The Dallas city manager search has unspooled in the chaotic style we’ve come to expect from this City Council. There was the ho-hum recruitment brochure draft featuring the wrong skyline. There was the council civil war over the timeline of the search and the flow of information about candidates. And nothing says “we’ve got our act together” like eleventh-hour candidate interviews the day before Christmas Eve.

When two original semifinalists and a former Dallas city official dropped out of the race, no one was surprised.

We wish the next city manager the best of luck because no amount of talent and hard work can overcome a fundamental flaw of this search, and that is the lack of formal, measurable goals by the City Council. Our city is about to hire its CEO, but its board of directors has no metrics to set expectations or hold that person accountable for the most important job in Dallas.

If you want to understand how dysfunctional the situation is, start with the fact that the council’s appointees — the city manager, city attorney, city secretary and city auditor — haven’t had a performance review in more than two years. Our last city manager, T.C. Broadnax, had his last evaluation in August 2022. He left in May 2024. Interim City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert, the front-runner for the job, hasn’t had an evaluation since her appointment last spring.

The council has hired a consultant over the years to help conduct the evaluations of its appointees. But no consultant can fix this council’s main problem, and that is its inability to come together to develop a consensus around four or five priorities and the metrics to measure progress in those areas.

Even when performance reviews for council appointees were happening, the process was broken. The council’s consultant called council members individually to solicit feedback, with the consultant identifying “themes” shared verbally with the council, and with no particular comments attributed to specific people, according to a 2022 memorandum from Management Partners, the firm hired to do the work. The city manager and other appointees were “invited” to prepare a report on their accomplishments and goals for next year, with the potential for “refinements” based on council input.

There was no written report from the performance evaluation, other than any goals reports produced by the appointees.

It’s a shockingly wishy-washy approach to evaluating an employee, let alone a C-suite executive.

And don’t expect even a veneer of transparency for taxpayers. Last year, we requested Broadnax’s goal reports and were told by the city that there were no responsive records, only to hear a council member remind her colleagues last week that Broadnax produced a memo with his goals after his last performance review in 2022. City staff failed to release this memo in response to our request. Such a document should be public under the Texas Public Information Act.

Now, on the brink of hiring its next city manager, the council is panicking about the fact that it hasn’t evaluated its council appointees in a long time and that it has no measurable goals for any of them. The council committee whose job it is to codify the annual review process can’t seem to agree on how to move forward.

Mayor Pro Tem Tennell Atkins chairs the committee. In a December meeting, he led a discussion on next steps to resume performance reviews of council appointees. Council members learned that their previous consulting firm, Management Partners, had been acquired by Baker Tilly, the company that is leading the messy city manager search. But the woman who had worked closely with the council on previous performance reviews was no longer associated with either company.

The committee gave city staff mixed signals on how to proceed. Some council members said they wanted to continue working with the previous consultant. Others asked to hear from Baker Tilly. Some said they were dissatisfied with the previous consultant or concerned about Baker Tilly and wanted to hear from other vendors. Council members said to move quickly.

By the time the council committee picked the conversation back up this month, confusion reigned. Baker Tilly prepared a presentation that described a performance review process very similar to what the council had with its previous partner. Atkins indicated that the council was moving forward with Baker Tilly using an existing contract, and other committee members pushed back. Meanwhile, an assistant city manager and an assistant human resources director couldn’t answer a council member’s simple question about when the council appointees were last evaluated.

“Yes, we are overdue for these reviews, but I think that they should be pursued seriously with the appropriate time periods involved,” said council member Paul Ridley. “I don’t think we should out of convenience select someone who is doing other work for the city at the present time.”

Council member Jesse Moreno asked whether Baker Tilly would have a conflict of interest in facilitating the performance review of an executive the firm helped hire. A representative tried to assuage Moreno, but he is right to bring that up, given that Baker Tilly would be required to conduct a new search at no cost to Dallas if the city manager doesn’t last a year. Council members should be skeptical. (Keep in mind it was Baker Tilly that produced the hiring brochure for Dallas city manager. The cover photo was a shining image of the Houston skyline.)

The council now seems poised to consider other consultants for the performance evaluations. Council members should do their due diligence instead of repeating their sloppiness for the sake of comfort.

Hire a consultant, if you must, to moderate the conversation or offer pointers, but a management firm can’t do the hard work for you.

Outgoing council member Jaynie Schultz said it best: “This problem is ours as a council. We have not done our work. And so we can try spending all of our time diverting all the problem and the blame on Baker Tilly. … The delay is us, 100% us.”

The council’s job is not to run the city but to set clear, measurable expectations for the people it hires to do that. It’s telling that council members have relied on a consultant to remind them to perform a fundamental duty.

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Remember when Miami was a team you had to take seriously? That Miami could hurt you. That Miami could float like a butterfly and sting like a bee. That was not the Miami we saw Tuesday night and frankly we miss that other Miami.

Duke beat this Miami by 35, 89-54, and it was nolo contendere, no mas, no way for the ‘Canes, and that started early.

Miami tied the game at 6-6 and then Duke took over and went on a three point binge.

Kon Knueppel hit two, then Mason Gillis hit two then Knueppel hit another. Then it was Sion James and Isaiah Evans hit a pair. By that time it was 30-15 and the game was effectively over.

Duke shot 8-12 on threes in the first half and finished the game 17-32 and 53.1 percent on threes is not bad.

Duke’s defense was also imposing. The Blue Devils held Miami to 6-20 on threes (30 percent) and 23-59 overall (39 percent). The ‘Canes only had eight turnovers, but that doesn’t reflect the number of pressured shots, airballs and shot clock violations that Duke pushed them into.

Lynne Kidd was the only real threat Miami had for most of the game and he did surprisingly well against Khaman Maluach, finishing with 20 points and just one rebound.

Austin Swartz got 11 points and that was about it for the ‘Canes. Jalil Bethea had seven; no one else had more than five.

No doubt a lot of people were looking for Cooper Flagg to erupt again after his 42 point game against Notre Dame but that didn’t happen. Flagg finished with 13 points, seven rebounds and six assists.

The leading scorer was Knueppel. Playing like he wanted to make up for the end of the Notre Dame game, Knueppel finished with 25 on 9-11/6-8 shooting. He also had three assists.

Tyrese Proctor didn’t score in this one and that followed a three-point outing against the Irish. Prior to that he had 14, 13, 14 and ten in the previous four games.

Sion James finished with five points, five assists, two rebounds and three blocks, including one terrific one in the second half.

Mason Gillis was tremendous too. His role has really expanded in the last two games. He’s just playing at a much higher level.

Caleb Foster played well, scoring nine points on 3-6/2-3 from the floor. He has been working hard to get to the basket lately and that’s a nice complement to the hot outside shooting.

Duke used Patrick Ngongba for 18 minutes in the absence of Maliq Brown, and he showed some improvement too. He finished with four points and five rebounds and certainly didn’t hurt the team. That’s pretty good for a freshman who was pushed back by injury.

Isaiah Evans played well and aggressively, finishing with eight points and two boards.

Darren Harris got in for eight minutes and also did well. He didn’t score much – just a free throw – but he was comfortable on the court.

You’ve probably noticed that we haven’t gotten to Khaman Maluach yet and that’s because we saved the best for last.

Well, Knueppel was the best tonight. But we could certainly say Maluach was the most exciting thing about this game.

In the earliest games this season, Maluach was tentative. At times he was almost timid. Those days, if they’re not gone, nearly are.

Maluach is a different player. It’s not his stats though they were excellent. He had 12 points on 6-7 from the floor and 15 rebounds. Maluach was tremendous Tuesday.

What really excited us though was his alertness and confidence. There was no tentativeness. There was no uncertainty. And best of all, there were two plays in a row in the second half where he was near the basket and just took the ball straight up. First time was after a rebound and the second he just went up for a jump hook.

These were things he just didn’t do earlier. It wasn’t a question of ability. It was just a lack of confidence and experience. He’s improving with unbelievable speed.

It’s really one of the most striking things we’ve ever seen at Duke. We’ll have to think about this but who has ever improved like this this quickly?

With the win, Duke moves to 15-2 and the losses to Kentucky, by five, and Kansas, by three, don’t seem as concerning.

Next up for the Blue Devils is a trip to Boston College Saturday, then three straight Tobacco Road opponents – at Wake Forest, then NC State and UNC at home.

Atlanta Hawks (20-19, ninth in the Eastern Conference) vs. Chicago Bulls (18-22, 10th in the Eastern Conference)

Chicago; Wednesday, 8 p.m. EST

BETMGM SPORTSBOOK LINE: Bulls -2; over/under is 245

BOTTOM LINE: Atlanta visits the Chicago Bulls after Trae Young scored 43 points in the Hawks’ 122-117 win against the Phoenix Suns.

The Bulls are 15-13 against Eastern Conference opponents. Chicago is 10-13 in games decided by at least 10 points.

The Hawks are 13-7 against Eastern Conference opponents. Atlanta is eighth in the league scoring 17.2 fast break points per game. Jalen Johnson leads the Hawks averaging 3.6.

The Bulls average 118.1 points per game, 1.7 fewer points than the 119.8 the Hawks give up. The Hawks average 13.2 made 3-pointers per game this season, 0.3 fewer makes per game than the Bulls allow.

TOP PERFORMERS: Nikola Vucevic is averaging 20.3 points, 10.2 rebounds and 3.3 assists for the Bulls.

Johnson is scoring 19.8 points per game and averaging 10.1 rebounds for the Hawks.

LAST 10 GAMES: Bulls: 5-5, averaging 120.7 points, 48.1 rebounds, 30.8 assists, 8.1 steals and 4.8 blocks per game while shooting 47.7% from the field. Their opponents have averaged 119.8 points per game.

Hawks: 6-4, averaging 120.2 points, 42.5 rebounds, 29.8 assists, 11.1 steals and 5.0 blocks per game while shooting 47.2% from the field. Their opponents have averaged 120.4 points.

INJURIES: Bulls: Adama Sanogo: day to day (knee), Torrey Craig: day to day (leg), Ayo Dosunmu: day to day (achilles).

Hawks: Kobe Bufkin: out for season (shoulder), Larry Nance Jr.: out (hand), Jalen Johnson: day to day (shoulder), Cody Zeller: day to day (personal), De’Andre Hunter: day to day (foot).

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The Associated Press created this story using technology provided by Data Skrive and data from Sportradar.