In a two-reporter, eight-paragraph story on Saturday, the Chronicle reported that Mayor/Senate Candidate Bill White would like to spend nearly $200,000 so two law firms can look further into issues of equality within the Houston Fire Department:
Mayor Bill White wants to hire two local law firms to examine “equal employment opportunity processes and practices” in the Houston Fire Department, his office announced Friday*.
The effort to initiate an outside review comes about 10 days after two women found racist and misogynistic graffiti near their quarters at a department fire station.
White has asked City Council to authorize a contract of up to $190,000 with the law firms Thompson and Horton, L.L.P. and Lemond and Lemond, L.L.C, who will “work jointly to review, assess and recommend policies and practives on issues that include diversity, conflict resolution, preventive practices, compliance, communication and management practices,” said a city news release*.
[snip]
“In any organization there is always room for improvement. We want this expertise to help us examine how we can do that,” White said in a statement*.
The rest of the story updates us on the lack of significant new developments in the HFD investigation. The two reporters do not, however, inform us what precisely Thompson and Horton or Lemond and Lemond will be doing (beyond the platitudes in the mayor’s statement) or shed any light on why those two law firms were chosen (as opposed, to say, management consulting firms or any number of other firms). Apparently the mayor’s staff wasn’t able to shed much light on those issues either.
We did find one interesting connection. It turns out that Thompson and Horton employs a young associate lawyer by the name of Annie Stein. Ms. Stein, we are fairly certain,** is the daughter of Marty Stein (Mayor White’s agenda director) and Bob Stein (Houston’s expert on everything).
Now, are we suggesting that the selection of a law firm to handle ambiguous consulting for HFD has much to do with a junior associate lawyer who is related** to the mayor’s agenda director? Not at all. It’s probably complete coincidence. We are just amused by the small-town feel of Houston at times (being from a small town ourselves).
* Was our mayor too busy running for his next office to participate in this HFD announcement?
** Our multiple layers of fact-checkers and research assistants are out, it being the weekend and all.
UPDATE (07-22-09): As it turns out, there were even more interesting connections between Mayor White’s staff and the law firms that apparently influenced their selection without any input from Council or public vetting. See this story from the Chronicle for more details.
BLOGVERSATION: Isiah Carey’s Insite.
