There seems to have been a problem with a Melissa council member paying her property taxes for the last 10 years. A concerned citizen sent a letter to the City of Melissa in February, 2010 that stated that Sharon Weideman, Melissa’s current Mayor Pro Tem, had built house in her backyard. The letter said that when Ms. Weideman applied for the building permit, she said the permit was for a garage that would have a value of about $10,000. In fact, what Ms. Weideman actually built was a residential dwelling with a value closer to $100,000. You can check this on the Collin County website, cad account # R-3597-000-0030-1.
This dwelling has a bedroom, bath, full kitchen, living room and game room. For the last 10 years, however, Mayor Pro Tem Weideman has been paying property taxes on a structure valued at $10,000. In her role as city council member for the last three years, Ms. Weideman has been making important decisions regarding our city taxes—taxes that affect every resident in Melissa. It doesn’t seem quite fair that she’s been cheating on her own property taxes while making government decisions on taxation issues for our city. I was lead to believe that our present Mayor Greer told the Melissa Police not to investigate this when the letter arrived at their office.
There are other curious inconsistencies in Mayor Pro Tem Weideman’s ethical make up.
For example, when she first ran (unsuccessfully) for a city council seat against incumbent Randy Kaiser, there was a ‘Meet Randy Kaiser’ event to be held on a certain date in a certain subdivision in Melissa. Ms. Weideman called the developer of the subdivision and said she was calling from the office of the Mayor of Melissa. She asked the developer to cancel the “Meet Randy Kaiser” event. The developer declined her request. Undaunted by her failed ploy to quash her opponent’s campaign efforts, Ms. Weideman decided to post her own campaign signs illegally along the roadway to Mr. Kaiser’s event.
Another example of unprofessional behavior by Ms. Weideman occurred when she was first elected to the city council. Ms. Weideman had a hissyfit and refused to speak to the head of the City of Melissa Chamber of Commerce during her first six months she sat on the council. At that point in time she was a paid employee of the Melissa Industrial Economic Development Board. The Economic Development Board is a critical part of the prosperity of a growing community like Melissa. Economic development serves all the residents of Melissa by expanding our tax base. All members of the Economic Development Board should be friendly and inviting, courteous and professional in all dealings with other city boards, and especially with residential and commercial prospects and newcomers to Melissa. In tandem with the Economic Development Board, our young City of Melissa Chamber of Commerce must also encourage commercial parties who show interest in establishing their businesses in Melissa. If a city council member refuses to speak to the head of her own Chamber of Commerce would you want to move your business to Melissa?
Ms. Weideman works hard. She earned her license as a real estate agent while she was still working for the MIEDC. The last year Ms Weideman worked for the MIEDC she was given an office in the city center. Her duties as a paid employee of the MIEDC included being in this office during the mornings on weekdays so that anyone interested in Melissa as a possible new home for their business would have a knowledgeable representative of the city to speak with about their interests and business. Sadly, Ms. Weideman did not go to her office for weeks at a time. On the days she did go to the office in the morning she was conducting her real estate business and not the job the city was paying her to do. We have to wonder what business opportunities Melissa lost while Ms. Weideman was working so hard to list and sell houses for personal profit.
Another of Ms. Weideman’s duties for the MIEDC was to pick up the mail at the post office. Evidently, Ms. Weideman was simply too busy to do this. The post office called the city and complained that the MIEDC mailbox was so full that they could not put one more letter in it—the mail had not been picked up for 30 days. That day the city dispatched someone else to empty the MIEDC’s mail.
Sometime later, the post office also had to put a notice on the door of the MIEDC office warning that the post office box would be canceled if the bill was not paid. The notice was left on the door on a Friday. It was not picked up until the following Wednesday, but not by Ms. Weideman. The first notice was sitting untouched in the PO box that was crammed full of mail which had once again accumulated for 30 days.
While working as a paid employee of the MIEDC, Ms. Weideman used both City of Melissa (MIEDC) and Chamber of Commerce supplies to print flyers for her Real Estate listings. I suppose many of us have done this: used the paper and copier at work for personal projects, and it’s never an honest or ethical thing to do. And when you do it using the paper and copier that your neighbors pay for with their taxes, it’s particularly dishonest and unethical. Ms Weideman was paid $18,000/year for a 20 hour per week position. Not bad pay for a part time position. Really good pay if you don’t do anything and can use the office supplies for your own business. I don’t know a real estate agent in Melissa that would turn this job down.
The façade of ethics and professional conduct crumbled a bit more for Ms. Weideman when she tried to do a little arm-twisting with a residential developer. She misused her position on the city council to pressure this developer to list his properties with her as the real estate agent.
Unfortunately, in my observation, Ms. Weideman falls short of the standards we hope our elected representatives will uphold. Everyone is busy, and no one is perfect. We make mistakes, apologize, learn from them, and move on. We endeavor to be humble and refrain from casting the first stone. But every now and then, somebody has to throw a stone to defend his town and all good citizens from lies and deceit.
No comments:
Post a Comment