By Ashley Toland Editor

After being nearly starved to death (for excitement) for the past few months at city council, the mayor and council finally served up some tasty nastiness. And with each passive and not-so-passive-aggressive attack, the councilors and mayor made on one another, I could feel my strength and hatefulness coming back.

They used such profane expletives as “baloney” (I’m surprised the family publication in town even printed that one) and “sad and shallow,” accused each other of trying to “draw attention” to themselves, and they even had the audacity to question each other’s “principles.”

What caused all this delicious b-a-l-o-g-n-a?

Well, it was over an action plan or budget for their Community Development Block Grant funds, which are federal monies designed to be used in low-to-moderate income areas in town – for building or funding senior or economic development centers or any other project that will improve the area. The action plan did not allocate any funds to a proposed senior center in Connie Hudson’s district (her baby, a project she has been working on for years). It was supposed to have been, so hence the fuss.

For years, only a few of the eastern districts received this money. But after some lobbying by the WeMo councilors, they proved that although they didn’t have as many, their po’ folks also deserved a li’l bit of this fundage.

Districts Four (Brooks) and Seven (Gregory) actually have areas that qualify under HUD guidelines, but Sweet Connie doesn’t have any in richy, rich District Six. However, there is, what you could say is a sort of technical loophole that says you don’t have to meet the income requirements if your project serves seniors or disabled people, so that’s how the ball initially got rolling on this.

A couple of years ago, the council even approved the center, which is supposed to be located on Hillcrest Road near Girby. Now at that time, it was supposed to cost a little under $3 million and be paid for with a low-interest loan. The plan was to make the payments on the loan with these CDBG monies.

Then came a new mayor and Katrina. Because of the storm, Mayor Jones says the new estimated cost of building the center would be $4.6 million and the approximate operating costs per year would be $750,000, a figure Councilwoman Hudson calls “bloated.”

But “bloated” (probably from the baloney) or not, Jones says the money for the center needs to go to buying out Katrina-damaged homes and that they “can’t bid out a project they don’t have the funding to build or operate.”

Councilman Clinton Johnson contended that the center didn’t meet the CDBG eligibility requirements and said, “if we use these funds in an area where it isn’t 51 percent (of the population isn’t low income), then we ripped off funds.” He said it’s possible the city would have to pay HUD back if this was proven to be the case.

Newcomer William Carroll said, in his loud, ultra-jock, locker room-towel-popping manner, he was not opposed to the center, just the plan for funding it. He very loudly reminded everyone that CDBG funds have been decreasing over the years, and it wouldn’t be fiscally responsible to plan on paying debt service with future entitlements, especially since they weren’t sure if they would actually be there.

But all the “fiscal responsibility” talk, which you usually hear from the WeMo councilors, didn’t stop some folks from saying that was baloney and that this was just an attempt to keep from giving West Mobile something.

During the time when the public is allowed to address the council, this senior woman came in (for like the third or fourth time), and, in an almost rude manner, barked at the mayor and warned that if they didn’t get the center that annexation would be very difficult. Then she mocked his “too busy to be divided” campaign and accused him and the administration of dividing the city into east versus west, and favoring east.

The mayor barked right back and reminded her it was the council who voted on the budget and that he didn’t see how this would affect annexation. Snap.

Now, Mayor J, I didn’t like the way she talked to you either, but saying it won’t affect annexation is straight up Oscar Mayer. Because you know there are folks, just like her, who will make it an EMo/WeMo issue (even if it isn’t) and will remind voters of this next time annexation comes up.

She tried to argue back, but Reggie cut her off and said there wouldn’t be any further debate. She apologized and said she wasn’t trying to be difficult. Reggie said, “I know you’re too sweet to get into a debate.” Giggle. Giggle.

(Oh please. What does that even mean?)

Citizen Brooksie continued the civic flirting with the senior madam by saying in a syrupy sweet voice, “now Miss Joy, I told you we were going to fight for this project.” (Vomit)

And then in true Brooks fashion, he offered some well-researched plans for alternate funding sources for the Katrina homes, so the money wouldn’t have to be reallocated from the center. The he said we needed to do this because it was, “good for all Mobile,” fueling the EMo/WeMo duel.

So then Fred Richardson, the king of (usually) nonsensical rhetoric, accused all of the WeMo councilpeeps of not supporting this because they abstained on the vote when this came up last time. That is true, but they only abstained because some of the money was being used to pay then Councilman Thomas Sullivan’s salary at another job, which they thought (correctly) was a conflict.

That’s when Brooks said to Fred, that is “sad and shallow” and “baloney with a capital B.” Oh my god, it’s uppercase baloney. Even better.

And that was a ridiculous assertion to make, Freddy D. You know they weren’t against the senior center. Just the council crook. So I’ll have to agree with Brooksie, uppercase BALONEY!

Anyway, after more speeches by the rest of the gang, it was obvious all the WeMo (including wild cards, Reggie and Gina) councilpeople were going to abstain and that the resolution would fail. The mayor spoke up and said he was willing to work on this and consider other funding options, but no one had come to him and he hadn’t heard about any of this until that day. He also reminded them other projects in the budget would be in jeopardy if they voted this down.

The WeMos agreed to discuss it further, but still abstained. The resolution failed. It will be back on the agenda at the next meeting.

After you eat all of their baloney and cheese, you are left with the most important part – the bread. The bottom line on this is funding. Not East Mobile or West Mobile. I don’t think anyone is against this senior center, but the funding is questionable.

When I called the housing board, they said Connie was right, the HUD guidelines do state you don’t have to meet the economic requirements for a senior center. But they also said Clinton was right as it is indeed a possibility that one day it could be determined that it isn’t meeting the requirements and the loan would have to repaid. If that’s even a remote possibility, I don’t see how they could advocate funding it this way.

So unless they are the biggest hypocrites in the world, there is no way they can vote to fund this center in this manner, unless they want to take “fiscal accountability” out of their vocabularies. Talk about uppercase baloney.

Ashley Toland is Lagniappe editor. Contact her at ashleytoland@lagniappemobile.com.

Archives