Otis Brumby, Bill Kinney, Joe Kirby
"Thunder really rained on Dunaway's parade," said one City Hall watcher, referring to how Tumlin's principled, measured resistance to the smelly bond scheme had proved a catalyst and successful rallying point for the plan's opponents.
Meanwhile, indications continue to roll in about how far Dunaway, city bond guru Gordon Mortin and City Manager Bill Bruton were willing to go in their cynical attempt to keep the public in the dark and manipulate events. And there are hopeful words as well that point to Tumlin's intent to change the way business is done at City Hall and put the public back in the loop.
THE BOND SCHEME initially was opposed only by Council members Grif Chalfant and Van Pearlberg when initially unveiled last week by the mayor. But Wednesday, two who initially favored it - Holly Walquist and the Rev. Anthony Coleman - had switched sides. Probably not coincidentally, Walquist and Coleman both have election opponents, and both incumbents no doubt got an earful about the proposal from constituents.
Tumlin, who is facing opposition himself from a pair of little-known candidates, let it be known from the start that he was uncomfortable with the proposal and with how it was being presented and argued it makes poor business sense for the city.
The proposal apparently was cooked up by Mortin and would use an "intergovernmental agreement" to pull off an end-run around taxpayers, paying off $30 million in outstanding debt on the Conference Center and issuing $35.5 million in new bonds, incurring a $4.6 million prepayment fee on the existing bonds in the process.
Many City Hall-watchers suspect the conference center/hotel would be worth only about half the bond debt, or $15 million to $20 million, if on the open market. While it's possible that a careful analysis of the bond proposal may show it's the best deal possible for the city at this point, it's also important to remember that the more money the city sinks into the facility now, the greater its loss may be down the road if it has to be sold.
Mortin - who it seems has never seen a bond deal he didn't like - sold Dunaway and Bruton on the scheme last year after interest rates on the variable-rate bonds began going up, and the decision was made at City Hall to secretly buy up all $30 million of the outstanding bonds starting last November. Dunaway and Bruton had 10 months to come clean with the public on the deal, but kept their lips zipped instead. And then there was no clear explanation from them or Mortin in recent days about why the proposal needed to be approved on what they made sound like an urgent basis.
"City Hall was too cute by half on this one," said a Cobb politico.
There was never a council vote on the change, just an obscure press release apparently worded to be comprehensible only to professional bond traders, not the general public.
BRUTON'S SECRETIVENESS about the scheme is par for the course. City Hall watchers with long memories will recall how the city manager deliberately withheld information from the council and the Marietta Redevelopment Corp. back in 2004, when Dunaway and the MRC were gung-ho to give a TAD subsidy of between $6 million and $10 million to a group of developers who didn't need a subsidy to develop a piece of property that didn't need a subsidy - the old Johnny Walker Homes site on Powder Springs Street. Bruton and his TAD czar, MRC chief Gary Mongeon, sat for five days on the news that a Cumming-based group had sent them a proposal containing a serious redevelopment offer for the property - one that would not need a TAD subsidy.
Recall, too, how when a thinly financed group from Alpharetta rolled into town in early 2007 wanting a TAD subsidy for a whopping $250 million mixed-used development on troubled Franklin Road, Bruton - by his own admission, if you can believe it - sat through two months of meetings with the group without ever asking what size subsidy it would request.
And later that year, Bruton stage-managed efforts to keep the public clueless about a pending effort to float $7 million in bonds to pay for refurbishing the Conference Center. Those efforts included having the mayor and council meet in two groups and individually - in violation of the spirit of the Open Meetings Act - with hospitality industry lawyer Arch Stokes. In fact, Bruton and Mongeon had taken a similar approach in 2004 regarding the Walker site.
THE TIMING OF THE BOND SCHEME just doesn't pass the smell test. Dunaway has given countless talks around town since last November (most of them styled as "State of the City" speeches), but never breathed a word in them about the pending "need" to put taxpayers on the hook for millions in additional bond debt for the conference center. Nor did he tip off the council, apparently.
No, Dunaway and Mortin waited until Sept. 3 - the day after qualifying ended for November's election - to unveil the proposal to the council and public. That meant it was too late for anyone angered by the news, or by his or her councilman's stand on it, to run for office this year.
And when Tumlin last weekend suggested the bond proposal should be voted on by the public, since it amounted to a General Obligation Bond backed by a "full faith and credit" pledge from taxpayers, City Attorney Doug Haynie was immediately ready with a response that the U.S. Justice Department-required 60-day notice period for adding referendum items to election ballots had already passed.
Then, of course, there's the way that Dunaway and Bruton dropped the highly complex proposal in the council's lap on the eve of the long Labor Day weekend and expected them to vote on it just six days later.
TUMLIN, WHO IS A TAX ATTORNEY, let it be known he was very wary of the proposal, so Dunaway asked if he would be interested in a private briefing from Bruton and city financial director Sam Lady "on how to save money on interest payments for the city."
Tumlin, who had an inkling the briefing was to be about the bond scheme, turned Dunaway down cold - reportedly to the mayor's great surprise. Tumlin added he thought that taxpayers deserved to receive whatever information he was being offered, and that he didn't want to hear it if they weren't going to hear it, too.
In other words, no more "business as usual" at City Hall. No more dealing in the shadows and no more cutting the public out of the loop.
Tumlin's unwillingness to be co-opted by the secretive City Hall is a refreshing change.
TUMLIN SENT ANOTHER such signal during Mortin's bond presentation to the council Sept. 3. During a break in the action Tumlin complained to Mortin that the proposal contained even fewer details than in the Dunaway-backed parks bond referendum coming Nov. 3. Tumlin added that he had doubts about the bond proposal, to which Mortin replied, "I don't write the laws."
Answered Tumlin, "Well, I follow them."
THE MUCH-AWAITED Sprayberry History Academy holds its inaugural session this morning at Sprayberry High School under the auspices of the Gilder-Lehman Institute of American History and is expected to be packed, reports director Michelle Luckett.
“We’re going to have 87 kids there, the overwhelming majority of them ninth-graders,” she told AT. They’re coming from eight public and two private Cobb high schools, as well as several home-schooling networks.
The endeavor has the backing of the Marietta Museum of History, the Cobb Landmarks Society, the High Museum, Kennesaw State University, the Aviation Museum and Discovery Center in Marietta and the Southern Museum of Civil War and Locomotive History in Kennesaw.
“This is so out-of-the-box for the Southeast,” Luckett said. “Having an enrichment class on a Saturday morning — not a remedial class — is very unusual. And having this many kids willing to give up their Saturday mornings, well, it just makes a very powerful statement.”
FIFTY YEARS AGO Carl Couey, one of Cobb’s best known businessmen, opened a skating rink on Austell Road in South Cobb called Crescent Park and later opened a rink called Dazzles in Douglasville. Saturday night from 7 until midnight he is inviting all former skaters to visit him and his family at Dazzles in Douglasville.
THE COBB SCHOOLS FOUNDATION will present the 5th Annual Cobb Homecoming Classic charity golf tournament on Monday at Brookstone Country Club in Acworth. All proceeds from the tournament will benefit the programs of the foundation. Call (770) 426-3390.
POLITICAL PATTER: The public is invited to the District 2 Town Hall meeting at 7 p.m., Monday at Mt. Bethel Church in room A-18. Commissioner Bob Ott will host. The church is at 4608 Lower Roswell Road.
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