Golden, Jack N. | Testimony transcript

Transcript of the Testimony of Jack N. Golden

Date: November 7, 2013Volume: I

Case: In Re: Joplin Critical Investigation

Printed On: November 13, 2013

Holliday Reporting Service, Inc.Phone: 417-358-4078

Fax: 417-451-1114Email:[email protected]

Internet:

Jack N. Golden In Re: Joplin Critical Investigation

417-358-4078

Holliday Reporting Service, Inc.

Page 1

IN RE: JOPLIN CRITICAL INVESTIGATION

SWORN STATEMENT OF

JACK N. GOLDEN

Taken on Thursday, November 7, 2013, from 10:39 a.m. to

11:20 a.m., at the law offices of Juddson H. McPherson,

LLC, 626 S. Byers, in the City of Joplin, County of Jasper,

State of Missouri, before

SHARON K. ROGERS, C.C.R.650,

a Certified Court Reporter and a Notary Public within and

for the County of Jasper, and State of Missouri.

Jack N. Golden

In Re: Joplin Critical Investigation

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APPEARANCES

MR. THOMAS E. LORAINE

Loraine & Associates, LLC

4075 Osage Beach Pkwy., Suite 300

Osage Beach, MO 65065

[email protected]


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S T I P U L A T I O N

IT IS HEREBY STIPULATED that this Sworn Statement may be

taken by steno-mask type recording by SHARON K. ROGERS, a

Certified Court Reporter, and afterwards reduced into

typewriting.

It is further stipulated that the signature of the

witness is hereby waived, and that said Sworn Statement of

said witness shall be of the same force and effect as

though said witness had read and signed Sworn Statement.


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I N D E X

Page/Line

DIRECT EXAMINATION BY MR. LORAINE . . . 5-4

E X H I B I T S

Exhibit #A. . . . . . . . 5-5

Advice of Rights

Note: Exhibits in separate binder

(sic) - typed as spoken

(ph.) - phonetic


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1 JACK N. GOLDEN

2 Having been first duly sworn and examined,

3 testified as follows:

4 DIRECT EXAMINATION BY MR. LORAINE:

5 Q. Mr. Golden, I have Exhibit #A, the Advice of

6 Rights that you have read, understood, and

7 executed, is that true?

8 A. That is correct.

9 Q. All right. I'm going to refresh your memory.

10 I have three items to talk about. This is

11 my contract. The conduct of Mayor Pro Tem

12 Scearce involving lease of a building

13 determined later convicted of bookmaking

14 specifically the desire of the City that

15 Loraine request this file. Nobody at the FBI

16 regarding Scearce's conduct provided a

17 report. The same to the Council. Number

18 two, the fact and circumstances surrounding

19 release of information related to Mr.

20 Scearce's conduct including but not limited

21 to the handwritten note referenced by Mr.

22 Scearce in City Manager Rohr's handwriting.

23 Number three, the facts and circumstances for

24 consideration surrounding involvement of

25 Council member Woolston with Mr. Charlie


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1 Kuehn, Four State Homes, it's subsidiaries,

2 related entities and the City's master

3 developer Wallace-Bajjali with respect to the

4 purchase, sale, or leasing of real estate for

5 current or future development. Those are my

6 charges.

7 A. Okay.

8 Q. To that extent I'm going to go to number one.

9 What is it that you know, if anything, or

10 any leads concerning the charge of the FBI

11 involvement with Councilman Scearce?

12 A. I know that Councilman Scearce, at least it

13 was stated with various people, had been

14 involved in an FBI investigation. I

15 understand that there were two people who

16 rented his building and I have never met

17 either one of those people to my knowledge.

18 And at the point in time of this activity I

19 believe Bill was owner and operator of Olston

20 Personnel Services. And during that period

21 of time I very seldom saw Bill. I don't know

22 how many offices he had. He worked day and

23 night. That's basically all I know. I do

24 know that - well, ask your question.

25 Q. All right. I have of course interviewed Mr.


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1 Scearce. I have obtained a blow-up of the

2 secret note. This is the secret note,

3 Exhibit #1.

4 A. That's the secret note?

5 Q. That's it. That's what caused all the

6 problems.

7 A. That right there?

8 Q. That's all there is.

9 A. All of this, that's a blown-up thing?

10 Q. Yeah, blown up of the secret note so we could

11 read it. And it has been identified by

12 Attorney Head as your City Manager, Mr.

13 Rohr's handwriting, and Mr. Rohr has

14 identified it is a copy of the note that was

15 stolen from his desk.

16 A. He says the note was stolen was from his

17 desk?

18 Q. Well, he does. That's not what my other

19 evidence indicates.

20 A. What do you want me to say?

21 Q. What I want to know is I want you to see what

22 the magic information being held over Mr.

23 Scearce's head is. Number one, there's a

24 name here, it's helpful information, Carol

25 Stark. Do you know who that is?


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1 A. Oh, that must be Carol Stark, the Joplin

2 Globe.

3 Q. Yeah, that's the Editor. Here's the date

4 that this all occurred, 8/12/13. Lovett is

5 mentioned. It's spelled improperly, but

6 Lovett is mentioned. He's the guy that spent

7 house arrest and rented from the guy. Here's

8 a continuing criminal investigation.

9 Basically each one of these lines has been

10 deciphered and read into the record by Mr.

11 Rohr and I will include that in my report,

12 but I wanted you to see what the damning

13 information was against Mr. Scearce. This is

14 it. I will include in my report that it was

15 not stolen off of his desk so my number two

16 issue is gone, there was no stealing off his

17 desk.

18 A. I think I have either heard in conversation

19 with the City Attorney or whatever because,

20 you know, you go to him, he's our attorney,

21 go talk to him. He had indicated that the

22 note had been found by an employee of the

23 City and I think attested by another employee

24 that the note was found and taken to him.

25 Q. To Mr. Head?


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1 A. Yes, that's my understanding.

2 Q. So issue number two is dead is what I'm

3 telling you. There is no stealing of

4 anything off the desk. That's the end of

5 that.

6 A. Okay.

7 Q. And this is the note, okay? I asked for your

8 information, and you can have this a little

9 early, I don't want you to talk to other

10 members about it yet, but it will be included

11 in my report, Carol Stark refused to talk to

12 me about her name being on it. She wouldn't

13 say anything about it. I have no information

14 received from the Police Chief that this is

15 all there is. That he was talked with and

16 questioned by the FBI. It has nothing to do

17 with - there's no reason to believe that he

18 was a target. I mean if he was a target it

19 ended a long time ago. He did not get

20 indicted and he is not under any kind of

21 continuing - nothing that I can come to. Now

22 I also talked with the former Lieutenant with

23 the police force and he also worked with the

24 FBI, he wouldn't talk to me. There's nothing

25 more to say. I'm not going to get the FBI


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1 report and if I do it will be about ten years

2 from now. There's nothing to this, okay?

3 A. Well, maybe nothing to that in terms of --

4 Q. There's nothing more. This is all anybody

5 can say.

6 A. I don't know what that means.

7 Q. It's nothing.

8 A. I mean does that mean Mr. Rohr is not guilty

9 of anything?

10 Q. Mr. Rohr?

11 A. Uh-huh.

12 Q. No, this has got something to do with Mr.

13 Scearce. He's not guilty of anything, that's

14 what it means.

15 A. Okay.

16 Q. Nothing to go with Mr. Scearce and nobody can

17 tell me anything more that would make me

18 wonder about Mr. Scearce's involvement with

19 that. So that issue is pretty well dead.

20 I'd like you probably - it will be in my

21 report, but you're one of my bosses here, so

22 - now that's pretty much two of the issues

23 gone. Now there are some issues that I'm

24 still looking into and I was asking you if

25 you had anything to contribute to me, any


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1 additional names that I need to talk to or

2 question on Mr. Woolston's issue?.

3 A. Oh, on Mr. Woolston. I had been called by

4 some concerned neighbors --

5 Q. I'd like to have their names.

6 A. I don't think it would be very well accepted,

7 but the name is Larson or whatever. They

8 live along a tract of land that Mr. Woolston

9 wanted to buy, part of their property, and

10 they did not want to sell. He was the former

11 head of a company called Allgeier-Martin &

12 Associates or maybe even the owner and --

13 Q. Larson, L-A-R-S-O-N?

14 A. I think so. It's been many years since I

15 knew the man. He'd been retired for quite

16 awhile. So that is a group. There is a lady

17 who used to be a Councilman who claims - I

18 don't know that she claims, but who states

19 she has concerns about the buying of her

20 family's property. Her son and daughter --

21 Q. Cheryl Dandridge?

22 A. Yeah, Cheryl Dandridge.

23 Q. Okay. Who else?

24 A. That's really the only people I think that I

25 have talked to is those two people. I may


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1 have some notes and emails at home.

2 Q. Can you dig those up?

3 A. Sure.

4 Q. And anything you've got in reference to

5 people that you think I ought to chat with

6 about that? I'm trying to get absolutely

7 every lead followed up.

8 A. Okay.

9 Q. So if you've got anything you've got my card

10 just call me.

11 A. One thing is coming to mind, and I hate to

12 talk about things that are just pure rumor.

13 Q. Well, that's what I'm here for, to follow-up

14 and find out. Everything is pure rumor right

15 now. That's why I'm following up on it.

16 A. Charlie Kuehn has a brother. I think he

17 actually has two brothers. I can't remember.

18 And one of them is a realtor I think here in

19 town handling some of his projects. They

20 apparently had a marriage that was performed

21 out at the Elks Club and one guy who was

22 involved in working out there not as an Elk

23 but in support of the wedding, et cetera, had

24 made mention that the brother had stated that

25 Charlie now is making more money just buying


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1 and selling land. So I don't know whether

2 that's a biggy or not a biggy, but it's

3 certainly interesting.

4 Q. What was that guy's name, the brother?

5 A. Well, I don't remember his first name, but

6 the name is Kuehn.

7 Q. What's the guy that told you this?

8 A. Man, I hate to drag anyone in. His name was

9 Frank Schaffer. I believe that's who it was.

10 My relationship with him is he just happens

11 to live across the street from my daughter.

12 Q. Well, why don't you talk to him and see if he

13 wants to talk to me and if he does let me

14 know.

15 A. Okay.

16 Q. Pretty far removed, you know, but let me see

17 if he has anything further. I don't know if

18 that's something that I'd go out and get on

19 my own, you know. Anything else? Do you

20 have any complaints from any City employees

21 on the City Manager, the way he does

22 business?

23 A. I'll start with a lady, she's not on the City

24 Council, but she was with the Ozark

25 Foundation which handled a lot of the money


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1 that came into the City, and Mark seemed to

2 think that money was donated to him to spend

3 however he chose. But anyway --

4 Q. What's her name?

5 A. Her name is Michelle, her last name is

6 Dupree. I haven't seen her for quite awhile,

7 but I got a specific complaint from her. The

8 other one I got a specific complaint from,

9 and I get pretty upset, is a woman by the

10 name of Nancy Good who complained to me that

11 Mark was bullying, beating up on - not

12 beating up physically - was trying to push

13 people around in that charitable

14 organization.

15 Q. What organization was that?

16 A. That's the Ozark Community Foundation. They

17 were the holders of these funds that came in.

18 Q. Is that federal funds?

19 A. No, they're actually just contributions.

20 Q. How do I get hold of Nancy Good or Michelle

21 Dupree?

22 A. Well, Michelle Dupree, I'd just have to stop

23 around and find her number. I'll try to get

24 it for you. And Nancy Good owns Joplin Title

25 Company out on 32nd Street and interestingly


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1 enough is a supporter of Mike Woolston in

2 terms of campaign contributions.

3 Q. A lot of money he makes her. Sends her title

4 work.

5 A. Well, there's nothing dirty with her that

6 way. She was complaining about the fact that

7 she was with a group going through the

8 community foundation seeking funds, et

9 cetera, et cetera, had some kind of dialogue

10 like that. Mike was a - well, whatever.

11 Some other things that might be pertinent,

12 and maybe this is not of your concern, the

13 Joplin Globe in my opinion has targeted Bill

14 for the very simple - and always been

15 promoting Mark, I kind of cleaned up my

16 language there, for a long, long time. They

17 keep talking about a split on the Council and

18 Benji wanted to I think did a survey for all

19 that for a long period of time, et cetera,

20 and found that that wasn't very accurate.

21 When Mike was --

22 Q. Woolston?

23 A. Yeah, Mike Woolston was elected Mayor this

24 was kind of the sequence - it wasn't kind of

25 the sequence, this is the sequence of events.


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1 Benji came up with the bright idea doing it

2 like the School Board did. Whoever is senior

3 would have a term for two years, two years

4 finished, the next senior person moves up,

5 has a term for two years, the next person

6 moves up and has a term for two years. So

7 that's the way we started off. We actually

8 elected Mike because Mike only had three

9 votes and that would be Seibert, Woolston,

10 and Morris Glaze. So, you know, we all got

11 behind Mike because it was his turn, he was

12 the senior guy. And we knew that we were

13 going to do that so we all voted for him.

14 Well, when it came time to vote for the Mayor

15 Pro Tem, which was Melodee Colbert-Kean,

16 interestingly enough they voted against her.

17 Now common courtesy in the past of Council

18 that I've observed in all the years that I've

19 worked for the City were pretty simple. You

20 know, you pave the courtesy out front of

21 unity and everybody votes for, you know who

22 is going to be elected, so everybody's vote

23 is a matter of proper behavior. That didn't

24 happen and then it became a shunning of

25 Colbert-Kean and Mike in my view of not


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1 involving her in anything. Not giving any of

2 the other Council people any real insight as

3 to what was going on or information. Now

4 this is all pre-storm. Had nothing to do

5 with the storm. And it didn't get better, it

6 got worse. And to give you a typical example

7 she's trying to do something, she comes

8 together with an out of town speaker, some

9 television star who promoted, you know, young

10 women becoming a whole person, motivational

11 speaker for young people. And she brought it

12 to the Council, we're live on the podium

13 talking to this guy, and the Manager and we

14 simply started to give him an overview and

15 Mike Seibert says, stop right here. As of

16 3:30 this afternoon there was absolutely

17 nobody in favor of this project. And so we

18 went ahead and I finally asked him again with

19 a little discussion the same question, as of

20 3:30 this afternoon, bang, nothing. And in

21 my opinion that was an attempt to embarrass

22 her. So I mentioned to the guy, I said, you

23 know, apparently there's no interest. I

24 apologize on behalf of the Council and I'm

25 sorry that we wasted your time, et cetera,


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1 went on down the pike. But that was the

2 beginning of the split on the Council. That

3 was. The split on the Council occurred well

4 before the storm had occurred, primarily

5 because of an attitude toward the Mayor Pro

6 Tem by in particular those three guys.

7 Q. Who were they?

8 A. Mike Seibert, Morris Glaze, and Mike

9 Woolston.

10 Q. Morris Glaze?

11 A. Uh-huh, G-L-A-Z-E, I believe.

12 Q. Is he still on the board?

13 A. Yeah, he's on the Council. All three of them

14 are still on the Council. But that was just

15 an indication what was going on. The Globe

16 upset me more. They would always put a

17 picture when we were having a feud or debate

18 or whatever it was, an issue with Scearce and

19 all this, they always had him in a frowning

20 mode and he'd always have the City Manager in

21 a smiley mode, except one time. And the one

22 time was they had a bad picture of him in

23 there so that's just basically what's been

24 happening. The split Council, I always try

25 to explain that to people, because a split


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1 Council has nothing to do with the storm. I

2 hate to talk about myself, but I'm going to

3 talk about myself a little bit. As a

4 commander of a guard company and as commander

5 eventually of the 203rd and being the

6 Executive Officer of an engineer brigade I

7 worked a lot of disasters, you know, I know

8 how they go and what you can do and what you

9 can't do, and we had great performance from

10 the Corps of Engineers in miracle work. I

11 mean they cleaned up the neighborhoods, they

12 did a good job, and of course Rohr got a lot

13 of good policy publicity, which he should

14 have being the City Manager, but the real

15 heros there were the county disaster guys and

16 probably the Fire Chief did an excellent job.

17 But there was a lot of marketing going on,

18 you know, big group things flicking their

19 bics and all that kind of stuff, so you wound

20 up with an attitude in the community in my

21 opinion of a very strong pro support for

22 Mark. So almost untouchable. But incidents

23 have came along in my opinion that have kind

24 of done some correction. One was they were

25 going to take 20th Street and do some pretty


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1 sophisticated and fancy look there just to

2 get a look and an appeal and had sort of a

3 revolt in the community and the community

4 began to wonder a little bit about, hey, we

5 came out of a mess and we have talked about

6 this, we've made comments about this, and we

7 want a 4-lane street, which I think we're

8 going to wind up with now. They began to

9 kind of see through, you know, what was

10 happening. The other thing was the

11 Wallace-Bajjali thing, and I don't know

12 Wallace-Bajjali from anybody. I talked to

13 him maybe once, maybe twice. When I talked

14 to him I tried to talk to him in private. We

15 had a meeting and I questioned some of the

16 things that he's doing. I just looked to him

17 and visited with him about it and see if I'm

18 misinterpreting or what the heck is going on

19 there. Many cities have a person on staff

20 that does nothing but monitor master

21 developers. In my opinion we've never had a

22 person on staff monitoring the master

23 developer because the person on staff is an

24 advocate, not a person who is watching out

25 necessarily for the good of this community,


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1 which really upsets me. We did a master plan

2 for the City while this was going on and I

3 ran into, I can't remember his name, but I've

4 worked for the City for long enough that I

5 worked through two or three of these master

6 plans with him. And he said, you know, we've

7 got to do something to bridge the gap between

8 the private sector and the public sector here

9 and get that private sector's support in the

10 interest of some of the people who are

11 rebuilding homes, et cetera. So we did that,

12 we put a clause in there and we put some

13 standards in there, and we asked the people

14 who were doing the local development here to

15 get with those neighborhoods. They had a

16 neighborhood meeting, a fellow developing

17 20th and Range Line. He made sure all of the

18 egress and all of the traffic flow that he

19 possibly could out of his development did not

20 intrude upon those folks, and it worked out

21 real well. The neighborhood was happy and

22 the people who made investments already in

23 housing were pretty happy and I felt like

24 that was the thing. But the bottom line is

25 on a master developer we've had one project,


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1 just one. You know, that's not quite out of

2 the ground yet, but it looks like it's going

3 to be a senior housing project. I don't know

4 whether anybody has talked to you about that

5 or not.

6 Q. Well, I haven't heard much about it, but I

7 know the location is being developed now.

8 A. Well, what's interested is we passed, I think

9 I voted against it, I may have, and we passed

10 a resolution and gave about 44 percent I

11 think it was, 43 or 44 percent of the project

12 costs to guarantee the project, to guarantee

13 that the people involved are going to make a

14 certain level of profit, et cetera, et

15 cetera, et cetera. I did that kind of work

16 for 34 years. I'd never ever seen that

17 particular thing happen. But to me that was

18 really a problem and it's a project for low

19 income seniors with the rent being for a

20 1-bedroom $1,000.00 a month, for a 1-bedroom

21 with two people living in it I think it's

22 $1,600.00.

23 Q. That's low income?

24 A. That's low income. And if you happen to have

25 a little bigger unit that jumps up to


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1 $2,000.00 a month.

2 Q. Not very many social security checks would

3 cover that.

4 A. It's a sham. I mean in my opinion it has to

5 be. They're going to have to manipulate the

6 HUD regulations to do that. And when we had

7 the storm here they did elevate the HUD

8 regulations to a point where the definition

9 of low or moderate income is not where you'd

10 pick up from a HUD field office for those

11 things.

12 Q. Who did the due diligence for hiring of

13 Wallace-Bajjali?

14 A. That's an interesting case because - I'll

15 give you the name of a guy that could

16 probably give you some information about

17 that. His name is Matt Moran and his

18 telephone number is 624-4514 and his cell

19 phone is either 438 or 439-7810, one of those

20 two.

21 Q. 7980?

22 A. 438 or 439 and then 7810 are the four digits.

23 And his normal office phone is 624-4514. He

24 followed me being director of the housing

25 operations here in the City. When I say that


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1 --

2 Q. Is he director of the housing?

3 A. He's director of the housing.

4 Q. Does he work for the City?

5 A. No.

6 Q. For the court?

7 A. He works for - it's a separate individual

8 corporation.

9 Q. 43D, 453?

10 A. Yeah.

11 Q. That's what his position is.

12 A. Well, he's director of the local housing

13 authority. The local housing authority has

14 its own set of state statutes on what they

15 can and can't do, et cetera, et cetera, and

16 it's ran by five housing commissioners who

17 are really not, you know, have a real deep

18 knowledge of it, but they're pretty good.

19 They're generally pretty good people. And of

20 course there's a lot of rules, regulations,

21 et cetera about that. He also was on the

22 CART committee and he would talk about the

23 CART.

24 Q. C-A-R-T?

25 A. Uh-huh.


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1 Q. What is that?

2 A. That's a group of people who somehow some way

3 got selected and got involved in the planning

4 process and they just became the CART and

5 they are supposedly a City appointed

6 committee and they were appointed, not

7 illegally because Mike Woolston had the power

8 during the storm under the charter to be able

9 to appoint committees and et cetera and

10 groups to work on certain things. But

11 basically what happened the town was hit with

12 architectural schools, everybody blowing in

13 to come up with designs, you know, part of

14 the study of a college curriculum more than

15 anything else. And they narrowed down the

16 mass - they had a pretty large group of

17 people. They narrowed that down to a group

18 of five or six people, and you could get that

19 group from the City Manager's secretary

20 probably or from the City Manager.

21 Q. Who should I talk with there?

22 A. Who would you talk to? First I would start

23 with Matt because Matt will give you other

24 names of people who felt like they really had

25 no input into the CART plan.


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1 Q. Kind of ramrodded through by the City

2 Manager, is that what you're telling me?

3 A. I think so, yes. Certainly Wallace-Bajjali,

4 they're very supportive of him. Aren't you

5 glad you asked me to start talking?

6 Q. Well, this is --

7 A. Kind of interesting, I guess.

8 Q. Do you know who the City planning director

9 is?

10 A. Troy Bolander is the Zoning and Planning guy.

11 Q. No, that wouldn't be it.

12 A. It's not Sam, is it?

13 Q. Let me see just a minute. Off the record.

14 (Off record discussion held, back on record)

15 Q. (By Mr. Loraine) Do you know Chris Cotten,

16 the Parks Director?

17 A. Yes, I do.

18 Q. Have you heard anything about him being

19 reprimanded by City Manager Rohr for getting

20 an independent baseball league to come down

21 and talk to the board? Do you know anything

22 about that?

23 A. Well, I can't speak - I do know something

24 about it. I cannot speak to what Chris has

25 said very much, but I can speak to that issue


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1 a lot. I sat on sports authority as a City

2 Council appointee and the sports authority

3 was approached by, and I don't know what

4 Chris' total involvement in that may have

5 been, was approached by a group who would

6 like to bring a minor league type team to the

7 City of Joplin at only one location and

8 that's Joe Becker Stadium. And Joe Becker

9 Stadium is where the Boyer brothers if you're

10 a baseball fan, Mickey Mantle, those guys

11 kind of cut their teeth on that ball field.

12 They visited the sports authority and we're

13 sitting there and we're talking and one of

14 them did make a comment that they're not

15 interested in coming to the City of Joplin

16 for this project if Wallace-Bajjali is going

17 to be involved in it in any way.

18 Q. All right. Let's take that one more step.

19 Chris Cotten advised me that he made the

20 contact with that group.

21 A. Probably did.

22 Q. Individually.

23 A. I don't know whether he made it individually.

24 I don't know.

25 Q. Well, he made the contact.


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1 A. Yeah.

2 Q. I've been told that he was disciplined for

3 not running that through Wallace-Bajjali by

4 City Manager Rohr.

5 A. I don't know whether he has or not. I would

6 put my money on it that he has.

7 Q. Well, that's not a good thing, is it?

8 A. No.

9 Q. There would be difference in the price of

10 bringing that ball club. According to Chris

11 Cotten it would cost the City 5 million if

12 they didn't go through Wallace-Bajjali and it

13 would cost something like 25 million if they

14 did.

15 A. Well, if Wallace-Bajjali brought a ball team.

16 Q. Yeah. Well, you've got to understand the

17 City Manager wanted to chastise him for not

18 running this issue through Wallace-Bajjali.

19 A. Let me go back a little bit further and tell

20 you why I ran for the Council. It wasn't to

21 spend my life on these kinds of issues, it

22 was to enjoy myself. I was very disappointed

23 with the involvement of the athletic complex.

24 I had resigned from the City Council and the

25 softball league had promoted a sales tax to


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1 have funds to build the complex plus do a lot

2 of other things. That was just one project

3 that was funded out of this tax. More

4 police, more this, more sewers, more, you

5 know, a whole array of things that the City

6 needed money for. Somehow some way I had a

7 call or two from guys that had worked for me,

8 I also was the Parks Director, and they were

9 upset with the fact that they had contracts

10 to finish out tennis courts with other

11 people, other than the City of Joplin, and

12 they had done work for the City of Joplin for

13 a number of years and they knew my name

14 because they did work for the Parks

15 refinishing some tennis courts way back when.

16 And they said I've got contracts ahead of

17 your contract and now they keep pushing and

18 pushing and pushing for me to move this

19 contract date up, you know, and this is going

20 to be an insult and a real problem for me to

21 work with people I've already got on a

22 waiting list. Well, we got into the tennis

23 court thing, we got into the construction

24 mess and we had a plaque on the wall that

25 said it's going to be dedicated at a certain


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1 date, certain time, et cetera, and apparently

2 Rohr was going to accomplish that mission be

3 hell or be damned. Later on I took a piece

4 of stone, basically sandstone, it wasn't

5 really formed in a natural way but they use a

6 raw mix on the infield, they had the batter's

7 box in the wrong location as far as facing

8 the sun. The tennis courts, if you have a

9 net post you have a big bell bottom thing on

10 the bottom so that you've got good weight,

11 good structure. Sometimes you'll run some

12 rebar out from that ball to make sure that it

13 can take a lot of stress. Just pulling on

14 the net on a tennis court is pretty awesome,

15 and tennis players have a habit of going and

16 sitting on the nets between their matches and

17 so forth and visiting, et cetera, et cetera.

18 So that all had to be replaced. Then we had

19 water underneath the courts. We had a pond

20 over in Schifferdecker Park for the golf

21 course that was elevated above the water

22 level for the tennis courts. And I believe

23 that's what caused at least part of the water

24 problem. They put drains around the tennis

25 courts for this part of the country, you need


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1 to do that, and it was just a whole array of

2 things. And the Parks Department has

3 basically taken care of and they've redone

4 all those things. There was no attempt to

5 make the contractor do it, to my knowledge.

6 Now there could have been.

7 Q. This is Rohr's contractor?

8 A. Yeah. Well, the City's contractor.

9 Q. Well, I mean it was the he was --

10 A. And then the people who designed the field,

11 the specs and the standards weren't specific

12 enough to take care of those matters. Just

13 more of a mess. And we probably spent

14 $30,000.00, maybe $40,000.00 in laying sod

15 over grass that was coming up for this little

16 dedication that was a softball game down on

17 the big field that had been built. And that

18 was just part of it. Part of it was - it was

19 just a bad deal. Chris is, by the way,

20 extremely respected by most people on the

21 Council. I believe. I mean he's done a

22 masterful job. One thing laid on him that

23 was not an easy chore was improve the revenue

24 stream out there.

25 Q. You're talking about Chris Cotten?


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1 A. Yeah, I think he's going to talk maybe

2 $600,000.00. Which I don't know what it was

3 when he started. It was not much at all.

4 Q. Let's go off the record. Do you have

5 anything further you want to talk about?

6 A. Not unless you want to talk about something

7 more.

8 Q. Okay. Let's go off the record for a minute.

9 (Short break taken, back on record)

10 Q. (By Mr. Loraine) Mr. Rohr has intimidated

11 people.

12 A. I would say, yes, he does.

13 Q. Do you have any names of anybody that would

14 testify to that?

15 A. There may be one guy who wrote a scarring

16 letter, I think I have a copy of it, I'll get

17 that to you. In a scope of things in the

18 Engineering Department one of your key people

19 back some years ago I mean they had to be

20 number one good, they had to almost be

21 engineers themselves, they had to know the

22 City. This guy worked there forever. He was

23 working there when I worked for the City. I

24 ran into him all the time. Worked with him.

25 And I'll get you what his comments were.


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1 Q. About Mr. Rohr?

2 A. I think Mr. Rohr is involved in those, yeah.

3 It's a very scary thing for some of these

4 people. I called - the other night at

5 Council meeting I called Leslie out by name.

6 Q. Leslie?

7 A. Our Finance Director. And I asked her point

8 blank, I said if we do this adjustment that

9 Rohr wants to do for some of these workers --

10 Q. Leslie Haase?

11 A. Yes, and if we want to treat all departments

12 the same throughout the City can we afford to

13 do that. She said, no, and it hurt her to

14 say no I think because of, you know,

15 whatever. It's so damn touchy to come out

16 and it's so doggone tough even with Nancy

17 Good and Michelle Dupree. I think Michelle

18 could probably talk quite a bit, but I don't

19 know that Leslie - I don't mean Leslie. I

20 don't know if Nancy Good would say much. I

21 probably said way too much.

22 Q. Well, we're off the record. We're done.

23

24 (SWORN STATEMENT CONCLUDED)

25


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1

2


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REPORTER'S CERTIFICATE

STATE OF MISSOURI

ss.

COUNTY OF JASPER

I, SHARON K. ROGERS, Certified Court Reporter in the

State of Missouri, do certify that pursuant to the

foregoing Stipulation the witness came before me on the 7th

day of November, 2013, was duly sworn by me, and was

examined. That examination was then taken by me by

steno-mask recording and afterwards transcribed; said Sworn

Statement is subscribed by the witness as hereinbefore set

out on the day in that behalf aforesaid and is herewith

returned.

I further certify that I am not counsel, attorney, or

relative of either party, or clerk, or stenographer of

either party or of the attorney of either party, or

otherwise interested in the event of this suit.

_________________________

SHARON K. ROGERS, CCR-650

Documents

Golden, Jack N. | Testimony transcript