The big story from yesterday’s Birmingham City Council meeting was the hiring of a 13 year-old as a consultant by Mayor Larry Langford – well, sort of.

Raven Hatcher (of no relation to the mayor’s executive assistant Terri Hatcher) actually turns 14 on Friday. This means that she will be able to apply for a work permit and receive $10,000 as a consultant to the city’s parks and recreation department after presenting her suggestions for improvements to Ensley Park to the Council. NBC13 is reporting on their morning show that $5,000 of the total amount will be placed into a college scholarship fund for the W.J. Christian School student.

The girl’s good fortune and suggestions did not prevent some from offering a wide range of comments on AL.com’s blog post about the story, causing the website to not accept more comment early yesterday evening after several violations of the site’s community rules. We’d recommend watching the interview that Joseph Bryant did with Hatcher yesterday.