Anyone surprised? No one I know for sure. Former Deputy Mayor Rick Johnstone has been rehired to oversee the federal stimulus money Louisville is set to receive. According to Abramson he has been working as a volunteer since his retirement 3 and 1/2 months ago. Sure and I have swampland for sale in the Arizona desert.
In the meantime, according to Abramson, this money has already created 1000 jobs and thousands more to follow. Will he give us a list upon request of the 1000 jobs that have been created to date? Are these full time jobs or temporary jobs as most know they will be.
Abramson forces a hiring freeze down the throats of every department citing a budget "crisis," that has yet to be proven true to most of us, and then as predicted rehires a "retired" insider friend of his to do a job that we should be able to do within the confines of existing employees.
Typical arrogance of this Mayor. The list of insiders and favorable treatment in jobs etc have hurt us more than most can imagine. More and more we continue getting stories of people not being qualified , think Kim Bunton and the Crit LuAllen report at this point, and when someone retires they don't really retire they double dip.
There is no doubt that Johnstone knows the players and can "hit the ground running." Heck he either appointed the players or was involved in getting them appointed in the first place. Cronyism at its finest.
This was a done deal before he retired in my opinion as is the case with most who get "rehired" at taxpayer expense.For those who will insist it was the right thing to do and Johnstone is only doing it out of the goodness of his heart I must ask this: Why change the terms then?
Jerry says this job is too important to be trusted to a volunteer. But if so then why has it not been that important for the last 3 and a 1/2 months Johnstone has been doing it and taking credit for creating 1000 jobs. Johnstone has been volunteering for this long. If it was too important to trust to a volunteer then why would we trust Johnstone he is a volunteer after all correct?
So which is it Mr. Mayor. Volunteers are not good enough even though they have been with you for years but they are certainly good enough when you give them $94,000? I fail to see what the difference is.
Did Johnstone get immediately smarter and better because he got $94,000 of taxpayer money, in addition to his retirement, at the expense of ALL others who have had to sacrifice because of your budget "crisis?"
Paradox huh? Nah just typical Abramson spin. Stand firm Kelly Downard most of us agree with you.
So here is a solution for you Mr. Mayor. If Johnstone is so important, even though he apparently wasn't good enough when "volunteering" based on your comments, then perhaps you should split the difference.
Pay him a total of $94,000 less his retirement pay. Seems that would be a valid answer so he does a better job not volunteering.
Stay tuned folks. It is time to start showing the links of all the players in Metro hierarchy to Abramson and cronyism. We will begin linking them all for your review soon. From Fawn Lakes in the Housing partnership to the Louisville leadership community and all points beyond, including the Federal Reserve of St Louis Louisville Branch, cronyism pays and it pays well when in the Abramson regime.
More to come...........
Your story is valid in so far as a volunteer position turns into a $94,000 a year job. There’s a hiring freeze, but this job is not only created as a new position, but filled.
ReplyDeleteMr. Johnstone retired before Obama became president, so there was no stimulus package to over see. So apparently the argument that this was planned before he retired doesn’t hold water. Sorry.
Now for the double dipping, what is the problem? The money does not come from City funds. The city and Mr. Johnstone contributed to his retirement funds for years. Then he decided to retire. It’s the same as drawing from a 401k that ane employee and employer paid into, and now the Employee is collecting form it.
Yes, the city is paying into a new retirement plan for Mr. Johnstone, but if we had hired a non former employee at the same salary would they not be paying into the retirement plan. The answer of course is yes, and it would be the same rate that they will be paying for Mr. Johnstone. So the double dipping point is moot except for one issue. Instead of hiring someone unfamiliar with city government you have an experienced employee in the position. Yes, he’s a “friend”, but who want to work with someone you don’t like?
So your only valid complaint is that he hired a “friend” during a hiring freeze.
Any of Abramson's opponents next year are going to have a boatload of material to use against him. This is a joke.
ReplyDeleteThis is total nonsense about Jerry Abramsons's comment that Rick Johnstone was the best qualified person about the job. The only reason is because Rick needed the income after retiring and doing his double dipping. Are you telling me that a deputy mayor that didn't do squat for the last several years is going to be qualified for the job. I think we need a wide variety of people for the job or perhaps some sort of personal with professional experience in dealing with different private sector employers. Not only that but what are Rick Johnstone's qualifications.
ReplyDeleteI believe that there should have been a community board with non Abramson and non political based people doing oversight for a hire such as this. Getting some real employment professionals. We can't afford to strike out on this plan as they have for the last 30 year. We've been shedding jobs since the 1970s and 1980s that were good paying jobs and seeing them go overseas. Yet that was fine until we hit the current crisis.
I've been unemployed or even underemployed for the past several months and that is with a college degree. So Jerry when are you going to get us thousands if not tens of thousands of jobs we all need to survive and prosper.
I'm sure that we could have done better in this case than Rick Johnstone who is a appointed crony of Jerry Abramson and drawing 94,000 for this job. Maybe 50 k for this job but not 94,000 and we could have found a true employment professional for that price.
Look at this link and tell me about government largesse. If this partly isn't a waste project I don't know what is. Its no wonder our independent business community cannot survive here with this type of spending.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.louisvilleky.gov/NR/rdonlyres/AFE10FA0-66DA-4D50-AA7D-4AC5D527BA61/0/LouisvilleShovelReadyProjectList.pdf