The Killeen council drama around the north Killeen grocery store

KDH News editors Jacob Brooks and Dave Miller join the podcast to talk about the recent controversy regarding an alleged directive about a north Killeen grocery store.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

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SPEAKER_02 0:25

Welcome to the Inside Clean podcast brought to you by KDH News. My name is Kevin Limity. I'm the city government reporter here at KDH News, and I'm joined today by Managing Editor Jacob Brooks. How are you doing, Jacob?

SPEAKER_03 0:40

Good, Kevin. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 0:41

I'm also joined by Deputy Managing Editor Dave Miller. How are you doing, sir? Bye, Kevin. So basically what we want to talk about today is the controversy, really, the first real controversy of the new council regarding an investigation that from what I can tell it's may never have even happened. But you know, it's kind of hard to say either way. Now, it's kind of confusing, but I will try to explain it as clearly as I can. Basically, in one of the first council meetings of like the new council, June 2nd, I believe, there was a presentation from a variety of different community partners, and one of them was KDC. Now, Tyler Robert, who's part of the Clean Economic Development Corporation, was questioned by Councilwoman Melissa Brown, and it was in that during that line of questioning where uh he appeared to say that he was directed by a city staff member not to focus on a North Klean grocery store, which is like obviously a big deal for a lot of the council members and a lot of the clean residents, but instead to focus on industrial development. After that, it gets very strange. Like they did a vote to approve an investigation into it, but w and it was unanimous, but from then on, like things just kind of got murky because when the investigation was put on the agenda for for the following month of July, it was just basically like City Manager Ken Cagle, the interim city manager, saying, Well, I didn't have any directive, and there was never any such directive. So and everybody kind of backtracked away from the whole thing.

SPEAKER_03 2:29

He kind of scolded the council, I think, when he defended himself. He's like almost like, How dare you accuse me of such a thing, you know? Yeah. He didn't quite say it like that, but and then he kind of got into it with Brown. They were going back and forth, you know. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 2:47

Which is which is very weird. It is. Yeah. Like it's not common for like a city manager, even an outgoing interim one, to like basically like scold a uh sitting council woman who, you know. I mean, Melissa Brown has a lot of like controversial like stuff going on with her. Like she has had a very oppositional history with the previous councils, but even still, like, been arrested at council meetings. Uh yeah, and she has been at least twice, I believe.

SPEAKER_03 3:20

Yeah. When when she was not on the council, of course.

SPEAKER_02 3:23

Right. So yeah, the whole thing is very strange. You know, just just kind of wondering, like, now that like everything is kind of like at least publicly over, like, for the time being, like, what'd you guys think? Jacob, do you like kind of feel that that this is gonna crop up again in some way or yeah, I don't think it's totally dead.

SPEAKER_03 3:45

I think there's still some questions that have not been answered. So you're right, Kevin. On June 2nd, the council voted unanimously to basically put on a future agenda an item to investigate. And and when Councilman Kimball, Charles Kimball was the main the person who made that motion, but it was curious because and you know, we put this out on a video of of the council meetings, and he was kind of careful, he said, I don't want to call it an investigation, but uh an inquiry looking into you know which city staffer told the EDC to back off a grocery store and just focused on industrial, you know, you know, type jobs. And they and and the the message was from you know with Tyler Roberts saying this, uh, that the message was, you know, EDC would focus on bringing industry here, like manufacturing type businesses and things like that. And then the commercial side, which would include grocery stores, retail, stuff like that, the city would kind of handle that. That was like his main message. And the council was, you know, because it involves the grocery store, it's a very sensitive subject for the council. They some of them ran on that, you know, and they hear all the time, North Kaleen needs a uh a grocery store. And and you know, and this all goes back to, as you've reported many times, Kevin, 2019 when HEB had an old grocery store in North Kaleen, they pulled out, and then the same year IGA, another grocery store chain, which had been in Kaleen for decades, also pulled out the same year. Leaving there are a couple grocery stores in North Kaleen, but they're kind of non-traditional. We consider Omarts, that's a Korean grocery store on Fort Hood Street, and then there's the you've been to the Nutritional Center. That's a small kind of Puerto Rican type grocery store. Yeah, that's correct. And then there's one more, oh, Delicias Meat Market, which is like uh kind of like a Hispanic grocery store.

SPEAKER_02 6:13

I mean the interesting thing is that in the light of all that stuff, like like people were telling me like like that it's not actually the KDC's job to even find a grocery store. And and truth be told, like there's there's not actually that much hope of there being a North Clean grocery store until they solve like a very fundamental problem that they've been having, which is getting more rooftops in the area. I mean that's that was something that the council had reported I think at the time when Cigar was on the council. He and Dave, he recently just wrote a letter to the editor that you're gonna be publishing soon, right?

SPEAKER_04 6:50

That's correct. That's gonna be running this weekend. And uh I haven't taken the time to fully read it yet, but his as his basic assessment is that you know the the grocery store is that that's an economic function. I mean, like if you if you don't have the the correct demographics and your income, you know, your profile is not what a grocery store chain is looking for, it doesn't matter how many incentives the city offers, it still has to pass that bottom line test. And as a lot of people admit or acknowledge, grocery stores depend on a high volume, they have a very low profit margin. Yeah. And of course, there's also the consideration of, you know, the uh the theft rate, right? The the shrinkage, you know. Yeah if you have a high theft rate, as the one downtown Colleen was uh supposedly the ATB, yeah. Right, um, that's going to really eat into your profit margin and perhaps turn it into a loss.

SPEAKER_03 7:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 7:44

And uh, you know, when you're looking at a large chain and they have options, you know, Kleene's not the only place they're looking at. You really have to sell them, but the thing is sustainability.

unknown 7:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 7:54

And like Kevin said, if you don't have the rooftops, if you don't have a base of customers that goes beyond the neighborhood that they'd be located in, I mean, you have to make it enough of a draw that you're gonna bring customers in from other areas of Kleen or other towns. And I don't think that's been proven yet that that's that that's the factor that most grocery stores see here.

SPEAKER_03 8:15

There's another thing that gets often overlooked too. See, there's on Fort Hood, there's two commissaries, which is like a grocery store. And one of them, the there's the Clear Creek Commissary, that's over, you know, on Clear Creek, you know, Fort Hood's portion of Clear Creek. But then there's another one called the Warrior Way Commissary, and it is located north of North Killeen, where there's a Fort Hood fence there, and on the other side of that fence, pretty close, is that Warrior Way Commissary. So all those like retiree families, Army retired families in North Killeen, and there's a lot of them because North Kleene is the older part of Killeen. So if there's some families that retired from the Army in North Kaleen decades ago, it's not they don't have to go far. Now they have to go on posts, but there's multiple gates on posts, and they could go to that warrior way. So I think that is part a lot of those families are able to do that. Like my you know, my dad retired from the Air Force, and my parents went to a commissary even, you know, even decades after he was out. Because they, you know, if you're in the Army 20 years, you retain those on-based privileges. You can shop at the commissary, there's no taxes there. And and so I think that that I think part of North Kaleen, there's a lot of Army retirees there, and they might be okay with shopping at that Warrior Way commissary, which again is north of North Kaleen. So, you know, that might be another thing. So but even when the old HEB and the IGA were open and available, they weren't great grocery stores. They were small, old, aging, weren't getting a whole lot of customers because people would drive even from North Galleen to the nice H E B plus on Lowe's, you know, or the H E B in Harker Heights, which would be kind of it's on Indian Trail, so it'd be a little bit east of North Galleen, I guess. So I think that's a part of it too. But I think it's certainly true that North Kleene residents want a nice traditional grocery store. So they don't have because we hear the horror stories all the time. Well, it's cold outside and I have to drive, I have to go 30 minutes, you know, to get to a grocery store or whatnot. Because driving to North Kleene is kind of a challenge too. There's not like a clear thoroughway where, you know, there's hardly any stop. You know, if you go to North Kaleen, prepare to stop at stoplights on the way. And you know, there's not you know, there's Fort Hood Street, there's Tremere, there's WSU. But all of those are chalked full of red lights, you know. And you know, so you kind of have to, you know, depending where you are, if you're going from South Galen to North Kalleen, you're gonna stop a lot and it's gonna take some time. Or vice versa, if you're going from North Kleene to South Gene.

SPEAKER_04 11:25

You know, they tried to have a grocery store as an anchor store when when they had their most one of their more more recent proposals. Yeah. And and they would at 38th and Rancy.

SPEAKER_03 11:39

Well, there's a big used to be a movie theater there, burned down, I think.

SPEAKER_04 11:45

Yeah. And but uh the thing is, is like if you get that and if we get enough specialty stores in there, something that you can't find elsewhere in Kaleen. I mean, you're not just gonna throw an ATT shop in a Wendy's and call it good. I mean, you have to have something that other parts of Kleene may not have. People might be willing to go if they can make it a twofer, you know, they go to the grocery store and they can drop by this place. And so it's almost imperative that they did this with Heights, yeah. I mean, in in Coppers Cove, rather, when they open their new HUB there. And you know, they have other stores that are in there. So you have to have that, and you have to have so that requires a lot more land than just a 60,000 foot grocery store. But you know, the thing is they've tried since 2019, so many different times, they've brought consultants in, they've done studies, yeah, they've tried everything they can to make it to where the city can go a direction at least to recruit somebody and say, you know, our our numbers show this. Can you come in and see us? And every single chain that they've looked at, they've had their own agendas. I mean, you know, like Kroger wasn't, you know, they were emerging at the time and they weren't they weren't doing anything. And they almost got uh Walmart neighborhood groceries. Right. Yeah, they were changing their strategy away from that and going back to superstores. And so that that didn't happen. And Brookshire brothers, I think they came close on that one, didn't they?

SPEAKER_03 13:08

Mm-hmm. And for whatever reason, some somehow the negotiations fell through, and they took a while, it was like two years they were negotiating with Brookshire brothers.

SPEAKER_04 13:16

So, I mean, I think people are frustrated, they they think, you know, why not us? And you know, so many places in Texas, so many towns, especially the suburbs of Austin, just growing like weeds, and these other these stores, these chains are looking at them going, like, this is a gold mine here. Why do you want to abandon your gold mine possibility when you're gonna take a chance on a neighborhood that may not be growing, may not have the greatest crime rate. You know, it's it's tough, but you know, that's the economic reality of it.

SPEAKER_03 13:48

And I think the council was kind of taken aback by what Tyler Roberts said, because the clean EDC, they have been involved in the grocery store negotiations. Right, Kevin? You've you've reported on this.

SPEAKER_02 14:04

Yeah, in the past. I mean, especially like when I remember when Scott Connell uh was the uh KDC director or or he was the head honcho there. I mean he uh he basically told me that like you know he he basically gave gave uh told me basically what you guys were just saying that like that the city can't like can't just build a grocery store or like or just have one spread up. It it has to come through as like a business decision from from a company. And so but I know that he was involved with at least trying to help facilitate it somehow because he went down to uh Tulsa, Oklahoma uh with some other other uh city officials. Oasis. Yeah, for Oasis. That's right, when that was going on. And you know, that was under serious consideration, but for whatever reason that didn't pan out either.

SPEAKER_03 14:56

And Oasis is a grocery store in, like I said, Tulsa, Oklahoma, and it is how would you describe it?

SPEAKER_02 15:03

It actually specifically caters towards food deserts. Right. So that's why it's called Oasis. Yeah. And like and it's and it's pretty small. And and I do remember when I was first like writing stories about it, there were some concerns about the person they were dealing with. I I think he had some some I'm not sure if it was like legal trouble or something like that, but yeah, he had some there were some concerns about the guy who was like the CEO of that. Like people thought maybe he wasn't.

SPEAKER_03 15:32

And somehow he had like government help from the Tulsa government. Yeah, that's another thing. Like I said, in the building or whatnot.

SPEAKER_02 15:40

So Yeah, that's the other thing. Like he it was I'm pretty sure in in Oklahoma it was subsidized to some extent. Which I don't I don't think that can happen in Clean or maybe not in Texas as a whole, not not too clear on the state laws regarding that. I mean in New York City with with the new mayor, Mamdame, like like they're I think that they're trying to institute something where they like have like like city-run grocery stores and something in the future. So something like that, yeah. I think I mean honestly, I don't really like like like want to say one way or another whether or not that would necessarily be a good thing or not. But I think that it's worth exploring just simply because it's just no other way to bring grocery store here. That might actually be the only way, but it probably is dependent upon you know state law and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_03 16:28

So and then really there hadn't been much talk recently about a North Kleen grocery store, right, Kevin, until until this June 2nd meeting happened. Hello everyone. Jacob Brooks here, managing editor of the Kleen Daily Herald. You're listening to Inside Kaleen, our way of bringing you deeper into the stories that shape the Kleen Fort Hood area. We love producing this podcast and keeping it free for everyone to enjoy. But the truth is, the local reporting that fuels these episodes requires real resources. Whether it's our daily print edition, our breaking news coverage at kdhnews.com or this very podcast, community journalism depends on listeners and readers like you. By purchasing a digital subscription to kdhnews.com, you aren't just getting unlimited access to our reporting, you are directly investing in the reporters, video journalists, and editors who keep our community informed and hold our leaders accountable. Help us keep the the stories coming. Head over to kdhnews.com slash subscribe today to find the plan that works for you. You can sign up for less than a dollar per week. Thank you for listening to the Inside Clean podcast and thank you for supporting local news.

SPEAKER_02 17:51

Well, I mean, the thing is, I think it's always been something where like the city council members have said that it's very important and like they've repeated it like so many times that I actually got sick of them saying it. Yeah, you know, like but like the thing is like when when somebody when that happened with Tyler Robert and you know looking back at the exchange, like Tyler Robert was speaking in a very, very vague and political way. Yeah. And so it it would have been extremely easy to take him out of context. And and you know, some people have said that that he was. Right. Gonzalez, I think, said that.

SPEAKER_03 18:30

Yeah. That she she said he she went to Tyler Robert afterwards, and I think she said Robert told me it would it was out of context that discussion. And if you if you look at what happened, Brown was really pushing him. And and she started it out by saying Yeah, when I was onboarding, I had a meeting with you, and you told me that some uh city staffer said to back off, you know. And then she was like probing him to say the same thing that they had in this private conversation in front of the whole city, because he was at the podium, it was an open meeting, all the counsel was there, everybody was watching, they're scratching their heads, they're getting frustrated by what he was saying, but he was purposely being vague. And Brown at one point even said, You know, I I you know, I understand you're you're being very careful or you're tactful here, you know, but why don't you just tell me what you said? You know, she kept pushing him.

SPEAKER_02 19:32

Yeah, and you know, I mean, I don't want to like be too hard on Mr. Robert because he's probably like the least guilty party out of anybody. But but like but he was that is not a situation where you have where that is a situation where you need to be clear. And like and that and it's probably due to him not being clear that this whole thing happened anyway.

SPEAKER_03 19:55

I mean, and for the record, we have given Mr. Robert the opportunity to be very clear. We've Kevin, I think you've called him. I've sent him emails requesting an interview. You know, we just want to understand this in the full context, what what happened, who said what. Because he said things that really got the council upset, and and at the same meeting to pass a motion that kind of launched this investigation that you know, Kegel said and here's a quote from him what has been what has been harmed is the city's reputation because all this unfolded at the June 2nd meeting, and then it came back around at the July 7th meeting where Kegel defended himself. And so it's it's big it's like a big mess.

SPEAKER_04 20:48

It is it is a mess. And I had one thing I wanted to bring out, and you know, the I may be in the minority here. I still think that Kimball was set up on this. Um you know, he came forward with a motion that we're gonna talk about this, we're gonna get to the bottom of this, we're gonna investigate, he acted, yeah, I'm gonna I'm gonna lead it. Yeah. And then it gets put on the agenda on a week where he's not there. Uh to talk about again. One is he went on a cruise. It wasn't like he just decided on an impromptu camping trip. So he probably informed the city that he wasn't gonna be there well in advance. At the July 7th meeting. Right. And the second thing is it's only the city council or the the uh city manager and the mayor who can put things on the agenda. So if the mayor and the city manager knew that Mr. Kimball was not gonna be there on that day, why put that discussion out there since he was such a big part of the discussion about finding out what went on? I mean, it seems to me like he was intentionally, like it was done there intentionally, so it would be more favorable to Mr. Cagle to be able to get his side in. I mean, I I may be totally off base on that, but I'm just looking at it. From, you know, as Arsenio Hall used to say, things that make you go, hmm. Because that that's that was just weird that that came up on a week where you know.

SPEAKER_03 22:09

He's not there, although he was the one that launched it. Exactly. Why would you do that? Yeah. And then he was for lack of a better term, he was investigating. He said he was, you know. Uh what do you think, Kevin? You think it was curious that it came back up when Kimball wasn't there?

SPEAKER_02 22:28

Yes, I do think it's curious. However, I do recall seeing in some documents I got from the city through public information that I think that they were trying to, and this could just be an excuse, and and it could just be that you're totally on base here, but they did say that that they were trying to see this is budget season right now, and there's a lot of things that they had to get accomplished at very specific times. And maybe if I'm being generous, they simply felt that that was like the best time. I mean just to get it over with. Yeah, yeah, because because like, you know, even though even though Councilman Kimball was the one that made the motion, it's not necessarily like his job to like put it on the on the agenda. Yeah, I mean, that's like Dave said, that's the mayor and city manager's job. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 23:16

So I just think I think it's odd though when you've got seven council members who are so adamant, and you know, especially Mayor Pro Tem Gonzalez, uh she was livid as she said about this. And you know, Mr. Kimball just he just like really was launched into it too, you know. And he wasn't even on the council when this directive supposed directive was made. But you know, he was all gung-ho about getting to the bottom of this. And so you would think the subsequent discussion would feature all seven council members, or at least the ones who were most, you know, charged up about it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 23:48

And then possibly some findings, because there was a a phone call, let's call it, because it was, where Kimball, you were this was after the June 2nd meeting, but before the July 7th meeting, where we had a couple stories, and you had a phone call with Kimball, and that's where he talked about and you asked him just how's the investigation going, this KDC investigation.

SPEAKER_02 24:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 24:15

And what what was the gist of that conversation?

SPEAKER_02 24:18

By the way, what are you hearing about the council investigation about the KDC? Haven't heard too much about that since it happened.

SPEAKER_01 24:28

Yeah, I am, I am, I since I put the motion in, I'm the one that's doing the interviews. I have one more interview to do, and then I'll uh release my I'll release it to the council and the mayor of what who says what the says you're doing your release.

SPEAKER_02 24:42

You're conducting interviews. So you're conducting the investigation on your own. That's interesting. Okay. I mean a little bit more, but I guess you're gonna probably release it when it's finished. Do you know when that would be by the way? Is it gonna go to the council at some point?

SPEAKER_01 26:15

I mean, we don't think what the government is we we don't have what we try to get. We don't have we don't use the mechanism to do things like this.

SPEAKER_02 26:24

Yeah, no, I know that was a huge discussion as a chart.

SPEAKER_01 26:29

I mean that means that that's conversational lesson, I think it's a good mechanism to do these things.

SPEAKER_02 27:45

I guess if you're able to like let me know, but otherwise I'm looking forward to hearing what that's the same.

SPEAKER_01 27:59

I mean what is the meeting he wants to put that on? I mean there was some timeline giving.

SPEAKER_02 28:09

All right, well, great. Thank you so much. I I really appreciate it, and I guess I'll see you in a few weeks.

SPEAKER_01 28:14

Sure. Thank you, appreciate it.

SPEAKER_02 28:16

All right, take care. The gist of it was that he told me that he and two other council members, Anthony Kendrick and Jessica Gonzalez, were were like working together kind of to to like do an investigation or whatever you want to call it, but but the the wording I used was investigation. And you know, I'll at the time I was surprised actually that that was happening because like like to me it just seemed like this was something that was gonna be more like open somehow. Like I like I was surprised that I was surprised, basically. Like yeah.

SPEAKER_03 28:59

And he didn't in the phone call, he didn't say, Oh, this is not an investigation, you know. He just answered the question. He said, Yeah, I'm not doing it alone. Kendrick is helping, Gonzalez is helping. He's talked to one or more people about it already. They're they were looking at the minutes of EDC meetings.

SPEAKER_02 29:20

They were Yeah, they did say that. And I think that investigation, that word has become something like a scary word for them lately. Yeah, because like from the beginning, yeah. I mean, I think I wonder why that is, but like I think that maybe it just I think there seems to be a fear, a general fear among the council members that some council members will investigate other council members, which I mean to me seems a little bit like strange and maybe even unfounded, but I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 29:54

Yeah. So I mean and uh you know, and I I don't know what word they want us to use, but it it is an investigation. It's not a criminal investigation. I mean, like you can call whatever you're doing. You're talking to people, you're trying to get to the bottom of something. And so you know, we had Councilman Kendrick saying there was no investigation. He said that. There was no investigation. But we also have the city itself on July 7th, when they introduced this item, that's item number 15 on that agenda, the city secretary says uh uh introduced it as the KEDC investigation. So even according to the city, it was an investigation of sorts. Now, was it a real formal official investigation with a lead investigator and a team? And you know, there's it's uh and it I think this came up this week at council, you know with an investigation, an investigation has to be kind of protected in a way. You don't want everybody to have access to it. You don't want every you know, other people to, you know, you don't want to taint the investigation. So it was kind of a a loose uh investigation, I guess if you want to call that, you know, call it that. And we had Kimball investigating, and he's the former Clean police chief, by the way, so he knows how investigations work. And then we had the city also kind of confirming that city staff looked into it, right, Kevin? You want to talk about what they said there?

SPEAKER_02 31:38

Yeah. I mean they said they found nothing, is basically the long and short of it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 31:44

But Lori Wilson, the assistant city manager, sh she was confirmed.

SPEAKER_02 31:54

She was one of the ones that said that they were looking into it.

SPEAKER_03 31:57

And found nothing.

SPEAKER_02 31:58

Yeah, which is which I think is why Councilwoman Brown thought that she was going to be like investigating or sorry, not investigating it, but presenting her findings to the council that day. Uh so I I think that the whole thing ended up kind of weird because like you just had like basically people like shouting at each other. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 32:20

Did Mr. Kimball say, Kevin, that that he was working on his investigation and and he was wrapping it up or something to that?

SPEAKER_03 32:26

He did that in the phone call.

SPEAKER_02 32:28

Yeah, he he made it seem like he was gonna be like at least partially re pr present in the findings. Right.

SPEAKER_04 32:34

And so here he is. But what happened to that? Right. Yeah. So so here's the other thing about it. Okay, and you know, there's this has been discussed. The big bone of contention between Mr. Kegel and Melissa Brown is the fact that it was done in public. You know, Mr. Kagel said this should have been handled in open is in closed session. And as the uh city council's employee, that is a legitimate discussion point. I mean, they could have had it in closed session. He worked for the council, the council hires and fires city managers. So this could have all been done in in private. And he even said when he was discussing it, he said, I said the same thing to you that I said to them, meaning Mr. Kimball, Ms. Gonzalez, and Mr. uh Kendrick, who came by, so when they came by his office, and he acknowledged that they did come by his office to talk to him, and he says, I'm telling you the same thing I told them. Uh there was no directive from me. I can't give directives. I'm only an ex officio member of the EDC. There was no directive from the council, he further said. You know, and he says, and you know, this was all a mess and it was handled poorly, bad process, you name it. He went on and on. Had it been done in private, there's a chance that he would have told them the same thing he said out in public, but they may not have been intimidated by it as much. Because he really went strong.

SPEAKER_03 34:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 34:04

And I think everybody backed off after he, you know, was so forceful with his defense.

SPEAKER_03 34:11

Yeah, Councilman Nash King apologized profusely. And even highly encouraged all the other council members to apologize. None of them did really. No, they came up to the edge. Yeah. They praised Kegel for all his hard work over the years and you know how he's great with the budget. And here's the other thing. They desperately need Kagel right now. Kegel retired as the city manager at the end of May, but agreed to come back on as interim while they're looking for a permanent replacement and basically handle the budget, which is under a lot of strain, let's say. And so they have to pass this, you know, fiscal year 2027 budget in September. And so it's not easily done. It's a massive, it's like a $300 million budget, you know, something like that.

SPEAKER_02 35:06

Uh $350, I believe.

SPEAKER_03 35:08

Yeah. So they have a lot of new people on the council. And and Kagel is a master at the budget. You know, he can get it done. He knows how to do a budget. And so the you know, you know, could Kegel just get up and leave? Screw this. You accuse me of doing something, you know, I'm out of here. They don't want that to happen because then the who what who's gonna lead the city in the budget process?

SPEAKER_04 35:36

Yeah. And have they done it in private, it might not have been so.

SPEAKER_03 35:39

So there's an incentive, I think a big incentive for the council to just drop this and move on and don't upset Mr. Kegel anymore rather than pursue this for a full investigation. Let's just keep Mr. Kegel happy until we get a new permanent, you know, and move on. So and that seems to be what's happening. Kegel is still there. He was there at the meeting, you know, this week. So uh uh yeah, it's uh it's uh it's quite interesting. A lot of people have taken notice. Uh we've done since June 2nd, I think like six or seven stories this past weekend. We had a couple, we had a special report. It ran in the uh July 19th. Kaleen Daily Herald is a big, big spread special report. We had multiple stories explaining the whole issue. We had these big quote boxes of all the major players. We ran these ads, you know, sp you know, marketing the special report that we did. We had a whole video that Hamida uh produced for us. We took real footage from both meetings, put them together with context. Dave Miller was the narrator for that. It was quite a good video, and it really explained the issue, plus our special report. And so if you're listening, just go to KDH News, you can read all that stuff. But we're gonna continue to cover it. You know, we just released the audio yesterday of uh the conversation you had with with Kimball because other, I will say Kendrick was like sh you know, throwing shade on that and like doubting that it even happened. I guess, you know, he got very upset, you know, when he read that he was part of the investigation team, according to Kimball. He got very upset at that.

SPEAKER_02 37:35

Yeah, see, that that's like a situation where I had absolutely no idea how like how like that would like impact things. Because I mean initially I it was really just like two sentences that two very short sentences that that like basically like said that said said that Kimball said blah blah blah that was doing the investigations. I I had no idea it was gonna blow up to be that big of a problem. Like you know, and like it it turned into like like like Councilman Kendrick kind of like I guess questioning my like my integrity and my abilities as a reporter and my honesty, like like from his position of power on the dais.

SPEAKER_03 38:19

Yeah. He said it in an open meeting. And I know Kevin, you didn't like that. We didn't like that. We did file a formal complaint letter in regards to that, because council members shouldn't be use their very important time on the dais where they should be talking about the issues and getting to the bottom of the issues, you know, and you know, getting to the business of the city government rather than just re complaining about something they didn't like.

SPEAKER_02 38:47

Yeah, I mean at that point when you're calling out a journalist specifically, it starts to become like a freedom of speech issue because like because it kind of coalesces with like the idea of like vo like like intimidation and like that sort of thing. Now whether that was his intention or not, I don't know. But I mean but but I certainly felt under a lot of pressure while he was like saying all those things from the diet.

SPEAKER_03 39:12

So and our our formal complaint to the city, which I filed the week after that meeting, sent it to the city secretary, C C'd all the council, the mayor, and we're asking for Councilman Kendrick to be reprimanded for that, which the council can do. They can reprimand one of their own. And they have not done that so far. But uh we're you know, we've tried to meet with with Kendrick afterwards. Dave sent three requests for a meeting with Kendrick, you know, and the mayor. Hey, let's talk about this. Why did you say that? You know, you question our reporting, we can provide you the the recordings. You know, you you have a question about where this came from, listen to it. Come over, let's talk, let's listen to it. They don't want to do that. Kendrick wants to bring a lawyer with him. Okay, bring a lawyer. And then he said, Well, if the city lawyer is gonna be there, you need to have a lawyer of your own there. No, we don't need a lawyer. We're we're civilized people, we can talk. We don't need a lawyer. This is not a legal issue just to talk. But he won't meet with us, and he's you know, unless there's a couple lawyers in the room, which is a little shady. So yeah, it just it doesn't, it's not this is not a good thing for the city of Kaleen. They could have certainly handled it much better at a lot of different points, I think.

SPEAKER_02 40:45

Yeah, 100%. But anyways, I'm pretty sure that this is not the last that we're gonna be discussing of this. Really want to thank both of you for coming on and giving me your insights. It's always appreciated. This has been the Inside Clean podcast brought to you by KDH News. It's produced by Hamida Botchway. My name is Kevin Limity. Have a great day.