Rob Alway, Rob Often

[XLFD]

The latest Scottville city official to be caught acting unethical is Commissioner Rob Alway, also known as the editor-in-chief of the Mason County Press (MCP), a news disseminator for the county and a dependable propaganda mill for all public officials therein.  Just a few years back, Alway agonized over whether he could be a journalist and serve on the Scottville Planning Commission at the same time, he publicly resigned from the SPC.

But shortly thereafter, he quietly got back on to chair the Planning Commission without any public soul-searching, and in a couple years, he not only kept that public office he added th mayor pro-tem spot on the Scottville City Commission (aka the city clowncil) to his resume.  During that time he should have had a lot of epiphanies about improperly mixing journalism with politics, but he hasn't.  

His latest transgression has to do with padding his city hall paycheck by having the City of Scottville use the MCP for advertising and paying them well.  Nothing prevents the City of Scottville from doing this or prevents Commissioner Alway from getting paid a reasonable rate for his services, but it has to be done properly or it violates state law and looks very corrupt at the same time.  Let's review what has happened.

In the last week, the MCP has ran two 'employment opportunities' offered by the City of Scottville, the latest appeared on May 19th advertising for prospective campground workers:

And another article/advertisement for filling a position in the Scottville DPW:

Publisher Rob Alway did not give these services freely, the May 3, 2021 SCC packet shows a $99 charge for the DPW ad:

And the May 17 SCC packet contained a payment of $125 to the MCP:

As well as a much smaller payment of $40 given to the local paper for advertisement.  It's unclear whether there is an apples to apples comparison to media prices without further review of the record, but Editor Alway has cleared a tidy profit of $224 for running two simple ads electronically, while voting to 'pay the bills' at both of these meetings without anybody making any comments or putting anything in the minutes about his profits and his voting to approve the transfer of money from the public body he is part of to the private entity he is in control of. 

That is what's called unethical conduct, even if the services he provided were a good deal for the City, which is debatable.  The Scottville City Charter is a very weak document as it pertains to ethics and conflicts of interests, this is likely why there is very little obeisance by officials to the other parts when corrupted officials abound as they are now.  State law address this issue, however, it is often difficult to understand and interpret due to the breadth of offenses it looks at and the exceptions it offers for some officials.  

The Michigan Municipal League (MML) regularly updates their Handbook for Municipal Officials, and in Chapter 8, addresses ethics of Michigan city officials.  Act 317 disallows a commissioner from being a party or solicitor, even indirectly, to a contract between himself and the government entity he's part of.  An exception exists in that law if the official is part-time or paid for less than 25 hours a week, which Alway would qualify for, however:

Pecuniary means 'related to money'.   Neither Commissioner Rob Alway, nor anybody else at the two city clowncil meetings these invoices were approved, had any public disclosure of the pecuniary interest Commissioner/Editor Alway received for the services his company supplied and there was nothing in the minutes regarding these services and payments to the compromised commissioner.

[XLFD]

The above items on the City of Scottville Facebook page help illustrate what seems to have happened in the ad for a campground worker, which Alway apparently received $125 to post on the MCP.  Somebody at city hall, likely the new CM Jimmy Newkirk, drafted a job description and sent it to Rob Alway, who copied and pasted it to his website (but not on the main page or on his Facebook feed, one had to click on a sidebar prompt on the MCP home page to get to the ad).  

Someone at COS posted a link to that 'hidden' page at 2:09 PM on May 14th on Facebook, and then mere minutes later used their own picture and put the exact same info on the page without linking to the MCP page.  This indicates that the COS was capable of advertising for this position without the additional expense needed, which effectively seems to have given them exposure only to people who visit the MCP home page and actually pay attention to the margin ads.  To the MCP's credit, they finally put the ad up on Facebook late on May 19, less than two days before the deadline.

[Willy]

No matter how it's looked at, this situation with a news agency owner being involved with the politics of the City that he is supposed to be reporting on is corrupt at most and unethical at the least. It is a stain on the confidence required by administrators of Scottville's City Hall. And it certainly looks bad for Alway not only to his own reputation but his integrity and honesty. Could you people representing the citizens of Scottville please put the breaks on and reverse the shameful direction the City is heading in.