S

igh.

The City of Birmingham is really gonna pay Anthony Barnes to convince the Republican super majority in Montgomery that the Birmingham Water Works is ... the best thing since bacon.

Sigh.

It's like counting on Bernie Madoff to rebuild trust in the securities industry.

It's like hiring Bill Clinton to look after your niece.

It's like appointing that guy from Duck Dynasty to serve as ambassador to San Francisco.

In the grand scheme of good ideas, it's right there with ... New Coke.

Birmingham, along with the Birmingham Water Works Board, is scrambling to kill a proposed bill in the Alabama Legislature that would spread representation on the Water Board, limit board member pay, set term limits and – this is most important – require public notice and hearings before the board can raise rates.

The City Council agreed today to spend up to $100,000 on lobbyists – an amount equal to the taxes collected on $2.5 million in city spending – to help fight that bill. And former Water Board Chairman Barnes will get a chunk of it.

It's like sending George Armstrong Custer to pow wow with the Sioux.

Because much of what the GOP sponsors of this bill – Sen. Jabo Waggoner and Rep. Paul DeMarco – protest about the Birmingham Water Works was formed, performed and made the norm under the leadership of Barnes himself.

Barnes for years was expert at churning meetings for the $285 pay board members receive each time they show up. In 2011 he pulled in $30,045 for that part time job. Barnes was so good at snagging those paychecks that he – at least four times – got Water Board pay for meeting with the Metropolitan Development Board.

Even though he was a member of the Metropolitan Development Board.

Sigh.

Barnes was the one who somehow convinced lawyer Charlie Waldrep and the engineering firm Malcolm Pirnie to donate $100,000 each to the charity he co-chaired. Maybe because they both received – and continue to receive -- millions in Water Board contracts.

Barnes is the guy deemed by the city so valuable that it disregarded its own two-term policy for board members and let him stay on the board for 21 years.

Then again he was co-chair of a re-election committee for Mayor William Bell in 2011, a fund-raising committee that also included two Water Board members (including the current chairman), and at least five other Water Board contractors and subcontractors.

But while Barnes may be a big cheese in Birmingham, it is the very cheese that stinks to GOP members of the Legislature, who will determine the fate of this bill.

Sending Barnes to battle on this is like sending Chris Christie out on the bridge to direct traffic.

Still, the city and the Water Board are pulling out all they stops and cashing all the checks. Democrats in Jefferson County have vowed guerrilla war, and the fight has begun.

Over power, and possession, and the ability to let millions and millions of dollars in contracts.

War isn't cheap. The Water Board alone now spends almost $50,000 a month on lobbying and outside PR.

It already contracts with Birmingham Times founder Jessie Lewis for PR, at a mind-boggling cost of $25,000 a month, even though it has a public relations department and just added to it.

It pays Fine Geddie & Associates $7,500 a month, and Greg Jones $5,000 a month for Montgomery lobbying.

It recently hired lawyer Rebecca G. DePalma of the law firm White Arnold and Dowd to provide governmental affairs and public relations work for another $60,000.

That doesn't even include the $120,000 the board has spent on federal lobbyists in the last two years, or the huge volumes of money its contractors – lawyer Waldrep and Malcolm Pirnie among them – use to flood the Alabama political machine.

And now the city throws in its ... two cents.

It's all way, way too much in a community that already pours too much money down the drain.

Anthony Barnes? He's like throwing good money after bad.

John Archibald's column appears Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays in The Birmingham News, and on AL.com. Email him at jarchibald@al.com.