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Two stories predominate the blogs this week, and neither shine a positive light on the City of Indianapolis and most especially, the current mayoral administration of Republican Greg Ballard.
Most poignant is the horrific story of IMPD officer David Brisard’s crash into a group of motorcyclists, killing one of the men and critically injuring two others. This story quickly evolved from a tragedy to a scandal as Brisard was reported to have a blood alcohol level of .19, or more than twice the legal limit. This led to a number of alcohol related charges in addition to reckless homicide.
We had barely begun to process this information when it became known that not only was Brisard not tested at the scene–but more than two hours later–his test was apparently not conducted according to state law. As a result, Marion County Prosecutor Carl Brizzi dropped the alcohol related charges, saying they wouldn’t stand up in court.
Whether the post-crash sequence of events is a series of accidents or a carefully woven “protect our own” strategy conducted by the police department and the prosecutor’s office is the discussion of many blogs this week. Advance Indiana and Indianapolis Times weigh in, while Indy Democrat provides broader perspective on IMPD woes under Mayor Ballard.
The other story–the privatization of city parking meters and the upcoming rate increases–is less graphic but the implications are both long-term and indicative of more insider pay-to-play politics on the 25th floor. Seems that the contract–for 50 years!–was awarded to a company named ACS, who formerly employed Mitch Roob, the other Mitch’s right hand dude. ACS was also involved as a contractor in the failed privatization of FSSA. Read the reports by Bart Lies, Advance Indiana and Ogden on Politics.
