Michael Bornstein Employment Contract

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No review; just a contract.

Back in May 2013, there was some sort of a review by the Commission on Michael Bornstein.  Actually it was no review at all but a cheerleading session for the manager this commission hired after they fired Susan Stanton on December 6, 2011. Stanton was a manager who was publicly and extensively reviewed, the first one in my memory with Scott Maxwell having a thick bound book (fuel for his fire) with everything imaginable about Ms. Stanton in order to publicly humiliate her.

As I said back then, "We never found out one thing about Bornstein's first year other than we were told that the employees like him, the public likes him (one referring to the review as a "roast") and so does the commission. Commissioner Amoroso even jokingly said, 'He is sexy'. We were not told how any commissioner rated him or his own self-evaluation during Unfinished Business. Perhaps he revealed that at the end of the meeting. All we knew was, he's a likeable fella because that's what they told us."

What we see--crime, slum, blight, and the lack of transparency, short meetings and decisions being made out of the knowledge of the public. We have found out that he has no stomach for lawsuits as most all have been settled for unimaginable amounts of money. He purged all of Stanton's city manager weekly reports and he has given none. But then, as the mayor said back then, it is a "trickle down" management style. Who is at the top of the organizational chart that directs the style?  The Commission and they don't want the public to know anything. Who is above the Commission?  Well, it's the public but you know about our importance.

Since that first year, we have seen Mr. Bornstein in action.  He's low-key but as political as they come--going after residents in this city, even from the dais, and throwing them to the wolves. He even went after God Almighty--the Common Ground Church. He still gives no manager reports--nothing has changed. He meets with commissioners one-on-one and clues them in. City Hall is not the least bit transparent and it doesn't get better. One thing that HAS changed--he doesn't wear his bow tie as often as he did in the beginning.

Now Mr. Bornstein's contract expires on April 16 and is up for a two year renewal. He makes $135,000 a year, gets a $500 a month car allowance and we have been told that he lives only a few blocks away at The Lucerne Condos; the City contributes 10% of his base salary into a retirement account; he gets three weeks vacation and five months severance as well as life insurance.

I guess tonight is the night for another love fest.