The French disconnection: Is Meitzner or Longwell right about blown deal? | Commentary

If you listen to enough election speeches, words start to run together and it becomes a lot of noise without much substance.

But every now and then, a jolt of reality surfaces and gains your attention.

One such moment came during the Sept. 30 forum in east Wichita sponsored by the Wichita Metro League of Women Voters.

Raw video of this event and two other such forums featuring candidates for the Sedgwick County Commission are posted on the league’s Facebook page.

This particular instance arose in response to a question about transparency in county government.

Incumbent Republican Pete Meitzner gave the usual response about the need for transparency, but included a startling revelation along the way.

Transparency is essential, he said, but there are occasions when elected officials must take a pledge of silence when recruiting new businesses and industry to our community.

“Sometimes when you have an economic development opportunity …sometimes … you can’t talk about it,” Meitzner related. “When I was with the city, I was working with Mayor Longwell and he violated that non-disclosure agreement to bring a company from France that was really going to a very big deal for Wichita, and France said ‘thanks, but no thanks’ we’re going to talk to some other states”

WHAT?? A sitting county commissioner chooses this moment to bring up a five year old transgression by former mayor Jeff Longwell that likely would have been front page news if it had been disclosed at the time.

If Meitzner’s story is true, that means the City wasted time and money sending its delegation to France, only to have the deal squelched by the loose lips of the mayor.

Some details about the France recruitment were published in a Wichita Eagle story on Sept. 15, 2017, where Longwell spoke openly about the upcoming recruiting trip to France.

It can’t be proven or disproven that Longwell’s indiscretion cost Wichita a major employer, but that’s really not the point here. Longwell, responding to Meitzner’s comment, said he never signed an NDA. He also said the press already had the story at the time and was going to disclose the recruiting effort regardless of what he might say.

Asked about the accuracy of Meitzner’s accusation, Longwell replied, “It wouldn’t be the first time that Pete was wrong.”

A second quote from Meitzner during that candidate forum also raised a few eyebrows. As part of his answer to “What have you done to help the minority community,” Meitzner replied, “I supported the library.”

That comment raised the eyebrows of several members of the Wichita library advocacy community, considering that Meitzner voted against the library on five consecutive motions before the City Council, including the final vote authorizing funding for the new Advanced Learning Center.

The “loose lips” issue would have been useful information during the 2019 mayoral campaign, although Longwell didn’t need any more negative press to torpedo his failed reelection campaign.

Now, it is left to the rest of us to figure out who is telling the truth, what it means to the big picture and why it took five years to become “transparent”.

If this is what truth and transparency looks like, local government has a long way to go to win the public’s trust.

This story was originally published November 4, 2022 at 5:00 AM.