This entry marks the first post in a new category “Rumor Control.” Information found in these posts is not verified, and accuracy may be lacking. Any opinion I express on its veracity is just that, opinion. It is mostly, as the category title says, rumor.

A little over a month ago, a story broke about Cheryl Jackson, a city employee in the water department, that was allegedly accepting bribes to give people non-existent city jobs. It seems that, aside from the damage that it did to employee reputations and morale, there have been some more lasting effects. Apparently, Ms. Jackson was not familiar to many of the employees in the building where she worked, as she was an evening or night-shift manager in the IT section. In this position, she had access to a mainframe system containing SSN’s and TDL’s of over 400,000 Houston residents, a nightmare-inducing headache for the COH. (Bear in mind that there is a big difference in having access to the system and having access to the data.) Apparently, she was also running a “credit repair” business on the side, and the way she came into contact with some of her victims may have been through her business.

The rather obvious possibility that she might have obtained their information and targeted victims through use of city resources has no doubt occurred to investigators. It will be interesting to see if anything on that comes out in the trial. Whenever that is. Prediction: considering that the Bonusgate 4 aren’t going on trial until conveniently after the November election, I bet that’s about the time Ms. Jackson will also be tried.

Apparently, she didn’t just take money and offer a fake class. The rumor mill has it that she actually brought people to her office and administered bogus drug tests! Not working during regular hours, she escaped the notice of senior managers, and other employees were not willing to challenge an assistant manager about bringing people into the building after hours. I don’t know about the drug tests, but the part about bringing people into the building is probably true, as management at 4200 Leeland has apparently cracked down on badge wearing, ordered formerly insecure doors to be kept closed, and now requires employee badges to enter the building (for employees anyway — customers can still walk in the front door.) Most employees are said to be supportive of the greater security, so at least that’s a positive.

Far more speculative and unverified are persistent rumors that management has initiated a thorough review of all applications and employee files, looking for discrepancies and/or obvious problems. (Well, at least as obvious as putting someone convicted of document tampering in a sensitive job.) At least one supervisor is said to have been terminated for a problem with their application. One version says the person lied about prior employment. Alternate rumors say it was a random drug test that got him or her. Veracity: unknown.

An unrelated security issue is the new temp hiring agency that opened next door. Apparently, there have been problems with its “not-employees” trying to park inside the city’s gated lot, urinating in public, and accosting city employees.

That’s all I’ve got for now folks.