Why I felt motivated to record my calls

Just prior to the council meeting on January 19th of 2021, the council held a workshop session which was broadcast on the internet but not recorded.  One of the topics was about naming volunteers to be members of the city's various boards.

One of the councilmembers brought up Mike Vanbuskirk, who had previously served as the Vice President of the SEDC's Board of Directors.  Mike had recently decided to not ask to be reappointed to the board in 2020.  

Jeff told the council that he had talked to Mike about why he resigned from the SEDC board, and said that Mike had raised some concerns about the SEDC, but that Jeff didn't want to go into the details about his concerns.  As I recall, he said that he thought Mike might be willing to return.  

Since I had served alongside Mike for several years this came as a surprise to me.  Mike and I had a good relationship so I couldn't fathom what concerns Mike may have expressed to Jeff that he hadn't talked to me about, so I reached out to Mike a couple days later to see if he'd be willing to share his concerns with me.

When I spoke to Mike, he was surprised that his name had come up and said that he was not interested in returning to the board.  When I asked him to recount his concern, he said that he had told Jeff that he felt that the city council was exercising too much control over the SEDC, so his concern wasn't with the SEDC but rather with the city council's handling of the SEDC.

After hearing that from Mike, I realized that Jeff was unwilling to go into the details about Mike's concerns because it would have derailed his proposed by-law modification later in that meeting.  It seemed very disingenuous for Jeff to say that Mike had concerns about the SEDC when Mike's concerns were actually about the City Council.

In the days after my call with Mike, I wished that I had recorded the phone call so that I could make the issue clear to the council.

On January 27th of 2021, Jeff called me and I believe all of the other SEDC board members and councilmembers to apologize for his poor handling of the by-law proposal.  

In the days after that call, I spoke to a few other board members and councilmembers about our calls, and I learned that Jeff was telling different versions of the events to various people.  

As I was hearing various stories from people involved in this matter I again regretted that I had not recorded my phone call.  It seemed that a lot of different conversations were being had, with each one being targeted to a particular individual.  For example, he told me directly that his by-law change was intended to lead to Leslyn Blake's removal, and a councilmember was allegedly told that it was not.  Without a recording of Jeff admitting his intentions I had no way to prove that Jeff was being dishonest, or at the very least manipulative.  

So, when I saw that Jeff had tried to call me on February 1st of 2021, I verified that the laws in Texas allow for any party in a conversation to record the conversation, and I installed an app on my phone to record my call to him.  

I have since verified with legal counsel that I was within my rights to record the conversation.

It is very unfortunate that the lies and manipulation reached a point where I felt it was necessary, but having the recording should make his dishonesty clear to everybody who listens.