this county commission is pathetic
tommyI highly recommend you read Tuesday’s St. Pete Times entire editorial about the Hillsborough County Board of County Commissioners: Poor leadership hobbles county. But if you don’t have time, I’ll grab just a few sentences for ya:
…the commission resists looking for solutions that would stretch beyond the next election or the county line.
…they wing it on major policy decisions.
…political expediency routinely is the driving force for the commission instead of any long-term vision.
…ensures that one step forward results in two steps back.
Commissioners are caught up in their own pet projects or political frustrations…
…no one on the board or among the senior staff can articulate a vision.
The closing paragraph is here in full, but I bold those particularly interesting statements:
The board’s priorities are small potatoes. Sports, toll booths, nickel-and-diming the infrastructure - these are not the strategies for communities moving forward. This lack of vision is one reason why activists succeeded in putting a county mayor on the 2008 ballot. The public sees the board lacking not only leadership, but competence. It sees the administration as having settled into the role of an enabler. The wetlands debacle didn’t help and illustrated once again that commissioners have no guiding principles beyond self-survival. A county of 1.2-million residents deserves better.
In the past, we have seen county commissioners arrested while on the job. The current makeup of the BOCC is worse.
Tags: county, hc bocc
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August 21st, 2007 at 7:43 pm
As we get closer to election I am hopeful voters will pay closer attention to the commish. 3 are up for reelection next year. I say let’s boot ‘em out.
August 21st, 2007 at 8:10 pm
Wendy, what bothers me about that sentiment is that we’re almost a year passed the LAST election and the writing was on the wall with what the county was in for if they re-elected guys like Norman to the BOCC.
I don’t have faith in HC voters. There, I said it… The vote will come down to core conservative values instead of logic and foresight and the status-quo will reign supreme. ugh
August 21st, 2007 at 8:50 pm
It’s hard to believe anything that comes out of the St. Pete Lies, but this time the paper is DEAD-ON.
August 21st, 2007 at 9:42 pm
Anonymous is right… Very few paid attention last time, and we got what you voted for.
On the other hand, there wasn’t much of a choice.
This county needs some real leadership.
August 21st, 2007 at 10:01 pm
Citizen and voter apathy is our BOCC enabler and is why they were able to “streamline” our EPC wetlands, all the while making us think it was a noble compromise.
Our county has been mis-managed for so long (at least 50 years) that most folks are overwhelmed just trying to defend their very basic quality of life issues (like insuring they have clean water), much less working towards any comprehensive big picture vision.
Pinellas is slightly better but central Florida is rightly regarded as a pitiful backwater as far as planning and visionary thinking. We’re sunburned bumpkins, and we take what is offered and don’t demand better, which makes us beggars.
Everyone knows our BOCC seats go to the highest bidder. Just watch, when election times comes around folks like concrete mogul Ralph Hughes (with his “Lets Make The World A Better Place” funds), Dibbs and the other usual suspects will emerge spending tons of money to complicate the issues so the souless moneygrubbers can stay in power.
If our area had any true investigative journalism it would, of course, be easy to expose it all. These guys are pretty ham-fisted.
Sorry to rant but Hillsborough County is like a third world country, a few are wildly profitable, the rest of us get crumbs and suffer quietly.
August 21st, 2007 at 11:33 pm
I agree with you all. There weren’t choices. How do we change the status quo? I am disappointed with the good ol’ USA big business money-grubbing lobbying capitalistic govt. What do we do to change it? Fewer folks vote anymore….
August 21st, 2007 at 11:50 pm
SHP, I agree with you on most points, but please consider:
1) At least among Sticks readers, we didn’t believe that the wetlands hybrid package was a noble compromise, although the BOCC tried hard to spin it that way. In fact, I think the majority of the citizens at the BOCC meeting didn’t fall for spin either.
2) I can’t agree that central Floridians are dismissed as sunburned bumpkins. When sufficiently angered, Hillsborough people get off their asses. Transplants (generally Yankees) bring their crazy expectations about how government *should* work, and when they get disgusted and move away, their ideas linger and sometimes take root.
3) I agree that the BOCC is up for highest bidder, and too often it’s Ralph Hughes & his ilk; developers need concrete, after all. If Hillsborough had an industry or business entity that matched the clout of the developers, such power could provide some balance. I’m not sure we can look for new county leaders unless they have some power or foundation from the business community. Someone who recognizes the importance of educating our kids so we can have a decent workforce, the importance of saving the natural beauty rather than paving everything, the need for some kind of cultural depth beyond drinking and shopping, some respect for the area’s history (which is incestuously tied to developers in large part). We need someone who will make Hillsborough County a place where businesses want to relocate, where they can draw top talent and KEEP that talent here. And not have the talent driven away by the negative stereotypical BS we all can cite.
I don’t mean to imply that a benevolent new industrial giant would solve everything. I don’t mean to imply that there’s no hope for reform at the county level. But as long as the permissive good old boy mentality prevails in Hillsborough, the developers hold all the cards and thus almost all our representatives. We need a balance of power that can only come from business, not government.
August 22nd, 2007 at 1:46 am
It’s hard to believe anything that comes out of the St. Pete Lies, but this time the paper is DEAD-ON.
Huh? The Times is one of the best-respected newspapers in the nation. It’s held up as a paragon of accuracy and fair reporting across the country.
August 22nd, 2007 at 12:37 pm
One who can help the status quo is Kevin Beckner running for Blair’s seat.
August 22nd, 2007 at 2:20 pm
You all have it a bit skewed.
It’s NOT the voters.
It’s the way the VOTES ARE COUNTED.
Buddy Johnson will be the next mayor.
Capice?!
August 22nd, 2007 at 2:26 pm
Oh and when Daniel Ruth and Steve Otto expose things, does anyone do anything??
Does Mike Deeson get any reaction?? He’s exposed Pam a few times and everyone just bills and coos.
Meredith, I hope you’re right. Let’s see you HC people stand up and kick some ass for a change. It’s waayyyyyyy past time, friends.
August 22nd, 2007 at 2:31 pm
Voxy (and yeah, I am back around
) —
Having any candidate run a solid campaign where he wins over voters makes Buddy Johnson moot. It makes any fears of election fraud moot. How many candidates have actually been imposing enough county-wide during elections to brag about this besides incumbents and good ole’ boys?
Not saying your election concerns are misplaced but there are steps in front of Johnson that have to be addressed before complaining about Johnson… Like the fact a rural HC voter might sooner cast his/her vote on the issue of Abortion when it holds no true bearing on the race at hand (and nothing can be done by the person holding the seat to factor in on that opinion of pro/anti abortion). THAT’s the problem. It’s what helped get hateful and spiteful people elected to the BOCC in the past — simply because they stood with the party that stood with the rural voters priorities. Ronda Storms and Brian Blair never got elected specifically because of Buddy Johnson skewaring the vote. They got elected because the voters skeward the issues
August 22nd, 2007 at 3:07 pm
Right on, John. Hillsborough county citizens — whether rural or urban, conservative or liberal — we share many of the goals and we have more in common than not. But manipulative political backers like to throw sand in our eyes with emotionally divisive issues (such as abortion) so we stay divided and weaker rather than united and stronger. Whiel we are bickering amongst ourselves, they are extracting the wealth from this county (natural resources, heavier taxes, privitization of public services) and the citizens end up losing every time.
It’s one thing to get a commissioner into office — it’s another thing to dictate who they will represent once they get there. Look at Kevin White. How many people were duped by his campaign? Minimally-informed voters saw him as a good-guy cop who worked his way up from City Council. Look at his track record now. “Who knew?” they say.
…which brings me back to my original point: we need a power that will keep commissioners honest, and I don’t think the power of the ballot box is enough to achieve that anymore.
August 23rd, 2007 at 1:24 am
I guess that editorial is strong by Times standards. It makes a lot of good points but it’s too measured. Weak, given the circumstances.
The Hillsborough BOCC isn’t merely pathetic. It’s corrupt. Bought off. Stinking rotten. Local media should mount a good old-fashioned, brass-knuckles crusade for positive change. Someone needs to beat the war drum on this long and loud. Don’t count on the Times or the Trib to do it.
Nonetheless, public resentment mobilized by the EPC debacle should not be permitted to wane. It really ought to become a rallying point for greater sustained action. The corrupt majority of commissioners and their deep-pocketed cronies expect this to blow over. Corporate media won’t really mind THAT much, if it does. Maybe not at all.
Here’s hoping that key opponents to emasculation of the EPC will now go on an organized offensive in support of sensible planning and development. They could begin in Plant City, where city commissioners seem to have a reasonable 20-year plan for developing 5,000 acres of unincorporated land north of I-4.
For more, check out “A Declaration of War” at http://www.GoToTell.com.
August 23rd, 2007 at 12:09 pm
I think south and east county are where we need to start talking to people. SCC, Ruskin, Plant City, Riverview, etc. Identify what we have in common, establish a base, go from there. Does anyone like paying for Kevin White’s wardrobe? Probably not, but no one took any action. Does anyone gleefully anticipate paying for Jim Norman’s developer-payback sports complex? Probably not, but is anyone stopping him? Does anyone have any good ideas for how we can improve transportation or education or infrastructure in Hillsborough county without greasing the palms of the current powerbrokers? Probably, but they don’t speak up. Let’s organize, people.
August 23rd, 2007 at 2:27 pm
John — that’s WONDERFUL (you’re back I’d smile but I don’t know the icons MCSE no clue LOL)
I’d have to say I agree about Ronda (gad).. see? I look at Ronda and she’s very likable, her work ethic is good BUT she’s working for all the wrong things and those people either LOVE IT or she’s bought in. I’d venture to say it’s a church thing. Her congregation and others.
The divisive issues have their place, I agree; but the reason I got so down on Buddy and what goes on was the obvious 2000 thing which Pam played a part in. (now she’s mayor)
AND, the Trib (whoohooo) actually picked up on him paying off fired employees and buying their silence (approved by pat frank) AND hiring new people after he fired others and paying them these huge salaries. Among the criminal activity of shutting down polls illegally (that’s never been looked at again to my knowledge) I think he’s too big a problem to ignore.
I’d love to slip into some of these mega-churches on Sunday and hear what they are really preaching. Watch them around election times.
And, Meredith and DaveH … no time to comment on your words but —- I’ll throw the over-used AWESOME !!!! at them.