In our last blog we asked if local elections are truly non-partisan and from the response we received most readers responded with a firm NO. We are not surprised by the response because we believe local races stopped being non-partisan a long time ago. Political campaigns are serious business according to the book Political Campaign Craftsmanship by Edward Schwartzman which notes that over one BILLION dollars are spent in presidential election years. Where do the candidates get all this money?
Candidates for political office at any level of government, must hustle to raise money to fund campaigns. Campaign finance laws dictate who can contribute, how much one can contribute and how those contributions must be reported. In Texas, campaign finance guidelines are published by the Texas Ethics Commission. Before any campaign can start raising funds, they must first file paperwork to identify their campaign treasurer who is responsible for keeping up with the campaign finance reports that must be turned in to the city.
Generally, when a person donates to a candidate they have a specific reason or purpose that drives that decision. People may donate to support a specific candidate or party whom they share the same values or has the same goals. One may donate to try and influence an election outcome in their favor or to gain access or influence with the candidate. In Frisco, who is donating to our city council members and what are they doing with the money you donated?
In an early blog called The Ethics Conclusion & The Bogus Ethics Policy, we addressed campaign donations going back and forth between candidates and how it can affect them from being able to be independent when an ethics complaint is filed against a member of the council. In our blog Dark Money, we talked about the corrupt campaign finance system that has shifted the power in politics from the residents to the pay-to-play system that developers in Frisco seem to take advantage of.
As we said local elections are no longer non-partisan so if you are democrat you mostly likely donate to democratic candidates and the same could be said for a conservative donating to republican candidates. We decided to start with John Keating because he is currently running for re-election and his campaign finance report has been the most colorful over the years.
John P. Keating is a registered Republican. In 2015, Keating announced he would not run for re-election in Frisco because he planned on running for Texas House Representative District 33. According to TransparencyUSA he has received contributions from some interesting groups, most likely during the time he ran for the Texas House District. Empower Texas PAC $52,160.01, Texas Right To Life PAC $10,000, True Texas Project PAC $2239.86, and the Collin County Republican Party as well as 2 republican woman groups. One interesting donation to point out is the James Webb donation during his run for Texas House. Webb donated $20,000 according to TransparencyUSA and he was convicted of Medical Fraud in 2016.
What about locally? Keating made several donations according to his campaign finance reports, remember this is money donated to his campaign. Keating donated over $3000+ to The Frisco Chamber of Commerce, the most recent donation in 2022. In 2017, he “sponsored” $1500 for the Collin County Republican Party. Fast forward to 2021, John Keating’s campaign finance report shows he donated $1000 to each of the following republican campaigns: Angela Paxton Campaign, Jared Patterson Campaign, and Pat Fallon for Congress. Also in 2021, he continued donating to republicans like the Chris Hill Campaign for $500, Jimmy Angelino for $1000, and the Rob Altman for $1000.
In 2022, from his campaign donations, he donated $1000 to each of the following republicans: Keith Self for Congress, Jared Patterson, Matt Shaheen, Drew Springer, Frederick Frazier, and the Jimmy Angelino Campaign.
In local elections, using his campaign donations, he donated $1000 to the Bill Woodard Campaign, and in 2022/23 he donated $2000+ to the Cheney Campaign. Now what is interesting is that John Keating and then wife Leslie Keating, made around $7000 in donations to Angelia Pelham, a registered democrat. We could not find the donations on his campaign expense reports so we are assuming that came from personal funds. QUESTION:Keating has always made campaign contributions to politicians from his personal campaign fund so why when it comes to Angelia did he change that? Keating has donated to some very conservative politicians in recent years and received money from very conservative groups over the years, so we are guessing he didn’t want his “REPUBLICAN” donors to know he was donating to a democrat which would have had to be listed on his campaign finance report. Since it came from his personal funds, the only way to know he donated to Pelham is by looking at her campaign finance reports.
Why is this important? First if you donate to a candidate like Keating, but you don’t support Cheney or Woodard, would you be upset to learn he is using campaign donations to support them? If you are democrat voting for Keating, and never researched his campaign funds, would you be upset to learn Keating has donated to and accepted campaign funds to some very far right conservatives? Lastly, Keating supported Angelia for council then and now and the fact that he gave her $7000 could be an issue for party driven voters. Maybe that is why he didn’t donate from his campaign fund like he did with all the other candidates. We don’t know the make-up of Angelia’s voters, but if most are democrat do you think they know Keating is donating to some very conservative legislatures and accepted money from some very conservative PACs over the years?
In our next blog we plan to deep dive into the other council members’ campaign contributions to see who they are giving their campaign money to which was been donated to them.
Over and over, we hear local municipal elections are nonpartisan, which means candidates do not officially run under “party labels” or political affiliations. While we would like to believe our local races are non-partisan in theory, it is simply not true. Unless you are living under a rock, you understand politics has heated up and taken center stage across the nation and that has caused more voters to ask a candidate their political affiliation at all levels of government.
According to Ballotpedia, the local government has become a testing ground for political movements and policy proposals. Many cities are starting to clash with state and federal governments over issues of immigration to marijuana legalization. They website lists out the 100 Current Mayors of the 100 Largest U.S. Cities by population. As of January 2024, the partisan breakdown of mayors for the 100 largest U.S. cities was 63 Democrats, 25 Republicans, 1 Libertarian, 4 Independents and 5 Non-Partisans. While several Texas cities made the list, the City of Frisco is not one of them.
Just recently worldwide politics took center stage right here in Frisco at the January 18th city council meeting when residents chose to address a very divisive and hot topic current issue. During citizen’s input, several members of the local Muslim community spoke out asking city leaders to pass a resolution on the Israel Gaza Conflict. One resident asked for peace and a “resolution” to condemn the conflict while another resident asked for a cease fire resolution. A young woman spoke and said she carries the weight of displaced Palestinians and talked of her people’s genocide. She called for the city council to call for an immediate cease fire in Gaza, facilitate unhindered aid to the region and put an end to the siege and address the occupation and genocide in Palestine. While I understand the residents’ concerns I am sure we have residents who have a very different opinion that the residents who spoke at council. It is simply false to say in 2024, that local elections are “NON-PARTISAN.” The proof is in citizens input, it shows most voters are not separating local, state and national/worldwide issues.
This week I was sitting at my favorite local coffee shop and a young college student walked in and sat down. We started up a conversation about politics and he repeatedly told me he is a proud Democrat, and that Democrats will take over Texas soon. I asked him if he would ever vote for a conservative, support a conservative, or donate to a conservative. With a stern tone he said, “no way, no that would never happen.”
I then asked him who he is supporting in our local elections for city council, and he told me Angelia Pelham and John Keating. I asked him to give me the reasons why he chose each candidate so I could understand his mindset. When he was done, I chuckled and said you know John Keating is a Republican, right? He looked at me as if I was a stupid old man and said that is not true. I invited him to my table, and I showed him John Keating’s campaign finance report on my iPad. I asked him if that changed his opinion, and he replied who is the Democrat running? I told him local elections are supposed to be “non-partisan” and he responded swiftly “well not for me.” It is further proof that people of all ages are not seeing local elections as non-partisan anymore.
Do you think local politics is non-partisan? If you do, would you be upset if you donated to a local candidate and then found out that candidate was using your money to donate to other candidates in state and national races who are affiliated to a specific party? Local politics has changed in very significant ways and we are diving into where the money goes in our next blog.
Campaigning has begun and we are excited to see how the next few months play out. We thought we should educate ourselves on the rules, so we read city’s Political Campaign Sign policy listed on the city website.
Rules 1 & 4 are pretty clear so we decided to look at the candidates social media pages and election websites.
Rule 1: Political signs cannot be placed on any City of Frisco, Community Development Corporation (CDC), or Economic Development Corporation (EDC) property or in a City of Frisco easement.
Rule 4: The City of Frisco logo cannot be used in any way for campaigning including on political signs.
John Redmond website appears to only be one page and has a short intro to who he is and his campaign logo. We could not find any social media pages for him. – Passed Inspection
Mark Piland website does not include pictures of political signs on city property, and it does not contain the official city logo. In a review of his social media, we did not see any violations either. – Passed Inspection
Angelia Pelham currently holds Place 3 and serves as Deputy Mayor Pro Tem. Her website passed inspection. However, her social media did not! On January 17th she held a filing party at city hall. She had several supporters come join her and there are numerous pictures of her and supporters holding Pelham campaign signs on city property and more so in the rotunda of city hall! That is a clear violation of Rule 1 even if it was temporary. The photos also violate Rule 4 regarding the city logo not being used for campaigning because clearly in several photos the official city logo can be spotted. It became campaigning when she turned into a filing party, had her political signs and several supporters wearing t-shirts. The photos appear on her political Facebook page as well as personal page and on Instagram.
We liked her campaign video, she looks good in red and has a catchy slogan. We are a little curious about one portion of the video which shows her standing at the back of the room with Frisco Public Safety officers from both the PD and FD. The video is tagged in the corner with her campaign logo which could give people the impression she is endorsed by either public safety group, which she is not. The picture includes Mark Piland who has announced he is running for Place 1 which made us curious how he feels his likeness in her video? Lastly, when the photo was taken we were pretty sure none of them knew down the road it would be used for campaign video. We are not sure if there is any violation here according to campaign rules or city rules, however one would think before using someone’s likeness, out of respect, you might want to ask them if they are okay with it. Many police departments have rules about offices being photographed and for the purposes they can be used for.
Lastly, we looked a John Keating’s website. He currently serves Place 1 and is the Mayor Pro Tem. We could not view his social media because has blocked us across all channels. Keating’s website is in clear violation of Rule 4. As soon as the page loads you see a picture of Keating with the slogan Promises Made Promises Kept and behind it is a watermark of the official City of Frisco Flag. Then if you scroll down, right after he asks you for your money, you can clearly see the official city logo.
On the “About John” page it shows him standing in the Frisco City Council Chamber up on the dais. This picture was taken on December 4, 2018, the night the council approved a plan for the PGA of America. The picture appears in an article for the Dallas Morning News.
The last page titled “The Mission” has a picture of Keating with the official city of Frisco Logo right behind him, which is again, a clear violation of Rule 4. Then under Public Safety he has a picture with Chief Shilson, Frisco PD which mislead residents of an endorsement that he does not have. Now the picture with Shilson may not be a violation but is misleading.
When it comes to campaigning, rules should be taken very seriously. We could understand how first-time candidates can make mistakes, but if they are running it is their responsibility to know the rules. As for the Deputy Mayor Pro Tem Angelia Pelham, and Mayor Pro Tem John Keating, they have no excuse. If they are serving in the Deputy Mayor Pro Tem and Mayor Pro Tem positions then clearly they should know the rules. Keating has been around since 2011, off and on and if he doesn’t know the rules by now then we may have bigger issues. We go back to why are there rules for thee but not for me? I can guarantee if some of the previous candidates who ran for office committed these violations we would not hear the end of it. The city should also be accountable to uphold their own rules! Email the city council and ask them to uphold to the city rules now and in the future.
A morning routine helps us set the tone for the day, better allowing us to control our schedules rather than our schedule controlling us. There are science-backed benefits of having a morning routine: Past research has shown that a consistent morning routine can reduce stress, boost your energy levels and improve your productivity at work.
My wife and I have a morning routine and my favorite part of it is sitting in front of our bay window reading the paper and having coffee. However, this morning my wife was not too happy when I spit my coffee out all over the bay window and her new cushions. What could make me do that? Well, it was the headline in The Real Deal, an online real estate newspaper that read, “Stillwater Files Bankruptcy on Highland Park’s Mondara Condos.”
What are the Mondara Condos? The condos were sold as a high-end luxury multifamily living project in the prestigious Highland Park area. Jess Hardin who wrote the article notes that today the community is at the center of a legal battle in which the developer, Stillwater Abbott Development, has filed for bankruptcy.
Harden writes, “The Dallas-based developer filed for bankruptcy protection in the Northern District of Texas on Jan. 12. The filing comes almost four years after the Mondara Condominium Association sued the developer – and related entities Stillwater Abbott Management and Stillwater Abbott Development – for construction defects. In the bankruptcy filing, Stillwater wrote that it had fewer than 50 creditors, less than $50,000 in assets and less than $50,000 in liabilities. The paperwork was signed by Robert Elliott, the manager of Stillwater Capital Investments.
Why would the association sue the developer? According to The Real Deal, in a 2020 lawsuit the association claimed the property was “negligently constructed!” Oh yeah, the lawsuit states it was poorly constructed causing leaks, floods, and was a fire hazard. The Real Deal also reported that the lawsuit alleged, “The roof, stucco cladding, windows, doors, fireplaces, interior and exterior walls, parking garage and courtyard must be extensively repaired or replaced.
You are probably wondering, what does this have to do with Frisco, Texas? If you read our blog Anatomy of a Friendship we did a very deep dive into the relationship of Mayor Jeff Cheney and Robert Elliott. In July 2016, Robert Elliott created The Associates, a full-service residential real estate brokerage that Mayor Jeff Cheney joined in November of 2017, right before the big “FRISCO PGA DEAL.” The same Robert Elliott who is a founding partner of Stillwater Capital. His own bio from the company’s website reads, “Through the company’s custom home building brand, Robert Elliott Custom Homes (RECH), Elliott leads one of Dallas’ premiere single-family builders.
In 2021, Clay Roby represented Robert Elliott and Stillwater Capital when asking our council to approve The Link project that connects to the PGA. At one point in the discussion it was clear Clay Roby was tired of the delays and truthfully they felt this should have been a no brain vote after what they did for us bringing the Frisco PGA to town. When the council members got caught up on apartment multi-family the Mayor Jeff Cheney tried to even redirect the conversation, saying what else will it offer?
Stillwater Capital has a large investment in Frisco starting with The Corvalla, The Link, PGA Frisco, Link Multifamily Phase 1, and Greenway Village at The Link. All the projects were approved while Cheney has been on council or up at the pulpit as Mayor. The projects Stillwater Capital pitched here are no different than the Highland Park project based on the pictures they presented to the council on the Frisco Cottage development was to look like. SHOULD WE BE WORRIED ABOUT THESE PROJECTS?
Our investigation into The Preserve at PGA Frisco has offered up a treasure trove of information over the last year. We first talked about this back in February 2023 in our blog Fields West Dynasty where we discussed the historic future Fields development and the woven professional relationship conflicts. We began to unravel our opinion regarding the conflict of interest at play for Mayor Jeff Cheney vs Real Estate Mogul Jeff Cheney and his relationship with the Fehmi Fields development. Just the Fields Frisco website was cause for pause – why is there a letter from Mayor Jeff Cheney on it?
Then in our Field of Dreams blog, we talked about how Texas Scorecard had questioned the same thing we did years earlier. We also shared an email by John Baumgarten to then-Mayor Jeff Cheney asking how he could get on the “unofficial lot list” for The Preserve and that he would like to make a “donation” to a charity involved in the development. We also pointed out there was no response to Mr. Baumgarten supplied in our PIR but there was a continuing conversation between Cheney and then Chief of Staff Lori Medina (MedinaUSA) on where the donation could be made.
We continued our questions regarding The Preserve and PGA Frisco in our blog, The Silicon Valley of Golf followed by our blog Dark Money where we pointed out some very questionable campaign donations from all these developers involved in future Fields / PGA / The Link. Then we laid out in detail the conflict of interest friendships Mayor Cheney vs Realtor Jeff Cheney built in our blog Anatomy of a Friendship.
Then we release our Breaking News: The Preserve Lots VIP Program blog where we have a recording of a builder rep telling local Real Estate Agents that Jeff Cheney has a lot in The Preserve along with other important people in the project, kind of like a millionaire or billionaire row so to speak of lots and future homes. Go listen to the recording you won’t be disappointed. Then we published the proof in Land Lies of the developer plot map which shows the names Cheney and Keating under a “Developer Hold.”
Why are we reminding you about this? You have to go back to the beginning to understand how what we uncovered today is concerning. For years now local Realtors have been questioning the potential conflict between Cheney’s role as Mayor and as Realtor/Broker of the Cheney Group. Questions also surround his convoluted relationship with Fehmi Karahan and the sale of the lots in The Preserve. Multiple times, Cheney has publicly stated he is not the Realtor of record for lots in The Preserve. He joked in front of a room of real estate professionals, please don’t call me as I am not the agent for these lots. Realtors questioned though how a majority of the lots were already sold before going public to real estate professionals.
With everything he has said publicly were surprised to see 3 lots worth over $2+ million for sale in The Preserve at PGA Frisco on his website. A few months ago it said it was listed by one of his agents but now according to the multiple listing service (MLS) the REALTOR OF RECORD IS JEFF CHENEY OF THE CHENEY GROUP!
In closing, we initially were doing research into some rumors about a possible shake-up or break-up within the Monument umbrella. That led us to these lots for sale which sparked us to look through public records, talk to some builder reps as we “house hunted,” and what we learned from our Realtor neighbor. The lots in question had been sold or contracted by other agents for client’s they had. So why are they for sale now? We can only assume the original buyers probably changed their minds or backed out for some reason which happens all the time according to my neighbor. If they were contracted by other agents, then why are those agents not selling the lots? Why are the lots now listed with the Cheney Group? Why is Jeff Cheney listed as the Realtor/Broker of Record? With so many questions, you can see we are still looking into this so stay tuned for more of what we uncover.
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