In fact, only one County Commissioner, District Five’s Kristin Dozier, even broached the subject during the discussion. And even then she did so by saying that opening the process up to other applicants “would only help cement Vince’s profile as the best”.

24 hours. Seven votes. No bids. And a roughly $40,000 raise, complete with addition car allowances and $12,000 in “deferred compensation” Mr. Long freely admits “is undoubtedly an additional benefit”.

Oh, and the whole deal was sold as a fiscally conservative maneuver, as Long’s old position was eliminated, and between his old salary and the difference between his new one and Alam’s old salary, the County expects to save $250,000 a year.

Like we said, Vince Long is slick. Of course, he’s also generally considered to be among the top professionals in his position (past and present) in the state, touts a faculty position at FSU’s Askew School of Public Administration and Policy (as well as a Master’s degree from said school) and has graduated from the Executive program at Harvard’s JFK school of Government. His resume is literally over four pages long, and it seems like it takes longer to read it than it took the County to name him as Alam’s successor.

In a different time, maybe the discussion would have lasted a little longer. But with the local economy staring the legislative led layoffs and pension pinching in the face and pocketbook, and the County trying to close a 13 million  dollar deficit, the prevailing wisdom was that Vince Long was the right man, at the right time, for the job.

And for the record, Vince Long really likes the business he is in. He is always ready to trot out a stat about the leanness of the County workforce as compared to other counties around the state, even though he will also concede no other county has as strong and singular a governing entity as the City of Tallahassee to work alongside.

But Long takes genuine pride in the staff he has helped put in place, and is the first to admit his heavy reliance upon them, especially now that the staff is down one administrative position.

“Vince is a one-percenter” says Alan Rosensweig, Deputy County Administrator. “Some people need 90 percent of the information about an issue to make a decision. Some people need 50. I’m probably a five or 10 percent person. But Vince only needs one. And at his level, that’s how it should be. He trusts his staff. Around here, you have to sort of just figure it out. We’re so lean, we just give people issues and say ‘it’s yours’. And we’ve got the horsepower to pull it off.”

Time will tell. Certainly more challenges await. The County chose not to raise the millage rate this year, but swears it will have to happen next year as property values continue to decline and some additional expenses add up.

“If you can’t get excited about the challenges facing local governments today, you’re in the wrong business,” Long says.

Right or wrong, Vince Long is exactly where he wants to be.

In part one of this two-part series, it was shown how our commissioners from both the City of Tallahassee and Leon County have allowed a private contractor, the Tallahassee Trust for Historic Preservation (TTHP), to take control of a public citizens’ advisory group, the Architectural Review Board (ARB).  Half the membership is positioned to be compromised ethically.  Two genuine citizen members have been replaced by TTHP board officers, making four total on the ARB.  How does this matter?  Neighborhoods.  This is where the effect of voting control has huge impact upon large numbers of people.  This is how other people, who know better than you how to take care of your own property, intend to make you do as they say, whether you like it or not.

Historic Preservation Overlay (HPO) Zoning

Tallahassee’s Land Development Code provides for designating a neighborhood as an Historic Preservation District, which gets automatically rezoned by the city.  It’s called Historic Preservation Overlay zoning (HPO).  With HPO, the entire visible portion of every property (structures and landscape) is controlled by the Architectural Review Board, in perpetuity.

District HPO rezoning can be done to any platted subdivision or any neighborhood, including commercial or industrial districts, over fifty years of age.  It then applies to every building and property within the designated area, old or new.  Future property use is sharply curtailed, regardless of the primary zoning allowances.   New construction is also under ARB control.  Board members can invent confounding building design requirements on the spot.

Guidelines incorporated into Tallahassee’s Land Development Code for determining HPO districts or regulating HPO properties are based on a national standard code which has been found to be “unconstitutionally vague” (Illinois Supreme Court).  This vagueness, based on a “feeling and association” which contributes to a “sense of time and place” allows virtually any properties to be declared historically important, thereby justifying the rezoning process.

For day-to-day management of property issues, the ARB’s directive is to ensure all visible changes are appropriate to this “sense and feeling” of the district’s design and history.  The actual exercise of such a fuzzy standard can be astonishing and frustrating.  Appeals are nearly impossible.  Cost or time are not factors they consider.  It took one owner four months to get a roof shingle approved during Winter 2009.  New paint on another home had to be sandblasted off, as the owner proceeded without the ARB Certificate Of Appropriateness. Driveways, roofing, windows, siding, fences, additions, doors, landscape features, painting, railings, handicap ramps — all require formal review…an endless, meddling intrusion.

Billion-Dollar Land Grab Plan Emerging From City Attorney’s Office:

We are rapidly approaching the magic fifty-year window for perhaps 20,000 homes in Tallahassee in about 150 neighborhoods:  Betton Hills, Los Robles, Old Town, Killearn Estates, Indianhead Acres, Woodland Hills, Lehigh, Apalachee Ridge, Waverly Hills, Huntington Woods, Piedmont Park, plus very many more:  Every subdivision built before or during the 1960s will be front and center soon.  Then will follow the 1970s developments.  Tallahassee will be a living museum akin to Williamsburg, VA.  Tourists might come to visit and marvel….in about a hundred years.

Consider the market value of your home:  20% of that worth represents a reasonable valuation for a typical, voluntarily- deeded building conservation easement, with right of exterior control.  The City of Tallahassee is going to seize that right from every property owner, without paying for it, through HPO rezoning.  A billion dollars of property rights–stolen– from five-billion dollars of privately-owned real estate.

Here is the formula:  Historic preservation ordinances manipulated into an illegitimate abomination by our City Attorney’s Office (CAO) + An ethically-compromised, puppet ARB + A sole-source, no-bid, unregulated city contractor (Tallahassee Trust for Historic Preservation) + An utterly compliant Planning Department + A Planning Commission that always rubber-stamps ARB votes and officially appends the HPO rezoning, and a City Commission that may know what is happening but won’t act in opposition to their City Attorney. The two Planning stages are conveniently contaminated by dual-role members who also serve on the ARB:  This ensures continuity of the compromised ARB decision. There is no part of this process that will withstand scrutiny. Add in the Board of Adjustment and Appeals as enforcement agency.  Yes, they can assess fines or take your house away.  You have to cooperate.  This is full government power and authority in action.

It’s Already Happening:  Lafayette Park

Look at what has already happened in Lafayette Park Neighborhood, an interesting mix of 650 older homes in the triangle bounded by Miccosukee Road, Seventh Avenue and Gadsden Street.  Here, where HPO rezoning is now pending, a small club calling itself a neighborhood association had fewer than 30 active members.

In 2008, an historic preservation application was originated by the TTHP in collusion with part of this Lafayette Park Neighborhood Association.  This group provided faked documentation “proving” enormous community support for historic designation.  This support was a presupposed necessity at that time.

The application, through changes manipulated by the city attorney, now contains a patently counterfeit “owner” certification signed by club members in place of the code-required property owners’ signatures.

The City Attorney’s office stands behind this counterfeit certification as being legitimate, thus opening the door for anyone to begin rezoning another’s property in Tallahassee, without their permission.

No reasonable person can conclude anything from this owner-permission fraud other than the fact that something gravely wrong is going on in the Tallahassee City Attorney’s office.

More Shenanigans on Lafayette Park Application

Included in the Lafayette Park application were over 500 nearly blank pages of forms, supposedly describing the specific history and details of each property.  However, only the addresses were filled-in, plus phony historic descriptions such as “brick”.  Yes, just “brick”, or in many cases, “vernacular,”  an authentic-sounding, pseudo-expert, historic architecture adjective which is not applicable to any home in Tallahassee.  There was not one legitimate State of Florida Historic Property Form as deemed appropriate by the Department of State, which coordinates historic preservation on a state level.

Interestingly, public record emails show the ARB members didn’t bother to pick up their review copies of the 1800-page application before arriving at the first meeting to vote on it. Vehement property-owner protests were ignored.  The board hid behind Assistant City Attorney Linda Hudson:  She engineered or justified every atrocity the ARB committed against the property owners.  They did their deed:  The ARB voted unanimously to approve this defective application.

This is the fruit of those ethical compromises described in the first article.  This is the result when a private contractor is allowed to take over a public citizen advisory board.

Six months after the ARB voted, growing wrath from three hundred Lafayette Park property owners finally jolted the city commissioners from their inertia.  In reaction, they put the neighborhood historic designation process in abeyance, hoping for calmer attitudes.  Now, three long years after it began, this application still remains in limbo as a “pending rezoning.”  Sellers and realtors who fail to disclose it are on the hook for hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages when it moves forward.

City Commission Turns A Blind Eye To  City Attorney’s Behavior

The City Attorney designated the Lafayette Park application process ”quasi-judicial.”  CAO warned the city commissioners of terrible disclosure forms necessary, should they look at a single citizen letter or hear one complaint.  The commissioners dutifully closed their eyes and ears to the people who elected them.  Hundreds of earnest, impassioned emails and letters were filed away, unread.  This is well documented with public record correspondence between commissioners’ staff and Assistant City Attorney Linda Hudson.

That disclosure form is a mere formality for the record.  Our City Commissioners had a perfect legal right (and a moral obligation) to listen to constituents and read their emails and letters.  They willingly chose not to do it. You are not alone if you think “quasi judicial” is code-speak for the City Attorney to tell our elected commissioners to look the other way while a piece of nasty business is going on.

New Code, New Loopholes…

Now, City Attorney staff are fine-tuning their scheme:  Seizing upon a requested code revision from the Long Range Target Issue Commission, with an advisory “Citizens Workgroup”, they are re-writing land development code language for neighborhood historic designations.  Expect new loopholes big enough to shove neighborhoods through. We’ve seen the current code’s boilerplate property-owner protection evaporate at the first touch of the city attorney staff. Already, one workgroup member has informed the City Manager the results will not protect private property rights.

Grandma’s Porch….?

“Historic Preservation” is a very positive, heart-warming phrase, conjuring up an image of Grandma’s house, porch rockers, a shady yard and happy times.  Shame on anyone who would venture to speak against such a wonderful thing.  Beware!

In Tallahassee, “Historic Preservation”  is a sugar-coated, misleading label designed to conceal a cold legal procedure whereby your right to control your own home is taken away through this thing called “overlay zoning.”  True zoning is a passive categorization of land use to segregate incompatible uses. HPO zoning is an aggressive, continuous manipulation of every property and property owner. Afternoon ice cream with Grandma on the porch has nothing to do with this. It’s a method of control where property owners are forced to become tenants, while city government and the TTHP become their landlord through the ARB.  It’s about Grandpa rolling over in his grave at what’s going on.

A Solution is Possible

This catastrophe to our personal lives and homes can be prevented through two simple code changes:

1.  Specify in the land development code that HPO zoning cannot apply to Neighborhood district designations.

HPO rezoning should only be done on a property-by-property basis, when individual property owners (who will learn all too well the burden such zoning imposes) specifically apply for it.  It will have trifling value once the City grant fund is depleted.

2.  Make all HPO rezoning owner-revocable at any time through a simple, signed form, filed through the Tax Appraiser’s office.

Eventually, every owner of an historic re-zoned property will discover what the Tallahassee Architectural Review Board is like in actual practice.  The only way to keep such a board in line is to have them face the consequences of having an owner opt out and walk away, rather than put up with their cooked votes.  No governing board, given infinite authority, and freedom to act without written rules, will operate honorably.

The Not-So-Simple Part….

Another part of the solution is not so simple:  The Tallahassee Trust for Historic Preservation, while contracting with both the City of Tallahassee and Leon County, is apparently striving to subvert our honest governing processes for their own benefit.  This contractor’s unscrupulous efforts are openly supported and aided by the City Attorney’s Office, which is even more suspect.  This contract needs to end.

And, finally, the City Attorney’s office needs immediate, major changes.  If this much harm is happening through their efforts on an issue so small as historic preservation, we probably have a major earthquake about to occur in the other city departments.

——————————

The Architectural Review Board, The Planning Department, the Planning Commission and the contract with Tallahassee Trust for Historic Preservation are all jointly operated by both Tallahassee and Leon County.

Email every City Commissioner:  http://www.talgov.com/email.cfm?id=commissioners

Email every Leon County Commissioner:  http://www.leoncountyfl.gov/BCC/email/

A copy of this story, with extensive supplemental information and source data, will be posted at HistoricLafayettePark.com. This website newsletter was founded specifically to expose these abuses.

Mark S. Daniel
Editor & Publisher, HistoricLafayettePark.com
TallyMark@Rocketmail.com
July 4, 2011

Citizens can help by involving themselves in the decisions that have impact on their daily way of life. Just as local government entities should operate collectively as a body to make decisions, citizens must also work collaboratively to learn, research and to make recommendations on topics within our local government.

A citizen advisory commission is my vision to include citizen participation in the local government decision-making process. It facilitates more direct interaction between citizens, governmental staff and elected officials.  Citizen participation would help to efficiently implement policies, and to ensure that citizens all relevant stakeholders’ input are a key component in resolving issues pertinent to our community.

Our local government faces inadequate involvement by ill-informed constituents. Instead, well-organized and persistent interest groups dominate pitting the advocacy majority against groups that would disproportionately become affected.  Our city cannot succeed during these tough economic times without making a strong attempt to garner the support and respect from our citizenry. This can only be accomplished with the inclusion of people; encouraging them to participate as a part of a citizen advisory commission to provide advice and recommendations to the Tallahassee city commission, Leon county commission, and Leon county school board.

The idea of conveying a citizen advisory commission is not new to American local government. Due to increased authority being given to political leaders, administrators and the reliance on full-time professional staff, advisory boards have been weakened.

The goal of the program would be to engage civic-minded, grass-root individuals through a community outreach process and public consultation.  By promoting citizen and stakeholder participation, our government will be supporting a more transparent and accountable process, which will allow public officials to be well-informed and more responsive to the needs of our community.

For the program to be successful there must exist support from elected officials, which will create an enabling environment, disclose discussions on policy decisions ahead of time and facilitate citizen access to information.

Citizen involvement will lead to a more efficient and effective delivery of services to the public. This includes a more transparent and accountable government; and more importantly, public acceptance.

If you asked “What makes for a better tomorrow?”  Multiple participants, working together for a better solution, would make for a better tomorrow. Citizens can help too.

The reason for the proposal is to protect groundwater quality of the Floridan Aquifer, which is principal source of drinking water, and Wakulla Springs.  There is evidence that the quality of both have diminished over the past 30 years or so.  However, traditional septic tanks are not the principal source degradation from nutrients such as nitrogen, a byproduct of waste water treatment.  High nitrate levels have more to do with the presence of the city’s waste water treatment facilities than with septic tanks.

Prior to 1980, before the city built the southeast spray field, nitrate levels in Wakulla Springs were less than 0.2 milligrams per liter (mg/l).  Within a decade after opening the drain field, nitrate levels rose to an astonishing 1.5 mg/l.  However, with more environmental awareness, sensitivity, and policies, by the end of the 20^th century, nitrate levels had dropped to around 0.58 to 0.60 mg/l and, for the past decade or so, have been holding around 0.5 mg/l.  The state and others believe that the nitrogen level is still too high and would like to reduce it to less than 0.35 mg/l.

Although the number of traditional septic tanks has increased significantly over the past 30 years, nitrate levels have actually gone down.  Clearly, something unrelated to septic tanks is involved here.  Contributing to reduced nitrogen and nutrient levels have been improved air quality, better control of runoff, more judicious use of phosphates, reduced grazing, and not the least of which, changes in the way the city treats and disposes of waste water.

Nevertheless, both the city and the county are taking steps to reduce their nitrogen footprint.

Currently, the city is spending about $227-million to develop advanced wastewater treatment.  According to the city of Tallahassee, advanced water treatment can reduce nitrogen loading by 75%.  If that is true, I estimate that the city’s efforts could reduce overall nitrogen loading in the county by about 26%

Leon County has responded, in part, by creating the Primary Springs Protection Zone.  The county is also considering a proposal to require performance based treatment systems inside the zone.  Under the most recent version of the proposal, non-homesteaded property owners and homesteaded property owners exceeding a specified household income and property value would be required to use advanced septic tanks for new development, redevelopment, or whenever their traditional septic tank fails.

Given the expected life of traditional septic tanks, it could take another 20 to 30 years to phase in the more advanced systems, which in turn could last another 30 to 40 years.  Together, that means we could be using septic tanks as the primary means of treating southern Leon County’s waste water for the next 50 to 70 years or so.

Do we want to spend the better part of the next century using septic tanks (traditional or advanced) to collect, treat, and dispose of wastewater in southern Leon County?  My feeling is that we probably do not, nor should we.  While I am not convinced that we need to do anything about septic tanks at this time, in the long run, I am prepared to do something.

So what is a better alternative than performance based treatment systems?  If we are going to spend the next 20 or 30 years doing something, we ought to be planning for central sewer in those areas in southern Leon County where there is sufficient density.  While central sewer has its own issues, the advance water treatment efforts currently underway in the city’s system should promote more effective nitrogen reduction than advanced septic tanks.

There are only two such areas in southern Leon County where central sewer may be more feasible than advanced septic tanks: Lake Munson and Woodville.  Of the two, Lake Munson is probably the better candidate for more immediate sewer and, within the next 30 years, Woodville.

In the meantime, if the county is going to insist upon performance based treatment systems for southern Leon County, we also probably need to consider a couple other actions.  First, the county should not permit any other developments inside the Primary Springs Protection Zone unless it provides for central sewer.  Second, we should have a building moratorium outside the Primary Springs Protection Zone until there are sufficient waste water treatment facilities in north and central Leon County to collect, treat, and dispose of sewage without sending it into southern Leon County.

If water quality in the Floridan Aquifer is everyone’s responsibility, the cost of protecting it should not be placed only on those who live in the southern Leon County.  If the county expects neighborhood specific solutions, it should involve those neighborhoods that are making a bigger contribution to the problem: neighborhoods outside the Primary Springs Protection Zone that have sewer.

The past few months we have read about controversy over elected officials making mistakes, or mistakes involving personal gains.  Ethic’s issues of wrongdoings should be looked at with other actions made by staff during any business day in this city, county, and state government.  This would be for the benefit of free enterprise and property rights to insure a freer, healthy government, producing less corruption in government.

In less than three years, Governor Crist removed 33 public officials from office because of wrongdoings, although the home page for the State of Florida Commission on Ethics states that Florida has been a leader among the States in establishing ethics standards for public officials because the people have the right to protect that public trust against abuse.  Has the State of Florida set a good example for other States?

The statewide grand jury stated that Florida needed good ethics legislation to clean up government and save taxpayers money, but acknowledged that lawmakers and public officials are not very likely to crack down on themselves.  The grand jury called for criminalization of several corrupt acts that are currently only punished under civil law by the State’s Ethic’s code.

The Grand Jury found that legislators refused to get a bill out of committee calling for criminal penalties for certain crimes as bid tampering and bribery when done by a public officer.

The report states “given the serious fiscal limitation at all levels of government, anti-corruption efforts must stop the theft and mismanagement of public funds.”  Mismanagement and theft penalizes taxpayers by driving up the cost of all government services.

Removing the word “Turkey” in the budget would serve everyone well, including the Republicans and Democrats alike.  Turkey opens the process for corruption and favoritisms, bringing ethics charges against those that get caught.

It would appear that the only way to get a Code of Ethics or a reform of the ethics code would be for a committee independent of the lawmakers to establish a set of rules, not only for public officials but also for staff at all levels of government.

The ordinances are so convoluted that staff and engineers do not understand the true objective of the ordinances because the intent is unclear.  This leaves the interpretation of ordinances up to staff and even different staff can interpret the ordinances differently.

Public sector employees, who are virtually invisible to the average citizen, heavily influence our community’s corporate attitude about growth.  Their personal interpretation of growth management rules directly impacts private property values as well as the community’s attractiveness (or lack thereof) to prospective business employers.  This means that property values and the growth of our community frequently hang on the personal wishes of an unelected government employee.  Therefore, every public sector job description dealing with free enterprise issues should be reviewed and if necessary be rewritten.  Every job description should make it clear that staff members are not community policy makers.  Rather, they are employed by taxpayers to be, first and foremost, courteous and helpful public servants.  As a great rule, the benefit of any doubt concerning interpretation of rules should be added to the benefit of the free enterprise system and the property owner that pays for the benefits our government employee enjoys.

It is an inherent characteristic of all the governments to grow larger by increasing revenues, creating new programs, expanding old programs and by hiring more people.  Left unchecked, governments will ultimately consume crippling percentages of private sector growth and wealth.  Therefore, all proposed fees and tax increases should be evaluated in the context of the total tax burden on the taxpayer.  In most cases, tax increases should be vigorously resisted.

Free enterprise and private property rights are essential to individual freedom and to a growing standard of living.  Therefore, free enterprise and private property rights should be aggressively defended for the benefit of a free, healthy government.

The ability of private property holders to use their property to the best economic and personal advantage has come under attack by the political bureaucrat of the 1990’s and left us a legacy of a decaying free enterprise system.  It is the free enterprise system that is necessary to keep a free government healthy.

I have agreed for a long time that it makes perfect sense to move the current   Fairgrounds to a new site and to redevelop the existing site on south Monroe Street .

I supported a $25,000 study by Wiegel-Vesey in 2003 to determine the feasibility of moving to a new site and marketing the existing property to a developer.  That taxpayer funded study said that it would be possible to redevelop the property but not until 2013-15.  That study was done BEFORE the current economic recession came down on our heads!

Recently the county was offered an opportunity to buy 114 acres of US Forest Service land on Capital Circle SE for $2.65 million in reserve funds and commissioners were asked to support the purchase in hopes a deal would be struck with the Fairgrounds Association to relocate to the new site.  I was one of four commissioners who voted against the purchase at this time saying that the county unfortunately had the “cart before the horse”.  There is no agreement by the Fairgrounds Association to move to that site should the county choose to acquire it.  I would think that would be a preliminary and rather elementary step one should take if buying a multi-million dollar piece of land using taxpayer money.

Little  has been said by commissioners  who favor the move about the additional $7-11 million that would be needed to make the North Florida Fairgrounds Association “whole” by reconstructing the facilities as they currently are configured on the new property.

Taxpayers would ACTUALLY be looking at between $10-14 million to accomplish this move at a time when Leon County is facing a sizeable deficit!

Commissioners were asked to waive the requirement for two independent appraisals before purchasing the Forest Service land.   They were asked to buy the land before there was a formal agreement between the county and the Fairgrounds Association that they would agree to move their facilities to the newly acquired tract on Capital Circle.  We were asked to buy the land before there was any prospect of a developer coming along to offer the $10 to $14 million that taxpayers would have to lay out to accomplish the “vision” of a new urbanism reality.

To successfully redevelop the North Florida Fairgrounds, BOTH a rezoning and a comp plan amendment would be required.  The interesting tidbit here is that the county would be asking the city for both the rezoning and the amendment.  What do the neighbors who reside around the existing fairgrounds think of the idea of redevelopment?  Will there be a hue and cry by the surrounding populace?  How will the city commission respond should there be a negative reaction from the surrounding neighbors?  What developer, in their right mind, would think about investing millions without this basic knowledge or without a plan acceptable to local authorities for what could be developed on the site?

The Community Human Services Partnership, or CHSP, was implemented fourteen years ago when local nonprofits saw the need for an efficient, fair, competitive process for local human services funding. At the time, human service organizations were completing three separate applications for funding from the City of Tallahassee, Leon County, and the United Way of the Big Bend. It was also commonplace for organizations to lobby local Commissioners directly for support. These two practices made it especially difficult for smaller organizations with limited personnel to compete, putting them at a distinct disadvantage. It also left priority-setting to only a few elected officials.

In response to the growing sentiment that the current system was broken, the nonprofits worked with community leaders to develop a better way of doing business. What resulted was a partnership, the likes of which has yet to be duplicated anywhere in the United States. The City of Tallahassee, Leon County, and the United Way of the Big Bend joined together to become the Community Human Services Partnership. They adopted a single citizen-driven funding distribution process for all human services.

The development of the CHSP and its collaborative grant process not only did away with the separate grant applications used previously by each of the funders but also created a mechanism for citizen involvement. A major component of the CHSP process is the use of Citizen Review Teams.  These teams are made up of volunteers from the community who review grant applications, conduct agency site visits, complete program assessments, and ultimately make initial funding recommendations to the three funding partners.

Through their role as members of the Citizen Review Teams, local volunteers get to experience first-hand how difficult funding decisions can be when faced with limited resources. Each year, CRT members must make tough decisions about which programs are effectively addressing the needs of our community and which ones are not. They must decide which agencies will receive their full funding request and which ones will face a decrease, or receive no funding at all.   They are handed the responsibility of making sure our tax dollars and donations are being put to good use.

Participating in the CHSP process not only provides volunteers with the ability to make funding decisions on behalf of our community but also provides them with a glimpse into how difficult funding decision can be for elected officials. Balancing the need to be frugal and the need to serve people is not as easy as it may seem on the surface. However, the good news is that citizen participation in these decisions for is no longer an ideal. It is a reality for our community.

Sincerely,
Frances Powell

But the defeat of Amendment 4 wasn’t the only potentially bad news for the local economy. The election of Rick Scott as Governor would certainly seem to be bad news for an economy as reliant on state government as ours. And while many think the streamlining of state government is exactly what our state needs, you would be hard pressed to argue that cutting jobs is going to be good for the local economy.

But we better get used to it.

As the Republican wave swept over our state and country, several new faces washed up on shore. One of them, US Rep. elect Steve Southerland becomes the first Republican to occupy US House District 2 since Reconstruction. And while one can marvel at the historic nature of the accomplishment, the fact that he comes from Panama City, not Tallahassee, probably won’t mean great things for an economy whose leaders readily admit depend on Federal Dollars.

Sounds like a great campaign issue for 2012.

Speaking of 2012…Anyone who thinks that the hyper speculation on candidates two years from now will be limited to the national scene need look no further than the County Commission elections for Chair and Vice Chair on November 16^th. While current Vice Chair John Dailey would seem assured of being named Chairman (as is tradition), the posturing and positioning for Vice Chair is every bit as intriguing as any local election from the previous cycle.

The position of Vice Chair is like Vice President or Lieutenant Governor, only without the security detail. That is to say, it carries no actual responsibility. However, as previously mentioned, the Vice Chair is generally assured of being named Chairman the next year, which would carry through the 2012 election cycle.

Why does this matter?

A savvy Commissioner can use the position of Chairman to drive an agenda, generate headlines and create a profile that both strengthens their position for reelection and discourages any potential challengers. So look for the next Vice Chair, whomever it is, to be someone up for reelection in 2012. That means Akin Akinyemi, Bryan Desloge, or Jane Sauls.