On March 22, Gambit published a story on a failed and possibly illegal deal New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell inked with an Ohio refrigerant company while on a junket to Dubai last year.
Based on hundreds of pages of internal emails and documents obtained under a public records request, our story on the city’s Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Zoetic Inc. provides a rare glimpse behind the curtain of the increasingly secretive Cantrell administration. And what it shows is disturbing.
First, and perhaps most distressing, the mayor appears to have made what should be a science-based, carefully vetted policy decision after getting an elevator pitch from someone she randomly met at a conference. She did so without consulting experts and despite a city ordinance explicitly requiring her to obtain the New Orleans City Council’s approval before signing any MOU.
Second, aside from Cantrell’s communications staff, most of her top aides were left in the dark about what the mayor was doing. Officials responsible for implementing the agreement were not consulted on its details in advance. In fact, they only learned about it days after it was signed — via an administration press release.
The idea that Cantrell could unilaterally, without even consulting her administration’s own experts — and in a matter of hours — assess the efficacy of Zoetic’s technology, the city’s relative needs, and the appropriateness of using public resources in this manner is plainly absurd, and possibly even malfeasance.
Finally, the story also shows the mayor is starting to lose even her own advisors. For most of her second term, the mayor has been able to brush off public criticism as sour grapes or the result of political conspiracies orchestrated by her enemies.
In this case, internal emails showing aides joking about the Zoetic deal and repeatedly expressing concerns about its fundamental soundness make clear that alarm bells are now sounding inside the administration as well.
The story also raises some scary questions. Did Cantrell make other commitments binding the city without sufficient (or any) due diligence? If she has, how many of those deals have collapsed, as the Zoetic deal appears to have, and how much time and resources has she wasted as a result?
Getting answers to those questions was always difficult and has become even more so of late. As The Times-Picayune noted March 24, Cantrell has basically abandoned her traditional weekly press conferences, opting instead to rely on her heavily curated social media feeds to communicate with the public.
Her communications office also increasingly ignores requests for comment or forces journalists to submit public records requests for basic information, a process which can take weeks or even months to produce results.
While that strategy may allow the mayor to pump out a steady stream of glowing press releases, it does a great disservice to residents. It leaves behind the many New Orleanians who rely on traditional news media outlets for their honest information, while also hampering the Fourth Estate’s ability to question her and her decisions in public.
At a minimum, Cantrell should immediately resume her public briefings — and answer questions about her deal with Zoetic.
Documents show that after an initial flurry of behind-the-scenes activity, the project has completely halted.
