On the day after Houston voters passed pay parity for firefighters, Tony Buzbee offers free legal services to any Houston Firefighter that is attacked by Sylvester Turner. You really didn’t think that you would get a break from elections, did you?
HOUSTON, Nov. 7, 2018/ — Results are now in for Prop B and voters have spoken in favor of our city’s firefighters. Our current mayor campaigned hard against them in this election, spending over $500,000 of campaign funds to fight the proposition—and all they seek is equal pay. Prob B should have never been on the ballot in the first place.
In his continued movement against firefighters, today the mayor asked Chief Pena to restructure the Houston Fire Department and go from four to three shifts, as well as announced a hiring freeze of classified firefighters, allegedly as a means to absorb costs.
However, in advance of this election, our mayor convinced City Council to authorize up to $1.3 million to pay lawyers—his buddies—to fight our firefighters in court in the event that they won this election. The money is there, just not for the firefighters. This has to stop. A mayor should never pit firefighters against the city he governs, nor against the police force. This demonstrates a potential and disgraceful waste of tax payer money.
This situation needs to be defused—NOW. I am going to call the mayor today and strongly encourage him to work out a deal with our firefighters and the City, without a lawsuit. I’ve handled more litigation than anyone in this city, and I’m willing to step in and personally work this out for the best interests of our city and on behalf of our firefighters, without charge.
There is absolutely no reason to waste taxpayer money on litigation.
Tony Buzbee
713-223-5393
[email protected]
SOURCE The Buzbee Law Firm
You might have missed Buzbee’s announcement because there was another election happening. Who is advising him? Anyways, he’s taking full advantage of this one. I mean, what firefighter would pass up a chance to be represented for free by a guy that parked a tank in River Oaks? Can’t beat the publicity.
I should have known something was up when I got a request out of the blue this summer to help him with a problem. I did because it seemed like the right thing to do. I might have done something differently if I had known his intentions..
Who is Tony Buzbee? About all I know about him is that he represented former Gov. Rick Perry when the nutcase DA in Travis County indicted him. And the tank. And a few other things that are curious.
I’m on record saying that all sane people should coalesce behind Bill King and get rid of Sylvester Tuner. King has been doing the heavy lifting and I don’t recall Buzbee stepping up to the plate before he decided to run for Mayor.
But, I’m going to try and interview him. Hopefully this isn’t a lark trying to boost his marketing (think Eric Dick here) and he is serious about the issues and the campaign.
No rest for the (weary) voters.
I don’t know Buzbee, I just read about his declaration to run recently. That being said, I do like his intentions to end the pay-to-play at city hall and the fact that he will be financing his own campaign, so he won’t be beholden to anyone. I don’t believe Bill King has any chance whatsoever of becoming Mayor of Houston. I attended a candidates meeting in Meyerland during the last Mayoral race. All the candidates were there, and of course the main issue the audience had on their minds was the flooding issue. Bill King’s responses just did not impress or convey a full understanding or a human connection to the issue. I hate to use this canned description, but he truly had no gravitas compared to many of the other candidates. I believe that is his weakness, in addition to the fact that he is not a longtime Houstonian. Being a Republican in a Democrat city is another handicap. I think that one of the few Republicans who could win as Houston Mayor would be Jim McIngvale because he is so beloved by Houstonians from all walks of life and political parties. Just my take. Sometimes we have to recognize the lay of the land and support the best man for the job who actually has a chance of winning.
As a reminder, the fourth shift was added at HFD decades ago as the result of a settlement to a lawsuit. The plaintiffs alleged racial discrimination in the hiring practices at HFD. In order to reverse this wrong, a fourth shift was added in which the new hires would be primarily minorities. This addressed the problem with minority hiring and it is no longer an issue.
Is it unreasonable to discontinue a compelled action, once the underlying issue which initiated the lawsuit has been addressed?
It appear Buzbee’s viewpoint is that an action compelled by a lawsuit to correct a wrong, must continue in perpetuity, or he is simply pandering for HFD support.
Either way, not what I am looking for in a Mayoral candidate.
The Right LOVES jingoism. Jingoism is those star-spangled appeals to false patriotism, the military, the Maine, Plymouth Rock and the Golden Rule. Ted Poe’s annual Honor Our Heroes pageant was an orgy of jingoism. Dan Crenshaw won his primary solely on jingoism. Appeals to our jingoism for the Cops and Firemen are the most common everyday forms of Jingoism. Jingoism is an overrride of common sense.
Jingoism sure overrode common sense in the case of Prop B. Republicans in Houston forced through a “Revenue Cap” against all common sense.
And then the same Conservative Republicans, in one of the biggest orgies of jingoism that Houston has ever seen, propagandized the hell out of Prop B knowing that it was impossible under the Revenue Cap that they themselves had imposed. The Right could not have done this out of jingoistic love for firemen, but as an attack on Mayor Turner.
NOW, the only solution is to put a proposition for removal of the Revenue Cap on the ballot next year.
And the Firemen had better be out at every polling place supporting it.
Jingoism: noun. “extreme chauvinism or nationalism marked especially by a belligerent foreign policy”. I don’t believe that word means what you think it means.
Not that I’m surprised. . .
Just an observation: Proposition B won 59% to 41% – an 18% margin on an election day that saw Democrats literally sweep local elections. And now you want to blame conservatives? You might want to work on your grasp of reality, Pat.
Fat, if you look at the voting map on the Comical, you will see that the main areas that voted against Prop B are GOP strongholds. Democrats love unions and voted for the imperfect solution to firefighter pay problems. What’s troubling now is that HFD’s union is going around telling anyone that will listen how their collective bargaining trumps the charter vote. So much for the sanctity of the voter’s will. Maybe one of you lawyers can enlighten us as to whether that is wishful thinking on their part but it leaves a bad taste given all their campaign rhetoric.
I just dont see any Republican winning in the City of Houston in 2019, city wide. In 2015, Trump wasnt in office. Thats the difference now. How many Chris Bell or Costello voters (many of them swung to King last time) are willing to vote for a Republican or a Trump mega donor? In 2015 with Obama in the White House, some did…In 2019, I think thats going to be a far tougher sell. By the way, I was a Costello voter who didnt vote for Turner in the runoff. If its King and/or Buzbee, Ill vote for Turner. A lot of people are mildly unsatisfied with Turner, but I doubt that King or Buzbee are going to get a lot of those votes again. Unless they turn far to the left, and that will wipe out their base. I think Kubosh and Knox are going to find some strong opposition too. Im curious on the “pitch” that they feel will convince the 20 percent they need from Houston Clinton voters to vote for them.
I don’t really care for Turner’s post election day antics with threats of cutting staff with the firefighters and threats that Houstonians can now expect slower responses from Houston police and firefighters because voters passed proposition B. Houstonians don’t like threats, and they don’t like our police snd firefighters being used as scapegoats for the city’s overspending. There are plenty of other areas where the city can cut back. I expect my tax dollars to first go towards police, fire, and infrastructure. The city should have plenty for those basics.
Karen, Turner has said all along that cuts would happen if Prop B passed, mostly targeting firefighters. That’s his bargaining chip for future negotiations and he isn’t going to give it up. Since public safety comprises 70% of the operating budget, most infrastructure coming from the capital works budget, I’d like to hear your proposed cuts. But as far as candidates for the next city election are concerned, King is done, reduced to being a detractor that points out everything Turner does as being wrong. Mattress Mack is looking rough these days, I pray his health gets better but he’s in no shape to run for office, and Knox would barely make it to footnote status.
Since Ben Hall isn’t likely to run, the best choice to support with a chance of winning is Mike Kubosh. The only way he’s going to win in the increasingly democratic city is for the county party to put forth a real effort into supporting him, the kind it has not bothered with in recent memory.
Police and fire cost more than property tax collections by a significant amount. Given that, how do you pay for Prop B?
I voted for Prop B because I wanted to see how Sly performs having to actually run a budget that balances, like he said he was an expert at as a state legislator. He has a revenue cap and a legal requirement to bring the firemen’s pay in line with the other municipal groups. Sly is in as deep in the pension fiasco as anyone and probably more so by his ability to take local control out of the city’s hand via state legislation while he was a member. The city administrations wanted that and he delivered. John Whitmire and Mario Gallegos also assisted but Sly now owns it.
Let’s be clear here. The public at large never had a seat the table that brought us this mess. Our local media has done an excellent job of not reporting on what goes on but as devout members of the democrat machine that is to be expected. The unions made their choices and their members got the results of their directives. Police and Munis took the cash upfront KNOWING their pensions were’t being funded. Firemen kept their pensions funded and accepted lower pay to do so. Classic Ant & Grasshopper fable being played out with real people.
Mayor Turner you own this. You have shown by your actions that you are trying to run from the problem you created with your almost 30 years of ‘service’ now playing on the big screen.
As far as Buzbee goes? I have doubts we can litigate our way of this so I’ll wait to hear from him on how his experience can be used deal with bad debt. Doubt it can be worse than the current attorney occupying the chair though.
Houston may well have elected its last white mayor. Only Jim McIngvale, with his notoriety and populist views, might have a chance of being elected Houston’s mayor. But, why would he want to subject himself to trying to fix such a dysfunction city. Also, last time he talked about running for Mayor, in didn’t live in Houston. I suspect he may have moved since then. Anyone know?
I don’t understand the snide remark about Eric Dick. That’s the lawyer that is fighting the city for making it illegal to give food to poor people. Apparently the author has some type of grudge?
No, no grudge against Eric. I like the guy. But the truth is the truth.
DJ