by:  Diane Benjamin

City Manager David Hales was on WJBC last week defending his hiring of fired Mattoon City Administrator Sue McLaughlin.  He claims he knew all about her firing.  He also claimed that people in her position create both friends and enemies and there was nothing unethical about her attempting to sell City property to her fiancée for less than market value.  Besides, Hales hired her through an agency so it wasn’t his job to vet her.

That sounds a lot like the excuse the ISU Trustees used in hiring Flanagan.  It is so much easier to blame people you hire!  I wonder where the Pantagraph editorial on Hales is?  They finally wrote one on the ISU Trustees, but then the Trustees don’t pay the Pantagraph for advertising so the Editorial staff was safe writing about them.

You can quit laughing now.  Seriously, quit laughing!

It gets better.  They are searching for a permanent employee and, according to Hales, if Sue applies she will be seriously considered.  In other words, she has the job if she wants it.  She would either get paid $175,000 a year or have to take a pay cut since that’s what $85 per hour amounts to.  http://www.cityblm.org/Modules/ShowDocument.aspx?documentid=6721

Barb Atkins was paid $131,078, with benefits her compensation totaled $168,098 in 2013.  Why did Bloomington need an $85 per hour employee to replace her?  The new hire has access to all kinds of confidential documents.  Does hiring anybody with questionable ethics make sense to you?  Does Hales have questionable ethics?

Done laughing now?  (probably not if you live in Bloomington)

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