Miller: No regrets on stadium; Mayor says Dallas will benefit if Arlington site hosts major events Friday, January 21, 2005 By DAVE LEVINTHAL / The Dallas Morning News

If Arlington plays host to a marquee sporting event at its soon-to-be-built Dallas Cowboys stadium, it won't hurt Dallas ? it'll help it, Mayor Laura Miller says.    "When they get the Super Bowl, everybody who comes will eat, shop and stay in Dallas," the mayor told city business leaders at a breakfast Friday at City Hall. ... During the breakfast, the mayor also explained her change of mind concerning the Trinity River Corridor redevelopment project ? especially its triple suspension bridge component ? that she once opposed and now fervently supports.    "My motto was, 'Signature schools, not signature bridges.' As a council member, I didn't understand the bridges," Ms. Miller said.    But the bridges, the mayor now says, are key elements in transforming the Trinity River Corridor from a wasteland filled with tires and garbage into a recreational paradise of parks, lakes, trails, parkways and surrounding land ripe for development. ...

Is that insulting, or what?  What a message she is sending to the rest of the council who already refuse to work with her. 

As a mere council member, Our Mayor says she wasn't smart enough to understand what the String Thing Bridges could do for Dallas, but as Mayor she's a whole lot smarter (though her husband thinks she's stupid).  Since Our Mayor thinks she's so much more intelligent than anyone else on the council (or anyone else she knows, except her husband and Bob Decherd), what does that make all those council members who thought the the Trinity String Thing Bridges were great from the get-go?

I still think the String Thing Bridges are a ridiculous waste of our limited financial resources and will only draw attention to the blight of the Trinity Sewer Trough.  The Trinity Project is an environmental disaster waiting to happen, and Councilwoman Miller knew that and worried about even after she was elected as Mayor -- before they turned her into a Stepford Mayor.

Anyone who knew Councilwoman Miller before she was converted to a Stepford Mayor would have been shocked to see the Mayor Miller who debated Don Hill at the Walnut Hill Rec Center.

Councilwoman Miller debated then County Judge Lee Jackson over the 2012 Olympics pursuit at the same Rec Center.  It's hard to reconcile the new Stepford Mayor Laura Miller with the calm, reasonable woman who gave a simple rationale for not buying the ODB's campaign to bring the Summer Olympics to Dallas.  She said "Give a mouse a cookie, and he'll want a glass of milk.  Give a mouse a glass of milk, and he'll want ...". 

That simple logic seems to be lost on Our Stepford Mayor.

Strong mayor battle is joined Saturday, January 22, 2005 By EMILY RAMSHAW / The Dallas Morning News

Dallas Mayor Laura Miller took the strong-mayor campaign into her own hands Friday, officially filing paperwork for the 30-member organization she put together to ensure the measure passes. ... The mayor's move sets up a head-to-head battle with a well-organized opposition, made up of longtime political rivals from the city's 14 council districts.    "I personally recruited every person on the committee," Ms. Miller said of the Stronger Mayor, Stronger Dallas campaign. "You cannot have a citywide issue this sensitive and not have everyone at the table."    Ms. Miller's allies include rock musician Don Henley, Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens, Elite News publisher Bill Blair, former Dallas Mayor Steve Bartlett and Betty Culbreath, ...  David Laney, former chairman of the city's Charter Review Commission; Regina Montoya ... and Charles Terrell, former chairman of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. ... The strong-mayor initiative has drawn support from outside the city ? a point of contention for many of its opponents. Ms. Blackwood's effort has been criticized for being funded by well-known Park Cities financiers. And at least two members of Ms. Miller's Stronger Mayor, Stronger Dallas committee ? Mr. Pickens and Mr. Bartlett ? live outside the city. ... Opponents of the strong-mayor effort, including some City Council members, questioned whether it was ethical for Ms. Miller to take a leading role in a political action committee.    "This particular proposal is going to empower her office, and she is the person in the office," said Sharon Boyd, a Dallas political commentator who is a member of the Coalition for Strong Government. "She should be sitting out, letting this thing take its own course." ... Although Ms. Miller initially blasted Ms. Blackwood's proposal, she has since warmed to it. ... The city's ethics code states that Dallas officials may not use the prestige of their office "on behalf of a candidate, political party or political committee." They may lend their names to a campaign, as long as the office they hold "is not mentioned in connection with the endorsement." ... Fund-raising    Ms. Miller said Stronger Mayor, Stronger Dallas will have a separate finance committee that handles fund raising, and that she will not solicit a single dollar for the effort. She and other members of the steering committee will work their way across the city speaking on behalf of strong-mayor governance, she said. ... "It's almost like having a mayor's race all over again," Ms. Miller said.    Council member Ed Oakley said he's not sure whether the mayor's actions are an ethics code violation.    "I'll have to get some clarification. But it sure raises questions," he said.    He said the public would see the campaign as a "power grab on behalf of this mayor." ...

Interestingly, Our Mayor continues to turn to the Park Cities for her supporters and financiers.  Who knows what moon Don Henley's living on these days, but T. Boone Pickens is another Park Cities tycoon who clearly views the democratic process as messy and unnecessary.  Former Mayor Steve Bartlett lives in Washington, D.C.

Former Mayor Bartlett was the mayor who forced the very capable City Manager Jan Hart to resign -- because she was doing her job as City Manager and refused to let him violate the City Charter.  It is pretty sad for Our Mayor to turn to someone who forced out the first female City Manager, who happened to be our last good city manager. 

We have had two individuals as City Manager since Jan Hart who either abused their position (John Ware negotiated a deal for himself with a Tom Hicks company while selling out Dallas taxpayers) or were not up to the job (Ted Benavides was content to hold on to his job rather than doing a good job).  That doesn't mean we need to do away with the position of City Manager.

We have had two individuals as Mayor since Steve Bartlett who either abused their position (Ron Kirk's sins are too numerous to cite here) or were not up to the job (Laura Miller doesn't know how to use the power she already has).  That doesn't mean we need to do away the office of Mayor.

I am absolutely convinced the person we see on TV impersonating Laura Miller is some invention created by Bob Decherd (Belo/DMN).  She may look like Councilwoman Miller and Candidate Miller, but the things coming out of her mouth are not what you would have heard from Laura Miller.

When Stepford Mayor Miller comes out and says she's heading up a group called "Stronger Mayor, Stronger City", you have to assume she means "Stronger Mayor, Stronger Park Cities".  Like most limousine liberals, she prefers the company of the wealthy elite to slumming with regular folks.

Someone should program Stepford Mayor Miller so she understands that residents of Highland Park and University Park are not citizens of Dallas.  Just because a bunch of her steering committee hold positions on various Dallas artsy fartsy boards does not make them Dallas residents.  Of course, having a home in the Park Cities does give one more entr? to Mayor Miller's office than being a Dallas homeowner.  Having the Barbier-Mueller sisters and T. Boone Pickens on her "Stronger Mayor, Stronger City" steering committee makes it pretty obvious Mayor Miller does not get the distinction between living inside the city limits of Dallas vs. living inside the Bubble.

We have a strong city.  We have a mayor's office with strong powers the current occupant is reluctant or afraid to use to accomplish her goals.  We thought we were electing a mayor who shared our priorities of making Dallas a more livable city, but we got a mayor we cannot trust with the limited powers that she cannot use effectively.  We do not need a mayor with stronger powers whose agenda is 90? opposite to what she pledged in her campaigns for the office.

Laura Miller has changed her mind on the Trinity River, on the String Thing Bridges and countless other issues.  She cannot be trusted.

This should have been a campaign about the issue of completely revamping our city government structure, but Laura Miller has once again made herself the center of the storm.  Her ego prevents her from letting others debate this issue.  She doesn't respect anyone else enough to let them take the lead and has made this another campaign about Laura Miller.

To dredge up "In her own words" again, we need to remember what Laura Miller had to say in an article she wrote for Texas Monthly.

A hard-charging city hall reporter wins a seat on the Dallas City Council, takes a hard look at her old profession, takes an even harder look at her new one. by Laura Miller

... My husband would tell you that one of the things that irritated him about my column writing was that, in his opinion, I saw things only as black and white, never gray. I used to wince at that remark, but it's hard to say it wasn't true. My columns were built on an unshakable bedrock of deeply felt personal precepts: Bad legislation should be killed. Good legislation should be passed. Rich guys shouldn't get handouts from the government. The government should focus on delivering basic services, especially to those who foot the bill. Public officials should never personally benefit from, nor should they abuse, their positions. People who help the less fortunate are saintly. People who tell lies are evil. Evilness should always be exposed, preferably in one of my columns. ...   I had a ridiculously simplistic view of my job change: I was merely going from being a journalistic watchdog of the people to being an elected watchdog of the people. ...As a reporter, i spent years observing city council meetings, during which I usually ended up asking myself, What are these people doing? Why don't they just do the right thing? Why is my version of the "right thing" so different from their version of the "right thing"? Why don't they just do what the citizens who elected them want them to do instead of doing what the city's business leaders want them to do? Worse, why do they always insist on doing it in the name of "doing what's best for Dallas?"Now I am finishing my second term on the council, and I still don't know the answers. ...  I just can't get rid of the attitudes I developed as a reporter, especially my belief that the City of Dallas gives away far too much taxpayer money to those who need it the least. Then, to add insult to injury, we turn around, lament the fact that we don't have enough money, and deliver mediocre city services to the average, working-class citizens who never get any tax breaks and would never even think to ask for any. ...  But when I was first running for office, I seriously worried that if I actually won, I would wake up the morning after the election and be a totally different person. Somehow, the mere mantle of the job would automatically transform me into an agonizer and a compromiser who would never again make a spontaneous, nakedly honest statement about anything. After all, as a reporter, I'd seen plenty of candidates go from being passionate populists on the campaign trail to indistinguishable pulp in office. "Just shoot me when it happens," I told people, who promised to do just that. ... As a columnist, I had made unflattering comments about a number of council members, particularly Mayor Ron Kirk. ... In the council-manager system of government, the mayor and the council have little real power. But make no mistake, Ron Kirk is a powerful mayor. Government Lesson Number Five: Personality and popularity matter more than the limitations of position. ... When Kirk appointed his council committee chairs in 1999, I swallowed my pride and asked him to make me chair of the Housing and Neighborhood Development Committee, which handles all of the meat-and-potatoes issues that I care about. ... He scoffed: "You're not on the team. People who aren't on the team don't get chairmanships." ... In the wake of Kirk's successes on the arena and Trinity projects, he admitted in his annual State of the City address that the quality of city services had declined.  ...  "Problems facing code enforcement, housing, and city streets are realities that can no longer be ignored."...

This hurts as bad as it did last June to have her own words prove to us that Laura Miller has been converted into Our Stepford Mayor. 

A stronger mayor does not make for a stronger city, not when the person holding the office is not up to the job.  It's interesting that Miller told DMN's great reporter, Dave Levinthal that as a councilmember she could not understand the bridges.  Yet, as a councilmember, she could understand that Ron Kirk was a strong mayor using the same limitations and powers of the office she now holds.

We have seen Laura Miller use the resources of the police and firefighters to get herself elected and then turn on them.  We have seen Laura Miller promise to focus on our quality of life issues and then ignore those issues in favor of "big ticket items" that she formerly criticized.  Now, Laura Miller will be saying, vote for the Blackwood proposal to change Dallas city government to make me a strong mayor and trust me not to abuse the power the Blackwood proposal will give me.

Fool me once, shame on you.  Fool me twice, shame on me. 

Are we going to be fooled again?  Or are we going to say NO to Stronger Mayor, Stronger Park Cities?

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