Cauthen Loses Sweet Gig
Today, Funkhouser announced he won't let Cauthen keep his job. Last week, the Pitch reported, "Cauthen spent $32,163 on 23 trips between January 1, 2006, and October 8, 2007." A lot of that expense was incredibly shady.
Any questions?
Labels: funkhouser, kansas city
posted by Dan at 12/10/2007 07:11:00 PM
22 Comments:
where can you get a good hooker in paris for only $135 a day?
Good job Funk. Hey - he could of fired him right after being swore in. But he gave Cauthen some time and tried to work with him. Get Funky y'all...
Anonymous - I've never been there, nor traveled to Bourdeaux on the city's dime to look at a train, but I think you might want to check out La Courneuve. The Bush administration has sunk the dollar, but you still ought to be able to get some action for that price.
Dan -
Is this your way of speaking out against France's immigrant population? Do you think it is "CLEVER" or "LIBERAL" to mock the plight of those working hard to make their dime in the viciously LIBERAL French WELFARE STATE?!
Don't you think that if we had a MITT ROMNEY in charge who would bring back AMERICAN FAMILY VALUES we wouldn't have FOOLS like you making "JOKES" about PROSTITUTION?!
Anonymous - How can there be immigration issues in a foreign country, where, ipso facto, everyone is an immigrant to start with?
Point set match.
Like this was a surprise. But then this isn't necessarily either:
http://primebuzz.kcstar.com/?q=node/8830
It's more interesting (marginally) to contemplate how long Morrison sticks around west of here.
Dan -
You think speaking French at me makes you more qualified to talk about the French? Ha.
Dan, the Clinton admin also let the dollar go into a free fall during a point of their reign...were you aginst that alos?
Won't Beth fix this?
Nice way to reduce the whole thing down a cheap shot. Everyone knew this was coming. I would have respected him if he had just fired Cauthen right off the bat. He was hired by the Funkhouser's predecessor, so it would be understandable if the new mayor wanted his own guy in there. Instead, the way it played out over eight months seemed contrived.
So, when will Wolf get the job?
Anonymous - yes, I was "aginst that alos", though the exchange rate for french hookers was never as bad during the Clinton administration as it is now.
Eric - Wow, you must be doing really well if you think that $32k in extravagant travel is a "cheap" shot. I'm just a poor taxpayer, and I think that a $1600 flight to DC is far from cheap.
Looking ahead, I don't think that Wolf would take the job, even if offered. The man wants to retire, and his wife wants him to retire. His work thus far has been genuinely motivated by public service - perhaps he would consider doing the CM job on an interim basis to help Funk out, but I don't know . . .
As long as we're defining what we poor taxpayers think is pricey and cheap, this poor grad student who donated to Funk's campaign sure hoped it wasn't part of her additional last-minute donation that the Mayor used to buy himself and his wife two iPhones at their priciest when the Mayor is making around $150k a year, plus his $600/mo car allowance. I don't think a $600 phone is cheap (much less two of them). I didn't know I'd potentially be subsidizing that when I contributed to his campaign. It would've been nice if he'd used it to call Councilmembers about this before they heard about it elsewhere.
What I'm trying to say is that some days it sure feels like everyone high enough up in politics loses perspective of what it's really like for the other 90% of us. That includes both the city manager and the mayor some days.
I don't know that from looking at that that any of this looks like a huge deal. I've personally booked a $1600 airline ticket (Charlotte) for business. I'd never have done it on my own dime, but if work tells you to be somewhere at a certain time, sometimes you have to do what you have to do. I've also stayed extra days on a business trip. And hotel rooms in big cities cost a lot of money (particularly if you stay in the "conference" hotel). Nothing in that article really jumps out as being anything more than much ado about very little. Maybe I'm wrong....
So is this funk person the school board president? or is he the mayor. I'm getting confused. They are looking so much alike these days.
Anna
This is an old score being settled. Too bad ssidedem is not here to celebrate another common cause with you Dan.
Funk is a mean-spirited man with a poorly adjusted, little boy's outlook on getting back at people.
I will be surprised if any member of the Council other than Deb Hermann welcomes this power play.
I expect the gloves will come off now.
No wonder Evert left.
As always with Funk, it's not just about the moves, but also the way in which they're carried out. I don't have a beef with him wanting a new city manager, but couldn't he have consulted or at least notified the city council about his decision?
Couldn't he have found a way to "thank" Cauthen for his service to the city but say that he believes the city would benefit from a fresh start? No one would necessarily have argued with that. Some might have disagreed, but it would have gone over much more smoothly. Instead, he's created yet another fire that he won't manage to put out for weeks on end. What a genius.
It's like when he replaced the parks board. There was no reason to be mean spirited toward the outgoing members, and yet he was. Yet again Funkhouser comes off an an arrogant jerk who doesn't understand the importance of perception when it comes to leading a city.
Oh, and with Cauthen leaving, is there any chance Funk will want to tap Gloria for the job? Along with step in it every chance he gets, that seems to be his M.O.
Anonymous said...
Won't Beth fix this?
As far as I can tell, the only constructive thing that Beth has tried to do was the smoking ban. Whatever happened to that?
NOT SO FAST MON AMI!
We may see the back of Funkhouser before that of cauthen.
Bet?
I don't normally say things like "I agree with nitwit", but in the comment above, I do. I don't know that Cauthen's the perfect person for the job? Or if the Council ultimately had the legal right to overrule Funkhouser? But the way things are being handled feel like our mayor's wielding a rusty machete to accomplish his goals.
The City Council does have the legal capability to do what they did. Funk can and will veto it, because he is an idiot and likes more problems. The City Council can turn around and overturn his veto with a 2/3 margin vote. Given that they were already working out a contract when Funkhouser aka Gloria decided that undercutting them without even talking to them would be a smart thing to do, they will obviously get that vote. 3 people won't vote for Cauthen and they will be north of the river. 2 of those 3 are racists anyways. The 3rd will just go along because he's northland.
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