Which annoying district 3 city council candidate with more questions than answers is about to get even more annoying with robocalls he knows are so annoying that he doesn't want to accurately describe them on his campaign finance reports?

[Disclosure: District 3 candidate Zack Matheny is a paid advertiser on web sites operated by this blogger.]

Yes! Weekly's Jordan Green synopsizes city council campaign money, including:

"George Hartzman
Major expenditures: ...Bill Money, West Palm Beach, Fla. for 'voice broadcast', $873"

"Voice broadcast?" William Money does phone calls for political campaigns.

We do not need a representative on city council who thinks it is cool to be obtuse. We do not need someone who thinks it is clever to obfuscate. One of the most important roles of a city council representative is to bring forth information with clarity. District 3 candidate The Committee to Elect George Hartzman (as he refers to himself in a proud salute to obfuscation) would do the opposite. He has a fondness for ambiguity that would be maddening in an elected representative.

Good question.

Whatever their method for getting letters to the editor online, the procedure at the (Greensboro, NC) News & Record appears to require some human effort. Occasionally, I'll see a stray letter pop up on Greensboro101 a few hours after the others have already been published online, which is usually around 3:00 AM or 4:00 AM.It is not unheard of to see an overlooked letter appear online later in the day.

Yesterday, a letter in support of mayoral candidate Bill Knight did not make it online with the others for the day. So Joe Guarino wrote about it, noting its absence from the web*. The letter did not subsequently appear.

Today, Tony Wilkins asks again why the letter is still not online. Good question.

[* Guarino has edited his post since its initial publication, subsequently removing his observation that the letter is not online.]

Public input sought on City's records response procedures

Greensboro Assistant City Manager Denise Turner is preparing procedures for City employees to follow in response to public records request to propose to City Council on November 10th. She is inviting "media partners," which I imagine includes interest bloggers, to give their suggestions at a briefing on November 2nd. The meeting is at the plaza level conference room of the Melvin Municipal Building, 300 W. Washington Street, Greensboro at 2:00 P.M.

The invitation letter and an outline of the draft proposals are below:

Letter seeking input on Greensboro records response policy   

Greensboro records response proposals    

Yes! Weekly's Brian Clarey: Time shifter

On October 17th, remarking on how illuminating it is to have Greensboro videos aggregated at Greensboro101.com, I posted a found video (by Jp2easy) showing two fights within minutes of each other in downtown Greensboro.

The next day, on October 18th, Ryan Shell posted the same video with no mention of how it came to his attention.

In this week's Yes! Weekly, editor Brian Clarey writes that Ryan posted the video on his website and that it was subsequently "reposted" on this blog where Jerry Bledsoe commented on it.

Yesterday, I will send Brian an email to ask him to review this:

Who is Warren Romaine?

John Galt? Who is Warren Romaine?

My message to Senator Kay Hagan

I sent the following to North Carolina's Senator Kay Hagan today:
-------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Honorable Senator Hagan,

I am 46 years old. I am in great health. In the past fifteen years I have not needed any medical services beyond ten or twelve physicals and some quit-smoking medication (which worked -- I haven't had a cigarette in eleven months).

I do not engage in risky sports, I exercise vigorously three to five times a week and I eat a very healthy diet.

In January, three months after I quit smoking, my Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina health insurance premium rose from $200/month to $300/month. Today I received a letter informing me my premium will rise again in January from $300/month to $350/month.

FROM $200 to $350 IN TWO YEARS! My health insurance premiums are going up 75% IN TWO YEARS! -- For a healthy person who barely utilizes the health care system.

Meanwhile, the CEO of "non-profit" BCBSNC earns $4 million a year and top policy sellers go on company paid vacations.

This is unconscionable, Senator. People are drowning out here. You MUST, please, for the sake of simple human compassion, support a public health insurance option. I think Howard Dean is right that the simplest, fairest and most economical way to achieve this is to let people buy into Medicare.

But however you accomplish it, it has become imperative, beyond any consideration of the protection of the insurance industry, that we, the people, have a public health insurance option.

Please do the right thing.

Sincerely,
Roch Smith, Jr.
----

[Related: The (Greensboro, NC) News & Record's Doug Clark defends insurance companies against these kinds of "attacks."]

Social media expert pulls blog post to share it with a wider audience

Social media expert Ryan Shell announces he has pulled a blog post "so that it can be shared with a wider audience," by which he means so that he can capitulate to the demands of a print publication that it only be shared with their audience. Ryan complies. Google does not.

Excuse me while I trip over my ideology

I have a few friends and intellectual adversaries upon whom I try to impress the pitfalls of trying to frame everything as an ideological issue. More often than not, it dumbs down an argument, limits its appeal to only the like-minded and supplants sound logic. Yes! Weekly's Jordan Green rightly faults the Rhinoceros Times' editor John Hammer for falling into this trap.

Hammer tries to make the case for a conservative city council by using the tumult surrounding the firing of former Greensboro Police Chief David Wray as an example of government gone awry when conservatives are missing from the panel. Hammer blames the fiasco on the fact that only one conservative, Tom Phillips, was on the council when things went to pieces with Wray. But wait a minute, as Jordon points out, Phillips actually supported former City Manager Mitch Johnson in his firing of Wray -- just blows Hammers "argument" out of the water.

So thank you John Hammer for a flawed argument advocating for partisan considerations in the council race and thank you (sincerely) Jordan for pointing out the ideological wheel-spinning to us.

Sunshine Workshop -- Good things coming, I believe

I attended this afternoon's public records workshop offered by The City of Greensboro and the Sunshine Center -- the afternoon session oriented towards city employees*.

Short version: I think Greensboro may be on track to make some significant steps forward in responding to public records requests.

Not as short version:

1. Nearly fifty city employees in attendance
2. Exciting to see Charlotte's public terminal for accessing city employee email communications offered as an example of modernized public access. (Maybe not exciting enough to warrant my applause, I'm a geek that way.)
3. Greensboro city attorney Becky Joe Petterson-Buie presented a candid and, to this layman, accurate explanation of what is and what is not public record.
4. Assistant City Manager Denise Turner gave an update on the progress of her attempts to formalize records request response procedures for city employees. It is thoughtful and substantial. It needs a few tweaks which I expect will be suggested to her when she has her anticipated meeting with media and records-seekers before presenting the plan to Council on November 10th.
5. Elon College professor and Assistant Director of the Sunshine Institute Dale Harrison gave an update on efforts in the state legislature regarding public records. He mentioned that Greensboro has already adopted a procedure proposed but not yet legislated into law -- that of recording the closed sessions of public bodies. This practice was adopted by Greensboro thanks to the approval by the current council of a motion made by City Councilor Zack Matheny.
6. Greensboro has also implemented a system called PIRT, Public Information, Request Tracking. Developed "in house" by city employees, I have some experience with it, enough to know some kinks still remain but it is a super initiative and one that should serve Greensboro well when fully tuned.

Thanks to the Sunshine Institute and the City of Greensboro for doing this. It is going to produce better government.

* There is another workshop this evening, this one geared more towards the public. It is at 7:00 P.M. at the Greensboro Historical Museum. About 90 minutes.

4G wi-fi coming to Greensboro

Time Warner Cable and Sprint are bringing 4G wi-fi (wireless internet access) to Greensboro.

A step in the right direction.

Way over-priced.

Joe Killian and Dick Barron report.

Update: Proposed Greensboro sewer extension to airport

[Credit: Thanks to Greensboro Assistant City Manager Andy Scott and Water Resources' Brian Boyd for their very speedy response to my request for these maps -- hours.]

These maps (below) show the proposed extension of water and sewer lines to areas of the Piedmont Triad International Airport. (Download them if you want greater detail.)

I am certainly no expert, but from what I can tell, it appears as if these maps answer the question of whether these proposed lines would benefit private property owners. With the exception of passing by a few individual homes, it appears not -- that it is only going to be airport property that is served by these extensions. (And, for some reason, a third try at extending sewer to the new FedExHub that the city originally said would cost around $250,000).

This item was continued from Tuesday's City Council meeting. I am not sure why. Maybe councilors wanted a few more questions answered. Here are mine remaining.

1. With any development served by these extensions being on airport property, the city will never reap any tax benefits from the properties, airport property being exempt from city taxes. Is this the best use of $4.5 million of the taxpayers' money? Maybe. Maybe not. A thoughtful consideration of costs vs. benefits including a careful consideration of opportunity costs is in order. Would $4.5 million spent elsewhere reap greater benefits if it meant development of taxable property instead of development of tax-free property?
2. Is the cost in line? Were I on council, I would want to see documentation for every penny the city is asked to pay. With the Airport Authority as the middle-man, with Greensboro having no opportunity to control bidding or costs, we should have clear evidence that the costs are appropriate.
   

Greensboro Airport Sewer Extension Map (West)
Greensboro Airport Sewer Extension Map (East)

Speaking of business recruitment

Yes! Weekly reports on the issue of business recruitment and the two mayoral candidates. Speaking of which, in March, Mayor Johnson said she was going to attempt to recruit a broadband internet access competitor to Time Warner Cable. I wonder how that is coming. I haven't heard anything in the seven months since and Mayor Johnson did not answer my email inquiry about it.

Exclusive: Video of Amanda's interview with the new city manager

Getting to know you -- or not.

Love 'em or hate 'em, Greensboro is renowned for its thriving community of local blogs. For all the many unsuccessful ways Greensboro has tried to find or fabricate an "identity" for itself, we have a genuine organic one in our preponderance of local blogs: "Blogsboro," as the L.A. Times called us. In our collection of citizens using blogs to converse, reflect, debate, inform and influence we are very unlike most other cities -- even Dayton.

[If you are aware, you can skip the next two paragraphs]
Greensboro bloggers have a significant record of investigating, organizing and reporting in ways that include not just expressions of policy-influencing opinions, but also manifestations of "real world" action ranging from organizing fundraisers to launching law suits.

Reporters know it. Politicians know it. Greensboro's smart and paying-attention know it: Greensboro blogs are a wealth of knowledge about and insight into Greensboro. You read them if you want to know what's going on in the hearts, heads and lives of Greensboro's people.
[/end skip]

So when someone brand new to town says he will not read local blogs because "I don’t have time for the noise,” my shoulder-shrugging reply is "Your loss, Mister City Manager."

Whoohoo! I won! I won! I won!

My fantasy football team's loss this week to Jeff Sykes' team is compensated by winning this week's GreensboroSports.com CiCi's Pizza NFL Picks Contest. I picked ten right and four wrong.

It's easy to play, just watch for the entry announcement each week at GreensboroSports.com, then post your picks. Thanks to the guys at GreensboroSports.com for the pizza,  I think I'll see if I can make a date of it with my nephew.

Um, make that $4,582,000

With some help from Keith Brown at Triad Watch, I found the attachments to tonight's city council meeting that describe in greater detail the grants the city is contemplating giving to the airport authority for extension of city water and sewer lines.

The total is $4,582,000.00.

Missing from the documentation are any maps showing where the water and sewer will be going. I have asked the city if any maps are available. There are several properties abutting airport land owned by popular contributors to city council campaigns.

Also on tonight's agenda, extension of water and sewer along Pleasant Ridge Road for which individual homeowners owners, unrepresented by moneyed interests, are being assessed between $2,700 and $7,000 each.

Uh, make that $3,364,000

In the comments to this post in which I ask some questions about the $1,546,000 grant the taxpayers of Greensboro may be about to make to the Airport Authority, an anonymous commenter notes that also on the agenda is a resolution authorizing the use of $1,800,000 from the Greensboro Water and Sewer Trust fund to extend water and sewer to industrial sites on the airport property.

The suspect cost aside, that is the way one might expect to see funds allocated for water and sewer extensions. Thus we are back to square one on our knowledge of the $1,546,000 grant to the Airport Authority, i.e. still ignorant of what it is for.

I appreciate the comments I am getting here and offline attempting to help bring some understanding to this. I know that Amanda Lehmert of the News & Record is attempting to get documentation to answer some of the questions raised. In the mean time, can this serve as a convenient example of how good our city government is at communications and transparency -- NOT! Seriously folks, here it is 24 hours before city council is about to consider spending over $3 million on some airport stuff and the public hasn't a clue--really, really piss poor public relations.

More on Greensboro's mysterious $1,564,000 payment to the airport

An anonymous commenter to my previous post says this about the $1,564,000 that the Greensboro City Council is to consider giving to the Piedmont Triad Airport Authority tomorrow night:

"It represents funds designated years ago for the City to help pay for sewer passing beneath Bryan Blvd. Some sewer originates off of the airport property but passes through the airport on the way to the plant. The alternative would be a pump station, which may have a lower initial cost, but would have to be maintained forever.

"Nothing sinister there, just normal, everyday, well executed growth of the city's w&S system" 

Assuming the anonymous commenter is not completely off base:

1. What is the history and where is the record of this responsibility being "designated" to the City of Greensboro? When, where and by whom was this "years ago" financial obligation assumed by or assigned to Greensboro?

2. Where is the property to which this sewer is being extended? Who owns it?

3. By what authority does the Airport Authority involve itself in extending utilities to facilities off its property? I am pretty sure that is not within the scope of its charter.

4. Why is this being paid to the Airport Authority? If Greensboro is to build a sewer line, by what rationale do we have to pay the Airport Authority for it?

Anonymous assures there is nothing sinister here. If that's true, the answers to these questions should be forthcoming and found acceptable before council even begins to consider approving this.

Greensboro to give $1,564,000 to airport?

Does anybody know the details of item #13 on the agenda for tomorrow's Greensboro City Council meeting?

"Resolution authorizing the use and appropriation of $1,564,000 of voter approved Economic Development Bond Funds on an Economic Development Incentive Grant to Piedmont Triad Airport Authority. (roll call vote) (Attachment #13 to Council members) "

The referred to attachment is not online and a Google search for details comes up empty.

Naw, Greensboro doesn't have a police shortage

Aggregated local videos on Greensboro101 continue to illuminate. Two street fights in downtown Greensboro within two minutes of each other.