Email From Bartlett Mayor James Grant
Below is an email I received from the Mayor.
Attachment Fri, Jan 27, 2012 at 4:20 PM
Reply-To: jmgrant@texsys.net
To: public.information@oag.state.tx.us
To Whom It May Concern:
My name is James M.Grant, and in May of 2010, I was elected by the
good Citizens of the City of Bartlett to be their mayor. As
background, the City of Bartlett is a Type A General law city, with a
mayoral and council form of government. After several aggressive
moves by the Council to overthrow the Mayor's office, the Council
passed a resolution in June of 2011 requiring the Mayor, and ONLY the
Mayor, to comply with The Great State of Texas' Public Information Act
in order to obtain ANY information from the City. By Council
resolution, the Mayor was twice ejected, under threat of arrest, from
City Hall and denied access to City records.
The Mayor, believing that the Council is acting in contradiction to
the Laws of the Great State of Texas, as outlined in Attorney General
Opinion JC-0544, contacted the County and District Attorney, offering
written, photographed, and audio evidence of their activities, got
only a brush-off statement that it is "small town politics," forcing
the Mayor to forward the information to the Attorney General - no
response.
Attached, you will find a copy of the letter affirming the Council's
resolution, and a copy of all the requests the Mayor has submitted in
an effort to perform his statutory duties as the Chief Executive and
Budget Officer for the City of Bartlett. You should find a request,
dated September 12, 2011, asking for a copy of an email wherein the
City's attorney allegedly advises that the Council is in conflict with
the laws of The Great State of Texas, in requiring the Mayor to comply
with the Public Information Act in order to obtain information. This
is further mirrored in a request dated December 28, 2011, wherein it
is evident that the City Council is denying the Mayor of even his
official communications.
Of particular note, is the first request. If you read the hand
written note, by Councilman Jamie Crathers, it is clear that she
intends to enforce the resolution and that ALL requests must be
cleared by the then City Administrator, Randall Holly. You may note
that she did not sign the second request from July 19, 2011, but that
is because it was not presented to her because the account is related
to her.
You should also note that on August 5, 2011, the Mayor had to
resubmit a sequence of requests after the first ones were "misplaced."
Although it is evident that the Mayor submitted requests, as he had
his copies, which are initialed by the City's Secretary, Diane Evans,
the Mayor submitted "clean" copies to ensure the City had "originals"
with colored date stamps.
It should be pointed out, that the Mayor has the City employee date
stamp the original, but the procedures do not require anyone to sign
for the documents, the Mayor then asks for a copy as a receipt, and
the original is then placed with the City Administrator. The Mayor
makes the City Secretary aware of the request, but as she recently
reaffirmed, the City Administrator, now Chris Hill, who has
independently changed his title to that of City Manager, demands that
all the Mayor's requests flow through him, and none have been returned
to Ms. Evans.
In regards to the request dated August 8, 2011, regarding
information necessary to prepare the City's budget, this is the ONLY
request that was even remotely responded to. A review of the
Council's "CITY OF BARTLETT REQUEST FOR INFORMATION" signature sheet,
will show that the Mayor signed for that response, but annotated that
it appeared much of the information was missing. Ironically, in Mr.
Holly's response, he states he was not given a copy of the of the
requested information nor instructions for its use, but then provides
not only a copy of an odd couple of the pages he denies he received,
but also the instructions given him by the Mayor.
It should be clear, to even the most casual observer, that the
Council intended to deny the legally elected mayor access to the
City's information, and to interfere with the Mayor's statutory
authority. It should also be blatantly obvious that most of the
requests are related to budget and fraud issues. What is not so
apparent, is that Mr. Hill is related to most of the Council as well
as several of the City's employees, and as Mr. Hill's lifelong friend,
Councilman Wally Capetillo stated, 'we ignored many laws and City
policies' to hire Mr.Hill. I still recommend that the Attorney
General listen to the Council's recorded April 2011 executive session,
also attended by the City's attorney, in which they allegedly
discussed their strategies to overthrow the Mayor's office and still
ensure their re-election, and when it is was agreed that Mr. Holly
would be given "all the power" over the City - effectively changing
the City's form of government. It should also be known that both Mr.
Holly and Mr.Hill have stated they have no intention of cooperating
with the Mayor's office.
Regardless of what other actions the Attorney General may take,
perhaps the investigation involving the City of Bartlett and CM
Energies, which exemplifies the Mayor's many concerns, should be
factored into this complaint. Nonetheless, the City's violations
regarding Texas Government Code, Chapter 552, must be addressed.
Respectfully,
James M. Grant, Mayor, City of Bartlett
James M. Grant
Reply-To: jmgrant@texsys.net
To: public.information@oag.state.tx.us
To Whom It May Concern:
My name is James M.Grant, and in May of 2010, I was elected by the
good Citizens of the City of Bartlett to be their mayor. As
background, the City of Bartlett is a Type A General law city, with a
mayoral and council form of government. After several aggressive
moves by the Council to overthrow the Mayor's office, the Council
passed a resolution in June of 2011 requiring the Mayor, and ONLY the
Mayor, to comply with The Great State of Texas' Public Information Act
in order to obtain ANY information from the City. By Council
resolution, the Mayor was twice ejected, under threat of arrest, from
City Hall and denied access to City records.
The Mayor, believing that the Council is acting in contradiction to
the Laws of the Great State of Texas, as outlined in Attorney General
Opinion JC-0544, contacted the County and District Attorney, offering
written, photographed, and audio evidence of their activities, got
only a brush-off statement that it is "small town politics," forcing
the Mayor to forward the information to the Attorney General - no
response.
Attached, you will find a copy of the letter affirming the Council's
resolution, and a copy of all the requests the Mayor has submitted in
an effort to perform his statutory duties as the Chief Executive and
Budget Officer for the City of Bartlett. You should find a request,
dated September 12, 2011, asking for a copy of an email wherein the
City's attorney allegedly advises that the Council is in conflict with
the laws of The Great State of Texas, in requiring the Mayor to comply
with the Public Information Act in order to obtain information. This
is further mirrored in a request dated December 28, 2011, wherein it
is evident that the City Council is denying the Mayor of even his
official communications.
Of particular note, is the first request. If you read the hand
written note, by Councilman Jamie Crathers, it is clear that she
intends to enforce the resolution and that ALL requests must be
cleared by the then City Administrator, Randall Holly. You may note
that she did not sign the second request from July 19, 2011, but that
is because it was not presented to her because the account is related
to her.
You should also note that on August 5, 2011, the Mayor had to
resubmit a sequence of requests after the first ones were "misplaced."
Although it is evident that the Mayor submitted requests, as he had
his copies, which are initialed by the City's Secretary, Diane Evans,
the Mayor submitted "clean" copies to ensure the City had "originals"
with colored date stamps.
It should be pointed out, that the Mayor has the City employee date
stamp the original, but the procedures do not require anyone to sign
for the documents, the Mayor then asks for a copy as a receipt, and
the original is then placed with the City Administrator. The Mayor
makes the City Secretary aware of the request, but as she recently
reaffirmed, the City Administrator, now Chris Hill, who has
independently changed his title to that of City Manager, demands that
all the Mayor's requests flow through him, and none have been returned
to Ms. Evans.
In regards to the request dated August 8, 2011, regarding
information necessary to prepare the City's budget, this is the ONLY
request that was even remotely responded to. A review of the
Council's "CITY OF BARTLETT REQUEST FOR INFORMATION" signature sheet,
will show that the Mayor signed for that response, but annotated that
it appeared much of the information was missing. Ironically, in Mr.
Holly's response, he states he was not given a copy of the of the
requested information nor instructions for its use, but then provides
not only a copy of an odd couple of the pages he denies he received,
but also the instructions given him by the Mayor.
It should be clear, to even the most casual observer, that the
Council intended to deny the legally elected mayor access to the
City's information, and to interfere with the Mayor's statutory
authority. It should also be blatantly obvious that most of the
requests are related to budget and fraud issues. What is not so
apparent, is that Mr. Hill is related to most of the Council as well
as several of the City's employees, and as Mr. Hill's lifelong friend,
Councilman Wally Capetillo stated, 'we ignored many laws and City
policies' to hire Mr.Hill. I still recommend that the Attorney
General listen to the Council's recorded April 2011 executive session,
also attended by the City's attorney, in which they allegedly
discussed their strategies to overthrow the Mayor's office and still
ensure their re-election, and when it is was agreed that Mr. Holly
would be given "all the power" over the City - effectively changing
the City's form of government. It should also be known that both Mr.
Holly and Mr.Hill have stated they have no intention of cooperating
with the Mayor's office.
Regardless of what other actions the Attorney General may take,
perhaps the investigation involving the City of Bartlett and CM
Energies, which exemplifies the Mayor's many concerns, should be
factored into this complaint. Nonetheless, the City's violations
regarding Texas Government Code, Chapter 552, must be addressed.
Respectfully,
James M. Grant, Mayor, City of Bartlett
JAIL CLAIMS CITY OF BARTLETT, TEXAS OVERCHARGING
Water Fight: Jail Claims City of Bartlett Overcharging For Services
by Deborah McKeon | Police Reporter
Published: April 28, 2011
Temple Daily Telegram, Temple Texas
by Deborah McKeon | Police Reporter
Published: April 28, 2011
Temple Daily Telegram, Temple Texas
Corrections Corp. of America filed a federal lawsuit claiming the city of Bartlett has been overcharging Bartlett State Jail for water since the summer of 2010 and, as a result of notification, that the city would disconnect services.
CCA and the City of Bartlett will appear in US District Court in Waco at 9 am today to determine if a preliminary injunction should be issued to prevent the city from shutting off water and sewer services to the jail. The court ordered appearance and temporary restraining order were signed April 19th by US District Judge Walter Smith.
CCA maintains in the complaint the city's water an sewer utility bills to the jail were excessive.
Bartlett councilwoman Gina Grove said no comment would be made until after the hearing today.
According to the complaint, the city stated in an April 14 letter that CCA owed $213,237(two hundred and thirteen thousand) for water and sewer services including the April bill of $179,500 and the $33,737 the city maintains was discounted without council approval, The payment as demanded by noon Monday..
"Failure to tender payment in full will result in water service being terminated for non-payment," said the letter, which was reportedly hand delivered to Jean Shuttleworth, assistant general council for contract management for CCA.
The letter read:"I regret that our first contact be of this nature, as you are aware, the city conducted tests on the meters servicing your facility. The tests indicate that your facility is actually receiving more water, than being billed.".
According to the complaint, meter testing March 4th confirmed the state jail consumed less water than Bartlett figures and water flow was not being measured accurately.
CCA contends that terms of an ordinance addressing utility billing disputes were not received until CCA submitted and Open Records Request Dec 14, 2010. CCA said a faxed copy was received Dec. 15.
The city faxed an invoice to CCA on Dec 28 dated Dec 17, 2010 for utility service from Nov 12th to Dec 13th, the complaint said.
On Jan 10th CCA said it submitted a dispute/protest, saying water consumption was overstated by 44 percent.The city did not respond to the protest within 5 business days, as required by city ordinance, the complaint claims.
Subsequent bills for utility services were faxed to CCA, to which they replied with protests, which went unanswered , it said.
CCA continued to receive faxed invoices, to which they filed complaints, the last of which was filed April 11th protesting the March bill.
CCA claims it attempted to pay the undisputed amounts of several bills, and the city took the checks payable to the city as the undisputed portion of the Dec bill, but has not cashed or otherwise used the check. In addition the CCA states the city would not take checks submitted along with their protests.
CCA gave the city a check on April 11th for dumpster charges on the December, January, February and March bill, however the dumpster charges were reportedly included in the checks sent along with the protests..
The complaint says because the city did not respond to CCA's protests, the balances due as determined by CCA should have been final, under the city ordinance, and they should not owe the entire $179,500.82, the city demanded.
CCA seeks a judgement that the city may not shut off or terminate utility services, and if the city does shut it off, even after CCA has complied with the city's dispute procedures, they would be violating CCA's due process.
CCA asked the court to award it reasonable attorney fees and expert witnesses and requested a jury trial.
In a supplement CCA contends that ordinance provides inadequate notice to request a hearing, the hearing is not by a neutral official, and there is no judicial review of the official's final decision.
Sutton G. Page hired by CCA, said he city meter doesn't accuarately measure jail water consumption. During his evaluation on Sept 09, 2010, he found that the pipe feeding into the city's meter from the tank is larger in diameter than the inlet to the City's meter. He contends that a meter's accuracy can be affected by immediate variations in pipe diameter or the presence of fittings.
William Johansen, a licensed professional engineer, and director of engineering at Colorado Engineering Experiment Station Inc., said the jail meters don't function properly, and can't reliably account for the amount of water flowing through.
Johansen observed the March 4 testing and recorded that the low flow meter was inoperable, and the flow measurement error was 100 percent. That of a properly reading meter should be 3 percent or less.
Johansen said the high flow meter had a flow measurement error of 14.4 percent to 95 percent, which,was 5 to more than 30 times the recommended standards.
Johansen said the type of meter has a rate of flow of 2,000 gallons per minute when operating at full capacity. He said the testing equipment that Bartlett used had a flow rate of only 150 gallons per minute in the high flow meter, at the highest measurement. .
email dmckeon@tdtnews.com
Bartlett High School Fight
I found this while surfing YouTube. Is this Bartlett, Texas High School? Who are these people if it is.
House Trauma In Bartlett, Texas
The Williams Family of Bartlett, Texas still live in this house. They endured the freezing weather we had with the roof like this. Apparently started out as a sag that caved in once, and then a second time which is making the wall on the south side of the house bulge. Louise Williams may be contacted at 254 527 4152 in Bartlett, it is her daughter that lives in the house. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated, this is a low income family. There are some people working hard to get a lot cleaned off and furnish them with a trailer house.
 |
| From CITY |
The Story of Rudolph *Gene Autry
Gene Autry singing Rudolph
RePosted from last year.
This is a true story per Wikipedia.
**True Story of Rudolph & Gene Autry**
A man named Bob May, depresed and brokenhearted, stared out his drafty apartment window into the chilling December night.
His 4-year-old daughter Barbara sat on his lap quietly sobbing.
Bobs wife, Evelyn, was dying of cancer.
Little Barbara couldn't understand why her mommy could never come home. Barbara looked up into her dad's eyes and asked, "Why isn't Mommy just like everybody else's Mommy?" Bob's jaw tightened and his eyes welled with tears.
Her question brought waves of grief, but also of anger. It had been the story of Bob's life. Life always had to be different for Bob.
Small when he was a kid, Bob was often bullied by other boys. He was too little at the time to compete in sports. He was often called names he'd rather not remember. From childhood, Bob was different and never seemed to fit in. Bob did complete college, married his loving wife and was grateful to get his job as a copywriter at Montgomery Ward during the Great Depression. Then he was blessed with his little girl. But it was all short-lived. Evelyn's bout with cancer stripped them of all their savings and now Bob and his daughter were forced to live in a two-room apartment in the Chicago slums. Evelyn died just days before Christmas in 1938.
Bob struggled to give hope to his child, for whom he couldn't even afford to buy a Christmas gift. But if he couldn't buy a gift, he was determined a make one - a storybook! Bob had created a character in his own mind and told the animal's story to little Barbara to give her comfort and hope. Again and again Bob told the story, embellishing it more with each telling.
Who was the character? What was the story all about? The story Bob May created was his own autobiography in fable form. The character he created was a misfit outcast like he was. The name of the character? A little reindeer named Rudolph, with a big shiny nose.
Bob finished the book just in time to give it to his little girl on Christmas Day. But the story doesn't end there.
The general manager of Montgomery Ward caught wind of the little storybook and offered Bob May a nominal fee to purchase the rights to print the book. Wards went on to print,_ Rudolph the Red- Nosed Reindeer_ and distribute it to children visiting Santa Claus in their stores. By 1946 Wards had printed and distributed more than six million copies of Rudolph. That same year, a major publisher wanted to purchase the rights from Wards to print an updated version of the book.
In an unprecedented gesture of kindness, the CEO of Wards returned all rights back to Bob May. The book became a best seller. Many toy and marketing deals followed and Bob May, now remarried with a growing family, became wealthy from the story he created to comfort his grieving daughter. But the story doesn't end there either.
Bob's brother-in-law, Johnny Marks, made a song adaptation to Rudolph. Though the song was turned down by such popular vocalists as Bing Crosby and Dinah Shore , it was recorded by the singing cowboy, Gene Autry. "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" was released in 1949 and became a phenomenal success, selling more records than any other Christmas song, with the exception of "White Christmas.."
The gift of love that Bob May created for his daughter so long ago kept on returning back to bless him again and again. And Bob May learned the lesson, just like his dear friend Rudolph, that being different isn't so bad. In fact, being different can be a blessing.
This is a true story per Wikipedia.
**True Story of Rudolph & Gene Autry**
A man named Bob May, depresed and brokenhearted, stared out his drafty apartment window into the chilling December night.
His 4-year-old daughter Barbara sat on his lap quietly sobbing.
Bobs wife, Evelyn, was dying of cancer.
Little Barbara couldn't understand why her mommy could never come home. Barbara looked up into her dad's eyes and asked, "Why isn't Mommy just like everybody else's Mommy?" Bob's jaw tightened and his eyes welled with tears.
Her question brought waves of grief, but also of anger. It had been the story of Bob's life. Life always had to be different for Bob.
Small when he was a kid, Bob was often bullied by other boys. He was too little at the time to compete in sports. He was often called names he'd rather not remember. From childhood, Bob was different and never seemed to fit in. Bob did complete college, married his loving wife and was grateful to get his job as a copywriter at Montgomery Ward during the Great Depression. Then he was blessed with his little girl. But it was all short-lived. Evelyn's bout with cancer stripped them of all their savings and now Bob and his daughter were forced to live in a two-room apartment in the Chicago slums. Evelyn died just days before Christmas in 1938.
Bob struggled to give hope to his child, for whom he couldn't even afford to buy a Christmas gift. But if he couldn't buy a gift, he was determined a make one - a storybook! Bob had created a character in his own mind and told the animal's story to little Barbara to give her comfort and hope. Again and again Bob told the story, embellishing it more with each telling.
Who was the character? What was the story all about? The story Bob May created was his own autobiography in fable form. The character he created was a misfit outcast like he was. The name of the character? A little reindeer named Rudolph, with a big shiny nose.
Bob finished the book just in time to give it to his little girl on Christmas Day. But the story doesn't end there.
The general manager of Montgomery Ward caught wind of the little storybook and offered Bob May a nominal fee to purchase the rights to print the book. Wards went on to print,_ Rudolph the Red- Nosed Reindeer_ and distribute it to children visiting Santa Claus in their stores. By 1946 Wards had printed and distributed more than six million copies of Rudolph. That same year, a major publisher wanted to purchase the rights from Wards to print an updated version of the book.
In an unprecedented gesture of kindness, the CEO of Wards returned all rights back to Bob May. The book became a best seller. Many toy and marketing deals followed and Bob May, now remarried with a growing family, became wealthy from the story he created to comfort his grieving daughter. But the story doesn't end there either.
Bob's brother-in-law, Johnny Marks, made a song adaptation to Rudolph. Though the song was turned down by such popular vocalists as Bing Crosby and Dinah Shore , it was recorded by the singing cowboy, Gene Autry. "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" was released in 1949 and became a phenomenal success, selling more records than any other Christmas song, with the exception of "White Christmas.."
The gift of love that Bob May created for his daughter so long ago kept on returning back to bless him again and again. And Bob May learned the lesson, just like his dear friend Rudolph, that being different isn't so bad. In fact, being different can be a blessing.
I will be doing a story about my Great Grandmother Ellafair Brown Crumbley Autry
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