Perspective Fail

Heard this morning on Bay News 9 (and paraphrased here because I don't TiVo):

dealerships may have a reprieve.

Host Erica Riggins describing the lawsuit to halt the Chrysler-Fiat deal as apparently good for Bay Area dealerships. The lawsuit is jeopardising the agreement between Chrysler and Fiat which was put together to save what's left of the weakest of the Big Three's business in the US: pension funds are ticked that they're not getting what they perceive as their fair shake and want the entire agreement renegotiated. Fiat has said they'll bow out by the end of this week if the agreement cannot be finalised, and the current push to the Supreme Court could push settling the debate past that window. Apparently to BN9 losing the entirety of Chrysler to legal wrangling is a good thing, though, since it means local Chrysler dealerships will remain open (at least for a couple more weeks).

It's a lot of money, but it's in line with private summer camps.

A summer camp counselor for Hillsborough County describing the county's new (far higher) tuition rates for summer camp. Someone really needs to teach this genius the difference between public service and private luxury.

Buddies For Hire

The scandals surrounding former Elections Supervisor Buddy Johnson continue to unravel.

Some members of a black advisory board created by former Elections Supervisor Buddy Johnson now say they witnessed firsthand the influence of paid consultants on the message being presented to voters.

...

The concern came over a discussion about whether Johnson's name or just his title should be used in public information distributed to black voters.

When a member of the African-American Advisory Board offered his opinion, he was overruled.

"There were times in which we would discuss things and how they should appear. There was a fine line," said Anddrikk Fraiser, vice president of the African-American Advisory Board. "I said, 'Maybe we should just go with Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections,' and the consultant would say, 'No, it should say Buddy Johnson.'

"Was it egregious? I would say yes."

Johnson and his office created the advisory board in August to be an independent panel that would identify issues of concern among minority voters.

It was a volunteer organization made up of black leaders from area churches, businesses and community organizations.

But Johnson used federal voter education money to pay two consultants, Thomas Huggins and Sherryl Cusseaux, who regularly attended board meetings. Huggins was in charge of Johnson's black outreach, and Cusseaux had been hired, in part, to establish the board.

...

Today, Johnson is out of a job and under federal investigation for how his office spent taxpayer money.

Phyllis Busansky, who defeated him in November, no longer employs the consultants who worked to craft his education outreach.

But the advisory board remains, trying to fulfill its mission.

...

Board members are still discovering how little they knew about Johnson's outreach effort.

It was only recently, Fraiser said, that he learned Johnson also paid $16,204 to a third consultant, Patty, to duplicate work the board was doing for free.

Fraiser said they were never told that Patty had been hired in early October to help defuse rumors about "No Match, No Vote." At the time of Patty's hiring, the board was scheduling two forums to discuss the issue and address concerns.

"I had no idea Michelle Patty had anything to do with Buddy Johnson, besides being an endorser, until those stories came out," he said.

"I do find it a little bit odd because of the efforts we went through to flame out the rumor of the 'No Match, No Vote.' That was one of the top things on our list, behind working with ex-felons to get their rights restored."

...

From its inception Aug. 21, there was much the board wasn't told.

The 17 members were not told how everyone was selected or why.

They were not told until mid-September that the board would not receive any money. Members had to pay for expenses out of pocket, Favorite said.

"No one on that committee got paid anything," Fraiser said. "We were meeting two, three hours every two weeks."

And they were not told that Cusseaux had been paid to create the board.

The investigations continue.

Hell Froze Over Last Week

Creative Loafing has two stories that made my head spin this morning.

Item one: the Hillsborough County Council is beginning work on a light rail system.

Item two: a reprint of an item - from Think Progress no less - about a CSPAN call-in show which featured a caller from Tampa busting CSPAN's chops for paying attention to failed Conservative policy points and continuing to emphasise Conservative speakers.

Who'd'a'thunkit: Tampa Bay's Rightward lean may finally be reversing.

Interception

A lot of folks in Tampa thought it might be a good idea to raise some cash by renting out their homes for the Superbowl. At least one outfit they turned to, however, seems to have thought it was a good way to fleece sports fans.

Some people who saw the Super Bowl as an opportunity to make some extra cash by renting out their homes are now trying to get their money back -so far, without much luck.

Steve Melone is one of the residents who hoped the Super Bowl would help them bring in a bit of extra money after he lost his job in September.

"My wife and I saw it as an opportunity to get caught up on our bills," he said.

Melone signed a rental contract with an Arizona-based rental company and sent in a $900 refundable deposit. But shortly afterward, something strange happened.

"The representative was talking to me and then his personal cell phone rang," he said. "He put me on table hold, he put the receiver down, and he answered the phone with a different name."

It turns out his home was never rented, and he can no longer get in touch with the company to get his deposit back.

The article goes on to say that those defrauded by this scheme are seeking redress from an assortment of law-enforcement and regulatory bodies, with a range of results - including the Department of Agriculture's statement that it does not regulate such businesses.

Locally, signs remain for this type of business, promising up to $10,000.00 for such rentals. It sounds like easy money. For at least one out-of-state business, apparently it was.

Crime And Punishment

Some of my professors, when covering the Middle Ages and the birth of Islam, applauded Muslim jurisprudence for its moderation. One key example was punishment for theives: under Sharia a convicted thief lost his/her right hand as punishment. In a time when Europe was hanging people for the same offense, on the surface this seems humane. However, one item that wasn't covered all that well is that in Islam the left hand is "unclean:" anything done with it is deemed evil, and eating with it poisons the soul. A faithful Muslim thief, without the support of family or charity (unlikely given the offense), would starve to death rather than risk damnation, and a thief who fed himself would be shunned by society as sinful and unrepentant.

In this context, the local flap over Nick Bollea's ability to drive has similar undertones. Bollea, son of wrestling star Terry "Hulk Hogan" Bollea, has a history of poor driving, including a spectacular crash in August 2007 that left his passenger John Graziano permanently disabled. Bollea entered a no contest plea and was sentenced to eight months in jail (he was released early for good behavior), five years of probation, 500 community service hours and suspension of his driving privileges. He's also facing civil action from Graziano's family.

In light of this, the hearing last month by the Bureau of Administrative Reviews to grant Bollea a hardship license is getting a lot of press here. DMV hearing officer Cindy Van Dunk was reluctantly persuaded to issue the license to Bollea after hearing his need for transportation for his new job. The decision is getting a lot of heat, at present from Bay News 9.

A "hardship license" in Florida allows someone who would ordinarily not qualify for driving privileges to get to work, school, church or medical services, but no more. There's also a strict work-only variant. It's not clear which version Bollea was granted.

Certainly Bollea is hardly a responsible driver from his prior actions. The job he cites as reason for the license - with a recording label - will likely put him on the streets at hours not unlike those where his prior accidents occurred. And Bollea has since then moved to California, which does not recognize the Florida document, rendering the decision effectively moot.

But consider this for a moment: regardless of all these things, depriving someone of driving privileges in a community with a bare skeleton of public transportation denies that person nearly all opportunities for employment. Transit in Tampa Bay is geared far more to getting residents to shopping than it is getting commuters to work. Many businesses are some distance from bus routes, and residential communities do not have ready links to commercial districts. Distances between bedroom communities and businesses make commute by foot or bicycle practically impossible. Unless one is content as cashier at a corner market or gas station, opportunity for those without cars is basically nonexistent.

I looked recently at commuting to work on the bus: staying within Tampa, and within the HARTLine service region, it would take me two hours at least, and two or three buses, to travel twelve miles across roads I could navigate on my own in twenty minutes. Much of that commute time would be spent waiting at the local mall for the bus traveling the next leg of the commute: a location five miles out of the way. It would also cost me $90 a month for a bus pass, versus at most half that in gas. Connections between Tampa and St. Petersburg are even worse: the only regular link is Greyhound, which runs only four times a day and requires a separate ticket, and HART and PSTA (Pinellas County's transit authority) do not accept each other's passes either.

Working in Southwest Florida virtually requires one to have personal transportation of some sort, and with the distances involved the automobile is the only practical solution. Denying anyone the right to drive essentially deprives that person of employment even as it makes the roads safer for the rest of us.

I'm hardly sympathetic to Nick Bollea. He is an irresponsible brat who deserved his punishment. However, his case highlights a problem here: public transit is not a viable option for anyone who has either a preference or a need for it, which makes suspension of driving privileges for any length of time effectively an inability to work. The suspended driver in this case is left little better off than the one-handed convicted thief in medieval Arabia.

He's Not Our Buddy

And about time, too:

The FBI has opened an investigation into the office of former Hillsborough Supervisor of Elections Buddy Johnson, hauling away documents related to a blistering audit that revealed Johnson had overspent his budget by almost $1 million.

Phyllis Busansky, who defeated Johnson in November, said a subpoena was served Wednesday on the office of Tampa accountants Ernst & Young, whose audit was highly critical of the way Johnson handled tax money during his last year in office.

Busansky said she called Ernst & Young to inquire about a second audit she wants done and was told by executive director John DiSanto that another audit might be difficult, since "the FBI just came and took away all our working papers."

...

The audit released last week revealed that Johnson broke Florida law by overspending his 2007-2008 budget by $942,022. The audit also said Johnson handled grant money improperly and failed to establish appropriate procedures to monitor finances.

...

It isn't clear what happened to the $1 million Johnson spent that he didn't have or to the $2.1 million that should have been used to pay Premier [Election Solutions, whom Johnson contracted to provide election equipment and from whom he has subsequently sought employment].

But in the run-up to the election, Johnson authorized the expenditure of $2.5 million in tax money to pay for a blizzard of TV spots, radio ads and printed literature for "voter education," according to records reviewed by the St. Petersburg Times.

Johnson has been a bit of - to put it kindly - "local colour" on the Tampa Bay political scene for a while now. Good to see his misdeeds are finally getting the attention they deserve.

2010 Election Watch

One of the nice things about getting noticed is that other 'bloggers who visit often have useful things to say about common interests.

Interstate4Jamming2 has up a thorough breakdown of the Hillsborough and Polk county announced candidates for 2010. I4J2 also has a lot more local resources posted (having been doing this for a bit longer) than I.

H/T to Rob, the Interstate4jammer.

Just When You Thought It Was Safe To Go To The Airport

The St. Petersburg Times publishes this.

Engineers are still trying to figure out why a huge chunk of a concrete ceiling collapsed in Tampa International Airport's long-term parking garage last month... Airport officials said Thursday they don't know how much the final bill will be. It will include about $110,000 to clean up debris, plus reimbursements to Hertz for two damaged cars and the airport for legal bills and time employees spent dealing with the mishap during the week leading up to the Super Bowl.

Creative Contractors, the Clearwater firm that built the faulty structure, are apparently absorbing the cleanup and repair costs.

On Humour, or Lack Thereof

Anyone who thinks Southwest Florida is any less prone to the bigoted outbursts common elsewhere in the south better think again.

Hillsborough County GOP committeeperson Carol Carter, who recently resigned over a racially-tinged email, now wants her job back.

The spark to this whole brouhaha was choice:

Carter's e-mail, sent Friday, was a joke saying black people were able to travel to Washington, D.C., for the inauguration, but unable to evacuate New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina.

You know, because all those folks had plenty of warning, and could easily get out of town in their cars, and all. So if they can get to something planned months in advance you know they could get out of the way of something about which they had a whole 30 hours' notice.

Apparently all the local GOP bigwigs are busy passing the buck on this one:

[State Republican Party Chairman Jim] Greer said that in her e-mail [rescinding her resignation], Carter contended the resignation she submitted to him and local party officials last week isn't official until she sends a letter to the county supervisor of elections, which she hasn't done. Greer said he is "taking her position into consideration" and will consult with the party's lawyers, but for the time being, "It's our current position that [Carter's contention] isn't accurate because it's a party office.

...County party Chairman Debbie Cox-Roush accepted Carter's resignation last week.

Cox-Roush said today it's up to the state Republican Party whether Carter can rescind her resignation. "We don't have the authority to accept or reject Ms. Carter's resign," Cox-Roush said. "It's out of our hands and we are waiting for direction from the Republican Party of Florida." Asked whether she would recommend that the state party uphold Carter's resignation or allow her to rescind it, Cox-Roush said, "I have no authority over it," but added, "The party still stands on a zero tolerance level for racial insensitivity."

Personally I find any attempts at humour regarding the whole Katrina fiasco in pretty poor taste. This, however, strikes me as worse than most, mostly because Ms. Carter, after resigning in shame over the whole thing, apparently decided it wasn't so bad after all, and is using technicalities to insist that she didn't really officially resign rather than ask to rescind the resignation she admits she sent.

Humph.

Priorities

Let me see: the local economy is in shambles, the pundits are predicting Florida will be among the last to recover, the housing market is crushed, the former Elections Supervisor for Hillsborough County is in hot water for an array of misdeeds while in office...

... and what does TBO.com plaster all over their page? The Superbowl.

Granted, the Superbowl is a big deal. But the home team isn't playing this time, and there are a number of other ongoing stories that matter to the locals. It's good that we know what streets are closed for the weekend, and that police are on alert, but there has to be SOMETHING else worth writing about.

Oh. Yeah. Tampa. I forgot.