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Joyce Clark Unfiltered

For "the rest of the story"

It appears Glendale City Manager Brenda Fischer has a vicious temper. Rumors have circulated since she came on board in Glendale but employees have been reluctant to go on record and to share specific incidents. All have been within City Hall – until last week.

A little background first. Robert Heidt is the Glendale Chamber’s new President and CEO. He had been approached by a Chamber member, John and Alice Roach, owners of the White Eyes Fresh Fry Bread Company. The Roachs are Glendale residents. Apparently they have applied for entry to numerous Glendale events only to be turned down repeatedly. Mr. Heidt had been dealing with Glendale’s Communications Department (which runs all City events) for several months in order to obtain clarification on vendor policy and to advocate for the Roachs’ participation.

Darrell Jackson of the Glendale Star has an article about a confrontation Glendale City Manager Brenda Fischer recently and publicly had with Mr. Heidt. Here is the link: http://www.glendalestar.com/news/article_314b5612-a265-11e4-b241-87a6efc2a085.html . Last week Mr. Heidt was having a pleasant working lunch at the Yard House at Westgate. Ms. Fischer was also there, a few tables away, having lunch with several Glendale employees. At some point Ms. Fischer approached Mr. Heidt’s table and proceeded to publicly berate him over the White Eyes Fresh Fry Bread Company complaint. She was loud enough to be overheard by patrons necessitating a Yard House Assistant Manager’s request “to take it outside.”

Fischer, when asked by Jackson, about the incident conveyed that she was defending “employee integrity and professionalism” which, she believed, had a “negative effect on employees’ morale.” Between you and I, that is so much BS.

If Fischer were really concerned about employee morale she wouldn’t, among other things: 1. Have her reputed, infamous temper tantrums at any time, in City Hall or outside of City Hall; 2. She wouldn’t allow City Manager staff, including herself, and City Attorneys to not be physically present at City Hall on Fridays. They are available by phone and email. I believe that’s called telecommuting. Isn’t that what the previous City Manager Ed Beasley allowed Human Resources Director Alma Carmichle to do? From Mississippi? Wasn’t that a ‘no-no’? No matter the location…it does affect employee morale; 3. She wouldn’t have appointed Julie Frisoni to an Assistant City Manager’s position when Frisoni did not meet the qualifications needed; 4. She would insure that all staff information is distributed to the entire council and not a selected few supporting a staff position and 5. She would resume hosting Quarterly City Staff meetings. Apparently since her hiring she has had one, just one, such meeting with the entire staff.

Mr. Heidt had obvious concerns as a result of that confrontation and sent an email to the Mayor and City Councilmembers, summarizing the incident. As a result, the council will have a special executive session meeting on Friday, January 23, 2015 at 3 PM to discuss Fischer’s confrontation with Mr. Heidt. Expect Councilmember Gary Sherwood (and his two clones, Councilmembers Chavira and Aldama) to defend Fischer’s actions. Councilmember Sherwood not only actively advocated for Fischer’s appointment but personally met with her prior to council’s decision. His exclusive meeting with a potential candidate still under consideration may not have been unlawful but the ethics are questionable. With three newbie councilmembers there will not be much in the way of historical memory with knowledge of other, past Fischer tantrums.

Whatever the results, you and I will never know them as executive session discussions and direction must remain private. The most we can hope for is some kind of reprimand inserted into her personnel file. The best outcome would be for a majority of council to call for her resignation but that is wishful thinking.

Since retiring from city council I have had the opportunity to talk to countless city employees, from a wide variety of departments, at different levels of authority within the organization. None are within Fischer’s “inner circle.” To a person they have conveyed that employee morale is worse than at the height of former City Manager Ed Beasley’s tenure. As they often put it, “It’s the same, only worse.” While Ms. Fischer may have put out some financial fires she has most certainly stoked the fire of the lowest employee morale in recent history.

© Joyce Clark, 2014

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Instead of its regular meeting time of 1:30 PM the Tuesday, August 20, 2013 council workshop meeting will convene at 9 AM. The 64 million dollar question is will Councilmember Alvarez show up or call in? She’s on the injured reserve list once again. If she does show will pain medication affect her performance or lack thereof?

They will begin with an Executive Session to meet the candidates for the City Attorney’s position. Do we know how many finalists? Do we know who they are? At least when the City Manager’s position was up for grabs we knew a smidgeon about the finalists. This time there is a cone of silence.

prayerThe most interesting and possibly contentious issue for open workshop discussion is to pray or not to pray at the start of the evening meeting. FYI: Only Phoenix has prayer before its council meeting. The cities of Gila Bend, Winslow, Apache Junction, Litchfield Park, Benson and Florence have invocations before their meetings. What’s the difference between an invocation and a prayer? According to the dictionary an invocation is the act of asking for help or support from anyone or anything.  A prayer is a spiritual communion with God or an object of worship. Is it appropriate to start council meetings with a prayer? You can weigh in by participating in my unscientific poll to the left of this article. This issue could become a moot point of discussion as this fall the Supreme Court will take up the issue of prayer at town meetings as it hears the Greece, New York case.

After their discussion of prayer council will move into another Executive Session where once again they will receive information about the external audit. Apparently the audit has been completed. If that is the case, it’s time to let the citizens of Glendale review the result. After all, taxpayers paid a hefty price for it – a half million dollars. It should be presented to all on a gold plated serving tray! Come on, council, it’s time to give it up and direct staff to post the results on the city’s website.

The other item of note in Esession is discussion of the IceArizona management agreement. What could this be about? The council approved the contract with IceArizona with its public vote on July 2, 2013 followed by the sale of the team by the NHL to IceArizona.  Is the contract still under negotiation?  That is the only way it can be discussed in Esession. Here is the exact verbiage used: “Discussion and consultation with the City Attorney and the City Manager to receive an update, consider its position and provide instruction and direction to the City Attorney and the City Manager regarding Glendale’s position in connection with agreements associated with arena management, the Arena, and the Hockey Team, which are the subject of negotiations (bold emphasis mine). [A.R.S 38-431.03(A)(3)(4)(7)].” Note that discussion is permitted in Esession while the negotiations are in progress but negotiations were concluded with council’s vote on July 2nd. Hmmmm…

©Joyce Clark, 2013

FAIR USE NOTICE
This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to:http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.