realize that the MDC needs a fresh start. It hasn’t been the best run organization in past years, which is obvious when quality shops are leaving downtown as quickly as they’re setting up. But the MDC, with its new leadership – and if all its members can work together for the greater good – truly has the opportunity to make our downtown what we’ve always wanted it to be: a peaceful, vibrant retreat from the rest of the traffic, noise and busyness of Mooresville.

Okay, jumping off my soap box now. Off to do a little more snooping. Stay tuned.

More money needed for cable?

The Town of Mooresville may have to cough up at least $12 million more to finalize upgrades to the recently-purchased $80 million MI-Connection cable system.

A little background: Adelphia Communications Corp., which had a franchise in Mooresville, went bankrupt in 2002 and decided to sell its assets to Comcast Corp. and Time Warner in an effort to reimburse its creditors. Included in Adelphia's franchise agreement, however, was a clause that gave Mecklenburg County, along with the towns of Mooresville, Troutman, Davidson, Huntersville and Cornelius, the right of first refusal to purchase the cable system if Adelphia sold it.

After Adelphia went bankrupt, the municipalities formed a consortium to look into the feasibility of owning and operating the cable system. In the meantime, Time Warner was designated the system's “caretaker."

Mecklenburg County – which was originally supposed to fund the system – backed out of the consortium. Huntersville and Troutman did, too. Cornelius decided not to participate in the purchase of the system but agreed to turn over its subscribers to MI-Connection.

That left Mooresville and Davidson. Mooresville offered to fund the system, and Davidson guaranteed repayment of its share through subscriber fees.

Despite staunch public objections, the Town of Mooresville bonded $80 million, which was supposed to include the purchase of 10,500 subscribers and system upgrades … with a little extra cash flow for the first couple years.

Come to find out, though, the town gained more than 15,000 subscribers -- and they had to be paid for somehow. Rumor has it that some of the money earmarked for upgrades instead had to be dished out for the additional subscribers.

If the new cable system is going to finalize the upgrades that it originally planned and promised -- including fiber optic to local businesses, if I'm hearing correctly -- apparently it's going to need at least $12 million more to do it.

...or maybe it's March 24...

Though I was told earlier today that the hearing on the Town of Mooresville's motion for summary judgment is scheduled for April 7, the hearing (according to court documents I have since obtained) is apparently actually scheduled for Monday, March 24, beginning at 10 a.m. in Court Room No. 3, Superior Court, Statesville.

I've heard that the trial date (if it comes to that) is tentatively scheduled for April 7.

Additionally, Richard McMillan and Wilce Martin -- who were originally suing the town for defamation and wrongful discharge in violation of state public policy -- have voluntarily dismissed their claim of defamation against the town. The wrongful-discharge claim remains.

Hearing rescheduled for April 7

The hearing on the town’s motion for summary judgment in the Richard McMillan/Wilce Martin vs. Town of Mooresville case has been rescheduled for April 7 in Superior Court, Statesville.

The hearing was originally scheduled for March 10 but was continued because McMillan and Martin’s lawyer, Jenny Sharpe, was sick.

The town is hoping that a judge will dismiss claims made by McMillan and Martin, who are suing for wrongful discharge in violation of state public policy.

Former Town Manager Jamie Justice fired McMillan (the town’s engineering director) and Martin (the utilities director) in February 2006 amid controversy over Morrison Plantation developers (on which I will elaborate in a later blog entry) and the town’s hiring of CH2M Hill to design our wastewater treatment plant expansion.

The town contends in its motion for summary judgment that McMillan and Martin "did not engage in any protected activity and there is no causal connection between any alleged protected activity and the termination of their employment from the Town of Mooresville."

In a phone conversation on Wednesday, Sharpe declined to provide details about the case but said, “We can directly refute all of that. We do think there’s a cause-and-effect relationship. Obviously, that’s something we’ll develop in our brief when we file it.”

That brief will be filed sometime before the April 7 hearing, she said.

Hearing to be continued

The Town of Mooresville is hoping that a Superior Court judge will dismiss claims made against it by two former department heads, Richard McMillan and Wilce Martin.

The two men are suing the town for defamation and wrongful discharge in violation of state public policy.

A hearing on the matter was scheduled for tomorrow (Monday) at 10 a.m. in Superior Court, Statesville, but it will likely be continued due to illness.

The town -- represented by Patrick H. Flanagan and Melody J. Canady of Cranfill, Sumner & Hartzog LLP of Charlotte -- asks that the claims be dismissed because McMillan and Martin have "no genuine issues of material fact."

Specifically, the town's attorneys state that the defamation charges should be dismissed because "there is no evidence that (the town) made or provided any statements to the local media or anyone else that were defamatory as to either (McMillan or Martin) and because the substance of the communications at issue are true."

The wrongful-discharge claims should also be dismissed, according to the town, because McMillan and Martin "did not engage in any protected activity and there is no causal connection between any alleged protected activity and the termination of their employment from the Town of Mooresville."

McMillan and Martin's attorney, Jenny Sharpe of Charlotte, has not yet filed a response to the town's motion for summary judgment.

Success!

Four days after launching this blog, it has received 220 hits (as of 8:30 a.m. today) and has 22 subscribers.

But perhaps the most noteworthy success so far is that the content of Tuesday's blog entry ("Adage: rats abandoning a sinking ship?") made it onto Page 2A of the Mooresville Tribune today. Since it's not the front page, I'm not sure if the Tribune's webpage will have a link to the article. But if it does, I will link it here as soon as it's posted.

Thanks to all of you who have been reading ... and for your encouraging e-mails.

Until my next "meaty" post, here's some light reading for you, from one of my subscribers who responded to my question about the specific wording of the "rat" adage:

If people leave a company because they know that it's about to have serious problems, or turn their back on a person about to be in a similar situation, they are said to be like rats deserting a sinking ship. http://www.usingenglish.com/reference/idioms/like+a+rat+deserting+a+sinking+ship.html


Q. What's the Latin for Rats Deserting a Sinking Ship?

A. Pliny the Elder, in his Natural History, wrote about mice deserting a building when it was in imminent danger of collapse:

Ruinis inminentibus musculi praemigrant.
When ruin is imminent, the little rodents move away beforehand.

Book VIII.103 PROGNOSTICS OF DANGER DERIVED FROM ANIMALS http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/quotes/f/020908Rats.htm

Adage: rats abandoning a sinking ship?

What’s that old adage about rats abandoning a sinking ship?

A call to CH2M Hill’s Charlotte office on Tuesday confirmed that David Wagoner and Mike Osborne are no longer employees of CH2M Hill, the engineering firm that Mooresville’s town board hired in 2004 to study and design the Town of Mooresville's multi-million-dollar wastewater treatment plant expansion.

Osborne was the original manager for Mooresville’s project. Wagoner was the original project director and the initial reason that town commissioners offered for hiring CH2M Hill against the professional recommendation of the town’s engineers and utilities staff.

I was the investigative reporter who covered this issue for the Mooresville Tribune. Here’s a little background, gleaned from my 2004 and 2005 articles:

Of the five engineering firms selected as finalists to enter into negotiations with Mooresville for the expansion project, CH2M Hill was ranked last by all four members of the town’s engineering and utilities departments who independently reviewed and graded the candidates.

The five firms were asked a month before the town board’s decision to submit qualification packages with additional information about their firms to help the town select the most qualified firm for Mooresville’s project.

According to the grading sheet, Black & Veatch – which then-Engineering Director Richard McMillan ultimately recommended to the town board – received a significantly higher score than the other four firms.

CH2M Hill, which the town board ultimately chose, was ranked last by all four people who graded the firms.

The average score for Black & Veatch was 49, while the average score for CH2M Hill was 27.7. The highest attainable score was 55. The lowest was 11.

Despite that, and McMillan’s recommendation, then-Commissioner Alice Lee made a motion that the town instead approve the recommendation of fellow Commissioner Mitch Abraham to hire CH2M Hill because Wagoner, a CH2M Hill official, is a resident of Mooresville and worked at the town’s wastewater treatment plant, Lee said. (As an aside, Abraham had not made that recommendation in a public meeting; Lee later said that the commissioners had discussed the matter during a home visit and telephone conversations.)

Following the Oct. 18, 2004 vote to hire CH2M Hill, Abraham justified his decision, saying: “We feel real comfortable with that firm, and especially David. Everybody’s familiar with him and his work in the past.”

Added Lee: “The fact is that David Wagoner is a local person and was the superintendent of our waste treatment plant for seven years. He has a vested interest in the town, and he would make himself available to us at anytime. Under the circumstances, I feel they would do us the best job.”

Neither Lee nor Abraham mentioned that they are close personal friends with Wagoner and attend his same church. It was only later that Lee said another reason the town hired CH2M Hill was because the Engineering News Record had ranked the firm as the number-one wastewater design firm in the nation.

She failed to mention, however, that the ranking was based on annual sales revenue – or how much money the firm made in a year.

If the money that CH2M Hill intended and attempted (and, at times, succeeded) to make from the Town of Mooresville is any indication – and it is – it’s no wonder the firm was ranked number one in sales revenue.

For example, after the town board hired CH2M Hill, the firm attempted to charge Mooresville sewer customers $564,500 lump-sum for a preliminary engineering report, meaning the town would pay that amount regardless of the actual time CH2M Hill spent on the work.

McMillan baulked, though, telling CH2M Hill that the town would pay the firm on a cost-plus basis, meaning it would reimburse actual hours worked, out-of-pocket expenses and other reimbursable items.

Interestingly, after all the media hype – including a Tribune investigation into the costs that other cities and towns across the southeast paid for similar studies (which wasn’t even close to the amount CH2M Hill tried the charge us) – the Town of Mooresville ended up paying about $244,000 less than CH2M Hill originally tried to charge.

In other words, had McMillan not fought on behalf of Mooresville’s sewer customers, we would have ended up paying CH2M Hill $244,000 more than it actually cost the firm to complete the study.

Then, of course, was the August 2007 Tribune investigation that showed the Town of Mooresville had reimbursed CH2M Hill more than $150,000 for expenses ranging from airline tickets and $176 hotel rooms to chewing gum and $4.65 Starbucks coffees.

Many of those expenses had no receipts and non-itemized receipts, but the town reimbursed them anyway, against its own policy.

From August 2006 to June 2007, CH2M Hill billed the town:

• nearly $49,000 in air transportation,
• almost $49,000 in hotel rooms from Charlotte and Raleigh to Florida, Oregon and Ohio,
• three months’ rent for two Florida condominiums, each at $1,750 per month,
• nearly $23,000 in car rentals,
• about $17,000 in travel and business meals,
• about $3,200 in auto mileage,
• almost $4,000 in gas and parking, and
• thousands more dollars in grocery-store purchases, breakfast and catered lunches for CH2M Hill’s “working meetings” (including those held in Charlotte);
• Starbucks coffee purchases,
• Brachs candy at $5.61,
• "Cowboy cookies” at $2.99,
• $15 tips to hotel housekeeping,
• and other “travel-related” expenses, such as toll fees and cab fares.

In addition to hundreds of undocumented meal expenditures, CH2M Hill submitted:

• An expense for $603.04 in lodging, with a note stating the receipt was lost.
• Another submission from CH2M Hill stated: “Lost receipts for travel-parking & gas in the amount of $244.88.” The town paid them anyway.
• Another CH2M Hill employee submitted to the town a handwritten note for lost lodging receipts totaling $561.77.

The firm also submitted a parking expense with no receipt for $22 and

• $56.31 and $22.90 expenses with no receipt for “supplies,”
• an $8 expense, with no receipt, for “water plus snacks for field work,” and
• a $2.31 expense, with no receipt, for bottled water.

One CH2M Hill employee in particular, in one month, submitted 70 expenses – ranging from 64 cents to $36.36 – with no receipts. Those expenditures were included in a two-page itemized list of 126 meal expenses with lost receipts. Atop that list, CH2M Hill added: "Lost receipts for meals in the amount of $321.16."

In the midst of public scrutiny, CH2M Hill and Mooresville Mayor Bill Thunberg announced they both would launch individual "internal investigations." CH2M Hill eventually "wrote off" $2,500 in undocumented expenses that the town had originally reimbursed. The lavish hotels and other travel expenses were never addressed by either CH2M Hill or the town.

In February 2006, our town manager, Jamie Justice, fired McMillan and Utilities Director Wilce Martin, who also staunchly opposed the town’s hiring of CH2M Hill.

Justice, who was our town manager for only three years, resigned last month per the request of the majority of our town board.

As for the other key players in the CH2M Hill debacle, Lee chose in the midst of the controversy not to seek re-election when her term expired in 2005. That same year, Commissioner Mitchell Mack also chose not to seek re-election, and long-time Commissioner Frank Owens was ousted. Franklin Campbell, who consistently voted against CH2M Hill, resigned from his Ward 2 seat during that time due to family issues. Then in 2007, veteran At-large Commissioner Danny Beaver lost his bid for re-election. Mitch Abraham, however, was re-elected as Ward 1 Commissioner in a virtually non-contested race.

So, in a nutshell, one commissioner remains from the original five who hired CH2M Hill. And the primary reason that the town said it hired that firm – David Wagoner – is apparently no longer employed by CH2M Hill. Neither is the original project manager, Mike Osborne.

Where does that leave the Town of Mooresville sewer customers? Holding the bag in a relationship with a “local firm” that, come to find out, isn’t so local anymore.

There are reasons that government entities are not supposed to make decisions that financially benefit their friends. This, no doubt, is one of them.

So, back to the old adage about the rats being the first to abandon sinking ships: does anyone know the exact wording of that adage? ‘Cause I’ve googled the heck out of it today and can’t seem to find it. I’m just curious.

Oops

(Ahem.) I stand corrected. I received the following e-mail last night from one of my blog subscribers:

Thank you for this blog. I wanted to bring something to your attention. In the introduction to your blog, you stated that our local government “has experienced a near complete overturn in commissioners *since 2001*”. In actuality, this overturn has been complete. Furthermore, there has also been a turnover in the mayoral position, the city attorney position, and the town manager position, not once, but twice.
As a longtime observer of town matters, I can state with certainty that this is an unprecedented occurrence in the history of Mooresville. It signals a new era, and it sends the message that if the citizens are dissatisfied, they are willing to exercise their powers to replace their officials. And if they were able to do this once, they can and will do it again, if deemed necessary.

The writer is correct. Not one 2001 commissioner remains on today's town board. And only one commissioner, Mitch Abraham, remains from the group of commissioners who originally hired CH2M Hill.

The Gatton Report: an introduction

Anthropologist Margaret Meade once said: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

Perhaps in no place has that been more evident the past several years than in my hometown of Mooresville, N.C. – a small but burgeoning suburb just north of Charlotte.

Seven years ago, most people who lived in Mooresville considered the town a quaint place to live with an effective government and employees who truly cared for the community and its taxpayers.

Then one day, a citizen who had become passionately involved in our public library started asking questions – namely, why our library was not profitable. Following many attempts by our then-public officials and town employees to silence her – and our local media’s diligent reporting of the issue – the town librarian was indicted on embezzlement charges.

And the number of citizens asking questions grew.

I became one of those people in 2003, when I started covering town government for a local community newspaper, the Mooresville Tribune. In my first three years on that beat, our local government handed the Tribune enough information to earn three consecutive Community Service Awards, the highest honor that the N.C. Press Association awards to a community newspaper.

The scandals unfortunately kept rolling, from the 2004 firing – and, thanks to public pressure, eventual reinstatement – of the current library director (who had replaced the former embezzling librarian), to the town government's October 2004 railroading of the expert opinions of our town staff in their recommendation to hire an engineering firm for our multi-million-dollar wastewater treatment plant expansion. In that case, our then-engineering director Richard McMillan and then-utilities-director Wilce Martin -- along with two other town engineers -- recommended one firm, Black & Veatch, but Mooresville’s then-town board chose to hire a different firm, CH2M Hill, admittedly because one of the firm’s officials is a Mooresville resident and had worked at one time at the town’s wastewater treatment plant.

Two of the town commissioners failed to mention, however, that they attend church and are personal friends with that firm official.

In 2005, Mooresville commissioners hired a new town manager, Jamie Justice. After one year at the town’s helm, Justice fired McMillan and Martin. And shortly thereafter, the FBI launched an investigation into the process by which the Town of Mooresville hired CH2M Hill. Even as recently as last week, that case is apparently not closed.

McMillan and Martin have since sued the town for wrongful discharge in violation of public policy – a case that is scheduled for trial next month.

And in the meantime, our town board – which has experienced an almost complete overturn in commissioners since 2001 – recently asked for Justice’s resignation.

Justice’s last day as Mooresville's town manager was Feb. 3, 2008 – two years, to the day, after he fired McMillan and Martin.

The town has certainly experienced its fair share of natural growing pains and progress in the past decade. But many of the more behind-the-scenes, positive changes that we have witnessed during the past seven years have occurred because of an active, awake citizenry that believes in open, honest government -- and in holding public officials accountable for their actions and decisions.

And it all started with one person asking one question.

So, why a blog? I resigned from the Tribune in November 2006 to stay home with my son. But the "tips" didn't quit when I did. People in the Mooresville community are still hungry for information, and those with the information are looking for a way to put it into the hands of the press and the people.

While I am a firm believer in the power of the press, I know – due to deadlines, pressure from advertisers, etc. – that it’s tempting to “fall asleep at the wheel.” Just as frequently, perhaps mainly due to competition, I've noticed that the press can seemingly compromise its own code of ethics -- or at least carelessly push the envelope -- in an attempt to "get the scoop."

The people in the Mooresville community who appreciated my work at the Tribune will likely also appreciate the introduction and eventual content of this blog. Likewise, the folks who tried to put a lid on me and/or the newspaper during my time there will not be so happy.

Whichever you are, your voice matters to me. And it is my intent through this blog to provide information relevant to our everyday lives in Mooresville – and to foster open dialogue among and between our community’s residents.

I not only welcome but encourage your comments and feedback -- even, and perhaps especially, if they contrast with mine. As this is a forum for open expression and dialogue, I do not intend to edit comments. It goes without saying, then, that the opinions expressed by people in the blog do not necessarily reflect my opinions. Additionally, I ask that those of you who wish to post comments here “fight fair” and be respectful of one another. In the event that we have a difference of opinion, we can all simply and respectfully agree to disagree.

Do I expect to change the world with this blog? Absolutely not. But I do believe that it can and will help us keep our little corner of it clean.