Look at the big picture . . . The Pike, the aquarium bond debt, the art museum bond debt, the Sea Fest deficit, etc . . . . how many albatrosses and fleecings have been put upon us from this style of backroom negotiation?

Is it 'outing' someone to report that they are doing their job? Because none of the facts in this story indicate that Hankla did otherwise.

As asked before: What if Hankla was simply carrying our the requirement of his appointed position as mandated by our own City Charter?

If so, how is that 'getting his hand caught' in anything?

The entire premise of this story and comments like yours is that somebody did something wrong. Maybe they did and maybe they didn't.

Why must we assume, as this story does, some sinister motivation?

Would DeLong or Hankla have personally benefited somehow from having the Johnson Study researched separately? If so I don't see any evidence of that reported here.

Had the approaches recommended in the Johnson Study proven desirable, would either DeLong or Hankla have personally benefited from seeing them carried out? If so, nothing in this story says so.

Phrases such as “…conclusions that would cramp (Hankla's) expansion plans for the Port of Long Beach” tend to intimate that Hankla's not supposed to entertain plans for the Port's expansion.

But the Port is *mandated* to expand and it's part of Hankla's job, and that of his colleagues, to *facilitate* that expansion.

So DeLong learns of a study that could help him better serve some of his constituents (i.e do his job) and calls Hankla to tell him about it because the same Study could help him (Hankla) carry out his mandate to expand the Port (i.e. HIS job).

That's pretty much the gist of it yes? And, if so, isn't that what we pay them both to do?

Some of DeLong's colleagues became annoyed because they interpreted this as somehow undermining their own efforts in the same direction.

Fine…toes were trounced upon. But does that fact make what either Hankla or DeLong did ‘wrong’? Or simply unpalatable in the eyes of one or two others?

It just seems to me that a little more balance is needed in a story that is posted under 'news' rather than, say 'features' or 'columns' or ‘staff blogs’.

That's all I'm saying…

Look at the bigger picture . . . this is just one deal where a long-time Long Beach power player got caught with his hand in the influence jar. All Dave did was put a light on it. Can you imagine how many other such deals happen here all the time that DON'T get caught?

I apologize if I misinterpreted the tone of your response. I sometimes lapse into that error when others attribute comments to me that I never made (as you did) and when others encourage me to ‘celebrate’ a situation that I never indicated I was happy about (as you also did).

I wasn’t ‘making a case’ for anything, least of all anyone’s innocence, because I hadn’t (and still haven’t) developed an opinion that anyone was guilty of anything…other than doing their job, that is. As I mentioned, in my 2nd posting: “…I don’t feel I have enough information, yet, to make that call.” All I was attempting to do was offer an alternative interpretation and then provide information that might tend to support that interpretation, were one inclined to adopt it.

That your story was, “suggesting otherwise” seems quite clear, however.

If our stories are paintings, Dave, then our words are the paints we use and the manner in which we apply our words are the brushes. I have found you to be a very adept ‘painter’ of stories. The paints and brushes you selected for THIS story created a painting (at least for me) that strongly suggested that both Hankla and DeLong were guilty of some sort of misfeasance. When you employ phrases like: “…might be angling to undermine…”, and “…government run by invisible strings, misdirection stunts, knowing winks and in-secret handshakes” the sort of picture you’re painting seems obvious even to an admittedly novice art appreciator like myself.

As for your comment that “Hankla did more than that”: What precisely did he do that was not within his purview to do? As demonstrated, the Charter gives him and his colleagues the authority to do what you’ve reported that he did. They do, in fact, do such things (and far more) all the time in the course and scope of their positions. When the Charter employs phrases like: “…exclusive control and management…” and “…exclusive control and duty…” that seems to me to be pretty clear. Hankla and his colleagues have the authority, the staff and the budget to manage the Harbor District as they deem to be in the best interests of not only the City but the State and nation.

No doubt that’s why Hankla has now “dropped his pursuit of a separate breakwater study”…because he decided it was in the best interests of all concerned to do so. We can only guess at this point, however, because no one has asked Hankla, himself, the question.

Seems simple enough to me and not nearly as sinister a situation as you seem to intimate that it is.

Dave, you and everyone else at DW are very good at encouraging dialog…at stimulating discussion. I was just trying to play along.

I neither alleged nor intimated that your story reported legal wrong-doing. I simply opined that neither ethical nor legal wrong-doing appears to have occurred here. Nor did I say that your study said that the Johnson study was not valuable. I simply asked whether it could be argued that Hankla was under no obligation to advise the Council of his activities, preliminary or otherwise, in researching the Johnson report.

I very clearly understood what your report was about, Dave. This is why I said: “I understand that the way this is being handled doesn’t seem, to you, to pass the smell test…”

I’m not prepared, yet, to judge whether, as you put it, “the minimums” of “governmental…transparency” were reached in this situation. I don’t feel I have enough information, yet, to make that call. As to “governmental process” however, I am more than comfortable with any Councilmember directly contacting any other elected or appointed city official and saying something like: “Hey, there’s a very interesting study in existence, authored by this guy named Johnson, which might meet our needs here. Take a look at it and let me know what you think!

That type of informal communication between our elected and appointed officials happens day by day and hour by hour. A lot less of our business would get done if it didn’t!

Nor am I saying that this situation represents the “epitome” of anything, let alone what our local government “should be”. Nor do I have any desire to celebrate anything about this topic other than the fact that people (like us) continue to discuss and debate it.