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COLUMBUS, Ga. — This week saw one of the most divisive, destructive, and shameful displays of racial political action in the recent memory of our city.
During the city council meeting on February 28, 2023, 18 speakers were scheduled to present to council for five minutes each. Of those 18, only eight spoke in support of our city’s objectively-failed police chief, Freddie Blackmon.
Those speakers seized the opportunity to make illogical, objectively-false, and disgustingly race-baiting claims in an attempt to blame Blackmon’s years of well-documented leadership failures on racism. The speakers conveniently ignored any sort of logical connection between years of formal studies of the department’s leadership, the city’s skyrocketing homicide and violent crime rate, and the hundreds of officers who continue to resign from the department who specifically cite Blackmon’s abhorrent leadership as the reason for their resignations.
Many of those speakers are known friends and family members of city manager Isaiah Hugley.
Before we dive into the events of this past week and our articles that documented it all along the way, here’s a brief recap for newer readers who may be joining us for the first time:
After two years of Blackmon’s tenure, the department has a vacancy rate of 41% with roughly 290 officers of its 488 funded positions. Of the several hundred officers who have churned out of the department at a rate far exceeding Blackmon’s ability to recruit, Blackmon’s poor leadership, terrible communication skills, and lack of strategic aptitude continue to be cited as the reason for the officers’ departures. Officers continue to assert that they are gravely concerned for the safety and security of our city with the department under Blackmon’s command.
The officers’ continued concerns match the findings of four professional studies conducted on the department. In 2021, a SWOT analysis performed in partnership with Columbus State University formally documented the same concerts, though city officials ignored the findings as the city’s rates of violent crime continued to surge. In January 2022, an internal retention committee conducted an investigation on why officers were continuing to resign from the department. The committee also found that Blackmon’s leadership was the cause, though both Blackmon and city officials continued to ignore the situation as the department continued to devolve.
One month later in February 2022, the Fraternal Order of Police conducted a survey of all its CPD members — 73% of the department overall. The survey found that 70% of our entire city’s police force had no confidence in Blackmon’s ability to lead the department.
When those findings were presented to city officials as officers gave a formal vote of no confidence in Blackmon’s leadership ability, city manager Isaiah Hugley responded by condemning the findings, opting to claim that the findings must somehow be racist instead.
As a result, officers left the department in droves as our city sharply tanked into a violent state of urban decay.
One year later, just a few weeks ago from today, on February 14, 2023, a forth study on the department by none other than Jensen Hughes — the nation’s premiere law enforcement consulting firm — was formally presented to city council after the original publication of its findings in November of last year. Jensen Hughes is the same firm that investigated the Minneapolis Police Department after the death of George Floyd.
Unsurprisingly, the findings of Jensen Hughes’ months-long study of the department found exactly the same sort of extreme leadership deficiencies being the primary driving factor of the department’s woes, going so far as to say that “Addressing the development of leadership within the organization is critical for future success.” During the live presentation of the study’s findings to city council, Jensen Hughes representatives continued to state that they “cannot underscore enough” how important the leadership correction is to the future success of the department.
In response to the findings, city council members unanimously voted to give chief Freddie Blackmon until March 14, 2023 to present council with a formal strategic plan for how he intends to run the department and fix the absolutely disgraceful command climate his incompetence has created.
It’s important to note that this sort of a plan should have been in place since day one of Blackmon’s time as chief. Blackmon was not merely provided with a one-month timeframe — he has had two years, three months, and twenty-two days. He has never had a plan, and his demonstrated years of failure are living proof. If he had a plan, he could have just emailed it to council that day.
IF HUGLEY KEEPS FANNING RACE & DIVISION, PERHAPS IT’S TIME TO RELIEVE HIS POSITION
“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.” — Martin Luther King, Jr.
Despite these powerful words from one of the most revered and powerful uniters in our nation’s history, many continue to do the exact opposite.
Not only do some continue to judge their fellow man by the color of their skin and not the content of their character, but they insist that you must do so also — or else.
We’re not having that in our city. We don’t do that here. We do not judge people — at all — by the color of their skin, but rather by the content of their character; by their merits; by their demonstrated ability; by their professional competence.
Nonetheless, city manager Isaiah Hugley continues to see color as both a greater metric by which to judge the worthiness of city officers and the inevitable instrument of malevolence through which the public must somehow be as well. See: psychological projection.
Be sure to see the end of this article for the legal means through which our city council may vote to remove Isaiah Hugley from his position as a city officer, given how Hugley’s “personal interest is incompatible with the proper discharge of his official duties which tend to impair his independence of judgment or action.”
As a result of the continued racial tensions fanned by Hugley during that city council meeting in February of last year, city officials continued to ignore the severe leadership problems. Because of Hugley’s divisive quantum leaps of assumption that insisted race was somehow a factor, officials were too politically afraid to take any appropriate action. In turn, the abhorrent lack of leadership from Freddie Blackmon wasn’t only permitted to continue destroying the department, but was subconsciously encouraged; without the threat of consequences for his lack of professional ability, Blackmon felt more emboldened and justified in how he was choosing to run his department.
As a result, things got worse. And worse. And worse. Officers continued to resign, leaving the department with a 41% vacancy rate for its 488 sworn officer positions. The city’s 26 police beats are now often covered by fewer than 12 officers total per shift, even at night. Just last week on the night of February 22, there were a mere eleven total officers patrolling the entire city from 10 p.m. until 6 a.m. There should have been between 45 and 50 officers on patrol. Instead, there were eleven; fifteen fewer officers than there are beats to patrol.
Without the proper number of officers to police our city and keep our residents safe, violent crime has continued to rise. And rise. And rise.
In 2021, the city experienced 70 homicides at a rate of 34 per hundred-thousand residents. If Columbus were a country, it would have ranked the 11th most dangerous nation on earth in terms of homicide rate, right behind Nigeria and South Africa in tenth and ninth places respectively.
That same year, the Fountain City had 181 shooting victims. That number increased by 8.28% by 2022 to a total of 196 shooting victims.
Had the Columbus Police department’s severe leadership problems been properly addressed by our city officials instead of being cowardly dismissed through Hugley’s erroneous insistence on racism, we at the Muckraker would bet the proverbial farm that the department would have not only retained the invaluable experience of the hundreds of officers who have since resigned from the department, but that it would have also greatly increased its rolls so our city’s 26 police beats could have been properly patrolled.
But that didn’t happen.
Explore the full story to see the legal means through which our city council may vote to remove Isaiah Hugley from his position as a city officer, given how Hugley’s “personal interest is incompatible with the proper discharge of his official duties which tend to impair his independence of judgment or action.”
HENDERSON CANDIDLY BLAMED THE PRESS FOR PUBLISHING HIS CITY'S LEADERSHIP MESS
“Journalism is reporting things powerful people want kept hidden for the wrong reasons: moral wrongs, bad behaviors. As journalists, we are the custodians of the public’s conscience.” — James O’Keefe, referencing Custodians of Conscience: Investigative Journalism and Public Virtue, by James S. Ettema and Theodore L. Glasser.
Mayor Skip Henderson apparently has an awful lot to learn about why he should not attempt to silence, coerce, or influence the press.
During the 38th annual Black History Month Observance Breakfast yesterday on Feb. 27, Mayor Skip Henderson gave a statement that covertly sought to influence the public and the press to not publish stories that harshly criticize the state of our city.
Through a poorly-veiled metaphor of handwriting, Henderson asked the rhetorical question of whether we are using “divisive strokes, harsh and angry strokes, or the smooth flowing strokes of a loved one … when we are writing our collective history.”
Henderson then went on to encourage everyone to only speak and write with those “smooth strokes ” when writing the history of our city.
Respectfully, Mr. Mayor: you do not get to decide that, and you may politely go muck yourself for having tried.
Having an elected official — let alone the mayor of a city — suggest that we only speak, write, and publish positive things is precisely the reason why we shouldn’t — and it is exactly the sort of cultural kneecapper that has landed our city in the violent state of urban decay it is currently in.
The real world doesn’t run on the unicorn farts and fairy dust Henderson wishes would magically hide the malevolent wrongdoings and violent crimes our city continues to experience each and every day under his charge. The real world doesn’t run on kumbaya. The real world has gunshot victims. The real world has grieving families. The real world has consequences.
Explore the full story to see how Henderson is ironically in control of what our city’s journalists — real journalists — have available for their reporting on the actions of his administration.
HOW ONE MAN’S INTEGRITY UNITES OUR CITY WHILE OTHERS PLAY THE RACE CARD
“Great leaders are almost always great simplifiers, who can cut through argument, debate and doubt, to offer a solution everybody can understand.” — Gen. Colin Powell.
The city council meeting held on Feb. 28, 2023 was perhaps the most divisive, destructive, and vulgar display of human dishonesty in our recent memory — though one man’s integrity worked to unite our city instead.
During the public agenda portion of the specially-called meeting, more than a dozen residents angrily spewed race-baiting, divisive, accusatory, completely unfounded, and literally-illogical narratives in futile attempts to defend police chief Freddie Blackmon’s years of leadership failures during his time as chief of police. They were nasty — and when we say nasty, we mean the same sort of behavior that potentially leads to violence. It was that bad. Grotesque. Disgusting. Embarrassing. Degrading.
One man, however, had the courage to speak up, set the example, and set the record straight. That man was Byron Hickey.
Byron Hickey, a 30-year veteran of the Columbus Police Department, wasn’t phased by the intimidation in the room. Through the sort of integrity and courage that can only be forged through a lifetime and career of experience, Hickey spoke up against the race-baiting narratives being pressed onto him and his peers.
Hickey was also the only person in the room with any sort of bonafide credentialing and experience to actually know what he was talking about. With 30 years of experience on the force at CPD — many of them as a detective — Hickey personally worked with Blackmon on the department’s original gang unit as well as on the VICE/Narcotics unit. If you didn’t notice by his picture at the top of this article, Hickey just-so-happens to be a black man as well.
Byron Hickey exhibited exactly the sort of leadership that our city needs. Perhaps our city officials should take note of his integrity, courage, principle, and oratory.
Byron Hickey is a leader. Our city officials could — and should — learn from his example.
Explore the full story to see exactly how Hickey called out city manager Isaiah Hugley’s blatant continued racism, to his face, twice.
EVERYTHING’S RACIST: HERE’S WHAT PEOPLE SAID TO ‘PROVE’ BIGOTRY AGAINST BLACKMON
“I am convinced that the act of thinking logically cannot possibly be natural to the human mind. If it were, then mathematics would be everybody's easiest course at school and our species would not have taken several millennia to figure out the scientific method.” ― Neil deGrasse Tyson, The Sky Is Not the Limit: Adventures of an Urban Astrophysicist, 2000.
During the recent city council meeting held on Feb. 28, 2023, a total of eighteen people were slated to speak during the public agenda.
Most were expected to speak in reference to the current issues surrounding the city’s extreme rise in violent crime, the devolution of the Columbus Police Department, and police chief Freddie Blackmon.
Of those 18 people scheduled to speak, only eight spoke to support Blackmon.
Many of those speakers were known friends and family members of city manager Isaiah Hugley.
Those who spoke in support of Blackmon did so by providing a slew of illogical, objectively-false, and race-baiting statements. Some of the claims made were outright laughable, though the passion through which they were delivered left us to assume those speakers had no idea how embarrassing their statements actually are when put up to scrutiny.
Explore the full story to see the embarrassing claims made, along with their rather straight-forward refutations.
HOMETOWN HEROES: TWO COLUMBUS MOMS FORMING NEW SPECIAL EDUCATION PTA
On a lighter and far happier note, we at the muckraker also find it extremely important to recognize the outstanding accomplishments of members of our community worthy of merit.
A new type of PTA is being formed in the Fountain City specifically for the parents of children with special needs, thanks to two local moms who are teaming up to help others in our community.
GaQuilla Hunter-Mathews and Jennifer LeDenney, both the parents of children with special needs, grew increasingly frustrated with trying to advocate for the services their children require from the Muscogee County School District. After feeling as if their words were falling on deaf ears, they decided to step up to the plate and take action — and not only for themselves, but for our entire community as a whole.
The newly-conceptualized Muscogee County chapter of the Special Education Parent-Teacher Association, or SEPTA for short, is projected to function just as any other PTA, with the difference being that it is specifically laser-focused for the parents of children with special needs.
Unlike typical PTAs that are specific to one school, the Muscogee County SEPTA will be community-wide throughout the entire county. The county-wide approach will provide a place for parents to finally have a voice, as well as helping the Muscogee County School District to better serve each individual child’s needs.
According to the National PTA’s website, SEPTAs also serve to bring families together, building and strengthening communities in addition to helping to better serve the needs of children:
“Families with children who have special needs often seek out opportunities to meet other parents in similar circumstances. Special Education PTAs (SEPTAs) provide this opportunity and often bring together families of students who attend different schools in a district under one PTA umbrella. Becoming a SEPTA provides families with an organizational structure, resources and the opportunity to be a collective voice for their child and for all children.”
Though the organization is still in its preliminary planning stages, Hunter-Mathews and LeDenney are looking for other interested parents to help form the local chapter of the nationally-accredited organization.
We at the Muckraker would like to sincerely thank Ms. Hunter-Mathews and Ms. LeDenney for taking the initiative to help make our community a better place. Actions like yours are the real drivers of community change. Your leadership serves to bring members of our community together, strengthening relationships and making our city a better place to live. From our hearts to yours: thank you.
You're setting the example for others — and they should take note.
Explore the full story to see how you can get involved and finally have a voice for your child’s needs.
CHIEF BLACKMON’S BUDGET SAW 40% INCREASE FROM 2020; DID LESS WITH MORE ANYWAY
“Stupidity lies in wanting to draw conclusions.” — Gustave Flaubert, author of Dictionary of Received Ideas, in a letter to Louis Bouilhet, 1850.
During the city council meeting held on Feb. 28, 2023, several speakers grotesquely made illogically-spurious claims of ‘racism’ to excuse the well-documented failures of police chief Freddie Blackmon’s poor leadership, lack of communication, lack of transparency, and strategic ineptitude.
One of those claims was ironically the opposite of what the crowd’s political camp had been advocating for the past several years.
While simultaneously claiming that Blackmon has not failed in his role as police chief, several speakers claimed that the reason for his failure was because his department had been ‘defunded’ by the ‘racist’ city officials who dictate his budget.
That statement is so objectively false and illogical that we’ll have to break it down piece by piece. We’ll start from the broad, low-hanging fruit and converge downward in specificity to the nitty-gritty technical details, ultimately arriving at the department’s actual cited budget during Blackmon’s tenure as chief.
Explore the full story to see how last year’s screams to ‘defund the police’ have conveniently flipped to excuse Blackmon’s failure, along with a complete break-down of the illogical nature of the claims through the scrutiny of a proper syllogism.
THE WEEK AHEAD
As violent crime continues to skyrocket even in what have previously been thought of as the “safer parts” of our city, we at the Muckraker want to encourage our readers and their loved ones to remain hyper-vigilant as they go about their daily lives.
Based on lifetimes of experience and the combined professional careers of us at the Muckraker and our associates, here are what we consider to be the most important ways Columbusites can make themselves “hard targets” to avoid becoming a crime victim:
In closing, we at the Muckraker would like to thank the outstanding men and women of the Columbus Police Department who continue to shell out for the safety and well-being of our city each and every day, despite the abhorrent temporary conditions they are currently forced to work within.
“All police officers are entitled to outstanding leadership.”
Our city cannot thank you enough for what you do for us.
If you’re out and about throughout the week and see one of our city’s brave and valiant police officers, be sure to thank them. We’d bet it would mean an awful lot to them.
Facts are stubborn things — and we’ll keep publishing them, whether city officials like them or not.
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