As published in Toledo Business Journal - May 1, 2014
Mayoral investigation results surprising
Between 2010 and 2013, when former Toledo Mayor Mike Bell was in office, John Robinson Block (publisher and editor-in-chief of The Blade) had major disagreements with the mayor’s actions. Block and The Blade gave specific direction on many issues which Bell regularly failed to follow.
When Bell ran for reelection, Block and The Blade put significant effort into working toward his defeat. The Blade was used to portray Bell’s leadership as plagued with serious problems, and personal attacks on Bell were a priority in the newspaper.
Block has regularly used the newspaper in campaigns aimed at tarnishing the personal name and reputation of community leaders who do not follow his direction (see Personal Vendetta Exposed Series at www.toledobiz.com). Block has made it known that his vendetta campaigns against these public officials will begin while they are in office and will continue even after their service to the community concludes.
Another Bell investigation
In the Sunday, April 6 edition, The Blade ran a front page story on former Toledo Mayor Mike Bell and his administration. The article revealed that both new City of Toledo Mayor Mike Collins and The Blade used staff members to examine and investigate charges made to credit cards belonging to Bell and members of his administration. Significant time and effort was dedicated to this initiative by the new City of Toledo leadership and The Blade. One focus of this investigation involved periods of time when Bell and members of his staff both traveled on economic development missions overseas and separately hosted foreign visitors in Toledo who they met on these trips.
Investigation results
Major results of the investigation that were disclosed in The Blade article include:
Credit card charges for meals and gasoline were made by Bell and senior members of his staff. The article did not include the full amount of charges or the amount of charges made during each of the trips taken for recruitment of investment in Toledo. The article provided no information indicating that any of the meal or gasoline expenses were improper.
A credit card charge was made for what appears to be several flash drives that are small in size and that cannot now be located. “…We have the invoice, but no flash drives. Not one of them is around here, I can tell you that,” stated Mayor Collins in The Blade article.
A charge was made on former Deputy Mayor Steve Herwat’s credit card for the purchase of an inexpensive camera and accessories ($199). “We have the box, but we have no camera,” stated Collins in The Blade story. The article provided no evidence or information of impropriety involving this $199 camera.
$314 was charged to Herwat’s credit card for the purchase of flowers. No other information was provided about this. There was no evidence or information provided in The Blade article that indicated that this purchase was improper.
Late fees were incurred for failure to pay some of the credit card statements on time. No total amount was provided for these finance fees. It is clear that the City of Toledo should pay its bills on time and avoid late fees.
A charge for $59.33 was made by Bell for a purchase at Target. The Blade article stated, “On Dec. 6, Mayor Bell spent $59.33 at Target. No reason was listed and there was no receipt with the city records.” There was no information provided in The Blade article that indicated that this purchase was improper.
A number of members of Toledo City Council were interviewed for The Blade article. Each councilperson that was contacted by The Blade made a statement to the newspaper that indicated that the City of Toledo should be very careful with any money that it spends.
Surprising results
Significant time and manpower cost from both the City of Toledo and The Blade were used for this investigation.
The results were a complete surprise. How could an investigation of this extent by these two large entities, placed at the top of the front page of The Blade, have such relatively insignificant results?
An examination of the circumstances of these expenditures (that will be reviewed shortly in more detail) provides important insight into travel and hosting expenses by members of the Bell administration.
Recruiting new investment
Interviews with members of the team that traveled both in the US and overseas reveals important information that relates to the issues surfaced in The Blade front page article.
Mayor Bell and other Toledo leaders traveled to China, Japan, and Germany. A significant amount of work was done in advance to schedule meetings with targeted businesses and key officials. According to Paul Zito, vice president international development at the Regional Growth Partnership (RGP), the days were long with meetings and travel beginning early in the morning and lasting into the evening. The team worked to schedule as many appointments and meetings as possible into each day.
“Mayor Bell would begin work before seven in the morning and continued past seven in the evening each day. During our five day trip to Germany last year, I remember him getting a two hour break Sunday night after he had been in meetings the entire day,” stated Zito. According to a number of trip participants interviewed by Toledo Business Journal (TBJ), by the end of each of these economic development missions, the members were exhausted.
The fact that City of Toledo leadership did not do this type of work regularly, attempted to schedule a high number of meetings in the limited time available, and were trying to do this type of recruitment in China, Japan, and Germany suggests that there should have been an expectation that extra money would be spent and that some of the money would not be spent efficiently.
Given the circumstances of these trips, it is surprising that after an investigation of credit card expenditures conducted by the new City of Toledo leadership and The Blade that there were not issues of more substance that surfaced.
However, The Blade followed the front page investigation story by publishing a column in its April 17 edition. The column written by the newspaper’s Keith C. Burris stated, “…I don’t know how public officials can spend that much money partying hearty on the public dime when thousands of Toledoans, many of them children, go to bed hungry at night.”
Private sector leaders participated in the foreign investment recruitment efforts that were a focus of The Blade investigation. These individuals witnessed the actions of Bell and members of his staff both on these trips and during visits by foreign investors to Toledo. How many of these individuals did Burris interview before he made these comments to readers of The Blade?
Why did Burris not include comments from even one of these individuals that would have either supported or rejected his allegations that left readers to believe that Bell and his staff members were “partying hearty” on taxpayer funds?
The front page investigation article published in The Blade did not provide any information that City of Toledo funds had been spent for inappropriate activities. If Bell and his staff were so busy “partying hearty on the public dime”, why did neither the front page investigation article in The Blade or Burris’ column provide any documentation of such behavior?
Front page story
With the relatively insignificant results of this investigation, why was this article placed at the top of the front page of The Blade?
Why was this article published on a Sunday when The Blade’s circulation is higher?
Why was a large photograph of Bell, a former football player, placed at the top of the newspaper with the bold, negative headline above it reading “Like plastic on steroids’?
And why did The Blade provide information to its readers that Bell and his staff were busy “partying hearty” and using City of Toledo funds to do so that was unsupported by even one witness?
Misleading information
Both the front page article published in The Blade and Burris’ column were designed to raise the suggestion of impropriety. There was a skilled use of headlines, photos, and content in the front page article that attempted to imply some sort of wrongdoing.
The Blade article stated, “Mayor Bell’s administration also was filled with travel - including multiple trips to China, one to Japan, and a visit to Germany last year. The former mayor traveled so much it was difficult to know which charges related to which trips…”
The article further stated, “A Blade review of credit card statements and receipts for the three men (Bell, Herwat, and former Deputy Mayor Tom Crothers) showed thousands of dollars of taxpayer dollars spent on food, drinks, gasoline, and flowers.”
There was no information in the article that provided any evidence of wrongdoing. The Blade article did attempt to imply that it was wrong for Bell and other team members to spend money on food, lodging, drinks, gasoline, and gifts when they traveled overseas or hosted foreign investors in Toledo as they worked to recruit new investment to the area.
Were these efforts to recruit new investment to the community really acts of wrongdoing by Bell and his staff? And were these travel and hosting expenditures really made for personal benefit and enjoyment as The Blade is attempting to have readers believe?
The Blade article provided information that glass pieces were purchased from the Toledo Museum of Art store and “handed over” as gifts to foreign officials and business professionals.
There will be people who read The Blade article who are not experienced in doing such business recruitment work. They may not be familiar with the need to host and entertain and extend gifts to officials and business prospects.
The Blade front page article was aimed at this audience and designed to create an appearance of impropriety.
Burris’ column and his comments were aimed at all of the newspaper’s readers. He made strong allegations of wrongdoing that were not substantiated with supporting facts.
Personal vendetta
Block and his newspaper have published many of these type of articles in the past. Significant effort is put into selecting photos, crafting headlines, and creating and manipulating content that attempts to have readers believe that some sort of wrongdoing took place. These articles are published to tarnish an individual’s name and reputation.
Toledo Business Journal has documented a number of these past “vendetta campaigns” in a series titled Personal Vendetta Exposed that can be found at www.toledobiz.com. One of the editorials in this series appeared in the February 1, 2014 edition of Toledo Business Journal. This editorial stated, “In the past Toledo Business Journal investigated other actions undertaken by Block and his newspaper. Each time, these investigations exposed the real story behind Block and The Blade’s actions.
“In each case examined, the information that The Blade provided to its readers did not include Block’s true motivations and certainly did not share that he was using the newspaper to conduct personal vendettas against community leaders who did not follow the direction he gave.”
The recent front page article and Burris’ column published in The Blade were another use of the media organization’s resources in an attempt to target the former Toledo mayor who would not follow the directions given by Block and his newspaper.
Toledo priorities
This investigation of Bell’s credit card use appeared to have been initiated by new Toledo Mayor Mike Collins.
There will be readers who want to understand why Collins was so personally involved in this effort and why he spent as much of his valuable time looking for such things as several flash drives, an inexpensive camera, and a $59 credit card charge at Target.
With the number of serious issues facing Toledo, aren’t there higher priorities waiting for solutions from the Mayor and his staff?
Collins and Bell did have a long history of being political adversaries.
Block and The Blade did play a role in Collins’ election.
Would an investigation by The Blade of the economic impact the newspaper has had on the region yield results of more significance than the investigation of a $59.33 credit card charge at Target?
