Can’t Fix West Palm Beach
Cosmetic changes
Regarding the comments by former City Administrator Ed Mitchell that the “stature” of the city has improved: Clematis Street is a well-dressed watering hole, with boozers stumbling from one bar to another. If it wasn’t for the nonstop “free” events downtown, the waterfront would go back to tumbleweed.
CityPlace recently had foreclosure issues. The city had to dip into reserves to balance the budget. The new budget year started this month, and the city’s finance director has publicly stated that the city is starting out in the red. If more changes are not made, the deficit for this budget year will be greater than the $8.5 million first projected for last year. Let’s not forget the many failures of city departments that were under the direct supervision of Mr. Mitchell, such as the OpenSky police radio system that’s yet to be activated.
So the city’s degree of development and outward appearance has improved? To me, it’s like putting a fresh coat of paint on a house infested with termites and boasting about its outward appearance.
West Palm Beach CRA Selection Committee’s First Meet Postponed
According to the city, representatives of two of the six organizations serving on the committee, have scheduling conflicts and hopes to reschedule some time in the next few weeks. This is one process to watch because when the city announced they would outsource their CRA Department, Kim Briesemeister, who was currently acting as their CRA Director, resigned August 26th so that her Broward County based firm, RMA Associates could participate in the bidding process. Word leaked to the press that Ms. Briesemeister expressed confidence that the commissioners would choose her company, to a couple of CRA employees but denied the accusations when confronted by the press.
There is a public concern about two members on the selection committee having conflicts of interest. It is said that Russel Greene, who is president of the CRA Advisory Board, has a relationship with Briesemeister and stated that he is in favor of her RMA Company winning the bid, at a chamber meeting, where he is a board member and CRA Finance Director, Jeff Greene, who Kim worked with and helped him draft the RFQ, has a vote.
Kim Briesemeister was also the captain of the Digital Domain Ship that ran a muck costing WPB tax payers several million dollars so It’s past time for Ms. Briesemeister to move on and throw her hat in another unsuspecting ring.
Rally Against IG Lawsuit
Our rally took place at 1pm this afternoon, in front of West Palm Beach City Hall. There was a nice showing of roughly 25 dedicated citizens from as far north as Palm Beach Gardens and as far south as Delray Beach. Our goal is to attract more West Palm Beach residents to become active and involved in what directly affects them.
We were proud to have County Commissioner Jess Santamaria attend our rally, along with his two assistants, Fred Pinto and Paul Razza. Also in attendance were, West Palm Beach’s Ex Internal Auditor, Imogene Isaacs who stopped by, in support of our stand against the lawsuit to stymie the Inspector General. The leader of South Florida 912 was there, along with the President of the Palm Beach County Tea Party.
Palm Beach Post Reporter, Eliot Kleinberg was also there and spoke with Commissioner Santamaria. There were many onlookers and some who were oblivious to the fact of 14 cities who have filed the lawsuit against the Inspector General, with West Palm Beach leading the charge. The city’s Public Information Officer, Eliot Cohen was the only city representative there. He did speak with the Post Reporter.
We would like to thank all participants who attended and therefore contributed to the success of our rally to keep our much needed Inspector General funded.
