Keffler: "hope I can diffuse this one"

If you haven't read DC's blog entry on this yet, it's worth your time.

More notes from the 8/24 city council meeting

I am eating my own dog food at the moment (listening to the .mp3 I uploaded of the Ch16 broadcast from 6pm-10pm). I zipped through the video earlier but didn't pay close attention. On closer listening I have a few more thoughts.

Keffler's car compensation
I completely agree with visitor (is that the right term?) Mr. Morgan's call to re-visit the city's auto allowance for Mr Keffler, and indeed all city employees.

I believe that no one but the city employee should enjoy vehicle benefits; under no circumstances would anyone other than the designated employee use the benefit. And then even when on city business. This means no joyrides, no grocery runs, no dinners and a movie. Perhaps the car could be fitted with a woo-woo so we could always hear where it's going:


I trust that Mr. Keffler and his family drive better than Li'l Sis (or Bubb Rubb, whoever was driving that Supra in the video).

Civility
I appreciate the general civility of council members when dealing with each other, speakers, and visitors. It's better than I expected.


Executive sessions
I'd like to see a sunset provision on the sessions. Audio or videotape those sessions and set them aside for a year or five years. Then publish them on the COR website.

Collections fee last year
Does anyone know what the unusual collections fee was that is not expected to recur during the next budget period?
Is it 3498 - Attorney Collection Fees - $40,000?

Mr. Murphy and open records requests
Sounds like Mr. Murphy would prefer to put a chill on open records requests. I have not made any such requests but highly value the ability to do so. I will take Mr. Keffler's response at face value, that he and his team are dedicated to discussing requests with anyone that wants a real answer. I am less impressed with his subsequent discussion of car allowances.

Keffler's auto waste on the news

DVR'ed the 10PM showing of the news to catch this story. If the station doesn't post the video online I'll see if I can edit it down and post it somewhere.

The city manager said he has checked out the car while his family used the leased car.

It's obscene, and I am pleased the issue is getting traction in the wider community and media. I believe Mr. Morgan has been talking about this issue for a long while and it took the rest of us a while to catch up.

BTW, Mr Keffler and the Council: during this economic hardship you could probably pay someone $24k to drive you around in their own car. Wouldn't be fancy but at least it would employ a Richardson resident.

Heck, it'd probably be cheaper to call him a taxi every time. Current rates appear to be:
$2.25- Initial Meter Drop
$0.20- For each 1/9 mile

Let's run the numbers for the reported 1500 miles/year number the SUV gets driven.

Let's assume 4 rides a day, 250 days/year. That's $2,250. 1500 miles @ $1.8/mile = $2,700 for a total of $4,950. So we would save $19,050 a year if we bought Mr. K four taxi rides a day instead of providing his family an SUV.

Somebody check my math on this stuff; it's late and I was never great at math anyhow.

[Edit: I had some facts wrong. The 1,500 miles number is for the pool car, not the assigned SUV. So my math above is not useful. The breakeven point for taxi v. SUV would be 12,083 miles/year]