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TVs TVs Everywhere!! City Council Will Actually Have SIX 70-inch TVs…and a 55-inch For Good Measure

It was bad enough that IT Director Monica Wright signed off on a $100,000.00 face-raping of the taxpayers with her ridiculous city council A/V system (for which she only got one bid – Azbell Electronics)…..but it just got worse:

Hidden away in the 20-page bid sheet were several more turds, I’ve discovered. It’s apparently not enough that our august ruling body have access to FOUR 70-inch TV screens in the main council chambers at a cost of $8,595.80. No, they need several more TVs as well – which will be bought by the city!

Below is a screen shot of the council chambers layout from the bid sheet. The upper left corner is labeled “Executive Session” – which is where they can be hidden away from us peons and privately discuss $100,000 single-bid deals, no doubt.

Below that on the left is “Break Room” and right next to that is “Meeting Room”. If you think that all sounds quite redundant, you are correct. They need a break room from the Executive room and the meeting room? Which are both themselves separate from the main council chambers? Very confusing – but they all have TVs in them! It would be barbaric not to!

Azbell Electronics will be providing the FOUR 70-inch, wildly overpriced TVs in the main chamber. But we can’t expect our august leaders to be without a TV if they move into any of the other three rooms! So the Executive Conference Room will have “a city provided 70-inch TV”….the Meeting Room will have another “city provided 70-inch TV” hung on the wall.

And of course, the Break Room will have a dinky, shitty little “city provided 55-inch TV”. The kind of shitty, dinky TV that most taxpayers wish they had in their house. Oh, and the break room TV can be switched to show cable TV.

Sound too crazy to believe?? Here are screen shots from the bid sheet:

So we’re up to SEVEN mighty large TVs for city council! I bet those assholes in Marble Falls don’t even have that many! Lampasas wins again!!!

Monica Wright Busy Destroying Evidence of Herself Goofing Off on Facebook During Work Hours

Monica Wright, our super hard-working IT Director who screwed the taxpayers out of $100,000 last month, has been a busy little bee! One of the questions I submitted to Jo-Christy Brown was “are there specific rules banning government employees from using social media (Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, etc) for personal reasons during work hours? If so, what is the punishment for violating those rules?”

There was a reason for this seemingly random question. You see, I suspect most of these wildly overpaid government parasites do very little work during the day. They sit there and waste the taxpayer dime posting pictures of their cat on Facebook.

Apparently word must have gotten out to Monica and she is slightly smarter than she looks. She has been busily deleting any Facebook post that was made during working hours – and believe me, there were a lot of them. Luckily for you, dear reader, I took a screenshot of one of them a month ago – because I know that when you turn on the lights, the roaches go scurrying for cover. I was right…she is running for cover and deleting all the evidence.

As you can see in the photo, she posted personal photos on her page at 11:19 am on Monday July 16th. If you go to her FB page now (go ahead and do it now, I’ll wait here….) that post is now gone. Which means she knew damn good and well she shouldn’t have been wasting taxpayer time on that crap. I found at least TEN instances of this last month as I went through her posts. Looks like she scrubbed them all. A sure sign of a guilty mind. Makes you wonder what other things she has been up to.

So in addition to being wildly overpaid and being too lazy to get more than one bid on a huge job, she apparently has plenty of time to sit around and post personal photos on her personal Facebook page while sitting at her government job. Must be nice! She’s worth every penny, isn’t she?

The Twisted Logic of Councilman Mike White

During a 30 minute phone call (screaming match) with Mike White last month over the $100,000.00 Azbell Electronics debacle, other issues came up. Like how overpaid our city employees are and how they seem to get an automatic raise every single year, when those of us in the private sector (who pay their bloated salaries) do not.

Now, before I begin shitting on heads, I’ll say I’ve always considered Mike to be one of the sane voices on city council. He actually runs a successful business and understands the value of a dollar. Thus, he is always voting NO to the plethora of moronic ideas coming out of that group. Hopefully he will vote NO on the latest idiotic idea of a city recycling program, but I digress.

When I was bitching about the fact that we spend a LOT of money on a city manager AND and ASSISTANT city manager, he started laying into me that “we need to pay a lot because if we don’t, the city down the street will!!”. I heard this same bullshit argument when I complained about the massive amount of money being spent on Christmas lights a few years ago. The explanation I got was “they spend a lot more than that in Marble Falls!”

I don’t care what they spend on Christmas lights in Marble Falls. Nor do I care what they pay their policemen or firemen or their city manager. Lampasas is not Marble Falls. Not even close. So to justify bloated salaries because “Marble Falls does it,” is the height of idiocy.

The cost of living is much lower in Lampasas and the employment opportunities are much worse. Ergo, you pay what you need to attract a person who can do the job – not what Marble Falls is paying for that job.

Here is your proof:

Cost of living and employment opportunities in Lampasas

versus

Cost of living and employment opportunities in Marble Falls

The average person in Lampasas earns about $27,000 per year and 21% of the city lives below the poverty line. There is no excuse for paying city “workers” $70,000 or $100,000 per year. Many of these “workers”, like Monica Wright, would be scanning groceries at HEB for $25,000 per year if she wasn’t “working” at city hall.

But wait!! It gets worse!

Because when a city “worker” says they ‘only’ make $45,000 per year, they are conveniently leaving out all the benefits. The city also pays their health insurance, which can be up to $15,000 per year. They also put away another $15,000 or so for their pension! So they are not costing the taxpayer $45,000 per year. They are costing us more like $75,000 per year. All to sit on ass in an air-conditioned office and tell people like me, by email, to buzz off when I ask too many questions. Great work if you can find it! Who do I fellate for that job??

But that’s not enough. They think they should get a 2% raise every single year. This goes along with their overtime pay, “longevity pay” (yes, they get paid a bonus just for being there a long time), and weeks of paid vacation. Add it all up, and a lot of these clowns are making over $50 for every hour of ‘work’ they spend dicking around on their computers.

*NOTE*: All of the above guesstimates of employee cost are taken from the city budget. Of course, they refuse to tell me what anybody actually makes so I have to deduce these numbers from the budget. I DO know that a year or two ago, they wanted a 1% bonus, which a city council member said would cost the taxpayers another $60,000 – which means the city employee total employee salary number was somewhere in the area of $6,000,000.00 per year. That’s SIX MILLION. How many employees does that cover? No idea. They refuse to say.

City Dragging Feet Answering Questions About Employees – The Employees YOU Are Paying For

After last month’s bombshell about city council and IT Director Monica Wright wasting $100,000.00 on FOUR 70-inch LCD TV screens and fancy electronic equipment for city council (then refusing to meet with me), I typed up a list of questions I felt the taxpayer had a right to have answered. I submitted these to a city council member on August 7th….and the next day, City Human Resource Director Christina Marez assured me that she “has started work on your request”.

That was a month ago.

I waited two weeks, then gently prodded Christina Marez by email….asking her if the information I requested under the Texas Open Records Act was available yet.

Did Christina Marez answer me? No she did not. She dragged her feet for two weeks then sicced the Lampasas City Attorney on me – one Jo-Christy Brown! Yes, Christina Marez strung me along for two weeks then didn’t have the courtesy to even answer me – much like Monica Wright did. Apparently a LOT of employees at city hall can’t be bothered to lift a finger for the taxpayers.

Jo-Christy Brown informed me that I would need to pay almost $500 to see the answers to my questions! That’s right – the lazy, do-nothing city employees who sit around all day on Facebook, need ANOTHER $15 per hour to put my request together. Funny…when I dropped off the check at 4:15pm on Monday August 27th, half of the offices were already empty…including the office of Christy Marez. Must be nice to be a city employee and just cut out at 4pm on a Monday. Very nice indeed.

So I have paid the exorbitant and ludicrous fee JUST to get to the bottom of this. The fee was paid on August 27th (9 days ago now). We’ll see how long it takes to get my answers.

Here are the questions I submitted:

How many times has the City of Lampasas contracted Azbell Electronics to do work for the city in the last 3 years? What were the total sums paid to Azbell Electronics for these other jobs and what was the description of the work to be done (include copy of bid sheets)? Were any other bids solicited for those jobs?

2) What is the official job description for IT Director for the city of Lampasas? What education or training is needed to be hired for this position, if any?

3) What education and training has Monica Wright completed in the field of IT?

4) How many hours per week does Monica Wright spend in the office as Director of IT? Is her job description “9am to 5pm Monday – Friday”? How many weeks of paid vacation does she receive every year?

5) How many total full-time employees does the Information Systems Department of Lampasas employ? Does IT Director Monica Wright have any underlings reporting to her as IT Director?

6) Does Monica Wright, or any other employee of the Information Department of Lampasas have a city-provided vehicle, car or truck? If not, why did the city pay $480 for “vehicle maintenance” in the 2015/2016 budget (budget item 505-5420)? Is a government car one of the perks of being IT Director for the City of Lampasas?

7) Are there specific rules banning government employees from using social media (Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, etc) for personal reasons during work hours? If so, what is the punishment for violating those rules?

8) The budget for 2015/2016 and 2016/2017 shows $2,500 allocated for “Training and Travel” (budget item 505-5452). What training/travel has the City of Lampasas paid for for Monica Wright over the last five years? Please include copies of certificates or other proof of training completed and copies of hotel or airfare paid for by the City of Lampasas, if any.

9) The budget shows allocation of $15,000 and use of over $11,000 for “supplies” (budget item 505-5270) – please provide a breakdown description of items and expenditures on each over the last two years. Provide receipts for these items.

10) The budget shows large increases in “office equipment and maintenance” (budget item 505-5425) – please provide a breakdown of equipment purchased and ‘maintenance’ performed for the last two budget years. Provide receipts for these items.

11) The budget shows nearly $10,000 allocated for “other services” (budget item 505-5399) – and this item has grown over 400% in two years (from $2,300 to $9,750). What are these “other services”? Provide a breakdown and cost for each.

12) Employee insurance (budget item 505-5115) was around $11,000 in 2013, $17,000 in 2015 and $28,000 in 2017 – a whopping 250% increase over 4 years and 64% increase over the last two years. What caused this? What is covered by this insurance?

13) Salaries appear to have increased over 7% per year over the last two years in the Information Systems Department. Is this correct? Budget item 505-5000 was $103,000 in 2015/2016 and was $119,000 in 2017/2018.

Azbell Electronics pillaging Lampasas for $100,000.00 – City council OK with that!

Most suckers (I mean taxpayers!) see city council wasting money and just figure they can’t fight City Hall. They don’t have the time or the energy. They have real jobs, after all. Jobs that require them to get up at the crack of dawn and weld, or pour concrete or work the ranch in 100-degree heat.

Or maybe they don’t want everyone to get mad at them for pointing out the emperor has no clothes…they don’t want to be a jerk for making a big stink when money is clearly being wasted on idiotic ideas by city government.

For instance, they might not want to be seen as a jerk for pointing out we are spending ONE MILLION DOLLARS to RENOVATE City Hall.

(That’s $1,000,000.00 to RENOVATE an existing structure)

Or maybe they feel stupid and don’t want to be considered mean for calling out city council and IT Director Monica Wright for wasting ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND TAX DOLLARS on an audio/visual system for council chambers.

Yes…you read that right. City council and IT Director Monica Wright think it’s perfectly normal to flush $100,000.00 down a toilet for some TVs and microphones in city council chambers.

Well, one sucker has had enough. Me. I’ll be the Original Lampasshole. I’ll channel your rage. I’ll tell you the truth. I’ll get yelled at by city council and moron government employees. I’ll spend hours of my own time dogging these clowns about every penny they fritter away.

This website was started out of rage over ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS being wasted on an audio/visual system for city council. But there are MANY more instances of waste, fraud and abuse. Please check back often to see the latest ways you, dear reader, as being screwed by a bunch of lazy, overpaid, government buffoons.

Azbell Electronics Charging Lampasas an Arm and a Leg!!!

As reported by the Lampasas Dispatch, city council has recently approved a nearly ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLAR EXPENDITURE on an A/V system for council chambers.

How is this possible? I wondered the same thing. After all, you can buy a HOUSE for that kind of money. How can a few microphones and speakers cost this much?

I contacted several council members and gave them a chance to explain the inexplicable. The verdict?

“Well, what can you do? Government always gets screwed”, they told me.

“It seemed about $20,000 too high to me”

“Yeah, it’s a boatload of money”, said another.

Seriously?? Sounds like they’re REALLY trying hard to save money, doesn’t it?

I asked how many companies bid on the job. Do you know what IT Director Monica Wright told me? They don’t need other bids. One bid will suffice: Azbell Electronics – who does a lot of military work out at Fort Hood. I’ll let you in on a secret you probably already know: companies who deal with the military are used to wildly overcharging them and having zero oversight.

ONE BID? For a ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLAR job?

I asked city council for the bid sheet. Guess what the VERY FIRST item on the sheet is? They are going to get FOUR 70-inch BIG SCREEN TVs at a cost of $2,150 each. Yes, you read that correctly. City council, which meets twice a month in the tiny little town of Lampasas, needs FOUR 70-inch BIG SCREEN TVs in their chambers….and they are willing to pay $8,600.00 of your tax dollars for that luxury.

I don’t have a 70-inch TV…do you, dear reader? They didn’t even exist until a few years ago. Gee…how the heck did city council get along for the last 10 or 20 years without this extremely vital equipment???

Furthermore, a 30-second search on the Internet found a Vizio 70-inch TV for sale at $900. Therefore, Azbell Electronics is charging $2,150 for a TV that could be had for $900. And they are doing it FOUR TIMES. That’s $8,600 in TVs just for starters. ARE YOU INSANE????

Since city council didn’t seem to care about this colossal waste of money, I emailed IT Director Monica Wright about this immediately. I asked for a meeting to talk about this. Maybe give her a chance to explain the inexplicable. Do you know what she said? She copied and pasted a couple sentences from the bid sheet! She couldn’t even be bothered to write a response telling me to buzz off!!

“While I understand your concerns as a taxpayer, I assure that all purchasing policies and state local guidelines were met and with best value kept in mind. If you would like to address City Council on the matter, please feel free to speak at one of our City Council meetings that is held on the 2nd and 4th Monday of each month at 7pm.”

This response was COPIED and PASTED straight from the bid sheet. Not even an original response! Monica Wright, the city IT Director who appears to make over $100,000 per year in salary, pension and benefits, essentially told me she can’t be bothered to meet with the chumps who pay her salary. Guess she’s super, duper busy working those government hours! Must be nice to land a cushy government job and apparently make $100,000.00 in salary, benefits and pension in a town where the average salary is around $24,000 and over 21% live below the poverty line. Very nice indeed! And air conditioned, to boot! Where do I sign up??

SO….here we are. City council will do nothing. City IT Director Monica Wright thinks this is all quite normal. She can’t be bothered to lower herself to meet with the peons like me…or to pick up a phone and get another bid on a ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLAR A/V system. What is a squeaky wheel to do??

The average citizen would just give up. Not me. I told these buffoons I will be starting a blog JUST TO EXPOSE THEM. I will also be filing several Freedom of Information Act letters requesting details on the profligate spending in the Information Systems Department of Lampasas.

More to come soon…..

The Original Lampasshole