Agency Staffer’s Brain Serves as Permitting Repository; Sheriff’s Jail Basement ‘Armageddon’ Stockpile?
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Also: Maine is sued over chicken pox disclosure and North Carolina’s Confederate memorial protection legislation.
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DETROIT, Michigan: Last year, the state of Michigan took control of Detroit’s Belle Isle, a giant park in the Detroit River that offers great views of downtown and Windsor, Ontario. State Department of Natural Resources personnel have been ticketing people for various things like speeding and unauthorized alcohol consumption, things that would have gone unenforced when the city of Detroit was in charge. Also up for new enforcement: professional photo shoots without paying permitting fees. Michigan Radio’s Lester Graham detailed a long saga to figure out what the precise fee structure is that hit numerous roadblocks:
I needed to interview a source in Detroit, so I went early and stopped by the Belle Isle White House to see [Belle Isle event coordinator Darlisa] Rickman in person. I asked if I could get a copy of the price list. The answer, “No.” Then she explained that it was on her old computer and she transferred the information to a flash drive when she got a new computer. Then she lost the flash drive, so there wasn’t a piece of paper or electronic document to give me. I asked, where the information was kept, if she didn’t have a copy? “In my head,” she replied.
OZARK, Missouri: Local officials in southern Missouri were surprised to find a 3-ton stockpile of food in the basement of the Christian County jail, apparently a doomsday preparation project of the disgraced former sheriff, Joey Kyle. As the Springfield News-Leader reports:
Interim Sheriff Dwight McNiel said the stockpile was a bizarre discovery, another example of a poorly managed department with profligate spending, poor record keeping and very little accountability.
“It was apparently purchased as part of an end-of-time plan—part of a survival plan,” McNiel said.
In May, Kyle pleaded guilty to fraud and embezzlement charges. [Springfield News-Leader]
PORTLAND, Oregon: Electric power customers in the Pacific Northwest have been warned that scammers pretending to be representatives of Pacific Power are trying to “trick customers out of their money and personal information” and have even figured out how to make phone caller ID display the utility. [The Oregonian]
RALEIGH, North Carolina: Amid ongoing national discussion about the Confederate flag and other symbols, lawmakers in the North Carolina House approved legislation on Tuesday that would make it more difficult to remove historic monuments and memorials. Gov. Pat McCrory hasn’t announced whether he will approve the legislation or veto the measure. As The News & Observer reports, there are 120 Civil War memorials around the Tar Heel State. [News & Observer]
PORTLAND, Maine: The Portland Press Herald announced Tuesday that it is suing the Maine Department of Health and Human Services over the state Center for Disease Control’s “refusal to identify the names of schools where chickenpox outbreaks occurred.” In a statement, the newspaper’s executive editor said that the “CDC is putting at risk the health of people by refusing to disclose the locations of disease outbreaks.” [Portland Press Herald]
Michael Grass is Executive Editor of Government Executive’s Route Fifty.
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