Jeffersontext

There are a million sides to every story. Be back with more later.

-
It's later.

As things get sticky for Councilwoman Head around these emails let's me make sure that I'm telling the whole story.

We'll ultimately get many of these emails released but if what was leaked to me and others yesterday by LJI is the worst of the worst, count me as mostly unimpressed.

The Councilor is going to have to answer some questions about this for sure.

But...

Let us not forget the unusual circumstances around the early off-the-books release of the emails to LJI through Veronica White.

Connections to the Jefferson machine are quite transparent.

I actually have grown to have a lot of respect for what Head has brought to District B after ages of careless representation. Those changes have been good and I would hate for a sensationalized feud between Washington and Head to lead to the undoing of what I would say has been largely progress.

What really makes me angry and uncomfortable with the whole thing is that in my heart, I think that the LJI world and the Stacy Head world ought to be allied instead of feuding. I would say that 80% of their substantive interests align but that personal beefs around mostly inconsequential BS have distracted both sides from doing some really important things.

I have occasional email contact with both camps.

It's amazing how often they're on the same side of an issue but think they're working against one another. It's almost funny but it's mostly distracting. And I hate feeling like I have to pick a side.

Jackie, Jackie, Jackie

Council President Jackie Clarkson went on Fox 8 this morning to talk shop.




Here's the important passage:

"I think Veronica White should be reprimanded and dismissed. That is not my prerogative. That is not Council's prerogative. That is the Mayor's prerogative. But I truly think what she did was wrong...

"When we can't get our own emails. When we can't make our emails accessible to the public... And she can get emails? That's wrong. And she's not even the City Attorney. I'm sorry, that's wrong. Whether it's ethically wrong, morally wrong, or legally wrong makes no difference to me. It's wrong because she's getting more service than the public. We can't service the public and she can be serviced? I'm sorry. Whatever motivated her is immaterial. It's wrong."

I'm sorry Jackie Clarkson, you're driving me crazy.

-

It's not Council's prerogative? Is she serious?

Then what was she thinking in 2004 when she supported slimeball Jay Batt's ordinance to have Veronica White removed from office? In fact, she was the only Councilperson to do so. Her little dance to abscond from her responsibility as a civic leader is transparent nonsense.

-

You're the Council President! Make yourself useful for something other than a ribbon-cutting.

--

Then Clarkson claims that she doesn't have access to your own emails and that she wants her emails to be accessible to the public. This is also a cruel falsehood. Brad Ott of the Commitee to Reopen Charity Hospital has been trying for well over a year to obtain Clarkson's records in connection to the LSU/VA side selection process. Not even a month ago, he had to hold a press conference to publicly shame her for her failure to comply with the law. Remember?

Committee to Reopen Charity Hospital

PRESS RELEASE & NOTICE:

Press Conference Contesting the City of New Orleans’

Law Department Louisiana Public Records Act Policy

Thursday March 5, 2009 / 10:00am to 10:30am

In front of New Orleans City Hall, 1300 Perdido

This Press Conference is being held in direct response to the City of New Orleans’ Law Department policy directive and practice of compliance with the Louisiana Public Records Act. We contend that the effective exercise of this directive thwarts the timely and complete fulfillment of Public Records Requests made by individuals and organizations concerned with influencing municipal governance and recovery from Hurricane Katrina in the city of New Orleans. The policy and its execution must be reconsidered – as well as any public policy decisions made as a result of the lack of public transparency with the lack of timely and complete compliance with the Louisiana Public Records Act.

The Committee to Reopen Charity Hospital specifically supports member K. Brad Ott’s November 13, 2008 outstanding Louisiana Public Records Request of New Orleans City Council President Jacquelyn B. Clarkson. Pursuant to Louisiana Public Records Act (R.S. 44:1 et seq), Ott request included “for review and possible copying any and all records, memos, agendas, orders, directives, surveys, notices, communications printed and electronic, including e-mail, by fax, and/or postal mail in regards to the public and collaborative party dealings of the proposed VAMC/LSU Academic Medical Center, Section 106 Consultation, National Environmental Policy Act [NEPA], and National Historic Preservation Act [NHPA] through November 13, 2008 … as well as the Rev. Avery C. Alexander Charity Hospital, Medical Center of Louisiana at New Orleans.” (Bold type his emphasis)

The Committee to Reopen Charity Hospital contends Councilmember Clarkson’s Office as well as the City Law Department thwarted complete public participation in the decisions about the issue in which Ott’s Louisiana Public Records Request referenced. Deadlines for public comment without formal litigation have passed, effectively preventing alteration by the general public as well as by affected parties impacted by the New Orleans City Council’s authorization of funds in its 2009 City Budget for the expropriation of properties, homes and businesses within the Mid-City Historic District for the proposed VAMC/LSU Academic Medical Center – causing undue hardship and the potential internal displacement of area residents, workers and businesses. We are calling on Councilmember Clarkson and the City Council’s Attorneys to fulfill this Public Records Request, as well as to meet with similarly-situated parties to fully comply with the Louisiana Public Records Act. Other similarly-situated parties, individuals and organizations are invited to share their stories during this press conference.

Ott’s Public Records request is attached to emailed press notifications and will be made available at the press conference. We thank and credit The Times-Picayune and Nola.Com for links to the City of New Orleans’ Law Department Inter-Office Memo on Compliance with the Public Records Act, as well as the interview with Mrs. Clarkson regarding her handling of public records:

--

Council President Jackie Clarkson: a do-nothing and a hypocrite.

Booooo!

But where do I put the stamp?

WDSU:

In his accounts, Boyd does not recall anyone in his department duplicating Clarkson’s materials, Lane said. Council members have been reacting to the belief that the files of four members – including Clarkson – were improperly released by city Sanitation Director Veronica White.

“I haven't been able to get an answer as to why or an explanation as to why Miss Clarkson's emails have never been turned over,” Lane said.

“It may be because she doesn't e-mail as much as the others or it may be because Miss White didn't feel her e-mails should be turned over, so we'll just have to find out. But that is why the Office of Inspector General was created -- to find out when wrongdoing has occurred.”

Ha.

Of course, Jackie Clarkson couldn't be reached for comment because her stagecoach broke down en route from a "talkie" picture and 'DSU's telegram didn't reach her in time.

Unanswered Question 1

When White went to IT to get the emails for Washington, who provided them?


Keep this statement from Dr. Brenda Hatfield on file for later:

"The public records request for the CD was assigned and performed by an appropriate employee, of the technology department, not Mr. Jones, " Hatfield wrote in an e-mail message Monday.

Careful now.

Update:

WDSU has posted the affidavit filed by Penya Moses-Fields as a pdf.

In it, Moses-Fields describes how the disks made it from the IT into the hands of Veronica White, and then Washington:

8. On February 28, 2009, the Director of the Mayor's Office of Technology informed the City Attorney's Office that at some point in time prior to February 28, 2009, he had provided Veronica White with one set of discs containing emails of the City Council.

No names named but one would assume that Director of the Mayor's Office of Technology would be a reference to M. Harrison Boyd. However, I believe his official title is actually Interim Chief Technology Officer. If you were curious, Anthony Jones' current title is Management Information Services Enterprise Director.

Selectively Understood

The Feds have selected Veronica White's computers for seizure to better their own understanding.

A Grand Jury has been convened.

*And Big Red Cotton reports that Veronica White has been Defense Attorney shopping.

The White-t0-Washington email leak has turned out to be quite the catalyst for solving some of our other favorite mysteries.

I doubt this is so much about leaked emails as it is about, well, so many other horrible things.

Hats off to the American Zombie ten times over.

--

It's not going to stop. I wouldn't look away.

I'll certainly have more to add soon 'nuff.

Snowball

I'd love to put this Mayor Nagin interview side by side with some of the other he's given over the last few months.

So many contradictory statements, such denial. It's incredible. Another classic.




(Props to Fox 8 for making their video embeddable. More of our local stations should do this.)

The best part (if one can even choose) is toward the end when he discusses the crime camera investigation.

Kim Holden: Let's switch gears a little bit -

Ray Nagin: (interrupting): Really?

Holden: Another controversy involving the crime cameras -

Nagin: (agitated interruption): Controversy?

Holden: - That came up this week. The IG report blasting your office for basically failing to hold the contractors accountable for the work they did, way too much money being spent on this, and the fact that maintenance costs are going to be astronomical from this point on. At some point do you say let's just abandon this whole project?

Nagin: I wouldn't do that. I mean, you know, one of the things I want to remind the public is that this is something that we pioneered. This was a research and development kind of project that the city of New Orleans really hadn't done. And when you do research and development and you pioneer things, you know, you're going to have some issues. I want to tell you I was just in Washington and Mayor Daley came up to me and he said, "look, I like these crime cameras that you guys are doing in New Orleans. They're cheaper than hiring more police officers and we're going to do them in a big way in Chicago."

Now, have we had issues? Absolutely. It's been well documented. We started to look at it back in August and make some changes. The gentleman who was in running the department is no longer in charge of that, no longer in charge of contracting, and we're cleaning this up. We have had some issues and we are going to do better.

Jonathan Carter: Well right now there have been a reported three prosecutions coming off of the crime cameras. With a cost of $6.6 million, Raphael Goyaneche of the Metro Crime Commission, I mean, he said that's basically $2 million for a prosecution and... and... in his words, he says, "that's not much bang for your buck."

Nagin: Well, Raphael is not really a crime expert so, I mean, you have to take what he says with a grain of salt. I will tell you that three number I don't think is accurate. I know for a fact the US Attorney's office has used the crime cameras to solve cases. The Police Department has many more cases than three that they've used. Now, whether one case where you prevent a murder or you solve a murder is worth $6 million dollars, I mean, we're going to have that debate for a long time.

Holden: How do you feel about the US Attorney looking into this whole issue and the IG's report reviewing it -

Nagin: The IG? I mean, I'm happy to see that the IG has produced another report. It's the second one in eighteen months, so that's a good thing. The first one we thought was, um, not well written but this one is better. It confirms our forensic audit. As far as the US Attorney, I, I welcome it. We've always said if there's something wrong that we have done or one of our employees [has] done and if there's anything that crosses the line of the law, we were going to turn it over and that's what we're doing here; and we'll get to the bottom of it.

But, my read of this is that I'm not sure what criminal violations happened. But I'm not an attorney so we'll see.

Another interesting exchange came as Nagin tried to downplay the insufficiently nicknamed email controversy.

Carter: Do you have any plans to talk to Veronica White about what happened?

Nagin: Uh, I...I'm, that's... she reports to the Chief Administration Officer Dr. Brenda Hatfield. And I've asked Dr. Brenda Hatfield to look into this a little further and if there's any, you know, thing we need to do from a disciplinary standpoint, we will do that. . .

Very interesting defensive posture to take to a very basic, non confrontational question. He won't even discuss the matter with his own Sanitation Director. That's how isolated this guy is. He won't even directly "talk" to his own sanitation director, who controls one of the city's largest and most consequential service departments and who controls a budget of tens of millions of dollars. Is Brenda Hatfield the only person the Mayor talks to on his own staff?

Not one of the questions he was asked was particularly probing. They're all open-ended. They just ask "well what about this thing" and give him a platform to get out his message Imagine if a reporter actually pegged him with some tough questions that ask him about specific names and dates or specifically confront some of the bogus claims he makes.

For instance, he got angry during the interview when Holden asked him if it was "fishy" that all of council's emails had been leaked when he himself has been subject to a records lawsuit because his administration had refused to hand over his own emails before it was revealed that they had been deleted. He went on some long explanation about how the council and mayor's emails are stored on different servers (which doesn't really appear to be true) and how all of his emails are now available for public consumption (which almost certainly isn't true).

Overall, it's gotten to the point that even the mere suggestion that one of these issues be labeled a "controversy" is out of bounds.

And this is pretty much the only media outlet that Ray Nagin still talks to at this point.

--

At onset, I thought Nagin would be able to once again out maneuver Council in terms of political tactic but there are just too many 'fishy controversies' confronting his administration at the same time. It's really looking disorganized over there and there's too much bad press coming all at once. This Mayor was and is deeply unpopular. Council isn't fighting itself over the emails matter. He needed that in order to "win" on the transparency/emails kerfuffle and by proxy, obscure the crime camera disaster and now this new expenditure issue.

It's too much at once.

The Mayor is on very shaky ground right now. He might have been better off just staying in the bunker.

Viral Email or Email Virus

This email thing could be bogged down in the legal system for a good little while.

Today I wondered what types of material is generally supposed to be redacted from an email records request.

According to one Council aide:

"Personnel files, city credit card info, passwords, whistleblower emails, attorney-client privilege, correspondence pertaining to city litigation such as with Entergy, personal emails from family, friends, or doctors; constituent emails containing their contact information, emails with federal authorities of federal investigations - those are the examples that come to mind."

What of that is explicitly redacted under the law?

"The law is explicit with attorney-client privilege and personal email. Some of the other categories are derived from other laws, including case law. Making correspondence with the feds public or distributing could be obstruction of justice."

Yeesh. Serious.

Not looking good on WWLTV, either.


Someone did something stupid between Veronica White and the Office of Technology and could end up getting in trouble.

T-P:

Asked if the administration is considering disciplinary action against city employees who took part in releasing the information, Nagin spokesman James Ross said no decision has been made.

"This is the first time during Mayor Nagin's administration that such a situation has occurred, " Ross stated in an e-mail, adding that Chief Administrative Officer Brenda Hatfield is reviewing the matter and will make a recommendation to the mayor.

It's a rare day that the Nagin administration even suggests that someone maybe could be recommended for possible discipline-like action. So it definitely sounds like somebody did something really wrong between Veronica White and a select few individuals at the Mayor's Office of Technology (and those guys are in enough trouble as it is).

**(Not to mention the Mayor's own optics problems when it comes to his emails. Did you see read Jarvis DeBerry's recent piece where he compares Nagin to Kwame Kilpatrick?)

---

To go on a related tangent, is it just me or is Tracie Washington always getting people into trouble in the magical world of the electronic letter?

Here's a great one Tracie Washington sent to Brenda Hatfield from 2007 that has since circulated:

Brenda:

I represent the children of Verlin J. Dix, Sr., one of the recipients of the
CONO letters advising of impending property demolition.  Kindly remove this
property from the demolition list.  This property has been boarded and poses
no health threat to anyone, or anything.  The family is awaiting insurance
proceeds so that they can begin remediation.


To the extent you all cannot comprehend the devastation these letters cause
our elderly citizens, Verlin J. Dix, Sr. was my uncle, and his family has
owned this property and Alexis Fried Chicken and Seafood for generations.
Post Hurricane Katrina, they have battled with the insurance companies
trying to be made whole so that they can reopen this business, and the many
other businesses formerly housed in this building.  Those battles continue.

Unfortunately for my uncle, the post-Katrina depression brought on by the
many pressures of losing his properties, which he had worked so hard during
his adult life to acquire, were just too overwhelming and, frankly, I
believe this last letter from the City of New Orleans was just too much.  On
Saturday morning he took his life, simply walking into the Mississippi
River.


I don't sue the City of New Orleans and its mayor for sport.  These
defendants are sued because their actions and ineptitude often cause real
tragedy, especially for our older African-American citizens.  I'm not sure
you all get this, and that's just plain unfortunate.


Tracie

Tracie L. Washington, Esq.
The Louisiana Justice Institute

--

There are a bunch of scandals going on right now and I'm a little disappointed we haven't been giving them fun names. I mean, what are we supposed to tag posts related to this email kerfuffle? It seems to be just that complicated.

Traciegate? Nah.

I almost titled this post E-MOAH but the two scandals aren't really related enough for it to work.

Help me out here.

Simple Politics, Nuanced Reality

Okay so City Council's Attorney just filed a restraining order to prevent (temporarily) the further dissemination of Council's email records released to lawyer Tracie Washington and the Louisiana Justice Institute.

I've been trying to pry around about this as best I can.

It would appear that the release of the records, via the Mayor's Office of Technology and Sanitation Director Veronica White, was sloppy and in violation of protocol and policy. What's less clear is whether any of this violated actual law.

So they'll argue about it.

Council's attorney Steven Lane broke it down like this:

"Basically what happened here is in December of 2008 Tracie Washington filed a public records request,'' Lane said.

"She sent it over to IT at City Hall and the city attorney. For some reason, and I still don't know why, the report was sent to Veronica White at the Department of Sanitation. Ms. White, who is not an attorney and with no attorney oversight, produced the document to Ms. Washington,'' Lane said.

I don't think that's quite the right narrative. It'll take some additional digging before anyone can say authoritatively how the email records may have circulated amongst the City Attorney Penya Moses-Fields, Sanitation Director Veronica White, various employees at the Office of Technology, and Tracie Washington.

Certainly I have many questions for the mysterious series of tubes comprising the IT dept.

--

In terms of political optics, you have the white members of Council blocking the release of their email records in the midst of a buzz word transparency campaign that opponents have alleged is racially motivated. Certainly it looks weird for the white members of Council to fight the release of their own emails after weeks of criticizing Ray Nagin for failing to release his.

Obviously the whole story is way way more nuanced than that. But until more comes out, people are probably going to emphasize whichever elements reinforce their base perspective on the larger polarized transparency debate.

And certainly the point could be moot if the lawyers can hurry up and vet the emails for sensitive privileged information and release them to the public. If Council digs in hard, they'll be total hypocrites.

Mission Accomp... Naaah

What a blast I had today at City Hall delivering the petition to dismiss Sanitation Director Veronica White.

Each City Councilor's office has received their very own limited edition personalized copy of the petition.

Of course, so has the Office of the Mayor.

Did it work?

Well, Veronica White is still on payroll. So no, not yet.

However, I was able to generate some press for the issue, and for the greater specter of progressive grassroots coalition building.

Earlier this morning, Mayor Nagin announced some difficult budget decisions.

Council decided to hold a significant portion of the Sanitation Department's budget in reserve, presumably giving Veronica White the opportunity to prove that she has the credibility to lead the agency.

The Mayor's office has rejected that.

Instead, the Mayor is reducing the sanitation budget by cutting services.

I'm happy to sacrifice the French Quarter's chemical lemon scent, but I don't believe such action does anything to address the fundamental issues plaguing the Department of Sanitation. There is an underlying lack of transparency and credibility that has undermined public trust.

Service cuts don't address the procedures for awarding sanitation contracts. They don't magically reproduce the accounting numbers that were so poorly kept over the last two years. We're not being reimbursed for services not rendered. Seemingly, we're further away from a citywide recycling program than we were a year ago.

Relieving SDT of some of it's French Quarter responsibilities certainly does nothing to address the flawed demolition process that has allowed some of our neighbors' homes to be rendered prairie mid renovation.

The Department of Sanitation cannot change until our Director of Sanitation has the legitimacy needed to earn back the trust of the public.

Veronica White has lost that basic credibility as a public official. She must be replaced.

Trash Delivery Day

I'll be heading over to City Hall at 1PM tomorrow to deliver the unprecedented and amazing petition calling for the dismissal of Sanitation Director Veronica White.

This will hopefully coincide nicely with the scheduled delivery of the Mayor's sham audit.

I'll be delivering a copy of the petition to each member of City Council and to the Office of the Mayor.

I spent all day at the Kinkos so these better be read thoroughly.

I'd suggest recycling the paper afterward, but, um, we don't have recycling services in New Orleans.

I was hoping to arrive in a gold plated garbage truck. In a perfect world I'd dump thousands of copies of the petition out of the back of the truck and just stay double parked on Perdido for the whole day.Unfortunately those kind of theatrics will have to wait for Mardi Gras season.

Instead, it'll just be me and a stack of paper.

Feel free to meet me there, I'll need moral support.

Thanks to all that signed and to all that spread word.

More Info From McBride and WWL, More Silence From Nagin and White

WWL did a report on the city's "audit" of our sanitation contracts. There's also video.

"A normal standard audit would be comparing the data the contractor gives you with reality," said Councilwoman Shelley Midura.

But the company hired to do the report for the Mayor's Office, Public Financial Management, says they're not doing an audit. In an e-mail to Councilwoman Stacy Head, PFM Consultant David Hoskins writes, "We want to emphasize the fact that the project is not an audit of the collection contracts. Our assignment has been to create a baseline assessment of the number of locations served by the three contractors."

---

In a statement e-mailed to us, the Mayor Nagin's Director of Communications Ceeon Quiett writes "the letter sent by PFM to the Councilmember, emphasizes and reiterates the testimony and comments made by the Sanitation Director and a PFM representative before council several weeks ago."

Yet, according to council minutes and video tape from an April 25 meeting, Sanitation Director Veronica White called the report an "audit."

Neither the Mayor nor Sanitation Director Veronica White will speak to the press or answer questions about any of this. Wouldn't that go a long way toward clearing this up, if it can be cleared up? The silence is deafening. For many, it is damning.

Matt McBride has done amazing research and has provided a lot of the raw information to us, which no surcharge on our monthly statements:

Dear New Orleanians,

As you now know, the Metro and Richard's trash collection contracts have been poorly administered by the city's Sanitation Department. It is possible millions of dollars have been wasted, and an upcoming report from the Nagin administration - touted as an "audit," will do nothing but cloud the issue by attempting to replace existing inadequate records with even more records of dubious value. You can find the previous piece in my series of missives about this here (thanks, Eli):

http://wecouldbefamous.blogspot.com/2008/12/mcbride-and-another-thing.html

I thought it would be best for the public to see the actual records from the trash companies which were contractually required; these records are supposed to be the basis for the monthly invoices and payments on the contracts.

In addition to locating the texts of the trash companies' contracts there, I have created two new folders at the following link:

http://www.box.net/shared/18s6vzjbao

One contains the original, raw address list files as the city council received them from the administration on November 14th. There are four files there: the May, 2007 and October, 2008 address lists from both Metro and Richard's. To reduce download times, I've also placed those files inside a ZIP file.

The other folder includes my annotated files. The annotated October, 2008 lists from both companies are there, as well as the annotated May, 2007 list from Metro. I've also placed those files inside a ZIP file. I ran out of steam and never got to the Richard's May, 2007 to clean it up. It was a lot of work to get these files in a shape to use for analysis. Note that I didn't destroy anything in this analysis, only added stuff. But when I found obvious errors and misspellings, I corrected them.

If you are interested in finding your address or any other address, I strongly encourage you to look at the annotated files, since the original files are not very well sorted (Metro much more so than Richard's). My files are sorted by street, direction, and then street number.

Metro's area covers roughly everything north of I-610, while Richard's covers roughly everything south of I-610 and Algiers (except the Quarter, whch is SDT's). The actual map can be found in the text of the contracts, which are also at the link above.

I've hidden some columns that I used for work purposes. The columns with numbers in them and with titles including "Duplicate" contain how many instances either a complete address (which includes an apartment number or letter) or a building (which excludes apartment numbers) occurs on the list. I used these to find duplicates. Also included - for the October, 2008 sheets - are columns showing the results of cross referencing the building addresses against various demolition-related lists.

I've left the Autofilter feature on to allow folks to easily drill down to particular results, address, or whatever they wish.

The "audit" is expected to be released on Friday.

Dismiss Veronica White Now

McBride: Trash Irregularities Abound

(I've added links to the photographs)

Matt McBride:

You are likely aware of the recent problems between the New Orleans City Council and the Sanitation Department. At the center of the dispute is an attempt to determine which houses are actually getting serviced by the city's three main garbage contractors, SDT, Metro, and Richards on a month by month basis.

A couple of weeks ago, the Sanitation Department handed over Microsoft Excel address lists from Richards and Metro to the City Council (no SDT information was submitted). Stacy Head's office compiled a memo summarizing preliminary findings after an examination of the data. It's attached, and it provides good baseline information like rates the companies charge and how many houses they were charging for at various times over the length of the contract.

I have also received the monthly house count spreadsheets for October, 2008 for both Richards and Metro, as well as the May, 2007 sheet for Metro. I spent a lot of time over the past few days cleaning the three sheets up, and then analyzing the results. They are very interesting...

Duplicates

While media accounts and and city officials have simply counted the number of rows on these sheets and considered that equal to the number of houses, I found that was false. In fact, there are thousands of duplicate addresses buried within these lists. This is found when one cleans up the addresses and sorts them properly.

The problems with duplicate addresses seem to be far more severe with the Metro contract than with the Richards one. I analyzed the lists to isolate unique addresses. Here's what I found;

Metro, May 2007, 40,110 rows, billed for 40,000, actually 38,835 unique addresses

Metro, October 2008, 45,626 rows, billed for 45,336, actually 43,592 unique addresses

Richards October 2008, 64,101 rows, billed for 63,000, actually 63,600 unique addresses (it appears they are underbilling the city, but read on...)

So if one just looks at the number of rows compared to the number of billings, it would appear the city is actually getting houses serviced free. However, when one takes into account the inflating effect of duplicate addresses on the spreadsheets, it appears the city is paying money they shouldn't.

In October, 2008, there were about 2500 duplicate addresses between the two companies, including some addresses which appeared four times. Here's the details:

Metro May 2007:

1265 duplicates (3.2% of unique addresses)

9 triplicate addresses

1 quadruplicate address (4319 Chartres, Apt B)

Metro October 2008:

2014 duplicates (4.6% of unique addresses)

18 triplicate addresses

2 quadruplicate addresses (4319 Chartres, Apt B, and 13411 Curran)

Richards October 2008:

484 duplicates (0.76% of unique addresses)

16 triplicate addresses

1 quadruplicate address (2723 Jackson)

As the City Council memo indicates, the billing rates for Metro are $18.15 a residence. Theoretically - if the city can find a way to recoup these funds - it appears the city paid an extra $23,000 in May, 2007 and an extra $36,500 in October, 2008 to Metro. Using an average of these two numbers ($29,750), that would mean an average estimated overbilling of $375,000 per year due to duplicate addresses on Metro's contract.

What is noteworthy regarding the Metro duplicates (besides the large amount of them), is that 665 addresses that only appeared once on the May, 2007 list then became duplicate addresses on the October, 2008 list. Additionally, all but six of the 1256 duplicates on the May 2007 remain as duplicates on the October 2008 list. The remaining 99 duplicates on the October 2008 list were brand new duplicates that month, when compared to the May 2007 list.

Since the city paid for 600 fewer unique addresses than Richards says they collected from in October, 2008, it seems that the problem of duplicates on the Richards contract did not affect payments. But there are other problems with the Richards contract, as detailed below.

Multiplexes

For multi-unit buildings with more than four units, the owner is required to contract with a private trash contractor rather than signing up for the city's service. Such places should not be showing up on the lists of residences serviced on these municipal contracts. But they are.

There's more of this irregularity on the Richards contract than on the Metro one, and it only appears to be a few instances. But they are obvious.

On Richards, I found the following more-than-four-unit properties getting billed in October, 2008:

418 Pelican (eight-plex)

1015 Washington (appears to be six-plex, and - oddly - owned by the same person as 418 Pelican, a William W. Benson)

3351 Kabel (what appears to be a commercial multiplex property)

3820 3rd (six-plex)

3214 Diana (nine-plex) - I've attached a picture of this place from Google StreetView with 7 Richards cans out front. If you go on Google Maps and search on this address, and then click the little guy to see it in StreetView, you'll see an 8th can against the building. All 9 units actually show up on the Richards list.

In total, there are 35 "buildings" on the Richards list apparently receiving five or more cans, though not all have five units or more like those examples above. Some are fourplexes with duplicate addresses in individual apartments. Others are legitimate, and are artifacts of odd address assignments by the city. For example, there are 16 cans shown as assigned to 1 St. John Court. But that's because all the houses in that Bayou St John cul-de-sac have the same number address, but use letters to distinguish themselves.

Temporary trailer parks

This was one of my oddest findings. I discovered that Richards is still billing for temporary trailer parks as recently as October, 2008. It is unclear if trailer parks were even allowed to receive city trash cans under the contract. However, that question seems moot, because Richards continues to bill for them on the October 2008 list, even though (I believe) all these parks were shut down months ago. The addresses are:

Trailer park at 1605 Horace and 3220 Lawrence (trailers are all gone) - Richards appears to have been double billing this place, since both addresses are at the same corner. Looking at this place on Google Maps StreetView shows it as an empty lot when the StreetView van went by (last summer I believe). I have attached a screenshot of this. In the lower right corner, you can see the even older overhead shot from Google Maps which shows the trailers when they were there.

Trailer park at 2379 Rousseau (picture attached of Richards cans in front of trailers - note Google StreetView van passed by in 2007, so this picture is a historic document - all the trailers are now gone)

Trailer park at 9018 Dixon (picture attached of Richards cans in front of trailers - note Google StreetView van passed by in 2007, so this picture is a historic document - all the trailers are now gone)

Demolished properties

In response to an order from a federal judge, on November 13th the city finally began issuing lists of properties it has demolished and for which it received FEMA reimbursements. The latest version of the list was issued on November 26th. It covers demolitions performed by the city's contractor, DRC, between December 2007 and November, 2008 and can be found here:

http://www.cityofno.com/Portals/ImminentHealthThreatDemolitionProperties/Resources/CompletedDemolitions11-25-08.pdf

This list is the most authoritative list of city-initiated demolitions, since it includes the actual date a house was demolished. I cross referenced this list against the Metro and Richards sheets for October, 2008. Here's what I found:

Metro: 67 properties with demolition dates between December 1, 2007 and October 31, 2008

Richards: 33 properties with demolition dates between December 1, 2007 and October 31, 2008

My research indicates that the rebuild rate on demolished lots is about 10 to 15 percent, meaning that the vast majority of these 100 lots are likely still empty, but the city is getting billed for trash collection at them.

I also cross referenced the Metro and Richards October 2008 lists against four other types of demolition-related lists:

a) Properties which have appeared on one of the 10 Imminent Danger of Collapse lists from September 15, 2007 until July 17, 2008. Imminent Danger of Collapse (IDC) properties are those targeted for demolition by the city because they are about to fall down, or have already fallen down.

b) Properties which have appeared on one of the 22 Imminent Health Threat lists issued by the city from March, 2007 until November 20, 2008. Imminent Health Threat (IHT) properties are those targeted by the city for demolition because they are ungutted, unsecured, have tall grass, or some combination of the three. They are not in as bad a shape as IDC properties, but they are extremely unlikely to be occupied and receiving trash service.

c) Properties which received demolition permits for anyone - private owners or the city's or Corps of Engineers' contractors - during the term of the contracts - from January 1, 2007 until October 31, 2008

d) Properties which received any demolition permits since Katrina.

Here are the results:

IDC properties

Metro - 11

Richards - 9

IHT properties:

Metro - 181

Richards - 90

Demo permits from 1/1/07 to 10/31/08:

Metro - 607; including 34 duplicates

Richards - 191; including 18 duplicates

Demo permits from 8/29/05 to 10/31/08:

Metro - 1284; including 85 duplicates

Richards - 365; including 29 duplicates

While appearance on the IDC or IHT lists, or even the existence of a demolition permit, does not necessarily guarantee that the property is gone, or unoccupied, or otherwise unsuitable for garbage collection, they are strong indicators of that unsuitability. When one adds in the estimated rebuild rate of 10-15% on demolished lots, it seems clear there seem to be very many questionable properties on both Richards' and Metro's address lists.

Conclusion

There are many irregularities in the Richards and Metro address lists provided to the City Council. While at first blush it would appear that both firms are actually underbilling the city, it would appear Metro is definitely overbilling, and Richards is borderline.

Among the irregularities are:

- thousands of duplicate addresses being counted in the billing totals,

- billing the city for apartment buildings with more than four units, commercial buildings, and non-existent trailers (even double billing a trailer park in one case)

- billing the city for properties that have been demolished, targeted for demolition by the city, determined by the city to be in imminent danger of collapse, or which have had demolition permits granted to them.

With this many irregularities, it seems the skepticism some have expressed over the contracts' cost effectiveness is justified.

Best regards,

Matt McBride

Here is a link to the helpful preliminary report from Stacy Head's office.

Is a real municipal department of sanitation out of the question? Why doesn't the city own trucks or employ a workforce? It doesn't really seem like it's been particularly cost effective to go the selfish contractor route.

Certainly one place to make a change is at the top.

Lolis Column "Defends" Veronica White

Lolis Eric Elie reasonably points out Veronica White's side of the story in his column today.

But his "defense" of the Sanitation Director almost follows a familiar WCBF format.

Head complimented the city in a memo sent by her then-assistant in June 2006. Head notes that she had been on the council roughly a month and wasn't sufficiently experienced then to analyze the deal.

The city has also provided the council with at least some of the documents detailing the number of households receiving sanitation services.

Moreover, Head and most residents agree that sanitation service has improved dramatically since Metro Disposal, Richard's Disposal and SDT Waste and Debris took over.

These points would not have been sufficient response to Head's questions, but the points would have made White look more competent...

This is worded fabulously.

"The city has also provided the council with at least some of the documents..."

Good stuff. Former FEMA chief Michael Brown had at least some experience.

And the last line:

"...the points would have made White look more competent."

That's also an amazing structure. White provided at least some documents and services are better, and if these talking points had been highlighted, White would have looked more competent at the one particular hearing where she was exposed as a liar.

So while Lolis "defends" White in the first part of the column, here are some lines from later on:

...White's inability to answer questions in a reasonable manner makes it seem as if she has no explanations for her department's performance.

In the absence of an explanation, New Orleanians are inclined to suspect corruption.

Mayor Ray Nagin defends White, apparently convinced of her competence. But even if White has done a great job, her demonstrated inability to explain her department's actions is itself a form of incompetence. And things are about to get worse.

He goes on to profile some of the issues the city is having with SDT Waste, which has provided ZERO documentation, and had previously been given a pass on account of the pretty boy.

Things are going to get worse.

One suggestion is to dismiss Veronica White because she is incompetent, or as Elie might say, because she always makes herself appear that way.

Budget Trash

The budget for the Department of Sanitation proved to be one of the biggest sticking points at City Council yesterday. Veronica White was a no-show.

From the Times-Picayune:

The climactic debate involved the Sanitation Department, the object of frequent criticism from some council members, particularly over suggestions that the three companies that collect trash for the city have been serving far fewer addresses than they have billed the city for.

Sanitation Director Veronica White, who clashed angrily with Councilwoman Stacy Head during the council's hearing on the department's budget three weeks ago, was not present for the debate, and her name was barely mentioned.

After rejecting an amendment by council President Jackie Clarkson that would have cut 15 percent of the Sanitation Department's budget and diverted $4 million to pay for repairing street lights across the city, council members voted 4-3 to put half of the allocation in reserve and to require a second audit of the trash collection deals.

The results of an initial audit of the companies' performance is due next week, but some members made it clear that they want an audit by a firm with no ties to the administration.

Clarkson, Head, Fielkow and Shelley Midura voted for the move, with James Carter, Cynthia Hedge-Morrell and Cynthia Willard-Lewis opposed.

Hedge-Morrell, the chairwoman of the council's Budget Committee, had proposed putting 15 percent of the sanitation budget in reserve, but the majority wanted to go further.

Later, Nagin swooped in to blast Council's budget.

In an unexpected late-night appearance before the council, Nagin said he was "a little disappointed" at its actions and said the city is "headed for a financial train wreck" in 2010 because of the council.

Do you think he'll veto it?

Nagin believes the train wreck is upcoming because of Council's decision to use one-time monies to plug this year's budget gap. I generally don't support that kind of budgeting either, actually, but we're talking about $10 million. Are we really on such soft footing for 2010 that this reallocation of 10 million bucks tips us over? That's something the Mayor should answer for, not Council.

UPDATE:

An anonymous reader reports that, in fact, Veronica White was in Council chambers. She was a no-show at the microphone, offering no defense of her department.

Blogs are awesome because of readers.

Does this mean that the T-P's mention that White "was not present for the debate" is inaccurate? Their line leaves a little bit more latitude than what I extrapolated.

Sanitation Contract Audits

Guess what?

An audit of our city's sanitation contracts reveals a pretty murky situation. Our contractors are either keeping horrendous records, or they're reluctant to show their hand.

Either way, it's hard to justify continuing to pay SDT, Metro, and Richards at their current rates.

I've published the audit, conducted by Councilwoman Head's staff.
It's a quick read and can be accessed here.

Veronica White has not done her job.

We could have 500 signatures on this petition demanding her dismissal by the end of the hour.

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So now that we've succeeded in collected 500 signatures, how should we deliver them and when?

I have some ideas but what are yours?


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UPDATE:

Phase 1 complete. We have secured five hundred signatures. Thanks to everyone who signed, blogged, emailed their friends, etc.

There's more to do. Keep those suggestions coming. How do we deliver our petition?

They killed trees for THIS?

The founder and CEO of WCBF sounds like an idiot in your Saturday edition of the Times-Picayune. Man, that soundbite shit is hard. It took a lot of negotiation to get them not to print what I said about mouth-breathers. Yeah, you know the type.

I almost shut down the blog today to throw any would-be new readers off of my scent, but I know that's only for the yellah.

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If you've come to sign the petition to dismiss Veronica White, you can find it here. According to analyst calculations, it is 63% complete.

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Here's an uncomfortable interview between Norman Robinson and Mayor Nagin over the Veronica White fracas. Mayor Nagin refuses to defend the actual assertions he made to Council about the event in an email. My favorite question was:

"You don't feel, as the elected leader of this city, are exacerbating this by throwing this out there without offering any clarification, any real clarity?"

Nagin's answer:

"...we'll see where the legal procedures go from here."

Ugh.

Friday! Blakely's turn to not answer quetions

Tough day shaping up for Ed Blakely, who is set to go in front of City Council later this morning to defend his budget and performance as head of ORDA.

Yesterday, he confirmed that one of his top lieutenants, Patricia Robinson, has left her position. She was fired, which is something we know because Blakely refused to say whether she was fired or resigned.

The Nagin administration had delegated responsibilities related to the $5 million economic development fund to Robinson. It seems clear that her departure from government is related to her performance in this regard. As you'll recall, the administration through the grants to Council for approval without basic information like cost-benefit analyses.

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Jarvis DeBerry smells blood. He's got another winning column today.

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Tell your friends, keep pushing:

Dismiss Veronica White Now

Fielkow: "I Don't Think That's Democracy"

Arnie Fielkow isn't particularly enthused about the latest detente negotiated between Councilwoman Clarkson, Councilwoman Hedge-Morrell, and Mayor Nagin.

Responding to a question about Councilwoman Hedge-Morrell's plan to cut off microphones in the event of future heated exchanges, Councilman Fielkow concludes:

"I don't think that's Democracy."

He doesn't believe it's addressed the underlying issue that lead to the recent spat over decorum - whether or not the Nagin administration is providing the information that Council requests.

“Ultimately, that is the most important question. Does the council have the information needed to formulate an opinion on the particular sanitation contract? I don’t know the answer to that,” Fielkow said.

Here's another WWL report.

Apparently, then-Councilman Jay Batt tried to get Veronica White removed in 2004 with an ordinance.

The only other 'yea' vote in that effort belonged to none other than Jackie Clarkson.

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I did not know that.

I wonder if Jackie has signed this petition, which calls for Veronica White's dismissal from her post as Director of Sanitation.

Sign it and spread it, friends.

Hey Neat

The petition calling for the dismissal of Veronica White is officially half way to its signature goal. It's only been a few days. That's not too shabby.

If you haven't signed it yet, why wait any longer?

And if you have signed already, have you emailed the link to all your friends, enemies, and frenemies?

Just because we're eagerly anticipating whether or not the next Council meeting will feature actual questions and actual answers or the revocation of microphone privileges doesn't mean we wait to organize. Quite the contrary. This is our time.

Dismiss Veronica White now.


Update:

Oyster makes a compelling case for why we should also organize against any more funding for crime cameras. We've got a 25 million dollar hole to climb out of. An end to maintenance funding yields about $1.6 million. What could we get back if we also then sold the equipment?
There must be some other dumb municipality out there willing to make the same mistake we did, right?

All Better Now?

Earlier tonight, Ray Nagin, Cynthia Hedge-Morrell, and Jackie Clarkson emerged laughing from an expensive French Quarter restaurant where agreed to do absolutely nothing substantive to address the status of Sanitation Director Veronica White.

They have a new "system" in place that will prevent future disturbances from occurring, one in which committee chairpersons will be faster to cut off the microphones of whichever speakers might be disagreeing too loudly.

Flat-out unacceptable.

Dismiss Veronica White NOW!


UPDATE:

WWL now has the raw video.

Jackie Clarkson and Cynthia Hedge-Morrell were actually surprisingly insistent that they did press upon the Mayor that Department Directors are going to have to actually answer questions now.

It will be interesting to see whether or not Council asks about sanitation contracts with Richards, Metro, and SDT. I wonder whether or not Council asks about recycling.

And I especially want to know about demolitions...



Of course there are the answers to look forward to as well.