Oh, you thought City Manager Mary Suhm didn't actually run the city? And that City Council members read the stacks of paper put in front of them before voting on things? Bless your heart. The debate over gas drilling on city-owned property pretty much cleared up any lingering delusions about Suhm's place in city government. She secretly signed an agreement in 2007 with a gas drilling company, pledging to help change city policy in order to allow drilling on parkland. Then she (or her staff) snuck a lease into the mix that was not one of the ones the council approved. Suhm blamed the whole thing on a big misunderstanding, and the vast majority of the council quickly made clear that they were totally uninterested in investigating. Instead, the council just declined to let the driller sink its wells on parkland. So things kind of worked, in an ugly, infuriating way.