11/18/02  Corruption at So Many Levels.

Brett Shipp at WFAA Ch. 8 did something in the past several days that few journalists will ever accomplish -- he found a screw up at City Hall and through his reporting, government policy was changed.  He made a difference.

Some of my Police buddies hate it when I say good things about my friend, Mayor Laura Miller.  This issue of city officials and city employees misusing Visitors Bureau money would have been a tee-hee and would have not even been acknowledged while that Former Mayor was in office -- right up there with fake drug busts and sex club owners paying off council members and some "high ranking police officer" ordering police to lay off enforcement of lewdness laws in sex clubs.  

Did you ever see that Former Mayor express one minute of concern about the fake drug busts?  That Former Mayor even went out to Amarillo to testify on behalf of the bribe-taking councilman.  No, this squandering of public monies would have been completely ignored by that Former Mayor, but not by Mayor Laura Miller.

Mayor Miller appointed Chris Luna to be Chair of the Visitor's Bureau Board.  She could have just brushed it all aside and let the uproar die down.  She could have taken a defensive poise to protect her appointee.  She took a stand.

With the exception of Mitch Rasansky, she was the only council member who seemed to be particularly offended about taxpayer money being spent in sex clubs.  Some seemed to think it was just what you have to do to get business.

Questions raised about use of Dallas city credit card  11/07/2002 By BRETT SHIPP / WFAA-TV

Two Platinum tickets for Dallas Stars hockey games.     To some, those tickets may be a dream, but they are just one of the perks offered by the City of Dallas to visiting VIPs.     News 8 is investigating allegations that some of those tickets are going to city officials.     The confusion results in part from a small piece of plastic -  .  .  .  the credit card carried by the former manager of the Dallas Convention Center.  .  .   has, in fact, been used by at least one top Dallas city official.  .  .  .   Sources told News 8, however, that what was supposed to be used for city business has allegedly been used for personal pleasure.  .  .  .   But sources said instead of using those tickets to attract business to Dallas, some city officials took them for personal use.     Benavides was asked, "What about local officials - including yourself - taking advantage of Stars tickets, Mavericks tickets, etc."     "I did that, yeah," Benavides said. "I've gotten tickets, yes sir." .  .  .   So, does that mean the tickets are for use by city officials?    "I don't know," Benavides said.  .  .  .  "We probably shouldn't have used them - no," Benavides said. .  .  .  .   City council member and Commerce Committee Chair Mitchell Rasansky said he believes spending tax dollars to buy tickets to sporting events for client entertainment is fine.     So what, then, if City officials are using those tickets?     "They need to reimburse those back - we don't buy tickets for city officials," Rasansky said. "If they want to go to the game, let them do what I do: I have to buy my tickets."     Rasansky said he also wants to know more about other Dallas city officials being entertained with tax money - the expenses charged on the Visitors Bureau credit card.  .   .   .

There seems to be no end to the corruption related to the Hicks/Perot arena.  They bribed that Former Mayor with Half a Million worth of stock options for his wife.  They bribed former City Manager John Ware with a new job that doubled his $250 K city salary to a salary in excess of Half a Million annually.  Now, they have our Current City MisManager using tickets to the Stars and Mavericks that were bought with taxpayer money, but intended for convention recruitment business.  Poor old Ted, these are slim pickin's compared to what his predecessor and that Former Mayor raked off the top.  But still, Ted Benavides makes over $250,000 K.  You would think he could buy his own sports tickets.  You would think if tickets were to be distributed to city staffers he would get them to secretaries or desk clerks who really can't afford much in the way of entertainment these days.

City agency spending tax dollars on trips, liquor  11/08/2002 By BRETT SHIPP / WFAA-TV Second in a series

. . .  The tough financial times faced by the city are well reported. From the projected $95 million budget shortfall, to layoffs, cuts in city services and tax hikes, almost every part of city government has taken a hit.     Even the Dallas Convention and Visitors Bureau, funded by the city's hotel/motel tax, has had to borrow $1 million from the city of Dallas this year. . . .  The bureau receives about $10 million to $12 million each year to lure convention and tourism business to the city. It's a high profile, nonprofit operation charged with propelling the city's economic engine. . . .  David Whitney, the bureau's president, who said his job is to spend what it takes to make Dallas a competitive convention city.    "$13 million for $1 billion plus, I think, is a pretty good exchange," Whitney said. "So yes, it takes money to make money." . . .  This summer, the City Council agreed to loan the visitor's bureau another $1 million, which came from the only city operation making a profit in the past few years: radio station WRR.   . . .  WRR General Manager Greg Davis had earmarked for equipment upgrades and renovations.  .  .  .  Davis said. "If they see a need, and if the station has resources out there and they see that, then that's what I do."     But Davis hasn't seen Whitney's corporate credit card bills. Lavish dinners - some totaling more than $3,000 - along with cases of fine wine, golf outings and Stars and Mavericks tickets for vendors and clients are expenses that some say really stick out. . . .There was also a nearly $6,000 trip to this year's Ryder Cup golf championship in Scotland for a former visitors bureau chairman and his wife. . . . Whitney spent tax dollars taking his wife to Cabo San Lucas to attend the wedding of a business customer. Included in the $2,200 tab was a $300 bottle of liquor as a gift. . . . Whitney has free parking privileges at D/FW International Airport, he opts instead to be taken to and from the airport in a limousine. . . .  $1,600 in just over a year. . . . flight insurance. Over three years, that has cost another $1,500 in tax money. . . . cases of wine, totaling $2,800 over two years, Whitney frequently stocks up on liquor at his local spirits shop. He said it is for client parties he hosts at his house, in which some leftover libations are sometimes shared with employees. . .  $4,500. . . . complete physical at the Cooper Fitness and Aerobics Center in Dallas. . . $2,300.     "This is ridiculous," City Council member Mitchell Rasansky said. "$2,360 to pay for his physical?"    Rasansky, also chairman of the city's Commerce Commission, said he's never seen anything like it. . . .  "Taking the past chairman of the visitors bureau to Scotland? And spending $6,000? (Just) give the guy a plaque like I get after serving on a board." . . . the city took $1 million from WRR radio and loaned it to the visitors bureau - a bureau which, this past year, gave all of its employees a 5 percent raise and a $43,000 bonus to its president. . . .   WRR employees haven't received quite the same treatment. . . .  Dallas City Manager Ted Benavides said he has no problems with Whitney's $43,000 bonus, and no regrets about the $1 million cash infusion. . . . The bureau, in fact, is simply submitting invoices for WRR to pay. . . . $5,000 table for 10 at an awards banquet last month.

Ted Benavides is a bureaucrat.  He doesn't recognize public money as real money.  He thinks you and I as taxpayers live to give him and his staff as much of our disposable income as he can convince the council to hit us.  Whitney getting a $43,000 bonus, when recreation employees are being terminated -- I have a big problem with that even if the City MisManager does not.  The appearance of our parks and rec centers has a much bigger impact on my life than another convention.  This whole Visitors Bureau seems to be our city government funding private industry.  The people who benefit from conventions -- hotels and restaurants and transportation companies -- should be funding the Visitors Bureau.  That sales tax that Former Mayor sold to Dallas voters should go to the Visitors Bureau -- if it was needed at all.  

There is absolutely no connection between the hotel/motel industry and car rentals to basketball or hockey.  Since the hotel/motel and the convention people backed the sales tax that is breaking the back of their convention business, Dallas taxpayers should not have to take up the slack.  

Mayor wants review of city bureau's spending  11/09/2002 By BRETT SHIPP / WFAA-TV

Dallas Mayor Laura Miller is calling for immediate changes in the spending habits of the Dallas Convention and Visitors Bureau. . . .  The Bureau spent $12,000 entertaining clients in a luxury suite at the NCAA basketball tournament in Dallas last spring.    But what troubles Mayor Laura Miller, however, are the junkets to this year's Ryder Cup golf tournament in Scotland for the bureau's former chairman and his wife. . . .  another trip to a resort in Mexico for the Bureau's President David Whitney and his wife, as well as Whitney's frequent use of a limousine to get him to and from the airport.    "We are not going to have the Dallas Convention and Visitors Bureau taking Town Cars to the airport," Miller said. ". . . going to weddings with their wives on behalf of some client, and spending $2,500 at a Mexican resort. . . . buying liquor in bulk and taking it to their house - and then if there's anything left over they give it to employees."    MiIler has called for immediate policy revisions to prevent similar future expenses. . .  'Client Appreciation' at the Anatole Hotel for $661.    "There was a group of 12 people there that we hosted for cocktails before the Human Rights Campaign dinner," Whitney said. . . .  "It's an, uh, gay and lesbian human rights organization,"  . . .  My wife believes in that, and is active." . . . payments to a company that specializes in express pickup and delivery of golf clubs. Miller says . . .  "We need to go ahead and do an audit and find out exactly how money is being spent, and if any of the things we are going to catch in these policy changes isn't caught then, we'll go back and amend it." . . .

Can you imagine that Former Mayor taking such action?  Can you imagine that Former Mayor even having a problem with these excessive expenditures?  I am very proud of our Mayor.   

Visitors Bureau to implement changes following investigation into spending 11/12/2002 From staff reports

A News 8 investigation has prompted some big changes at the Dallas Convention and Visitors Bureau. . . .   Dallas Mayor Laura Miller received a list of policy changes agreed to by Visitors Bureau chairman Chris Luna. . .  No more all-expenses-paid trips for past chairmen. No more paying for liquor at private parties. No more limousines to the airport. No more free Stars or Mavericks tickets for some city employees. "The Dallas City Council wants to make sure that our Convention and Visitors Bureau is spending money in a prudent manner," Miller said.  . . .

When was the last time an investigative reporter in Dallas forced the city to change operations policies?  Brett Shipp should receive an award for this series.  This is serious reporting.   As if the excessive spending was not bad enough, Shipp turned up a worse abuse of taxpayer money.  

The Dallas Convention & Visitors Bureau entertains perverts at area topless bars.  I don't care if the perverts represent high dollar convention bookers.  At least one pervert Bureau personnel entertained at The Lodge represents Anatole Hotels.  If that pervert needs to watch whores hump and fake sex while he talks business, he should pay for that thrill himself.  What if that Anatole rep wanted to smoke some dope before he would make a business decision, what would the Visitors Bureau say then?

What's $645 in the big picture?  It's a lot!  It's $645 spent at The Lodge.  Do you know who owns The Lodge?  Why, it's our good buddy Caligula Nick Rizos.  That's our good buddy who bribed Old Al Lipscomb a miserly $7,700 to get Old Al to get "some high ranking police official" (who we all know was our current Chief of Police Terrell Bolton) to order police personnel at the NW Sub to "lay off" enforcement in the sex clubs on NW Highway.  The Visitors Bureau has been subsidizing a sleazebag who bribed a scumbag city councilman, which councilman was convicted for taking a bigger bribe from yet another sleazebag.  Hopefully, you don't have to be reminded that said scumbag former city councilman was a pimp and drug dealer himself in his younger days -- which probably explains his affection for the pimps who run the sex clubs in Dallas.   

Visitors agency OK'd topless bar expenses; Official says bureau tries to accommodate its business clients 11/13/2002 By DAVE MICHAELS / The Dallas Morning News and BRETT SHIPP / WFAA-TV

A senior executive of the Dallas Convention & Visitors Bureau spent more than $600 one evening at a Dallas topless bar, an amount that was later approved as a business expense, records show.    Richard Martinez, a senior vice president of the bureau, was compensated for the $645 he spent entertaining Tom Faust, vice president of sales and marketing at the Wyndham Anatole hotel, at The Lodge.   . . .  David Whitney, president and chief executive officer of the bureau.  . . .  The evening at The Lodge, he said, was acceptable if the Anatole's executives insisted they wanted to attend a topless bar.   . . .  "The only way it would become appropriate is if a customer said, 'I really want to go to The Lodge,' " Mr. Whitney said. "I can tell you we have customers who want to do that." . . .  The council earmarked $11.3 million, all from hotel and car-rental taxes, to support the bureau's efforts this year. In that respect, many officials insist the bureau is a public organization that is accountable to taxpayers.    "It's off-the-wall that anybody in their right mind could think they could go to a strip club with taxpayer money and watch naked girls dancing on a table," said Dallas Mayor Laura Miller. . . .   Ms. Miller said she now questions whether a thriftless culture has set in at the bureau.    Chris Luna, the chairman of the bureau's board, disputed the mayor's assessment. He said bureau policies did not prohibit any of the expenses that have attracted criticism.  . . .  Some bureau policies have been changed. On Monday, Mr. Luna said the bureau would not pay for perks such as an all-expenses trip for outgoing chairmen.  He also said the bureau would not provide sporting tickets or credit cards to city employees,  . . . .  "It's clear that the way we have done business in the past is not going to be the way we do business in the future," said Mr. Luna,a lawyer and former City Council member. . . .  Records obtained by WFAA-TV show that bureau employees expensed their entertainment at topless clubs on other occasions.

This just makes me sick.  Here the city has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars defending lawsuits by the sex clubs, but these city bureaucrats have used our tax money to subsidize these whorehouses.  Can you believe that we even have to address something so sordid and enact rules that city officials do not spend city money in sex clubs?

Topless bars out at agency; Visitors bureau will no longer treat clients to clubs, mayor says 11/15/2002 By DAVE MICHAELS / The Dallas Morning News and BRETT SHIPP / WFAA-TV

The Dallas Convention & Visitors Bureau, the tax-supported organization that promotes the city to conventioneers and tourists, will no longer court clients by paying for outings at topless bars, Mayor Laura Miller said Thursday.     The change in policy was announced two days after bureau officials defended the practice. Ms. Miller, who criticized a bureau official who spent more than $600 at a gentleman's club with a hotel industry executive, said the bureau's chairman had changed his mind.    "This is one aspect of entertaining that we should not be involved with," Ms. Miller said. "All of that is the opposite of the message we want to be sending to the world." . . .  The mayor on Thursday also criticized the bureau for allowing Burch Management, which operates several topless clubs in the Dallas area, to partly sponsor the bureau's Lone Star Classic golf tournament in June 2001. The city has argued in lawsuits that Burch clubs, which include Baby Dolls and The Fare West, operate in violation of the city's zoning laws.      However, other officials noted that Burch and other businesses that run topless clubs, such as The Lodge, are members of the bureau. Taxicab companies and American Airlines also belong to the bureau and have been involved in litigation with the city. . . .     Tom Faust, the hotel executive who visited a topless club with a bureau executive, worked for the Wyndham Anatole hotel, a dues-paying member of the bureau. . . .  Richard Martinez, a senior vice president . . .  played golf at three Arizona clubs with executives of the Anatole and a vice president of the Metropolitan Tucson Convention and Visitors Bureau. . . .   $1,700. . . .     But Ms. Miller said the outing should not have been expensed because it did not result in convention or tourism dollars for Dallas.     "All of these junkets and events ... that are just increasing the social life for bureau employees and their friends at local hotels are against policy," she said. . . .

We were not entertaining an out of town pervert at The Lodge.  Public money was used so a representative of a Bureau member (the Anatole Hotel ) got to go look at naked girls dance on tables.  Sure says something about the Anatole Hotel and its corporate attitude toward women.

Bureau to return part of city loan;  Questions on expenses lead marketing group to rework its budget 11/16/2002 By VICTORIA LOE HICKS / The Dallas Morning News

The Dallas Convention & Visitors Bureau will forgo part of a $1 million loan from the city of Dallas that was negotiated earlier this year, bureau officials told Mayor Laura Miller on Friday. . . .  "We are reworking our budget to be more efficient and leaner and meaner," Chris Luna, chairman of the convention bureau's board, said Friday. . . .     The bureau, a private organization, has a contract to market the city-owned Dallas Convention Center. It receives a one-third share of the city's hotel and rental car taxes. For the fiscal year that began Oct. 1, the city estimates that will amount to $11.3 million, though bureau officials expect less. . . .

Many Bachman/NW Hwy Warriors question why Chris Luna is heading up the Convention Bureau.  Last year, the former councilman addressed a convention of sexually oriented businesses to advise them on how to "skirt" local regulations and get their whore houses up and and running.  We believe the Convention Bureau's clout is why there are so many topless bars in our area.  Burch Management operates sex clubs and has cost Dallas hundreds of thousands in lawsuits.  Having one of their executives on the Bureau's board as well as Luna is just way beyond coincidence and absolutely unacceptable.  

Even more amazing -- that Burch Management executive is a woman.  She's as bad as Lipscomb pushing young Black women into prostitution.  Disgusting!

It is a great thing that our Mayor has stood up for Dallas taxpayers and basic decency.  It  would be a better thing if the council passes a regulation that no one connected with sex clubs that are in litigation with the City of Dallas can serve on the Convention & Visitors Bureau.

Whatever the city does about this issue will be to the credit of Brett Shipp for exposing the wrong doing and to Mayor Miller for taking action to make sure the wrong doing is stopped.

The Sex Clubs cannot be happy with more exposure of their seedy influence at City Hall.