This was reported last week.
Chris Brown
Mayor John Whitmire’s senior adviser for financial integrity, Chris Brown, has been largely absent from City Hall, rarely swiping into city offices and sending less than one email per week while collecting a six-figure salary, according to records obtained by the Houston Chronicle.
Brown, who was the city’s elected controller from 2016 through 2023, has swiped into city facilities on 13 days total since joining the mayor’s office in January 2024 – a period spanning nearly 600 work days.
As of April 7, the day the Chronicle started submitting record requests, he had sent a dozen email messages this year, but none of those emails involved senior staff in the mayor’s office, and none of them appeared to relate to fiscal policy or strategy.
The limited activity raises questions about what taxpayers are getting in exchange for Brown’s $127,321 salary in the mayor’s office. Brown has appeared to be on the sidelines even as the Whitmire administration weighs significant financial moves. The budget that City Council will vote on Wednesday includes a new $5 monthly administrative fee for garbage collection, the largest effort in years to introduce new revenue into the city’s coffers.
When asked by a reporter about his absence from City Hall, Brown said he wanted to give “a thorough response rather than an off-the-cuff one,” and asked to see the records. Once the Chronicle provided the information, he stopped responding to emails.
The Chronicle obtained Brown’s badge swipes, email data and payroll information with a series of requests under the Texas Public Information Act. The mayor’s office said it was working to provide his Outlook calendars in the last week of April, but since then it has stopped responding to the Chronicle’s inquiries.
Brown’s job was created by Whitmire and previously did not exist. Álvaro Ortiz, Whitmire’s director of communications, clarified that Brown is only an adviser and does not have an office at City Hall.
Whitmire’s office declined to comment beyond that and has not responded to a Chronicle request for comment since August 2025.
[…]
Brown swiped into city buildings on eight days in 2024, the year the firefighters’ contract was signed, then three days in 2025, when the police contract was signed, and twice in 2026.
His outgoing email activity this year includes a few messages about a “moderator briefing,” connecting two city employees and a few emails with Houston Livestock Show & Rodeo personnel. He has sent just two emails to fellow members of the mayor’s office this year, both of which were to Jesse Bounds, the mayor’s innovation adviser, with the subject line “Connecting.”
Doesn’t sound good, does it? This story has drawn an expected response.
Houston Controller Chris Hollins is launching an investigation into Mayor John Whitmire’s senior adviser for financial integrity after a Houston Chronicle report found he rarely appeared at City Hall while collecting a six-figure salary.
[…]
Hollins at a Monday news conference called on Whitmire to immediately suspend Brown until the investigation is complete. The central issue, he said, is whether work being paid for by taxpayer money is being performed at all.
“The mayor has repeatedly said that his administration is committed to rooting out waste fraud and abuse,” Hollins said. “I agree with that objective wholeheartedly, but accountability cannot be selective. The same standards must apply everywhere that taxpayer dollars are spent, including inside the mayor’s own office.”
[…]
“What we’re looking for is facts, and the facts will lead us to conclusions,” Hollins said. “I can’t tell you at the moment if this is something that can be handled in a week, in a month, or in a year. But it starts today.”
I’ve known Chris Brown for a long time, well before he served as City Controller. I thought he was a good Controller, and I see no reason why someone like him wouldn’t make a good Mayoral advisor on fiscal matters. I have no idea what is happening here, but I’d be very interested to hear an explanation, if anyone cares to offer one. If the facts as reported bear out under Controller Hollins’ audit, the least one can say is that Mayor Whitmire should follow his own edict about cutting wasteful spending. This would be a good place to begin.
If Whitmire proposed a resolution saying “Houston Loves Puppies”, Pollard would vote against it and Hollins would say “Puppies are full of waste and fraud.’
Greg, do you hate all black men or only some of them? Just wondering since Kuff’s article seems to lack any material for your response.
@Greg Shaw So…because Pollard, Whitmire, and Hollins are all Democrats, they should each look the other way when one of them is engaged in waste, fraud , and abuse?
Organized crime style “no-show jobs” and puppies are hardly analogous. Allow me to demonstrate:
If Whitmire proposed a resolution saying “Houston Loves six-figure no-show Jobs”, Pollard would vote against it and Hollins would say “Six-figure no-show Jobs are full of waste and fraud.”
Doesn’t quite have the same vibe.
Personally, and I find politicians demonstrating integrity and accountability refreshing.
Hollins has his sights set on this ass clown of a Mayor and seems determined to spend to his time as City Controller exposing the failures and fiascos of the current pin-striped City Administration. I wait with baited breath and giddy anticipation for his next expose.