Man, oh man, did former City Attorney Ben Lipscomb teach the city fathers in Rogers an exasperating and expensive lesson on what they don't want in a city attorney.
Cities across the state should take heed from what can happen when their elected legal eagle goes maverick and flies the coop.
Lipscomb, who departed the city with an astounding $390,000 in a settlement on the federal suit he'd filed against the city last November, was earning a salary of $127,187 when he got himself in prolonged controversies with the city he was elected to represent.
Stop to reflect on how much money we're talking about for legal services in a city of roughly 60,000 that Lipscomb waved farewell to with more than many Arkansans earn in a decade.
And that set the wheels in motion for what's transpired since. His former job has lain dormant since January. Takes time for the smoke to clear from any train wreck.
It's led up to last week when the Rogers council unanimously approved three ordinances which, among other changes, diminish the authority and salary of the elected city attorney while increasing power and compensation to the senior staff attorney.
Veteran reporter Teresa Moss wrote that the council's three-member Internal Affairs Committee redefined job descriptions for both positions while limiting the city attorney's position to a salary of $12,000 a year, less than a tenth of what Lipscomb was paid in that role.
Justin Eichmann, the attorney hired to navigate the council though the legal landmines, told Moss he believed Rogers would attract good people for the city attorney's position. Then Eichmann added what I perceived as a little barb by adding: "These will be people who have a desire to serve." That begged the question as code for: Thank God Almighty, finally ... We hope!
Actually, the city already has filled the senior staff attorney's job with Lipscomb's former assistant, Chris Griffin.
Moss' story said the third approved ordinance redefines Griffin's position and includes adding "senior" to its title. The ordinance states that the senior staff attorney will "act as legal advisor to all city officials, boards, commissions, departments and agencies." The staff attorney makes $87,132 annually.
Together, these dual attorneys serving Rogers would earn about $30,000 less that Lipscomb alone was raking in. Ya think that means he was being seriously overpaid?
With the senior staff attorney already in place, all that remains for the council to do to restore some semblance of day-to-day normalcy in its legal affairs is to appoint someone to fill Lipscomb's vacated position.
The Internal Affairs Committee supposedly will arrive at a process to make that happen before the next council meeting in mid-July. Afterwards, the city attorney would again be elected in 2016, and again in 2018 when it becomes a four-year term.
If you became slightly confused trying to follow this fandangoed mishmash, don't feel bad. Imagine if you'd been tasked with trying to explain it in writing.
That flag flap
With all the turmoil over which states will and won't continue to display the Confederate flag, I wonder what effective purpose (other than political) is served by removing this legitimate piece of American heritage and history in 2015.
Perhaps it is time to retire this banner to museums? It can't be a wholly positive image if it triggers fear or loathing among a significant number of Americans. Yet we thankfully remain a society of many views, thoughts and opinions, including those that inspire emotion.
Dylann Roof, a disturbed reported druggie, admittedly killed nine innocent black worshippers in a Charleston, South Carolina, church amid a racist rage. It's not the first time our troubled nation has seen mass murders committed by deranged young men.
From the nature of statements reported by police and the images on Roof's social media site, it's clear he bore a sick fixation on racial issues and he was photographed with a Confederate flag in the background. That did it!
My problem here isn't with a flag itself. It lies instead with this sick 21-year-old man and his deeply personal choices that led to mass murder.
Yet I also understand that for some Americans the Confederate flag symbolizes white racism, but for others an historical heritage.
I'd say the fundamental problem for the racists stems from cultural conditioning since childhood, rather than a cloth artifact. I feel certain many of their parents likely introduced them to this Southern symbol from birth as though it's normal to associate it with bigotry.
I also understand why Wal-Mart, Sears, Amazon and others immediately stopped selling the rebel flag. They didn't want to be seen as linked in any way with Roof's hate crimes.
The issue here for me isn't with our rights to purchase a flag, but rather with a state's decision to fly it over official buildings.
In this democratic republic, that decision is best left in the hands of each state's voters.
Mike Masterson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Email him at mikemasterson10@hotmail.com.
Editorial on 06/28/2015