City Managers Job

For those of you who are unaware of it David Husemans job (our city manager) is on the agenda for tomorrow nights city council meeting.

He has been good as schmoozing groups of individuals and nodding his head often to appease everyone but he's not leading our city in a manner which we need to be lead, and our council if finally sick and tired of it.

Bottom line is he does not communicate to the city council members at large, and has not followed their direction given him time and time again. He's tried to run several things under the radar, and when caught always comes up with a sweet talking snake in the grass answer to get out of it.

Honestly if I was a council member this item would of been on the agenda every month for a year now.

I know some of you don't agree with me on the rodeo issue, but bottom line is this year he is scheduled to lose over $200,000 in your and my tax money out there this year. After 3 years you would think he would of gotten it under control.

We are about to experience the largest growth our county has ever seen, we need a manager we can trust, is transparent, open and honest about the operations of this city. I totally support our council members in removing Mr. Huseman tomorrow and look forward to working with a city manager that will take us forward in the next 5 - 10 years.

I encourage all of you to attend the meeting at city hall at 6 pm Tuesday night.

God Bless,
Dennis Nesser

Shhhhhh - It's a secret

Two months ago a gentleman stood up at the city council meeting and asked the council and the city manager why there was so much secrecy in our city government.  He pointed at specific points like a book that contained city offices, and a listing of all members of all city appointed boards that sat behind a desk at city hall that he was told was not available for public viewing.  He spoke of several other specific incidences that he didn't understand.  Isn't our city government our government, working for the citizens of Gonzales?

His words ate on me for an entire month.  For those of you who know me well, you know I like to know what's going on, and am willing to share with anyone I know.  I go to every city council meeting I can (about 90% of them), and have never gotten up to say a thing, even though I've been passionate about several of the issues the council has discussed. But after a month of thinking about it I knew this gentleman was correct and I needed to reiterate it for the council and the city manager.

So at January's city council meeting I got up for the first time and spoke to the council in open forum.  I told them the words from last month had bothered me because they were so true.  Things like the removal of the river trash, the "JB Wells committee" that was illegally meeting and was not appointed by the city council, the expenditures of dollars that the city council has no clue of, and on and on and on.  And that whether or not it was intentional, or real the reality is the people of Gonzales believe that our city government is not only working in secret, but going to do what ever they want regardless of what the people of this town want.

There is an old saying that states, "Perception is reality".  Our perception of the city management and it's workings is that they are working in their interest, not those of the town, and they are doing it in secrecy.

Afterwards the city council members found out exactly what I was talking about as the mayor passed out evaluation forms for the city manager.  This wasn't on the agenda for the meeting that ended just 30 seconds before.  It wasn't discussed under new business, where the mayor can put any item on the agenda at his own whim.  And it wasn't in the package received by any of the city councilmembers prior to the meeting. 

The next morning is when the real slap to the council and the people of Gonzales came.  We found out that one month after the city council voted not to expand JB Wells (September city council meeting), the city manager signed a deal, obligating the people of Gonzales to well over $100,000, if not $250,000 in a 10 year deal for a new rodeo.  Not one of the city councilors had a clue this was even in negotiations, much less had been signed 4 months prior.

And then for the 'Official Signing Ceremony' only a few of the city managers supporters were invited. Selected businesses were told, most of ours were not.  Shhhhhh, the rest of the city might find out.

If this was my business and my General Manager had done that, he'd been gone.  Plain and simple.  If I was a city council member I would stand up at the next city council meeting and let everyone know "I do not appreciate the actions of the city manager in embarrassing me with my constituents.  The last I looked the city manager took care of the daily operations based upon my, and my fellow councilmen guidance.  He has failed to do that. in this matter, and it is unappreciated, uncalled for, and I have no confidence that any time in the near future our city manager is going to be able to operate this city as we instruct, above board, and in the best interest of our community."

People, it's time we as a community stepped up and spoke up.  We are the employers of our city government.  They work for us! We do not work for them!  Let your councilman know what you are thinking.  Let them know you are tired of "but it's always been done that way in Gonzales", tell them we deserve better than that! Tell them you want to see an above board, legitimate city government being run. It's the least we deserve!

God Bless,
Dennis Nesser

Youth Rodeo Contract

So for those of you who are living in a cave or under a rock you might of missed that in October our city manager signed a 10 year agreement to host another rodeo here in Gonzales at taxpayer expense.  The Gonzales Canon and the Gonzales Inquirer both printed these press releases that spoke about how wonderful a deal we got out of these deal.  I take exception to these postings, and to Mr. Mundys editorial "Arena expansion: You have to spend money to make money" (http://www.gonzalescannon.com/node/3647" telling us that we need this to grow, even though we don't have the infrastructure in place to benefit from the upcoming rodeo.  


I posted the following rebuttal to Mr. Mundys editoral:

While I agree we need change, and have supported issues like liquor by the drink to help bring an economy to this town I have several issues with this agreement that has been made with the rodeo.

1) We do not have the spaces needed to properly host this event. So now Mr Huseman and his hence men are trying to make this happen with sweet deals to GEDC if they will approve the money. The last time we added spaces to the arena it was estimated by Mr. Huseman to cost $1000 each, wound up costing approximately $2500 each, and now they want 300 more? Tally that on your fingers and toes.

2) Not even our elected city government (or at least 3 of the councilmen) we even aware of this contract, a significant liability to the city, until the papers ran the story. Why even have officials if there is no say? This contract was signed in October, see an issue here?

3) The city council told the city manager NO to expanding JB Wells, and yet he has ignored them.

4) We, as a city were promised an area for all of Gonzales out in JB Wells. I have copies of the plans that were originally brought to the people of Gonzales and to the Texas Parks and Wildlife, for funding, and it is NOT a huge rodeo area, but a common park for all of Gonzales. Why are we changing plans instead of completing the plans we have already in place?

5) Why are we again putting the horse before the cart? Even you said it, we have NO PLACE for these people to come spend money in Gonzales. The business base is not set up for it, and so we are NOT going to prosper from it. We need to be working on getting our 2 town squares filled with businesses as a #1 priority so that we CAN deal with visitors like these.

6) Even with JUST the $25 per head for 550, these rodeo visitors would have to spend $687,500 to break even on sales tax (2% sales tax rate, 550, $13,750 we are paying out, simple math), and that's not counting all the other concessions and items we are responsible for in the contract. Please someone lie to me and tell me we'll get real close to that number, but I don't think so.

7) We STILL haven't gotten a handle on the way we run our arena and the accounting over there! So lets make the problem bigger, because bigger will only make our losses greater....oh wait, something isn't right with that statement is it?

8) I spoke at the last city council meeting about secrecy in our city government. I understand contracts and negotiations, but this is once again a case of our city manager (and who ever else is involved) ignoring the will of the people of this town, the city council and going behind our backs to do something they were told we don't want. So in secrecy they've gone and done it and are taking the approach it's better to ask for forgiveness that permission. I for one and tired of this attitude from SOME of our city employees that think we work for them. This is our city, our taxes, our budget, and our livelihoods that are affected here, and we are suppose to have a say that counts!

And for the record I didn't read in the paper where the arena and all of it's facilities are at NO COST to the association putting on the event. That we will be providing most of the items used during this rodeo at our cost with their emblem and the year put on everything.

I wish I could run a business where I didn't have to pay for my building, my equipment, and oh the city is going to be providing a good bit of the labor for it, so the association isn't paying for that either, I AM as a taxpayer here in Gonzales.

I'm surprised that every business doesn't move to Gonzales with incentives like that, oh but wait, I'm not a rodeo, so my business doesn't count to the city does it?

Dennis Nesser

So my question is why are we allowing anything to happen without ramifications to those ignoring the elected officials and the taxpayers of this town?   Why can't we take care of long standing problems before we move forward?  Why is it our city continues to run in secrecy thinking we as citizens, "aren't smart enough to handle the truth"?

God Bless,
Dennis Nesser