Tactics to break 90-units mulled until final Sucette Harbor meeting
Bush was set to lift 90-unit limit Aug. 15
Advocate pushed 170 units even as Sept. 5 meeting loomed
Danielson dismissive of last-minute maneuver getting 3 votes
MANDEVILLE — Project proponents were working right up until the final Sucette Harbor meeting September 5th in hopes of finding a way to strip the 90-apartment limit from the Sucette Harbor ordinance, well after the August 15th meeting where two such attempts were unsuccessful, according to information contained in a public records release.
Editor’s Note: This is the second part in a series that will explore the recent Sucette Harbor public records release. At the end of this multi-part series, Mandeville Daily will publish a complete timeline of events from start to finish, including all text messages from all council members and other officials in PDF format for the reader to review independently, but as of the publish date of this article we do not have legible text messages from two of the council members involved due to a technical error by the City of Mandeville.
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5
Let us refresh your memory…
Before we delve into what the text messages and emails reveal, it is important for the reader to be familiar with the chain of events from the July 12th meeting all the way through to the final September 5th meeting when the project was rejected. Here is the recap:
July 12: The Zuckerman amendment
A density restriction added to Ordinance 23-16 at the July 12th special meeting in effect strangled the proposal by cutting the number of apartments from 178 down to just 90. That amendment was offered by Councilman at Large Jason Zuckerman who was joined by District III Councilwoman Jill McGuire and District I Councilwoman Rebecca Bush in adopting it. This was an otherwise unexpected turn of events for the developer team and by all accounts caught them completely off guard.
July 24: Danielson pumping the brakes
At the very next meeting on July 24th, presiding officer of the Sucette Harbor special meetings and Councilman at Large Rick Danielson had a surprise of his own for the standing-room-only crowd when he started the meeting by announcing there would be no amendments, conditions, questions, or votes that night.
At this meeting, developer Woodward Interests President Bill Hoffman plainly stated the 90-apartment limit would make the marina portion of the proposal unfeasible, to which Bush remarked, “The revitalizing of the marina is pretty important.”
August 15: The Robert’s Rules drama
Right out of the gate, District II Councilman Dr. Skelly Kreller offered an amendment to raise the number of units from 90 to 170, which would have nullified the July 12th Zuckerman amendment, to which Zuckerman immediately called a point of order. According to Robert’s Rules of Order (RROO), an amendment cannot nullify a previous amendment to a main motion.
After a recess where lawyers and council members huddled and conferred, the meeting continued with Danielson upholding Zuckerman’s point of order and announcing that assistant city attorney David Parnell Jr. advised that the “motion to reconsider” should be used instead. The only caveat was that it would have to be offered by one of the three members who had voted in the affirmative for the Zuckerman amendment July 12th. Bush offered to do so and it appeared things would move forward, although Bush equivocated on whether she would ultimately vote to remove the Zuckerman amendment or not.
Zuckerman later grew frustrated when his request to have his July 12th amendment read aloud by the secretary was ruled out of order by Danielson, despite RROO expressly stating it is permitted. But after a bit of wrangling and discussion, Zuckerman in-effect forced a second point of order.
After another recess and huddling with more lawyers, Danielson acknowledged that they could not move forward with the motion to reconsider due to time constraints. RROO requires that a motion to reconsider be made at the same meeting or at the very next meeting after the original amendment had been adopted. The August 15th meeting was the second meeting after the Zuckerman amendment.
September 5: Sucette Harbor rejected 5-0
The September 5th special meeting on Sucette Harbor was a more somber affair. A chain of amendments offered by Zuckerman and McGuire seemed to be one nail in the coffin after another until Ordinance 23-16 was voted down unanimously by the council.
The Zuckerman amendment from July 12th had become a wrecking amendment. Wrecking amendments usually force even proponents of a piece of legislation to end up voting against it, which at the time seemed to be what had happened.
’And now… the rest of the story…’
To the casual observer, it would have appeared that the August 15th meeting signaled the end for Sucette Harbor, but the reality is, behind the scenes, it had not.
Now we have the texts and emails that were released as part of a public records request made by Woodward Interests Vice President Bear Cheezem.
These conversations reveal a flurry of behind-the-scenes strategizing to somehow save the project before, during, and after the August 15th meeting.
According to text messages, it appears that Bush was willing to join the minority of Danielson and Kreller to strip the Zuckerman amendment after a meeting with the developer, possibly raising the number of units from 90 to 120, which could have been seen as a compromise.
Text messages between Bush and project proponent Rhonda Alleman show a lengthy conversation in the days leading up to the August 15th meeting, with Alleman also sending Bush an email the morning of the meeting.
Editor’s Note: Rhonda Alleman appears in the text messages from most of the council members as part of the Bear Cheezem public records release, where she is seen as a staunch proponent of the Sucette Harbor project, frequently lobbying council members with talking points, participating in social media response tactics, and offering Robert’s Rules of Order advice to break the Zuckerman amendment.
A text exchange between the two that day makes it appear that Bush was going to allow the Zuckerman amendment from July 12th to be removed.
Bush appeared to be looking past the 90-unit issue, cautioning Alleman that there were still other unrelated issues with the ordinance that she wanted to fix before a vote could be held, to which Alleman replied: “True. I would agree. Thank you so much.”
And in the aforementioned email from 11:33 a.m. that day, Alleman asked Bush to consider going from 120 units to 170 — not from 90 units to 170. This discrepancy is somewhat perplexing given that the ordinance currently stood at 90 units, not 120.
This email indicates Alleman had prior knowledge the developer would ask for 170 units at the August 15th meeting, and that Bush was prepared to go to 120 but not necessarily any higher. And of course, it ended up being Bush that night who made the “motion to reconsider.”
The City Council received no advance notice from the developer that they would lower their marina cutoff number from 178 down to 170 that night, yet Alleman had this information and was attempting to persuade Bush to go all the way to 170 earlier in the day.
Kreller also seemed to be aware of the 170-unit number the night before the meeting, texting that he would move to kill the ordinance should the 170-unit plan be rejected by the council August 15th, according to texts.
“[I]f their new proposal goes down, then I will probably call for a vote,” he texted.
It ended up being Kreller who made the first attempt to break the Zuckerman amendment at the August 15th meeting, not Bush.
After Kreller’s motion to raise the number of units to 170 was ruled out of order in a roundabout way, and another recess had been called to discuss Bush’s attempt to allow the Zuckerman amendment to be “reconsidered,” Alleman began texting Bush during the break concerning yet another RROO tactic, the “motion to rescind.”
However, Bush told Alleman that Parnell Jr. had told her the “motion to reconsider” was the correct maneuver.
But as it would turn out, Bush’s motion would in effect be ruled out of order by Danielson, ostensibly due to the time limits imposed by RROO.
During the next three weeks until the final September 5th meeting, Alleman and Bush exchanged 30 screens or pages of text messages, the majority of which are unreadable due to an error by the City of Mandeville in fulfilling the public records request.
However, August 21st — during the timeframe of the unreadable texts between her and Bush — Alleman texted Danielson that she believed the votes were there to “resurrect the 170 units” and that “it’s not complicated.”
Below is an exchange between Alleman and Bush a few days before the final September 5th meeting —deciphered by Mandeville Daily as much as possible — in which Alleman still appears to be pleading the case to save the Sucette Harbor project, despite the RROO impasse at the August 15th meeting.
Then, two days before the final meeting, Alleman texted Danielson again, asking that if the ordinance were to be voted down, could it be reintroduced without the Zuckerman amendment. Danielson replied, “I agree but at the moment, 170 would never get 3 [yes] votes from this crew.”
But Ordinance 23-16 did end up with five “no” votes that night plus an eventual federal lawsuit.
Sucette Harbor Exposed: Part 3 will be published soon.
Editor’s Note:
The City of Mandeville was contacted by other members of the public concerning RROO concerns in the aftermath of the August 15th meeting.
- Shortly after the August 15th meeting was adjourned, Ellen Pierce, ex-wife of P&Z member Mike Pierce, forwarded to Danielson and and Kreller a July 25th email between her and Alleman concerning an article published by Mandeville Daily. Pierce opined that Mandeville Daily was incorrect in asserting that amendments could not nullify previous amendments. Mandeville Daily stands by its reporting.
- Mandeville Daily Editor Emeritus William Kropog emailed the City Council August 24th, asking that the record be corrected after the City of Mandeville published the meeting packet for the September 5th meeting, in which Ordinance 23-16 had been incorrectly updated to show Bush as the member who had introduced the ordinance. Emails obtained as part of the Cheezem public records release show that Council Clerk Kristine Scherer acknowledged the issue and later corrected it. What’s more, it had been McGuire at the May 25th meeting who had made the motion to bring the Sucette Harbor ordinance before the council for consideration and adoption. According to RROO, the maker of a motion — once it belongs to the body — with a simple majority vote can withdraw it, stripping it of all amendments.
- Additionally, on September 5th, the day of the final meeting, Mandeville Daily Editor Emeritus William Kropog emailed Zuckerman a RROO order quick reference — based on the content of an article published on August 20th — relating to the parliamentary issues raised at the August 15th meeting.
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Related:
Sucette Harbor Exposed: Part 1
OPINION | Text messages make righteous indignation over ‘bribe’ post look bogus
Some Sucette public records request documents not readable
OPINION | Sucette Harbor’s next move: The ‘Nuclear Option’?
Mandeville Daily 
Correction: ex-wife
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