Marting Brick

“. . . the Albrecht-Gampp combination appear to be clowns by comparison.”

                                                            Marting Brick is falling down,

                                                            Falling down, falling down,

                                                           Marting Brick is falling down,

                                                           My fair lady.

On January 26, 2013, a report appeared in the Portsmouth  Daily (except Monday) Times on bricks falling from the Marting building onto the property of the American Savings Bank (ASB). The anthropologist and linguist Levi Strauss   hypothesized that one of the reasons humans developed language was to deceive.  Deception is important  in human activities, especially politics and business.  The  Portsmouth Daily Times (PDT) is a business and practices deception, especially since it is a failing business whose days are numbered.

“Portsmouth boy” reporter  Frank Lewis has spun quite a deceptive tale about Marting bricks. It is deceptive, at least in regard to intentions, as much in  what he  left out as  what he put in. The following sentence appears near the end of Lewis’s tale:  “The city purchased the building in May of 2002, and has done nothing with the building, allowing it to fall into deep disrepair.” This clearly makes it sound as if the city is the culprit where the Marting building is concerned.   The city is not guiltless but is far less guilty than the Marting Foundation and the mastermind behind the Foundation, Clayton Johnson.

What Lewis left out of his tale was that the “purchase”  of the Marting building was a swindle made possible by the conniving of two willing tools—then-mayor Greg Bauer and then-city council president Jim Kalb. But the perpetrator and the orchestrator  of the Marting swindle was Clayton Johnson,  the brains of the Marting Foundation. Having wrung every dollar it could from the crumbling bricks of the Marting building, the Marting Foundation  then foisted the building  off on the taxpayers of Portsmouth who paid about five times more for the bricks than they were worth. In fact, the bricks were not worth anything. They were worst than worthless: they were a tax liability  and a potentially large expense since the leaking asbestos building would need to be torn down at the Foundation’s expense.  

Is Clayton Johnson  mentioned even once by Lewis? No. Not one PDT reporter or editor has ever  criticized Johnson, and if anyone  had he or she would have been out of a job pronto. But the Johnson era is definitely now over. He’s retired and spending most of his time in the scalawag heaven of Hilton Head. And now that  Hatcher has turned into a public benefactor, with a public athletic complex named after him, could his rapacious career as a developer be drawing to a close?

What  Lewis reveals in his Falling Bricks tale is that  we are now living in  the beginning of the Gampp-Albrecht  era. Gampp is portrayed in Lewis’s tale as the good guy, concerned not only about the well-being of  bank property  but also of  the good citizens of Portsmouth who might  he clobbered by a falling brick. “Yes I know it’s a once in a million chance that someone could be walking down the alley and a brick could fall and hit them in the head,” Gampp told Lewis, “but it is there.”  He explained further, “So we want to make sure that we don’t have damage caused to our structure, and we want to be appropriately compensated if something does happen. But, beyond that, our concern was then, and still is, we don’t want to risk the safety or health of anyone, and our concern is, that as bricks start falling out of that building, we don’t want to see anyone get hurt.” Is it possible that Gampp, a banker, is more concerned about  people than profits? Or is Lewis’s tale confirmation of Levi Strauss’s suspicion that language evolved to deceive?

Lewis’s tale is not really about  bricks. You have been deceived if you think it is. His tale is not about the Marting building, either, not really. It is about the Municipal Building, or more specifically the land on which the Municipal Building rests. The last paragraph of Lewis’s tale drags in the the Municipal Building by the eaves. “Meanwhile, the city remains in a building on property considered by some as the most valuable piece of property in downtown Portsmouth with no solid plans for where they will house government offices in the future. All the while, bricks continue to fall from the Marting’s Fifth Street building, a brick at a time, with still no remedy in sight.”

  The developer Jeff Albrecht has been lusting for  the land under the Municipal Building for at least fifteen years. What  Albrecht wants to do is tear down the Municipal Building, and Gampp is abetting him by hyping the danger of falling Marting bricks,  suggesting by analogy that the Municipal Building is falling down and should be bulldozed as soon as possible, if not sooner. Intelligent people will not be fooled by the stupid deception. If Marting brick is falling down,  so is the IQ of the crooks in  control of the city.  I could never have imagined I would one day look back nostalgically on the Johnson-Hatcher era, but  the Albrecht-Gampp combination appear to be clowns by comparison.

J. Scott Douthat: The Specter of SSU's Anemic Academic Reputation

“What Professor Douthat and his students did at the Celebration of Scholarship, 
as the photo of him speaking at the Celebration suggests to me,  was to revive
 the Bela Lagosi-like  specter of SSU’s anemic academic reputation.” 

  

In 2012, a sociology professor at Shawnee State University, J. Scott Douthat, conducted a class whose ambitious aim was to address the many social and economic problems of Portsmouth. Such a daunting task would seem to require a multidisciplinary approach. Anyone addressing Portsmouth’s many problems—the poverty, unemployment, drug addiction, prostitution, political corruption, etc.—would need to understand not just sociology but also economics, political science, history, and other disciplines. Is Douthat multidisciplinary? What was the upshot of his class’s work? What conclusions did they reach? As the story on the front page of the SSU student newspaper The Chronicle put it in April 2012, the conclusion Professor J. Scott Douthat and his student researchers presented at the annual Celebration of Scholarship was that Portsmouth needs to be revitalized to become “the ‘All American [sic] City’ it once was 33 years ago . . .” As a former faculty member I’m embarrassed by such nonsense. The ignorance implied in the statement reflects poorly on us all. That Douthat conducts a real estate business in Portsmouth, rents to students, and has a private consulting practice, in addition to his full-time faculty position at SSU, may help explain why his students are not better prepared.

      One of the disciplines Professor Douthat and his students showed a poor grasp of at SSU’s 2012 Celebration of Scholarship is history, and in particular Portsmouth’s history. Contrary to what Douthat and his students mistakenly assumed, “33 years ago” was not the Golden Age of Portsmouth. On the contrary, In 1979-1980 Portsmouth was at perhaps its lowest point, at least politically, in the twentieth century, which was not surprising since the city had begun going downhill economically, socially, and politically after the Second World War. By 1979, when Barry Feldman (click here) was Portsmouth’s controversial city manager, the city was in desperate need of public relations. But Douthat and his students naively assumed, because Portsmouth had been designated an All-America City by the National Civic Association in 1979, that that period was Portsmouth’s finest hour. The promoter of All America City is the National Civic League (NCL), which was, and still is, primarily in the public relations business, which it is very good at. Cities looking to improve their image and reputation enter NCL’s annual All America City contest. One of the aims of public relations is to spin the news so that the public is too confused to know which side, or which city, is up. The essence of public relations is to use words and images to make anything, no matter how bad, look good or at least better. The historian Daniel Boorstin wrote wryly, “Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some hire public relations officers.” What some cities wanting to improve their reputations do is enter the National Civic League’s All-America City contest, as Portsmouth did in 1979. As an employee of NCL candidly admitted, the All-America City award is often used by the winners “for signs, for civic pride [and] to sell their city to corporations.” 

    Unfortunately, Portsmouth found no takers. Corporations continued their exit from our river city after 1979. What the city is left with now is little civic pride, no large corporations, and a big peeling icon of the All-America City on the river side of the flood wall. Peeling or not, it apparently still can fool some people, including Douthat and his students, into thinking Portsmouth’s past was so much better than its awful present. This is the stuff that myths, the ultimate in public relations, are made of.

      Mistakes or inaccuracies of any kind at SSU’s Celebration of Scholarship are unfortunate because the university from its founding in 1986 had gained a reputation as a  fourth-rate academic institution. U.S. News annually ranked SSU near the bottom of the lowest (fourth) tier of American colleges and universities. I wrote about those anemic rankings in April 2005:

Shawnee State is one of the 217 small liberal arts colleges that US News ranked for 2005. The 217 colleges are divided, by quality, into four tiers, the best in the top tier, the worst at the bottom. Shawnee State is one of 53 colleges in Tier 4, the bottom group. Not only that, it is near the bottom of the bottom group, and it has been ranked near the bottom of the bottom for at least a decade. By reputation (on a scale of 1 to 5) SSU is currently ranked at 1.6. There are only 4 colleges among the 217 that have a worse ranking.

What Professor Douthat and his students did at the Celebration of Scholarship, as the photo of him speaking on that occasion suggests to me, was to revive the Bela Lagosi-like  specter of SSU’s anemic academic reputation. Lagosi became famous playing  Dracula in the movies.

Bela Lagosi as the specter of SSU's anemic academic reputation

     Aside from looking the part, how did Douthat manage to raise the specter of academic anemia? Let me count the ways. Although he is a professor of sociology at SSU, Douthat’s B.A. and  Ph.D. degrees are both in psychology, not sociology, with the doctorate being specifically in forensic psychology. Yet he is, an associate professor of sociology at SSU and the coordinator of the department’s sociology major. The ideal venue for a forensic psychologist is the courtroom, not the classroom. Be that as it may, Union Institute and University, a primarily online institution where Douthat received his Ph.D. in 2005, is not, or at least was not, the best place to have a Ph.D. from in any field. In a useful consumer protection website, Ripoff Report, a frustrated Ph.D. candidate in religious studies wrote a long, detailed complaint in 2004 of his unhappy experiences with Union. “Now, as usual,” the candidate wrote, “further attempts to get the administration to update and correct my records and my program, have met with silence and inaction. This is only one string in this very long and complicated series of problems in which all attempts to get things cleaned up have met with, at most, a momentary flutter of activity that has resulted in no significant change except for often creating more problems.” One dissatisfied student, or perhaps he should be called customer, is one thing, but a complaint from an agency of the state of Ohio and another from the federal government is something else. In 2002, the Ohio Board of Regents (OBR) issued a report critical of Union’s Ph.D. program, finding that “expectations for student scholarship at the doctoral level were not as rigorous as is common for doctoral work . . .” As was reported in the Cincinnati Inquirer, the OBR called for a major overhaul of Union’s Ph.D. programs. Not long afterward the U.S. Department of Education (USDE) became concerned that the millions of federal dollars that were going to subsidize Union graduate students were not being distributed according to federal guidelines. The USDE  insisted on more accountability before it would release more funds. Shouldn’t somebody at SSU insist on more accountability from students and especially from professors participating in the Celebration of Scholarship?

Portsmouth's unelected mayor, David Malone, trying to balance city budget

      Who if  anybody benefited from Professor Douthat’s  class? A chief public relations beneficiary of the 2012 Celebration of Scholarship was Portsmouth’s unelected mayor David Malone, who embodies to an egregious degree the incompetency, dishonesty, and financial and moral  bankruptcy of  Portsmouth’s politicians.  “Several of the solutions proposed by students  to mayor Malone have been implemented,” The Chronicle reported. “Mayor Malone recently implemented the students’ suggestion that inmates could perform public services and clean up the city.” Oh?  My recollection is that inmates have been doing clean up for a long time. I checked with former mayor Murray, who, unlike the out-to-lunch, philandering Malone, was elected mayor and did not come in through a trap door. She informed me that utilizing inmates did not start with Malone. They were already being utilized when she became mayor, but she, along with the probation director and Health Dept. staff expanded it to include “litter control, mowing, cleaning the city buildings, etc.” Another proposal that one of  Douthat’s students came up with was increasing the city’s property taxes. This proposal is so misguided as to be insulting to the property owners of the city. No one who knew anything about the recent history of property taxes and other taxes in Portsmouth would seriously propose it.

    An earlier generation of students, twenty years ago,  on their own initiative, made a big impact on SSU and later on the city. Because The Chronicle lacked true editorial independence, these crusading students started their own newspaper The Shawnee Sentinel. SSU did everything it could to suppress these students and prevent their newspaper from being distributed on campus. This is part of the hidden history of SSU that Douthat’s students and perhaps Douthat himself are oblivious to. One of those former students, Austin Leedom, has an archive that includes copies of The Shawnee Sentinel and thousands of other documents that bring to light SSU’s hidden history. If only his collection could be made part of the archives at the Clark Library, SSU students would not have to rely on unqualified professors and back copies of  the politically correct  Chronicle for their research. It is time that a stake be driven though the heart of the anemic corpse that is SSU’s reputation as a fourth-class institution.

The peeling All-America icon on the Portsmouth flood wall

"Portsmouth Boy": James R. Saddler, II [reposted]

[In January 13, 2011, I posted the following opinion piece on Richard R. Saddler, II, following his appointment as the council member for Ward Two. The doubts I expressed about Saddler’s appointment then have been confirmed in the two years since. Austin Leedom tells me that our “Portsmouth Boy” outdid himself in assininity at tonight’s council meeting. The record of those who first got on the council by being appointed is a sorry one, but what else can we expect when drug-dealing pimps, drunken drivers, deadbeat dads, and bankrupt failures are shown preference as appointees?]

. . . . . . . . . .

 “There are some issues with some of our local roads and infrastructure, things like that that might be easily fixed.” Richard R. Saddler, II, Portsmouth’s new city councilman (shown above taking oath of office), as quoted in the 11 January 2011 Portsmouth Daily Times story headed “Council gives Saddler 2nd Ward seat.”

“Give” is the right verb to describe the city council’s action in regard to Richard R. Saddler, II. When a member vacates a seat on the city council for any reason, the other members give the seat to the applicant of their choice. One of the last persons to be given a council seat, prior to Saddler,  was the notorious Mike Mearan. The list of of council members who were first given rather than elected to council seats is long and reflects a serious problem in Portsmouth’s city charter. The four-year terms for all elected officials invites recalls and political shenanigans.

Like Mearan before him, Saddler has never run for city council or attended city council meetings or shown much interest in city government. This is often the case with those who are given seats on city council. Unwilling or too lazy or too chicken to run for a seat,  they are only too happy to be given it, usually with the blessing of the unelected crooks who control the city.  Having been given the seat, they have an advantage in future elections because they are  the incumbent, which helps them remain in office, though in Mearan’s case incumbency was not enough to get him elected. Portsmouth has sunk very low but not that low.

When Saddler told the Daily Times, “There are some issues with some of our local roads,” what was he referring to? Was he referring to the issues of traffic lights and vehicular safety, which Mayor Murray had given a high priority to but which Police Chief Horner had spitefully opposed. (Horner’s ideal would be a Portsmouth that is completely free of traffic lights and farting.) Traffic lights were probably not one of the issues Saddler referred to when he spoke of “local roads,” because the traffic lights issue will not be  “easily fixed,” to quote his words. You don’t have to be a member of the traffic committee to know that. In mentioning “local roads,” Saddler might have been referring to  potholes, or something like that. [I feel fairly sure one of the issues he is not concerned with is drunken drivers.]

The Son of Hell-on-Wheels Bihl

But since he mentioned roads,  rather than the deficits, drugs, or traffic safety,  I would say that if Saddler  is no better as a councilman than he is as a driver, then we’re in for a hell of a ride. From 1992 to 2008, Saddler  had twenty-one traffic violations, many of them  for  speeding and not using a seat-belt. (See his rap sheet below.)  In not wearing a seatbelt, he was not only breaking the law; he was  endangering his own life. In  speeding, he was not only breaking the law, he was also endangering the lives of others. If Saddler had  twenty-one moving violations in sixteen years, how many times was he not caught speeding and driving without a seat belt? Is Saddler “The Son of Hell-on-Wheels Bihl”? Saddler is just the kind of driver who is all the more dangerous the fewer traffic lights there are in the city. And he would be even more dangerous if he was driving while under the influence. But in  none of Saddler’s  twenty-one traffic violations is there any mention of alcohol. It’s hard  to believe that someone would  drive above the speed limit without a seatbelt as many times as Saddler has, and in every one of those instances be cold sober. It’s possible he never drinks and drives, and it’s possible he doesn’t drink at all. It’s possible, also,  that former Police Chief Tom Bihl, when he totaled  two parked cars on Offnere Street back in 1998  was cold sober,  as he later claimed he was. But how  can we be sure since he was  not given a breathalyzer test, which Saddler apparently wasn’t given either in   any  one of his  twenty-one moving violations.

I have been driving for twenty two years in Portsmouth and have never received so much as parking  ticket, but that’s probably because I  drive much less than Saddler. The only driving I do is the couple of miles of day on round trips to the Life Center.  But you don’t need to drive much to be at risk on “local roads,” especially since the number of traffic lights has been reduced. On my way to the Life Center one day  several years ago I was slammed into by a young woman racing through a stop sign at an otherwise  quiet intersection on Findlay Street, not far from the notorious pain clinic.

Since city  traffic lights were unwisely covered up during Kalb’s incompetent and corrupt administration, driving has become even more nerve wracking. Crossing Route 52 in particular has became a heart stopper, and about six months ago I saw a very serious accident at a Route 52 intersection where the light was covered.  One night just several months ago driving south on Chillicothe Street I was sideswiped by a car going over the speed limit. I tried following  the compact white sports car to get the  license plate, but the young male driver sped away. I had to replace the driver’s side rear view mirror. Since I didn’t get the license number, I  didn’t report it to the police.  I also didn’t report to the police another time when my car was broken into and some personal belongings were stolen. I am told that Horner’s officers discourage those involved in  traffic accidents or a petty theft reporting, unless they file a claim with their  insurance company. I am told that is how Horner is reducing Portsmouth crime and accident rate is being reduced: by discouraging victims from formally reporting them unless they are filing a claim with their insurance company. As long as Horner is chief, the real crime and accident rate may not see the light of day.

Troubling Questions

I will conclude with some  troubling questions about Saddler and offer some troubling answers. What will happen when and if Saddler gets another moving violation? Will he go to court to appeal it, now that as a councilman he has more political influence? And suppose, if he appeals the violation, that Steve Mowery is the judge presiding at the municipal court. Prior to being elected municipal judge, Mowery was the lawyer who represented Saddler in his divorce,  and Mowery is also one of the “friends” on Saddler’s Facebook site. There is even a photo of Mowery in shades (shown at left). Mowery is the one who when campaigning for municipal judge said that the Municipal Building should be torn down and the city government, including the municipal court, should be moved to a renovated Marting building. Mowery’s opponent in the contest for municipal judge correctly pointed out that whether the Municipal Building should be torn down and whether the city government should move to the Marting building is something the voters, not a municipal judge,  should decide. The  decision not to renovate the Marting building has already been rendered, twice, by the voters of Portsmouth. But the recall of Mayor Murray and the installation of David Malone as her replacement, and the “giving” of the Ward Two council seat to Saddler is probably the prelude to completing the Marting Scam, and the voters be damned. Malone, the Uncle Tom of Portsmouth, has already indicated he is in favor of spending the millions of dollars that the city doesn’t have to renovate the Marting building, and there is  no question how Hassle’em and  Bash’em will vote. In Saddler we already know we have one for the road, and it may not be long before we have another for the Marting building. 

Just the good ol’ boys,

Never meanin’ no harm.

Beats all you ever saw,

Getting in trouble with the law

Since the day they was born.

* * *

Traffic Violations of James R. Saddler, II

1

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 02/24/1992

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 9201332

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: SEAT BELT-DRIV

Case Type: Traffic

2

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 01/06/1997

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 9700112

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: 64/45 SPEED

Case Type: Traffic

           

3

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 09/19/1997

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 9705887

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: 67/55 SPEED

Case Type: Traffic

4

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 06/15/2000

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0004500

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: 70/55 SPEED

Case Type: Traffic

5

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 06/15/2000

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0004500

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: SEAT BELT-DRIV

Case Type: Traffic

6

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 04/17/2001

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0102442

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: FOLLOW TOO CLOS

Case Type: Traffic

7

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 04/17/2001

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0102442

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: SEAT BELT-DRIV

Case Type: Traffic

8

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 10/12/2001

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0107630

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: 66/55 SPEED

Case Type: Traffic

9

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 10/12/2001

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0107630

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: SEAT BELT-DRIV

Case Type: Traffic

10

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 05/17/2002

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0202903

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: 65/55 SPEED

Case Type: Traffic

11

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 05/17/2002

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0202903

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: SEAT BELT-DRIV

Case Type: Traffic

12

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Case #: 9705887

Docket Entry: Click

Filed: 09/19/1997

Arr. Agency: OSP

Charge: SEAT BELT-DRIV

Case Type: Traffic

13

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 09/19/1997

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 9705900

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: 67/55 SPEED

Case Type: Traffic

14

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 07/09/2002

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0204754

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: 50/40 SPEED

Case Type: Traffic

15

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 07/09/2002

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0204754

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: SEAT BELT-DRIV

Case Type: Traffic

16

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 10/18/2006

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0606781

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: 75/55 SPEED

Case Type: Traffic

17

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 05/08/2007

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0702581

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: 58/35 SPEED

Case Type: Traffic

18

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 05/08/2007

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0702581

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: SEAT BELT-DRIV

Case Type: Traffic

19

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 01/04/2008

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0800067

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: 70/55 SPEED

Case Type: Traffic

20

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 12/01/2008

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0808118

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: PHYSICAL CONTRO

Case Type: Traffic

21

Concerning: Saddler, James R II

D.B.A./A.K.A.:

Filed: 12/01/2008

Arr. Agency: OSP

Case #: 0808118

Docket Entry: Click

Charge: MARKED LANES

Case Type: Traffic