Who Is Steve Hoffman?
Steve Hoffman is one of WPB best kept secrets. Mr Hoffman has worked through four mayor’s, Graham, Davis, Frankel, and Muoio. His job description is Grants Compliance Officer for the City of West Palm Beach. Mr. Hoffman is responsible for tracking the dollars spent against grants received, and to insure all money is allocated, in the time frame allowed. I will offer one example of the city’s ineffectiveness to do this job. HOME grant.
On May 23,2014 the Internal Auditors meeting was held. In attendance were:
Sylvia Moffett City Commissioner, Chairperson
David Rosenstein Mayor’s Designee Committee Member
Len Fintzy Member-At-Large Committee Member
Harvey Caspari Member-At-Large Committee Member
Peter Camacho Member-At-Large Committee Member
The committee members listed above are all volunteers who dedicate their time in an effort to assist WPB to become a better city. Also present were Commissioner’s Robinson & James, Roger Strout- City Internal Auditor, Jeff Green -City Administrator, Michelle Sias-Director of Finance, Michael Fetterman -Marcum,LLP (Outside Auditor’s) These are the main players present at the May meeting.
Here are a few highlights from that meeting.
Commissioner Robinson made mention of HOME funds which totaled $709,942.00 and questioned if these funds were pending, or did the funds have to be returned.
Mr. Green responded he hoped the city would not have to return the funds.
Mr Caspari made a request to obtain the schedule to see how much of the expenditure was made against the awarded grant amount. Mr Strout mentioned that he requested the information from Steve Hoffman and to date has not received it. Commissioner Robinson stated he has been waiting 2 years for this information, and gave an example of a grant for a bike patrol worth $110,000.00, and because the money went unspent, the city lost the funds.
Mr Hoffman supposedly has completed the grants report, but wants administration to review it before presenting it to the Audit Committee. Really?
Mr. Strout requested that the finance department forward to the Audit Dept. and Committee members a copy of Mr Hoffman’s report before the next Audit Committee meeting. Mr. Green, city administrator agreed to this request.
Mayor Designee, David Rosenstein indicated that “the Internal Auditor is remiss in not pressing management to comply with his request in a timely fashion. The root cause for the delay is lack of people, but he must get his requested information in a timely manner to avoid fraud.”
Now here is where this writer is confused: What action does Mr. Rosenstein suggest Mr. Strout do in order to receive reports needed to do his auditing job, when Commissioner Robinson has been requesting this information for two years.
What is written above was taken from the minutes of the May 23,2014 meeting and approved at the July 18,2014 meeting by the Committee Members.
No meeting was held in June and Commissioner Moffett suggested the audit meet every other month instead of monthly. The committee members want to keep it monthly.
Now we jump ahead to the meeting held on July 18,2014 The people listed above were present at this meeting also joined by Dorritt Miller, Deputy City Administrator. This meeting was hot!
The city’s Grants Compliance Officer Steve Hoffman was requested in May to attend the July meeting, to answer to non compliance of grants. Mr. Hoffman was a no show and finance director, Michelle Sias told the committee members he was on 2 1/2 weeks vacation. Audit committee member, Harvey Caspari was not pleased with that answer and requested his displeasure be placed on record.
Commissioner Robinson also voiced displeasure saying he has requested grant compliance information since 2012 and to date, has not received the information. The commissioner continued to say, administration decided not to give grant information to commissioners and abruptly left the meeting, saying, he had 8 months left as a city commissioner, and he intends to continue coming to audit meetings when his term expires and then he left the meeting stating “I know where all of bodies are buried”
If Commissioner Robinson has information concerning city business, is it not his duty to the residents to expose wrong doings? He has already stated he is not seeking another term, so what has he to lose? He should give residents a fighting chance to remove, from the city, leaders that fear what will be exposed.
The Auditor’s May 23, 2014 request for the Finance Department to forward to him, copies of the grant manager’s report and bank reconciliation records from finance before the next audit meeting, was not met. Deputy Administrator, Dorritt Miller summed It up as a miscommunication between departments.
City Auditor insisted he was clear and have the two e-mails to show, and offered to resend them to the Finance Dept; but Ms. Miller said there is no need for e-mails when the departments are across the hall from each other and the auditor can just walk to the department for request. My interpretation of her comment is for God’s sake don’t leave a paper trail for some nosey resident to request a PRR or it can become a case for he said-she said. Always a good idea to back up statements with a paper trail.
David Rosenstein, Mayor’s Designee, suggested City Auditor Roger Strout adjust his number of yearly audit’s to a more reasonable number. I suggest Mr Strout, who has 30 years in the business realizes what he and his staff can accomplish if he was to receive much needed, requested information from departments to complete his audits.
Marcum ,LLP the city external auditor reported the city has not done a monthly bank reconciliation in the past year. This means the city has not balanced it’s checkbook with bank statements. Who runs a city like this?
The city places a lien on residents who don’t pay their water bills, and it is then placed on their county tax bill for collection. The problem is residents who have paid the bill have not had the lien’s removed, and residents are up in arms because it is two years later and they want relief. The city is fixing the problem. People are working Sat. 7/19 and 7/26 in an attempt to bring the records up to date. Who runs a city like this?
Some good news from the city: On Monday July 21 it was reported the City’s (employees) hot line to report cases of Fraud, Waste, Abuse of City Resources or Questionable Activities will be up and running. Reporting is to remain confidential.
WPB Needs Katherine Waldron
Dear Members,
We are proud to announce that we are heartily endorsing Katherine Waldron for West Palm Beach City Commission District 2, in the March 10, 2015 election.
It is our organization’s goal to help ensure transparency,integrity and ethics within our local government. Katherine Waldron has earned the endorsement of WPB Watch because she exemplifies the type of commissioner we hope to have representing our district as well as our city as a whole.
Katherine’s ability to provide her time and significant efforts to the job of commissioner adds to our strong endorsement. Our residents deserve a committed commissioner with the business, political and community background that Katherine has as well as the ability to commit the time our city deserves from our commissioners.
We encourage you to support her in her campaign and to vote for her on March 10, 2015.
Sincerely,
WPB Watch
P.S. Remember that the rules for absentee voting have changed and registration for absentee voting has to be renewed after two main election cycles. You can visit the web site of the Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections to check your absentee voting status
Introduction
Katherine Waldron is a former Sprint executive, founder of Gamxing® Inc., and the mother of three adult children. She received her undergraduate degree from the University of Virginia and, recently, her MBA from Palm Beach Atlantic University.
Katherine came to Florida in 2002 and became a full-time resident of West Palm Beach in 2005. Except for a brief stint in San Diego to co- found her online compliance training company, she has been a full-time resident since then.
As a resident, she has been very active in the community. Her accomplishments include founding ACTION PAC, a downtown political action committee; accepting a mayoral appointment to lead volunteer efforts for the 2010 Coleman Park Revitalization project; serving as president of her downtown condo board from 2007 to 2011; and most recently assuming Directorship of the Premier FC Foundation and maintaining membership of the Palm Beach Premier FC Advisory Board.
Katherine has raised funds and served as a board or committee member of various non-profits including the American Cancer Society, the Palm Beach County Florence DeGeorge Boys and Girls Club and ElderHelp Services. She has volunteered with the Palm Beach Preservation Foundation, the American Red Cross and the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. She was appointed by County Commissioners to the Citizens’ Committee on Airport Noise from 2008 to 2011.
In 2013 she established the east coast operations of her company, Gamxing® Inc., in West Palm Beach.1
Katherine enjoys living in this wonderful city with so much character and a great deal to offer residents and visitors alike. As City Commissioner, she hopes to continue the great efforts already underway in addition to developing new initiatives to ensure West Palm Beach remains the world-class city it is today.
1 Gamxing™ Inc., a software compliance training company, is headquartered in San Diego and has east coast operations in West Palm Beach. Gamxing™ has three U.S. patents pending and one international patent pending.
WPB Charter School = They never learn.
The Sun Sentinel newspaper has written an excellent investigative report on Charter Schools. If you aren’t sure where you stand on the City of West Palm Beach attempting to open a Charter School I recommend you read the story in the Sentinel for a real eye opener. (See: Florida’s Charter Schools – Unsupervised, part 1 and part 2);
The city has submitted an application, and Mayor Muoio, and 5 City Commissioners, Robinson, Mitchell, Moffett, Materio, and James are the “Founding Team”
The “Founding Team” will appoint the “Board of Directors” who will have authority and control over the school and will consist of Mayor Muoio, and 5 City Commissioners, Robinson, Mitchell, Moffett, Materio, and James. Can you see where this is going?
Of course the Board of Directors will be required to take the “Four-Hour Initial Governance Board Training Course” then they will have the education necessary to run the “West Palm Beach Municipal Charter School” (WPBMCS) You good with that?
(The Mayor of course has some real experience running a school. See: AFTER LAWSUIT, PARENTS PRAISE NEW SCHOOL THE FAMILY WAS REIMBURSED $110,000 and SCHOOL MUST PUT DISABLED GIRL IN CLASS )
WPBMCS is the brain child of Commissioner Kimberly Mitchell who has been moving this forward with as much enthusiasm as she pushed another school forward named Digital Domain, which was a complete failure, and cost the taxpayers two million dollars which was a taxpayer gift to John Textor, founder of DD, but I suspect that figure to be much higher, considering the effort by city staff, city attorneys, and attorney’s from out of state, hired by the city to initiate a lawsuit to get back the “tent city” land also donated to Mr. Textor which was valued at ten million dollars, and we were this close too losing it.
In my opinion WPB has had multiple failings in both projects and city departments, to name a few: Waste Water Treatment Plant (37 million) Open Sky Police Radio (5 million) and 5 years of supporting the “consortium” so add approximately 2 million to that figure, and we still don’t have a system up and running to insure police safety. Housing and Urban Development (HUD) is looking to the city to recoup millions of dollars misspent, or not properly allocated. The city has been embarrassed by news reports of departments not properly supervised, such as Housing and Community Development (HCD) Human Resource Department (HRS) Parks and Recreation, and the city hires consultants to over see the problems. What do these departments have in common? They all report to Deputy City Administrator Dorritt Miller. Why can’t the mayor see the problem? You OK with that?
The city mayor/commissioners constantly circumvent the city’s master plan by ignoring building height, density, and set backs, which has caused residents to file 2 lawsuits against the city. The residents voted, twice, to set the limit of 5 stories max. on the “Old City Hall” site. The mayor/commissioners are floating 8-10 stories. You OK with that?
Commissioner Mitchell has shown a desire to “help these poor kids” receive a good education. She wants the school located in the North End. Now would be a good time to mention the poor kids in the North End, the majority are black children. Please take the time to read two stories previously written on this site. “WPB slow to keep school children safe“, and “Holiday’s not so happy for all WPB residents.” Every taxpayer dollar placed into Charter Schools is taken from public schools. In my opinion this is not to educate children, but to help fill the treasury. The governing body of WPB has failed to be good stewards of taxpayer dollars, and are not fiscally responsible, and this latest project will fail because of the inept administration who put themselves in charge to run it. You OK with that?
Point Of Order!
An assault on the public in public meetings is getting to be common place and It needs to cease. The responsibility is on Mayor Muoio to run the meetings in an orderly fashion and put an end to this strong arm tactic on members of the public and city staff. She holds a strong mayor’s position as Mayor and CEO of the city and should be in charge of the meetings and exercise her authority beyond the general public and call for order on commissioners who are taking It upon themselves to beat down public speakers when they disagree with the content of their speech.
What must be understood is, the public approaches the podium, when invited to do so by the mayor, to express their feelings, not yours commissioners! Apparently public sector jobs are not very clear to some commissioners and who they actually work for. In the city’s June 9th CRA Public Meeting, Commissioner Materio called out a private citizen who had just finished his public comment, because she disagreed with his expression. She called the speaker to attention and asked the mayor If she could respond, in the middle of the public comment period. The answer, from the mayor, should have been “no” and for her to wait until the public speakers are finished. Of course, that didn’t happen.
The speaker returned to the podium and Commissioner Materio proceeded to tell the speaker how his comments were wrong and how she does not appreciate him placing blame on the commission. Her colleague, Commissioner Mitchell verbally agreed with her and called the same speaker out by name, reminding him of his criticism of the commission. The speaker tried to defend his comments but was stopped by the mayor, telling him he can’t respond. If the speaker can’t respond, why is It necessary to call them back? Mayor Muoio sat there and allowed that bully tactic to take place and she is just as wrong for not controlling the meeting, as the two commissioners who were out of line. In Monday’s, June 30th Charter School discussion, Commissioner Mitchell called out a private citizens name, who was sitting in the audience, asking him, did she hear him say something that wasn’t pleasing to her. Completely inappropriate even according to the city’s own problematic civility and decorum code.
Commissioner Mitchell’s actions were wrong and instead of her apologizing to the mayor for the outburst, she should have apologized to the individual she abused. The mayor needs to exercise full control over the meetings and impose order on everyone! The mayor and Commissioners have ample time to talk as much as they want and should never, ever interfere with a public speaker, just because they disagree with something said. They say they don’t comment during public comment but they do, when they hear something they don’ like. Neither the mayor or commissioners have any business responding to a public speakers comment unless It’s on their own time and not the public’s time.
Speakers who are speaking for three minutes under general public comment are interrupted and chastised, based on the content of their speech. Private citizens who are sitting in the audience are also called out and challenged by these elected officials, right from the dais and the mayor is quick to stop the victim from responding to this uninvited and embarrassing hostility. This type of unethical behavior is, not only unbecoming of public officials but has the potential to discourage the general public from participating in their public meetings, for fear of public reprisal.
Public officials should expect ridicule because scrutiny comes with the territory of public office, just as many benefits comes with public office, compliments of the public. Even though there are only two commissioners who have made a habit of beating down the public and staff that they disagree with, the responsibility falls on the entire dais to speak out against abusive behavior, regardless of who It is. Point Of Order!
Plagued With Lawsuits, Why Was WPB City Attorney Really Retained After Retirement?
One has to wonder why the City of West Palm Beach suffer with so many lawsuits, in spite of having a top heavy law department, lead by City Attorney Claudia McKenna, prior to her retiring in mid April 2014? A city attorney’s main duties are to be the chief legal adviser of, and attorney for the City and all Departments and offices thereof in matters relating to their official powers and duties. The city attorney is suppose to give legal advice to minimize exposing the city to liability.
In a February 2012 workshop, Ms. McKenna disingenuously discussed ways to legally spend tax payers money, to finance personal opposition to the extension of State Road 7. Regardless of schemes, there was no legal way to spend tax payers money without taking the request to the commission for approval and budget the expenditure. Why didn’t she do her duty and advise the proper way to access the funding and spending of public money? The expenditure of public money for T-Shirts, Stickers and Charter Buses to transport pre-selected residents to an FDOT Public Hearing in March 2012 and only those residents with an opinion against the project, was illegal spending of tax payers money, biased and wrong.
Did Ms. McKenna not know the expenditure of municipal funds may be used only for a municipal purpose and only when properly budgeted? Or did she know the law and looked for ways to circumvent It? Does Ms. McKenna know that her own current contract, as a personal consultant to Mayor Muoio for $4,800 monthly, for 32 hours per month has to be budgeted? Retaining Ms. McKenna is of no benefit to the general public and should be a personal expense of the mayor. Ms. McKenna often sat in her legal position, on the dais, as public speakers rights were violated simply for referring to elected officials by name and she said absolutely nothing to address the violation for the purpose of protecting the city from liability and doing the right thing. Surely a city attorney should know basic constitutional law and so should city commissioners but they are defiant of applicable laws and reject oversight .
Another one of Ms. Mckennas Greatest Hits was when she offered the “Public Purpose” Florida Statue to justify a reimbursement of $7,325 to Commissioner Kimberly Mitchell to remedy a personal matter that clearly didn’t apply. Freshman Governmental law students from Northwood University or any other University would easily know that the commissioners personal problem with her home Comcast Cable had absolutely nothing to do with a public good or public purpose and Ms. McKenna had no justification to even suggest that Florida Statue. Her purpose was to make It fit regardless.
In September 2007, Ms Mitchell herself opposed tax payers paying Ms. Frankel’s attorney fees for her personal fight to withhold part of a Grand Jury Report from the public, saying, “My initial feeling is that is something that Mayor Frankel is financially responsible for,” so why wouldn’t her same reasoning apply to her? When the city has square holes and need to accommodate round pegs, making It fit was what was expected of Ms. McKenna and that is precisely what she did as oppose to stating the laws and ordinances, forcing the city to comply and avoid liability.
The city Commission was not even satisfied with just Ms. McKennas advice and entered into the expense of their own, hiring an on call attorney for second opinions so what would be the rational reason for retaining Ms. McKenna as a consultant to the mayor, after her retirement?
Is It because she is the one who drove the square pegs into the round holes on the Inspector General Lawsuit and the State Road 7 issue and she’s the only one who can further chisel the city’s way to victory on those matters? What outside attorney could come in and maneuver through the maze of patchwork left by Ms. McKenna? Is there too much in the legal department to expose an outside attorney to and that’s why Ms. Rothenberg had to step up to the plate? With a top heavy administration, legal department, Internal Audit Department and Department heads, why does the city need so many consultants and study’s?
How many times have the current city attorney had to call Ms. McKenna regarding the piles under the rug? Jeff Green was an excellent Finance Director but when Ed Mitchell took to the sky in his golden parachute, Mayor Muoio did not scout for an outside administrator to come in to possibly look through files and under the rugs so Mr. Green was given Ed’s hat and no one knows how many times he might have been hung out to dry behind closed doors, by the mayor. Tax payers should be outraged at this display of malfeasance and misfeasance by our city leaders because It is costly and If the public does not promptly snap out of the apathy mode, Gold will be cheaper than our city water and service fees to cover bad debt!
They Won’t Stay Gone.
It appears once again the residents lose due to the irresponsible running of the city by Mayor Muoio.
It’s a shame that Claudia McKenna’s services to the city, was so unreliable that the city commission hired their own attorney, again at taxpayer’s expense, to give them advice, on an as needed basis because they didn’t trust the advice they received from the City Attorney.
Claudia McKenna’s contract with the mayor is not in the best interest of tax payers and any public money spent by elected officials is supposedly for the benefit, and best interest of residents. Every failure of the city for the last twelve years or so has happened under Ms McKenna’s legal watch.
Ms. McKenna should have advised the city about Digital Domain with all of the evidence of failure available on any computer search engine. Google would have told the story of John Textor and Digital Domain, and saved the taxpayers well in excess of 2 million dollars.
Ms McKenna sat on that dais as the mayor and commission violated the First Amendment rights of public speakers, by turning off the microphones, having residents removed by the police, commissioners voting to remove residents from public meeting, and the mayor even threatening residents with arrest, simply for mentioning a commissioner by name, without Ms. McKenna once intervening.
Ms McKenna advised the city commission that it was proper to refund $7,325.00 to Commissioner Kimberly Mitchell for her abuse of power in her Comcast issue. The Office of Inspector General, which investigated the issue, and found it to be improper. On Sept. 27,2013 the OIG wrote their 4 page letter to the Mayor, and outlined their reason for their finding, with a recommendation 1: “The city commission should be re-presented with all of the facts in order to make a determination as to whether or not the reimbursement of legal fees totaling $7,325.00 to Ms. Mitchell met the legal standard.” 2: “If the city commission determines that the legal standard for reimbursement was not met, the City should move to recoup those funds” Mayor Muoio’s response was one line We will take it under advisement. To hear more on this issue, please read the story found on this web-site titled “WPB Officials Disrespect OIG” Hear City Attorney Claudia McKenna, challenge the OIG, and spend over 42 minutes saying absolutely nothing over and over again. Also take the time to listen to Commissioner Keith James, who is up for reelection in March 2015. He feels he owe’s no one an explanation, including the OIG. All 4 commissioners, Robinson, Moffett, James, and Materio, said they voted for reimbursement because they were following City Attorney McKenna’s advice. Listen to them and judge for yourself.
City Attorney Claudia McKenna led the charge against the OIG in a lawsuit, in my opinion to cripple Ms. Steckler’s budget and halt investigations. The lawsuit is still ongoing, but maybe with Claudia McKenna’s supposed retirement things will change now that there’s a new sheriff in town.
Ms. McKenna’s duty was to advise city officials and protect the city from liability and in my opinion, she was derelict in her duties as a city attorney. What benefit does the public receive from paying Claudia McKenna $4,800 per month? I see no bebefit at all.
HUD asking city to return $1.3 Million.
The Mayor of WPB has guided the city back into the limelight with a story in the PB Post with headlines that read “City on hook for HUD’s $1.3 million” Read the story HERE.
Once again Mayor Muoio has let down the residents she say she’s committed to helping, who are among the folks most in need of help, with her irresponsible leadership, placing people in management positions who constantly “drop the ball” and for reasons known only to Mayor Muoio continue to leave them in their position to do further harm to the city and it’s residents, with no consequences.
The WPB HCD (Housing and Community Development) have had eight full or part time directors in eight years, who have lasted approximately one year. The city constantly had major problems with HUD and this is just one more repeat of the problem, with HUD asking for repayment of funds the city neglected to spend on poorer neighborhoods. If the money wasn’t spent where intended, where was it spent?
With a recommendation from Deputy City Administrator Dorritt Miller, who oversees the HCD dept; suggested the mayor hire an outside firm named Community Redevelopment Associates, and they were given a three year contract with option for two more. The mayor fired them after two years, and my bet is on another lawsuit for Breach of Contract. The city is now nine for nine, managers and years worked.
Dorritt Miller, Deputy City Administrator, is the person the managers of HCD reports too, and Ms. Miller reports to the Mayor. With that said, why are managers resigning or being fired after one year of service, and Ms. Miller remain’s at her post. Soon there will be a number ten, and before they are even hired bet’s are being taken on how long they will last.
The PB Post in the last paragraph of the story reads “It’s not entirely clear whether the city will have until mid-June or early July to make its final arguments. Although the letter notifying the city of its 30-day window to respond is dated May 19, it was not received by the deputy city administrator until late last Friday.” Why didn’t the Post identify Dorritt Miller as the deputy city administrator, and is it possible the letter was received on May 20 or 21 but wasn’t stamped by the city until May 30. After all the city is notorious for changing dates on documentation.
I addressed the problem of Ms. Miller at the May 27,2014 City Commission meeting and mentioned if Ms. Miller wasn’t bringing these problems to the mayors attention, in my opinion, she should be replaced. If she is bringing them to the mayors attention, and Mayor Muoio does nothing about the situation, until the PB Post writes a story, then the mayor should be replaced.
WPB Residents Fight Back
There are now three legal challenges facing the mayor and city commissioners over their decision to allow development that goes against what they as a group previously passed as law. In February 2014 the Citizens for Thoughtful Growth filed a lawsuit on the planned condo on the waterfront of the Chapel-by-the-Lake with the city leaders ignoring their own city growth plans concerning height, density, & set back along with state statutes.
A resident of Waterview Towers is challenging the city for the planned 75 foot, 108 room Marriott “Boutique Hotel” measuring over 92,000 square feet, along with 2650 square feet of meeting room, 5000 square foot restaurant, and a three story garage, all on 1 1/2 acres of land.
The latest lawsuit is the massive Rybovich Marina which the city approved the project in April 2014. The six buildings which the city approved will be 25 to 30 stories tall, and will total 1,059 units or 2,118 new residents based on couples, along with 15,000 sq.ft.of restaurants, over 61,000 sq. ft. of office space, 10,000 sq.ft.retail space, beach club, boat dock, and the icing on the cake, six slips which will house mega yacht’s.
Mayor Muoio stated “We have very excellent planners who are very knowledgeable” This writer disagrees, and if they wish to keep their job, the planners better approve the city plan. Mayor Muoio also states “If you want services, we have to increase tax dollars somehow. Where is that money going to come from?” I have a suggestion. Instead of raising taxes why is city government not being prudent with the taxes they have.
For example, the city has recently cost taxpayers over 2.5 million dollars in lawsuits and settlements, and that does not include the cost of the city defending the lawsuits. (The above figure includes a lawsuit won by Matthew Ladd who won a judgement of $880,000.00 against the city, as the mayor brags of a cap of $200,000.00, the city is contesting the award. Mr. Ladd has filed a FEDERAL lawsuit and I believe Mr. Ladd will be victorious, and a FEDERAL lawsuit has no cap, so what the courts award, the city (taxpayer) will pay. William Mc Cray who won a lawsuit against the city and was awarded $230,000.00 dollars, the city contested the award, and ended up paying Mr. McCray $300,000.00. The city sure showed Mr. McCray, along with the taxpayers. Over five million dollars wasted on Open Sky Police Radio, 2.9 million spent on land in the south end to keep Walmart out of the area, 2 million wasted on Digital Domain, and again doesn’t include the cost of litigation to take back the land that was given to Digital Domain by a very generous mayor and city commission. $37 million wasted on the Advanced Wastewater Treatment facility, a system that never worked right, and has been quietly shut down after a few years.
The figures above amount to 49.4 million tax dollars wasted, and the mayor asked the question if residents want services where is the money to come from. I say the city had the money, but choose to squander it. If a private business ran the way the city does, it would soon be bankrupt. The city continues to spend money it doesn’t have, and continues to punish the taxpayer for their negligence.
No one is happy when a lawsuit is filed against the city due to the fact it will cost us tax dollars when the city loses, which it generally does. On the other hand, when the city is determined to do what they believe is best for the residents, and ram it down our throats, they leave no alternative but to involve the courts. With that said I applaud the residents who will not be pushed around by the city any longer and are willing to fight back. It only takes one person the say “enough” organize a group, and fight back.
Now if we could only have someone say “enough”, organize, and work to replace Mayor Muoio and City Commissioner Keith James, who are up for reelection in March 2015, a new mayor and commissioner willing to lead the city and represent the residents instead of the developers, WPB will be a much better, healthier, happier city.
WPB City Leaders Chooses A New Police Chief
Interim Police Chief, Bryan Kummerlen, was officially voted in as the new chief of police after a unanimous vote by the West Palm Beach, City Commission on May 27th. Chief Kummerlen will more than likely continue to do a good job, leading the police department as he have with Assistant Chief Mary Olsen.
Chief Kummerlen’s plans to retire in August of 2017 should have been known by both mayor and commissioners and therefore fully aware that the chief’s commitment would be short term. Rather than choose a candidate who has plans to retire in three years, a smarter move would have been for the mayor to just keep both Kummerlen and Mary Olsen as interim chiefs and recruit from inside or nation wide for a permanent chief.
It is costly and not very smart to keep repeating the same process when you’re aware of limitations. If a better move didn’t register with the mayor, I would think, one of five commissioners would have realized the impending doom in 2017 to start the process of searching all over again.
Reflecting back when Lois Frankel lost her crown as mayor of WPB, then District 4 Commissioner, Jeri Muoio was not even seeking the office of mayor. Frankel entrusted Ms. Muoio to complete the downtown projects that she couldn’t complete, along with huge efforts to help her get elected by way of the western corridor. That victory was Mayor Frankel’s second term in office as West Palm Beach Mayor.
It is time for Mayor Frankel to relinquish her crown in next March’s election and butt out of West Palm Beach’s politics! The only way to reduce Ms. Frankel’s influence in West Palm Beach is for someone to challenge Mayor Muoio and win in March 2015 local elections.
West Palm Beach Charter School Mystery Location
The City of West Palm Beach is once again stepping into unfamiliar territory by moving forward with the first city charter school, led again by Commissioner Kimberly Mitchell. In the very near future, the city will be upgrading and beautifying LA Kirksey Street, also known as 15th Street, from Australian Avenue east to Tamarind Avenue. The Roosevelt Full Service Center, which use to be the old Roosevelt High School, is located on that corner. It is a street and an area of the city that city officials care absolutely nothing about so my suspicions are raised. The entire surrounding areas needs to be re-developed so It seems odd that city officials would pick one strip of roadway, about a quarter of a mile long to make over. I’m wondering if that is going to be the location of the new charter school?One has to wonder because city officials won’t reveal their chosen location, not even to the school board. City officials have had two possible locations prior to applying to the school district for clearance. The school district’s application did have a question about location of the school. The city attorney advised not to give the location and to just say we haven’t a location.
In November 2013, the mayor and commissioners interviewed Mr. Conley, a possible candidate to run the city’s first charter school and they seemed to be pleased with him and all of his proclaimed successes in many different locations throughout the United States. When this man was asked about successes with minority children, he boasted about how the test scores were so high until you would have thought it was a suburban school and everyone was surprised because their faces were dark! When questioned further about third graders, Mr. Conley replied, “the children are too naive to know that they’re stupid and too little to know that they’re not very bright” There wasn’t one outcry from any elected officials or anyone else on the dais about the disparaging remarks made about the very children they care so much about and who this man might be overseeing. There were two African American Commissioners who were present during this presentation and they, as well as others, said nothing about the thoughtless comment and did not publicly question the insensitive remarks in defense of children.
There is a good chance Mr. Conley will be hired to run the charter school for the city because our West Palm Beach leaders have a history of gravitating towards bad choices and failure. Many charter schools, under the guise of caring about children, are depleting resources from already struggling traditional public schools and are too often an investors dream of making money, at the expense of children, teachers and tax payers. If the city is not beautifying the small section of LA Kirksey because the city’s charter school will be housed at the Roosevelt Center then the up grading project is probably intended to benefit the Related/Rybovich Project down the road, tying the downtown, north to 44th and Flagler.
There should never be secret back room dealings, using tax payers money. Tax payers should be allowed to give input on every aspect of this and other inept ventures of irresponsible leaders, leading the city into fields the city has no expertise in and no business in. The public has no desires to just pay bills but want a say in how our money is spent otherwise, let the policy makers pay for their own passions and failures.