Pat Roller’s Excuses
Posted by John B. Kalb - 6/17/08 @ 8:47 pm - Filed Under Local Politics
Pat Roller’s “Command Performance” as City Council tonight was the normal Pat saying, “I did everything right, if you don’t believe me, just ask me!
She tried to convince the council that the decision to enter into the “legal” but probably “not ethical” contract without consultation with incoming Mayor Henry(in 4 days)with HPG was hers alone, with no prompting from King Richard. Her personel reason for entering into this contract was because ”our state governor gave us a $14 million hole in our 2008 city budget”. Her excuse for not involving the incoming mayor was that Henry was too busy to bother him with such a small item as a three(or is it four) year contract , spending “only” $285,000 and then at only $95,000 per year - with the first payment due before January 1, 2008!
The “deliverables” were questioned - no one produced the “secret” page 2 to the contract - and these were described as “training of city employees”. At no time was this training ever identified as to what was being covered. The only reference was to Graham Richard’s 4 day Leadership Development Roundtables involving nearly 300 City employees.
After the meeting, I talked with Kate Love-Jacobson and Bryan Casey about the training. Kate informed me that HPG DOES NOT DO “Lean Six Sigma training for the city - that is done by Total Quality Management, another private organization with close ties to King Richard. If that is so, JUST WHAT IS HPG DOING TO EARN the $95,000 per year? Bryan and Kate indicated in the meeting that they will be furnishing the council with a list of the “delivered” items have been since late December, 2007.
I can hardly wait to see what this “gobble-de-gook” consists of!
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[...] Note: See John B. Kalb’s post on the HPGN contract here [...]
I watched this on television, and I thought Pat Roller made a horrible representation of her case. When asked directly if Henry had been consulted, she tried to skirt the question a couple of times. Although she would not come right out and give a straight-forward answer of “no”, she simply said that it was known that Henry supported the policies of Richard, and Henry was too busy to be bothered with this little matter anyway.
So this made me wonder. If we were in mid-term when this occurred, would it have bee alright for Roller to say that Mayor Richard was too busy to consult, but since she knows his intentions she signed the contract for him. The fact is, that Richard was at the end of his term. He may have had the legal standing to sign this contract, but that does not make it right. Henry should have been consulted and he should have been the one to make the decision. Then again, perhaps he did and they are just trying to provide cover for him now.
[...] for Fort Wayne Public1 and writer for Frost Illustrated. You should also take the time to read Kalb’s and Spaulding’s posts on what [...]
If Tom Henry is the real Mayor of Fort Wayne he should fire Pat Roller. Remember she is the person in 2005 and 2006 to tell the State Board of Accounts that she did not and was not going to provide them with “conflict of interest” forms as requested by the state agency. Now you have her committing to a $95,000 contract and committing the city to following a contract that the Mayor never was clued in on. In the private world the “conflicts” would have gotten you fired. If some how a person lived through that they would be fired for this one.
Whoever is the real Mayor should clue their staff into who is running the city. Maybe we don’t know it but Mayor Richard assigned the task to Pat Roller. That might explain needing three PIO people.
I was somewhat impressed by the skill of several people at the end of the table to avoid answering questions but supplied answers. I am disappointed in several council members for letting them “skate” away without answering the question they had ask.
Just hang on people there is more to come. Wait until we get to the budget hearings. You will see more mirrors and double talk then you have ever heard. There are numbers going to be tossed around with no supporting data. The answer will be that “we can get you the data” but it will not be coming. If it is forced to be presented the numbers will be presented in such away that even Mitch Harper is going to be confused. Liz Brown will be pulling her hair out. Tom Didier will break the gavel on the desk.
Normally, before you engage an external consulting group in a training contract, you need to determine what the training is, how it is tied to the mayor’s goals (as in Henry not the lame duck). Then, you need to assess the current staff to understand their as-is skills so that you can build your to-be contract. This provides your baseline measurements and afterwards, you can assess how successful (in incremental degrees if you so choose), that “training” was.
See, I can really speak the speak when I need to.
SO - someone should ask - did they go through this “due diligence”? Because I know of no company in the world that just decide they need training - as in a sweeping generalization - without tying said training to some goals/objectives and most certainly - measureable accountability.
It all appears to be missing here.
I wonder - did they do a fixed bid price (and in government - aren’t you all supposed to RFP these things????). Or did they do a time and materials with this group? I wonder what their hourly rate is and how it compares to other like-training groups.
Just some questions to ponder….
I haven’t watched the video yet, but I saw a recap on the 11:00 news.
I couldn’t believe the reasoning Pat Roller provided. Am I correct in understanding her to say that “we knew we were going to be in a budget crunch (hole), so we decided to spend money.” Basically “let’s get ours while we can and the heck with the public.”
Maybe I am missing something here, but why do we need to two or three firms to tell the government how to be efficient and save money. Doesn’t the mayor have individuals around him in various positions who should have that knowledge?
The fact that the contract was kept below the $100,000 seems to indicate that someone knew what he or she was doing. And why isn’t it based on the total contract value rather than the yearly amount?
Charlotte,
Pat Rollers logic is that the training that HPG provides has been saving the city $3 MILLION per year. So we are spending a little to save a lot.
John, the name is RYAN Chasey- not Bryan!
The $3 Million per year number seems arbitrary and is typical of six sigma hand-waving. Was there any data presented to support that claim?
The one question never asked and has not been asked here as far as I know.
Why did the contract have to be signed before January 1, 2008?
Mayor Henry should be wondering what else she is doing behind his back that just might bite him at any second. She has a track record that any CEO would want out of their operation. That is unless she is running the city.
Kevin:
I thought this contract was a new contract with start-up costs. The signing date was December 27, 2007, so how could it already be saving $3 million a year? Isn’t that basing the future amount on the claimed savings from the past 8 years?
According to Indiana corporation info, HPGN was created in January 2007. Obviously, someone was thinking ahead. What appears to have happened - just a guess - is that Mayor Richard decided not to run, the individuals involved got together and established the HPGN in January 2007, the contract obviously was worked through in the ensuing months, and the contract was signed 4 days before Richard left office.
Here is a quote from this morning’s paper attributed to Pat Roller:
“We were literally going to be out of money in 2010. I had to react to that.” Again, to me that sounds like, “let’s get this in before we run out of money.”
The individuals worked for the City during those 8 years, and now they are leaving. If the employees decided to depart, that was their choice. Why should they be rewarded with a contract?
Charlotte,
Because the skills that they are teaching city employees saves TAXPAYERS money in the long run.
The program is sound- you will not that City Council did not fault the program- they were just not happy with the way the contract was handled.
Because the skills that they are teaching city employees saves TAXPAYERS money in the long run.
But according to what John Kalb posted, this group is NOT doing training for the city employees on six sigma.
And what saves taxpayers - or anyone money *btw* - isn’t “the methodology” - but some structure combined with common sense, logic, data, and buy-in/support.
Also - there is a law of diminishing returns here. Saving 3 million per year? Then basically, that says that on the front end of government that all of those people are idiots and need to be fired.
(in the most loving way).
Because six sigma (unless you are doing a DFSS and not a DMAIC), is meant to address defects.
So, these ouside consultants were hired to continue doing what they had been doing while serving in the Richard Administration. I suppose then that these same positions were then eliminated from the city budget under the new administration. After all, why do we need to hire “employees” to do a job that is now being done by newly bought “consultants?”
Also, the only thing I found to be more comical than Roller’s “explanation” of why Henry wasn’t consulted was the HPGn representatives own “explanation” of exactly what it is they do for the city.
They “teach employees to value diversity and to be agents of change.” Certainly diversity is important, but if you have to hire a consultant to convince your employees of this, then maybe those employees don’t really need to be working there. In my opinion, they only served to reinforce what many people are already thinking - that this entire program is probably a waste of money.