creepy but legal
jason permalink | categories: citizens, county, incredible, newspapers, tampa, transportationby jason @ 8:39 am
Well I think I know why the Trib spent no time at all covering the Storms/Gorham race over the past few weeks. They were devoting their time to proving that the head of the Tampa-Hillsborough County Expressway Authority, Ralph Mervine, owns a perfectly legal business that has nothing to do with his county employment.
Bravo.
I don’t know if Mervine was supposed to disclose all other businesses he was involved with as part of his contract. But I did notice that nowhere in this article does it indicate why the Tribune or, for that matter, anybody thinks this business affiliation makes him less likely to do a good job.
The Trib says, in part, [emphasis mine]
Board members appeared stunned when called for reaction.”This is unbelievable. This is unreal,” board member Tom Scott said. “I’m just shocked, man. I am shocked.”
Now I don’t know if by “Board” they mean the Expressway Board of Directors or the Board of County Commissioners since Tom Scott is a member of both and they both have had their problems with Mervine. Although the Tribune article indicates they spoke to more people than Scott they fail to quote anybody else so, again, all we get is a meaningless quote that doesn’t tell us how his porn business affects his job performance here.
Now Mervine has resigned. The folks we elected to determine his fitness for the position had nothing to do with this. Instead the Tribune decided to spend what appears to be a lot of time and manpower to “uncover” his other business knowing that by outing the guy they would create news where there was none. Lets be honest here, if it was just a matter of owning a porn company they would not have delved into details like,
“Twink” is an expression used by gays to describe young-looking men.
The films include brief descriptions and list the actors only by their first names. One film is described this way: “Rob enjoys making his first solo video a day after his 18th birthday.”
They want to make sure you know it is a gay porn company because that is so much worse. OK, old guys owning porn companies are creepy I get it but can somebody tell me why this guy can’t do his job because of it?
Tags: citizens, county, incredible, newspapers, tampa, transportation
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November 9th, 2006 at 9:44 am
i agree. its press gotcha time. but dont ascribe too many motives to the trib. believe me, they dont think too deeply there about much. unless this guy had a morals clause in his contract, i dont see what its got to do w his job here. of course, he resigned. he wasnt fired. maybe he was too hasty. maybe hes a closeted gay like mark foley and ted heggeland. maybe hes just joe redner by another name. in hillsboro, thats enough to get you run out of town….sad.
November 10th, 2006 at 11:24 pm
I have NO problem with anyone, including a public official, owning a pornography business, gay or otherwise. It’s a free country. However, Mervine was required to disclose all of his business ventures as part of his employment agreement. The bottom line is that he failed to disclose the existence of this company. That makes the other information he submitted suspect also. He obviously thought there was some reason to hide what he was doing, or he would have disclosed it.
November 12th, 2006 at 3:30 am
he also aint got proof they’re of legal age apparently, he could be in a world of trouble