Flying L PUD presents grievance against City Council member

At the City Council’s regular meeting on December 21, Steve Childers, Administrator for the Flying L Ranch’s Public Utility District (PUD), presented the PUD’s objection to Bandera City Council Member Darcy Hasty’s actions at their PUD meetings regarding negotiations of selling water to a Dollar General that will be built close to the Flying L property.

During the visitors-to-be-heard portion of the meeting, Childers told the council his board negotiated a deal to sell water to Dollar General in return for a much nicer store and a $35,000 special connection fee to help with their aging system. The Dollar General will be built on the adjacent land just south across from the Flying L entrance and facing 173. The negotiations also included a $2,500 tap fee, $200 per meter fee and $50 per meter connection fee.

Childers then presented his complaint to the council asserting that at several of their PUD meetings with the community, Hasty partnered with Bob Haueter, Flying L POA President, and his wife, Lyn Haueter, to oppose the selling of water usage to Dollar General.

Childers stated, “She was completely out of line by her actions at our board meetings; repeatedly telling us that we were all in a heap of crap because of illegal activity by myself and our board. She issued resignation letters to all of us and threatened that if we didn’t resign on the spot, she would be turning the matter over to the attorney general for prosecution.”

Childers continued, “She accused me of telling Dollar General that I offered a board member a $5,000 bribe in order to get the deal done. However, the saddest thing is when she read a statement by Colonel Travis comparing the fight against Dollar General and the Flying L PUD with that of the Alamo to further incite the crowd and raise the emotional temperature of the community.”

Childers said that since Hasty was introduced as a City Council member at the meetings, he assumed she was representing the interest of the City of Bandera. So, the PUD presented Hasty’s accusations of illegal activity to the PUD attorney.

“He has debunked all of her claims, and I have his letter here if you’d like to see it. Since the allegations were false, her statements now become slanderous, and I am presenting the city with a bill for $3,000 for legal fees.” said Childers.

Childers concluded his grievance to the Council saying Hasty was in violation of 1.030025 of the Code of Conduct of City Officials.

“The professional and personal conduct of city officials must be above reproach and avoid even the appearance of impropriety. The city official shall refrain from abusive conduct, personal charges, or verbal attacks upon the character or motives of other city officials, boards, commissions, and the public in general.” cited Childers.

Childers offered recordings of those PUD meetings to the Bandera City Council if they had any questions.

Flying L resident Penny Bateman, who is married to Flying L PUD President Don Bateman, also spoke to the Bandera City Council.

“Miss Hasty did offer her help with the deal. But it became apparent that you don’t stop Dollar General; they were going to build. Once the PUD voted to sell water to DG, just like when y’all vote on something, that’s a done deal. The efforts of Darcy turned immediately to solely discrediting our PUD board members. It was awful.”

“They were accused of primarily, at Darcy’s lead, of criminal acts,” Mrs. Bateman continued. “There were allegations of bribery and violations of the Texas Open Meetings Act, all kinds of things that just simply were not true. Things were exaggerated and blown up on Facebook. The reason they had the deputy out there the second time was because the first meeting was so disruptive, that the board lost complete control. It was like a riot almost. I don’t know that she has the right to insert herself into these deliberations of our board members. I can’t imagine that this type of behavior by an elected city official is acceptable, and if ya’ll can do anything about it, please do.” said Bateman.

In response to the above statements, Darcy Hasty gave the following response to the Bandera Bulletin:

“Mr. Childers originally attempted to have his statement read anonymously by the city secretary, and that attempt was denied. While much of his statement is incorrect, it did include some truths. I did include a statement by Colonel Travis from the Alamo in stating ‘I shall never surrender or retreat’. When I told the PUD board that, all we wanted from them was for the PUD board to fight alongside the community as the Texans they are, because we come from the same stock of men that once said words like this.

“As far as Mrs. Bateman’s statement goes, she wasn’t at the first meeting, there was nothing close to a riot, and City Marshal Will Dietrich was at the meeting. I am a citizen of the United States. I have no jurisdiction, as Mrs. Bateman stated. I am a person with first amendment rights like everyone else.”

Childers’ next move is to file a formal complaint with the Bandera City Council so the matter can be scheduled on a future agenda.

Bob Haueter told the Bulletin, “I found the comments made by Steve Childers at last week’s City Council meeting to be disingenuous, misleading and an attempt to shift the debate away from his own questionable actions and try and blame others for his own incompetence. As for Mrs. Bateman’s statement that a public meeting was a near riot, I find that to be a poor attempt to shift the conversation away from the fact that she and her husband, the Chair of the PUD Board both chose to skip the PUD meeting in order to enjoy a golf excursion outside the community. Trying to paint a public meeting as a near riot that you couldn’t be bothered to attend is also disingenuous.”

Childers told the Bulletin, “During the business negotiations, we didn’t think it was appropriate to be going back and forth on Facebook. So, it is sad that our community has been torn apart by this process. Good people have turned on neighbors as this information has circulated. Some of the misinformation just didn’t make sense to us.”

Bateman told the Bulletin, “This has been a carefully orchestrated political attack against the PUD. They’ve just repeated the same points over and over on social media until people just believe it. The PUD board needs to know that all of their efforts and all their work was not in vain. They need to see some kind of support.