text: 6:16 And as many as walke acordynge to this rule, peace and mercy be vpon the, and vpon Israel of God.
  
  (TX) – The Bexar County Jail has been short-staffed for a long time, but under Sheriff Javier Salazar, it has become critically understaffed. To add to those problems, KSAT 12 just released an article letting us know that Sheriff Salazar has terminated 102 officers during his first term in office. There definitely were officers who needed to be fired. In fact, a deputy was just issued a Notice of Proposed Dismissal on Monday. The intent to terminate came after Deputy Victor Damon Collins was arrested for assault-bodily injury. Collins is accused of assaulting an inmate. If the accusation is found to be true, then Collins definitely should be terminated.
  It’s unfortunate that KSAT chose to contradict the claim of back pay amount in the same article as the terminations. I understand the connection, but it also gives the impression that everything else said against Sheriff Salazar is also false. I don’t believe it is. What we know is that officers are written up for every minor infraction. Under Sheriff Salazar, people are being led by disciplinary action rather than through mentoring. The more dings you get on your record, the more you look like a problem employee.
  “I’ve made no secret of the fact that we’ve got people employed here that probably should never have been hired, some of them probably should have been fired years ago,” said Salazar during a recent interview.
  But it’s not the reality of the situation. I don’t see this number as being a sign of Sheriff Salazar’s commitment to maintaining the best staff possible. I see it as bad leadership. Leadership that is so bad that it puts the lives of officers at risk due to being understaffed. We already saw what can happen when a jail is understaffed. We just posted an article about the St. Louis jail that was taken over by inmates.
  The KSAT article ends with a quote by Salazar, “I’d rather work a man short than work with the wrong man.” First of all, it isn’t just one, it’s over a hundred that he has fired, keeping them short by approximately 250 positions, and secondly, Salazar isn’t the one in the trenches, his men and women are. It’s easy to talk tough when you are not the one doing the real work.
  I have no doubt that Sheriff Salazar wants to blame problem employees on previous administrations, but there are very few, if any, know problem people left from prior administrations. And if they aren’t known then the prior administrations could not have addressed them. No one expects the sheriff to be able to read minds or see into the future.
  His real problem is that his administration is made up of people with poor management skills. They were not selected for how well they manage, but rather on how good of a yes man they are. It’s easy to see that when you look at the command staff. As we noted in a prior article, Salazar has lost nine of his command staff picks. He can’t blame those on past administrations. They are people he selected for the positions. They are people he bragged about to the media. Then all of a sudden they were outcasts. So what happened there? Why can’t he keep chiefs? I haven’t seen that much turnover, in one term, out of any other administration. What he does to the chiefs is really not much different to what he does to the staff below the chief level.
  Sheriff Salazar can blame the previous administrations as much as he wants, but it’s not going to fix the problem. Those administrations were never the problem. Poor management is the problem. And as long as he ignores it, it will continue to be a problem.
  Tags: assault bodily inury, back pay, bad leadership, bexar county jail, officers fired, poor management, Victor Damon Collins
  
  There is an alarming trend among many buyers of real estate these days. We’re seeing more and more people who want to “place bids” rather than to “make offers” on a home.
  Real estate is not eBay. While some real estate is sold in an auction format, the vast majority of sales are not. I realize that in some markets buyers are in full control given the volume of short sales and foreclosures, but in many places the markets are balanced and in some places there are seller’s markets.
  In the north Dallas suburbs, there is a severe shortage of good properties under $150k. Last weekend I was out with some first time homebuyers who had been looking for weeks. We found a home the first day it was on the market. By day 3 there were multiple offers and my clients actually had to offer more than list price in order to secure the contract. It’s a seller’s market for good homes under $150k.
  I’ve seen buyers totally upset when their low “bid” was not countered while a more reasonable offer was negotiated and accepted. That’s not to say that a lower offer is not appropriate at times such as with an overpriced property. However, throwing in a bid at 70 percent of market value on a hot property is usually a waste time.
  Many investors use this approach but don’t really care if hundreds are rejected while they look for the one seller who will sell at that price. The average home buyer will quickly become frustrated using this method.
  Many of our younger buyers have grown up bidding online and to some extent bidding has become part of America’s landscape. While I suspect this trend will continue in consumer goods, I don’t think it will last in the housing market and certainly does not apply to seller’s markets.
  My advice is to know what kind of market you’re looking in and use an appropriate strategy rather than always going in with a “bidding” strategy.
  The phone rang in the office this morning. I had just walked in and grabbed the call. I introduced myself and asked the caller what I could do for them. “We saw the house you have for sale at 123 Anywhere and we want to place a bid on it” the caller stated.
  “Are you paying cash or have you been preapproved for a mortgage?” – “We’ll need a loan but we can take care of that next week.”
  “Are you aware that this is a Short Sale property and make take some time to get bank approval?” – “It’s a foreclosure?”
  I was holding a power-hour open house later, so I suggested they stop by and take a look. This house is priced well below market because it needs extensive work. Personally, I think financing is going to be a problem because of structural issues.
  But none of this is what really got to me today. It’s the eBay mentality that appears to be taking over our industry. The only listings where I can place a “bid” are HUD Foreclosures. HUD Foreclosures are sold using a sealed bid auction format.
  Every one of my 36 listings is “for sale” and I’m not running a reserved price auction. Yes, price and terms are negotiable but I expect buyers to make offers on a property by completing the proper contracts, being able to show reasonable earnest money, and proof of funds or a mortgage pre-approval from a reputable lender. When I’m working with buyers, I explain this to them if they talk about placing a “bid” on a property.
  It’s not just the clients either. I hear Buyers Agents talk about placing bids on properties all the time.
  While there are many issues, many buyers expect to be able to cancel their “bid” at any time without ramification. I had a buyer on one of my listings who decided to back out at the last minute. To make matters worse, the agent calls asking us to release the earnest money back to the buyer so they can use it for another property! This is not just a non-performing bidder email and a negative feedback situation. There can be serious legal and financial consequences.