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Joint City Council /PEDC Meeting <br />September 15, 2014 <br />Page 2 <br />specifically the value of the loans, security or appraised tax value, or both, of a certain <br />transaction involving the PEDC and HWH. He also said the letter indicates there appeared to be <br />a conflict of interest for then Mayor Will Baird to have participated in the negotiation of the <br />incentive agreement with HWH. Mr. Grubbs said on April 2, 2014 the PEDC elected to use <br />Defenbaugh and Associates to complete the forensic investigation, the estimated cost to be <br />$50,000, a ninety day agreement was signed and it began on April 3, 2014, and continued <br />through July 3, 2014. Under the agreement, Mr. Defenbaugh was to provide weekly oral status <br />reports and a monthly written report to the PEDC and that never occurred. He said PEDC board <br />chair Rebecca Clifford denied having received any reports from Mr. Defenbaugh at the PEDC <br />board meeting on May 6 and again denied having received any written reports at the June 3, <br />2014, joint meeting of the City Council and the PEDC. Mr. Grubbs said that he received a <br />preliminary report from Mr. Defenbaugh on July 25, 2014, and on August 5, 2014 the PEDC <br />board met in executive session to discuss personnel issues that were noted in the Defenbaugh <br />report. Mr. Grubbs also said that Mr. Defenbaugh was in attendance and it was then that they <br />were told that the report that they had received was in fact not his final report. On August 11 `f` <br />the final report was delivered to the PEDC office by Mr. Defenbaugh and on August 15, the final <br />report made available to the public. Mr. Grubbs said he asked PEDC attorney Jeff Moore to <br />walk them through the more relevant aspects of the report as it pertained to Texas Law. He <br />informed City Council that Jeff Moore was a partner with Brown and Hoffineister, who had a <br />practice emphasizing local governmental law, economic development, zoning and land use. He <br />also said Mr. Moore possessed 20 years of municipal law experience, was a frequent speaker <br />around the State of Texas on Municipal topics such as Economic Development for Texas cities, <br />including Type A and Type B sales tax, chapter 380 agreements, tax abatement agreements, tax <br />incentive financing, the Texas Open Meetings Act and the Texas Public Information Act. Mr. <br />Grubbs stated Mr. Moore had spent four years with the Texas Attorney General's office as the <br />head of the Municipal Affairs Section and currently assists the Texas Economic Development <br />Council, the Texas Attorney General's Office and the State Comptroller office with Type A and <br />Type B sales tax training, and conducts training seminars required by the Texas Legislature. <br />Jeff Moore gave a presentation to the City Council and the PEDC Board, which covered <br />Type A Sales Tax Issues, State oversight, permissible Type A projects, promotional <br />expenditures, job training, sales tax proceeds for promotional purposes, business recruitment and <br />development, gifting proceeds, approval of PEDC expenditures, and State conflicts of interest <br />statute. Mr. Moore noted the report had a lot of discussion about the lack of policies and <br />procedures, and then pointed out that State Law had already addressed all of that. <br />Mr. Moore stressed the sales tax was a local issue. He said voters vote it in and voters <br />can vote it out, and it was not for the Comptroller's office to investigate, and it was not for the <br />Attorney General's office to investigate. Mr. Moore said the district attorney's office is to <br />investigate if there is some criminal wrongdoing, and that they could ask the prosecutors <br />assistant division within the Attorney General's office for help. He noted that in the report there <br />was some quest for the Attorney Generals' office or the Comptroller's Office to review, and then <br />stated if the EDC hired a third party to do business recruitment and they did not have a written <br />contract for that business recruitment effort, that the Attorney General's Office could go after the <br />EDC for failure to have a contract. Mr. Moore said that was a civil penalty and the fine could be <br />