County View

By Jeff Poor

America took a giant step to the left earlier this month in the midterm elections. I took a giant step to the medicine cabinet for the Pepto-Bismol to alleviate my queasiness triggered by the jubilation exuded by the talking heads on a couple of the television news networks.

Children, not politics

When Mobile School Board Member Bill Meredith’s motion to extend Harold Dodge’s contract through June 2008 and outgoing school board member Lonnie Parson’s subsequent motion to extend through June 2009 both failed last week, the general public’s confidence in the school board as a governing body failed also.

“They just didn’t want to keep him until 2008,” Meredith in a phone conversation on Thursday. Meredith, however, he couldn’t quite pinpoint why.

Either this school board wants to go down in the annals of history as the most micromanaging school board ever or there’s something they’re not telling us. One of Dodge’s critiques was he made poor efforts to maintain the necessary good relations and two-way communications with board.

Can you blame him? He obviously doesn’t want a knife to his back, thus he maintains a safe distance.

Convicted felons need to submit a bid

Item number 10 on the Nov. 13 Mobile County Commission agenda was “to authorize the County Attorney to request an Attorney General’s opinion regarding background checks on contractors and vendors.”

Mobile County Commissioner Stephen Nodine is the biggest advocate of a measure to prohibit felons from bidding on county contracts.

“This would keep us away from people that defraud the government,” Nodine said. “I believe people get a second chance, but do you as a taxpayer want to deal with a person that defrauds the government?”

The Attorney General’s opinion would determine whether or not the county commission can create its own ban. If the Attorney General feels such a ban would violate state bid laws, then Nodine said the commission would push for a law in the state legislature to adopt such a ban. He alluded to laws in Florida and Georgia banning felons from bidding on government contracts.

Love him or hate him, Nodine efforts make sense. Opponents of this action seem to think that if it will save the taxpayers money, then why wouldn’t you allow a felon to perform government work?

With any large construction or maintenance contract, change orders are bound to happen. A change order is per-change charge to a contract signed after a successful bid. Change orders can add up to be a substantial amount of money and potentially open the door for potential shenanigans.

A Nov. 6 Press-Register article, “Nodine pushes ban on felons,” hinted that the ban could be motivated by Nodine’s affiliation with the Republican Party. Bay South, Ltd., one of such contractors that would be affected by this ban, was the low bidder on a project to repair the infamous Government Plaza leaky roof. Their bid came in $90,000 lower than The Lathan Company, Inc.’s bid.

Jerry Lathan, the owner of The Lathan Company, is a prominent power broker in the Republican Party. He was the vice president of the state Republican Party and has recently announced his intentions to run for the party’s presidency.

In a roundabout way, the Press-Register article tried to make this bizarre conspiratorial correlation that Nodine was acting on his Republican impulses because Jerry Lathan made a $500 donation to Nodine’s campaign and a $200 donation to Mobile County Commissioner Mike Dean’s campaign.

I have to scratch my head and wonder if they really believe $700 could buy a $687,000 contract, if that’s indeed what the gang on Water Street is trying imply. You have got to love our hometown daily that treads lightly around the Bishop State corruption but is Johnny-on-the-spot when it comes to prospective ulterior motives for a felon ban.

National election implications

The Democratic control of Congress is going to have a definitive impact on the economic development our city, county and state governments are trying to initiate in Mobile. Gone with the Republican control in Washington is the influence our congressional delegation of Jo Bonner, Richard Shelby and Jeff Sessions are able to wield.

The much-ballyhooed KC-30 refueling tanker project our politicians, both Democrat and Republican alike, have been touting as the economic shot in the arm that will forever change the landscape of Mobile, could very well be in jeopardy.

Mobile County Commissioner Stephen Nodine admits efforts are going to have to be retooled to compensate for the shift in power and suggested lobbying efforts by our state’s prominent Democrats, notably Lt. Gov-elect Jim Folsom and Mayor Sam Jones, would have to be stepped up.

Another project that could be in jeopardy is the Littoral Combat Ship contract that is being built at the Austal Shipyard on the Mobile River.

I wasn’t alive in the 1960s when Brookley Air Force Base was closed in Mobile, but the impact of that political gesture is still evident today around Mobile, with the deterioration of some the neighborhoods that once thrived before the Air Force left. Could this happen to Mobile again? Probably not, but even the most ardent Democrat thrilled with national elections has to admit Mobile probably has made more progress in the last decade with Republicans controlling the legislative branch in Washington than it has in any other 10-year period over the last 100 years.

Contact Jeff Poor at jeffreypoor@yahoo.com.

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