Friends over at Carolina Plott Hound refer to the Rev. William Barber as “Bully” Barber. But —according to the N&R, Greensboro has its own “Bully” Barber —City Council member Mike Barber, who allegedly pressured Downtown Greensboro Inc. to hire fellow council member Zack Matheny as its new chief executive officer:
DGI interim CEO Cyndy Hayworth said the threat came Tuesday in a telephone call from City Councilman Mike Barber.
“I received a call and was given an ultimatum or a deadline,” Hayworth said in an interview Friday.
“The parameters around that were, ‘If you make a decision on the hiring of a CEO by a certain time, then the City Council would not vote to stop funding to DGI,’?” she said.
Barber denies making a threat or giving Hayworth an ultimatum.
I know Barber and he’s a pretty nice guy and at times can be a voice of reason on a liberal city Council. But he’s also been feisty lately, as evidenced by his “knothead” comment when referring to the General Assembly during the debate over Gboro decision to hire a lobbyist to fight SB 36 (see video below).
Look, if DGI wants to hire Matheny then I say fine—but please don’t insult taxpayers’ intelligence by claiming there would be no conflict of interest if Matheny continued to sit on the City Council. Matheny didn’t seem to think there would be a conflict when the N&R reported back in February that he was seeking the job.
