From the outset of the municipal elections in Houston, it was clear that besides Mayor Annise Parker, City Controller Ronald Green was vulnerable. Not because of his various ethics problems but because he simply wasn’t doing the job of pointing out to the mayor, council, and citizens the deep, structural financial issues that the City of Houston faces. So now, in the eleventh hour, he decides to “take a stand” and the inept Mayor of Houston tries to help him. This story by Greg Groogan of MyFoxHouston (Fox 26) is the most contrived, desperate, last gasp attempt to sway voters that I’ve seen in a long time.
When it comes to the health coverage taxpayers provide the public employees who fight our fires, police our streets and generally keep our city running – there’s apparently new reason for buyers remorse.
“My blood pressure medicine went from $30 to $160 dollars per month. I work with people whose whole entire paycheck goes toward paying medical deductions for necessary treatment,” said Isiah Monroe, a longtime City of Houston employee.
…
To operate this so called “self-insurance plan” Mayor Annise Parker and City Council hired Cigna.
“I think we really need to take a deep dive and examine whether this really a good thing for us,” said City Controller Ron Green.
…
Mayor Parker, in a written statement, strongly disputed Green’s findings.
“The Controller’s audit appears to be Monday morning quarterbacking based on a lack of understanding of the true workings of the contract,” said Parker.
Forget the fact that not a single employee of the City of Houston has their entire paycheck going towards their medical deductions because the city self-insures – that’s something Groogan shouldn’t have included unless he had proof, which he doesn’t and can’t get because it isn’t happening.
Ronald Green is behind in the polls, so he finds something, anything, that he can bring up to “prove” that he’s been doing his job. Only he hasn’t and the voters know that by now. He wants to “deep dive”, does he? The time for that was when the contract was negotiated. He was absent, as usual. I really can’t blame him – he isn’t and never was qualified to do the job that he has. Unfortunately, the position of City Controller has been used as a stepping stone to the mayor’s office lately – heck, Annise Parker did the same thing herself. Ignore the problems of the city, refuse to use your platform to inform voters, get elected as Mayor. Hey, it worked for her, right?
The most interesting thing here to me is Parker’s “attack” on Green. Talk about contrived. Are you kidding me? She really does think that the City of Houston voters are idiots.
Here’s the deal: the last thing that Parker wants to see, assuming she wins another term, which is far from a safe assumption, is someone in that office that is competent to do the job and is willing to shoot straight with the voters of Houston.
Someone like Bill Frazer.
He’s ahead in the polls and that scares the living daylights out of Annise Parker. Why, someone like that might just remove the scales from peoples eyes about her record – so much for that legacy she was after!
Well, I am working hard for Frazer not so he can confront Parker, but work with her to improve city finances. I doubt Mayor Parker is in any way scared of having him serve in office, but rather, would reach out to him and welcome his professionalism and technical skills. The roles of mayor and controller are institutionally structured to be somewhat adversarial, and I am sure both of these well-qualified city leaders could work together respectfully and amicably.
I am not aware of reliable polls showing how the voters split on this upcoming contest. As much as I strongly prefer Frazer over Green, the Green name (Al Green, Gene Green) like the Yarborough name or the Robinson name has strength historically in our local elections. I am expecting strong turnout in majority black districts B and D, which may also help Green. District D has a whopping 12 candidates for that open district council position.
Bill Frazer is the right candidate at the right time for Houston. He is a CPA, which should be a requirement for holding any job of controller, and he has the vision and courage to point our where Houston is overspending and underinvesting. We are not Detroit, yet, but we are on the road to Detroit, and it is never too soon to straighten-out our direction.
It’s astonishing that Mr. Green chose the 5 o’clock news, where he would be unchallenged, to surface a news story to tout an imagined success on a belated audit. Had he been pressed on the facts, it would have immediately become clear that Mr. Green does not have a full grasp of the facts and is not even slightly interested in the “full transparency” he only gives lip service to.
As Mr. Frazer’s lead strategist and consultant, I’m well aware that Mr. Green has consistently and repeatedly ducked debating Mr. Frazer the entire campaign. He has backed out of all four of the scheduled debates/forums that he previously agreed to, including a Houston West Chamber debate. More recently, Mr. Green mysteriously cancelled his appearance on scheduled face-to-face discussion with Mr. Frazer on “Red White and Blue” on public television.
As the Chronicle stated, Mr. Green has done the “bare minimum” as Controller. Failure to face a qualified opposing candidate is doing even less than that. Apparently he finds it easier to answer to a news reporter than he does taxpayers.
In comparison, Mr. Frazer looks forward to interesting discourse on important issues facing our City.
What polls are you talking about? I’d be interested to see them. Can you give a link?