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Thank you, enjoy your visit and come back ya' heah.
October 31, 2011
DEAR PAM
We realize that you have limited resources available for pursuing cost reduction projects, so we have decided to help you with draft letters. This will free you up for important things, like dealing with all the serious problems of the police and fire department pensions. Hope this helps you formulate your position to the Mayor.
NOTES
1. $24,000 TO REPAIR A FIRE ENGINE MOTOR THAT OVERHEATED
When the red warning light goes on a water cooled engine, you would think you would turn it off. Buried in the agenda is an explanation of the repairs on one of the City fire trucks, but nowhere do they tell why when the engine over heated it was not turned off. Let us see, the Union Steward was operating the truck? Unlikely. It was a volunteer? We do not have any. They let the Chief of Police try his hand at driving a fire truck. Wow, we may have stumbled on something there!
2. WASTE PRO CONTRACT ON THE MENU
It took a couple of months for the Commission to own up to taxing you $210,000 more than in the last contract. The cost of picking up the trash went down, but the City taxed the difference. Your trash bill stayed the same. But $210,000 more of it is for the Mayor to spend. Let’s see, the Anglers Club could use a new parking lot and it is in the CRA, so maybe Chad boy could make a motion……
Oh What a web we spin operating this our little old pot of money in good old New Smyrna Beach...............
Mayor Barringer:
Thank Goodness those idiots at the SVAA are taking the heat off of us this week. But I still need a raise as the prices over here in high roller land called Ponce Inlet, are still climbing. However I am just glad I do not live in New Smyrna Beach; I could not stomach the pension costs.
PAM
Chairman Bruno,
Please authorize a position at Volusia Forever for me at $75,000 a year. Attached is my letter from me to the Board saying that Mr. Dinneen has vetted my application and that the pay is right.
Best regards,
NSB Norman Normal
Chairman Bruno,
Disregard my letter above. I have reconsidered and prefer the higher salary of $87,000 per year and health care benefits for me, my family, the next door neighbors, the kid down the block, and the two illegal's -Oops - Undocumented Aliens, living up the street. I am sure you can understand that while we are taking care of our friends and putting political issues behind us, it is the spirit of the season to care of all. Besides, I know I am worth it because I said so.
Best Regards,
NSB Norman Normal
Thanks for Stopping By and You Are Visitor Number:
103111 -
The Shadow Runs Best Under Internet Explorer.
Date: 
10/27/2011, 6:54 PM
10/27/2011, 6:54 PMName: The NSB Town Crier
Wish the Shadow would tell us readers who these mystery board members are on the SVAA who continue to rip off the taxpayers and give away money to Nicole Carni? The Shadow should let us all know who they are so we can choose other businesses to deal with in NSB.
Well, I will share some information that I heard. Word has it that one of them is George Richford who runs the Pastime Princess fishing boat and Dolphin View Restaurant on Riverside Drive. This is the same George Richford who got a ton of taxpayer money from the CRA to remodel his restaurant and the same George Richford who is a high placed mucky-muck with the Chamber. To me he looks like he is just another Boob Lott only in his case he is swimming in taxpayer money. Guess the Dolphin View Restaurant will not be on my dinner list.
Make your own decisions, but lets show these phonies that we do not have to patronize those who steal money from the taxpayer. Keep watching and I will identify another one of these sponges in my next missive.
SHADOW COMMENTS; As requested they are posted above and Mr. Richford is one of them. We checked and apparently he is also the recipient of CRA funds to fix his restaurant. The Chamber, as usual, does not release details about anything as they claim to be a private organization. Funny, we thought they lived in a taxpayer funded building at no cost and, as we found out by reading the Waste Pro contract, get their trash picked up for nothing.
BLOGS: A STATEMENT BY THE SHADOW
The Shadow generally does not edit BLOGS. Very profane comments, even in only first letters, and attacks accusing anyone of a crime are deleted or reformed even when they are about public officials. Personal attacks upon the publisher that are devoid of content are deleted. But not always. Not all postings are essays on important subjects. Not all are fully cogent. On the real positive side, there are way more than 100,000 postings over the last few years and many are excellent tip offs as to funny goings on in Mayberry. Many also are excellent essays on relevant topics. Do our readers a favor and stop attacking the opposing political party as commies or reactionaries. The Shadow does edit for spelling.
Happy Halloween To All Our Readers - No Tricks Here, Just Treats
Commerce. The previous director was fired after she gave notice and we at the Shadow were ready for a renewed effort at following the rules. Boy were we wrong as the current Board and Director (former board member) seem to be following the same old drummer by doing what they want to do and disregarding the direction of both the County and the enabling legislation.
The most recent fiasco with the ever changing Director’s pay is an exposition of either:
(1) How this Board and the County Council, was maneuvered by the new Director, or
(2) Political ploy by the Board to pay the new Director $110,000.
The Shadow thinks both.
The Board’s friend and sole applicant anointed by the Board was told to negotiate her salary with the County and, although the County forced a reduction to $71.755, the Board made it clear at its last meeting that it would raise her salary back to $110,000 as soon as possible.
When this outrage was first exposed, they scaled down her salary to $85,000, and then politically negotiated by her to a salary of $71,755 (considered by the Director and the Board as only a one year arrangement before she gets a raise). The entire process results in a fraud on the taxpayers by this Board and the County. Both Councilwoman Alexander and a County attorney were present at the “workshop”. We attach the vapid minutes for light entertainment. Also shown on the front page is the letter submitted by her to her Board as a fait accompli..
Last Thursday the County Council approved the budget of the SVAA which included a $71,755 plus large benefits for its new Director. These additional benefits, if her letter is correct, amount to $8045.00. Now we here at the Shadow think that is a bit excessive as it amounts to a cost to the taxpayer of $96,540.00. We can only assume that it must be one heck of a healthcare plan and probably includes valet parking at the hospital and doctor’s offices. Or is it more of her inability to create simple and correct office correspondence, we would think a key skill for a job paying $110,000 per year. Despite thinking they have fixed the problem, it continues to contravene County policy and good business sense in that the job was never advertised and to the best of our information (see side bar) the incumbent never submitted an appropriate job application. The report of how this salary level was provided (desk audit, job tack analysis, or any one of the accepted personnel practices and processes used in “functioning governments” to establish job classes, position descriptions, or salary and benefit levels) which allegedly reached the Council can be found. The Shadow had been led to believe that this was to be in place before the Council voted on the SVAA budget. The Shadow also understood that the County Manager was to vet this entire matter. He apparently reached a political accommodation before this pay proposal was vetted by County personnel office. He further avoided meeting with several citizens who requested an “audience” to discuss this fiasco.
Not posting the position is more than sufficient reason for denying the budget and salary demands, even if the County provisions can be argued not to apply to these Boards. Now that sounds strange as the Board was a creation of the County request to the legislature and its budget is approved by the Council. So why should not “reasonable and objective” procedures and policy trump political backdoor gamesmanship is a question we ask. And even if you buy the weak argument the policy does not apply, the council can always refuse to approve their budget. The last we heard, spades still trumped clubs. The last the Shadow heard also is that they can replace this board. And since they removed one of the Boards entirely last year, is seems to us it is time to clean house here again.
It took the Shadow a week to amass most of the information. Here is the timeline as we know it. As we stated, the previous Director, then being paid $87,000 and a huge benefit package, was fired. The SVAA then agreed to pay the new Director $110,000. With a public outcry in the offing County Council became “interested”, Councilmember Joie Alexander even showed up a Board meeting (note she appointed one of the current members – see board membership list above), and some of the Board members were replaced. Unfortunately it appears that the mindset of the new members is the same as the old. The details are that one of the old Board members resigned (now the current Director) and was named Acting Director. A few months later the Board decided to pay her $110,000 and a large package of benefits.
The County Council said no (that it would not pass the SVAA budget), and asked its Personnel office to give a range for this part time job with limited personnel. The report gave a range of $58,000 to $92,000, which the Shadow believes is way too high. It included $12,000 in health benefits and other benefits. The County also required, we thought, that all of its positions be posted. So this Board at a “workshop” (attended interestingly by a County Attorney and Council Member Joie Alexander – LINK here for the minutes)voted a salary of $85,000. Even the skunks were offended. So back to the rip off Ouija Board and she comes up with $71,000 and big healthcare benefits. It seems she privately negotiated this salary with the County Manager.
A review of the minutes of the SVAA where they approved the $71,000 discloses no discussion of qualification or pay. The letter she concocted with the County Manager is not attached to the minutes (but the Shadow obtained a copy – see sidebar). One of the members reported to the Shadow that there was a discussion of the letter, but not the qualifications or pay. There was no application filed with the County according to a spokesman from the County. The sad part is that the County Manager, Mr. Dinneen, excluded his Personnel office and the Board let the applicant, (Wow! Double Wow!) negotiate her own pay.
Forget the failure to post and widely advertise this position or even the minimum concept of fairness. It seems that the Board either does not understand that one cannot approve fiscal actions or other official acts of record at a “workshop”, a workshop which is not noticed as a Board meeting, or they just decided to thumb their noses at the County Manager, County Council Chair and all of the County Council, not to mention the taxpayers. So they went ahead and voted for $85,000 and all the benefits she asked for. They will not post this position because they know that there are probably tons of prospective applicants with more experience who would work for less. Nobody knows her qualifications or experience. The County Council deserves better if expected this individual to be “vetted”. Remember too, this is part time job with two employees or are there three.
In sum, the County Council Chair, that is you Mr. Bruno, and County Council was manipulated. The fact is that the Board converted a simple issue of an employment process focused on looking at the best applicants, qualifications and pay into a political issue. That is what happened here. Want as further bad example? The NSB CRA, where they are also giving away County taxpayer money with abandonment. Try $60,000 for a chiropractor to produce press releases for marketing. To the County Council Chair and especially Councilmember Joie Alexander, it is time to audit both the SVAA and the NSB CRA as neither appear to want to follow the rules.
2.ABOLISH THE HOSPITAL TAX DISTRICTS *
Time to rethink need for hospital tax. From the opinion pages of the Orlando Sentinel:
October 27, 2011
Gov. Rick Scott seems never to have met a tax he likes. He's still pushing for tax cuts, even with lawmakers facing a $2 billion budget shortfall next year and the prospect of slashing more spending from education, health care and other basic services.
But Scott's skepticism of at least one tax — paid by some property owners to operate or subsidize local hospitals in Florida — is well founded. There are 16 hospital taxing districts in the state. Three are in Volusia County, two are in Lake County. In 2009, those five Central Florida districts together collected almost $90 million.
Most hospital taxing districts were established decades ago to build hospitals or provide care for patients too poor to pay for it. Those districts came before the creation in 1965 of Medicaid, the federal and state program that finances health care for the poor. Yet they never went away.
Some taxing districts bankroll public hospitals, but others subsidize private nonprofit hospitals. The latter category of hospitals in the North Lake County District includes Leesburg Regional Medical Center and Florida Hospital Waterman in Tavares. Together they received almost $10 million last year from district taxpayers.
Hospital taxes in the North Lake district aren't even limited to covering charity care. They're designated for "continuing hospital services."
Recently one of the state representatives from the area, Republican Larry Metz, floated a proposal to eliminate the current hospital taxing district but empower local voters to replace it. The new district, if approved by voters, would reserve its taxes for treating poor county residents, and strictly account for those expenditures.
While Metz's proposal merits serious consideration, lawmakers should wait until a panel Scott appointed to study hospital taxing districts has completed its work. It's expected to report by Jan. 1.
The panel is led by Dominic Calabro, president of Florida TaxWatch, a respected business-backed think tank in Tallahassee. A 2009 report from TaxWatch on hospital taxing districts called for the kind of statewide study Scott ordered.
The TaxWatch report pointed out that hospitals subsidized by taxing districts often compete with ones that aren't. It also cited two studies in the 1990s that found Volusia County's three hospital districts were collecting more in taxes than they needed to cover their indigent care costs, and using some of the dollars for services that would have been covered by Medicaid.
If the state study finds that hospital taxing districts are unfair, or unnecessary, lawmakers should get rid of them.
Copyright © 2011, Orlando Sentinel
The SHADOW could not agree more and has advocated the elimination of these hospital taxing districts for years. The recent Bert Fish Sunshine Law violations by a Board not accountable to the citizens who pay the taxes, is a great example of how these Districts have misused the trust granted them in the original legislation creating them.
3.POSTER CHILDREN
Poster Child 1: Cindy Richenberg. Poster children are created, in her case, by a combination of arrogance, putting in place and not changing an unsustainable pension plan, and gaming the system as was done by Cindy Richenberg who retired at age 46 with a $64,000 annual pension. At age 68 she will receive Social Security we believe.
Poster Child 2: Karen Clancy. She got a $5000 grant from the SVAA with an application that said she “might put five head in beds”---$1000 per pop. She took the money before the event (in violation of the SVAA posted rules) and never submitted a report (again in direct violation of the rules). These SVAA rules provide only tentative grant approval and no money until the report is submitted. Another words the grantee must expend their own funds and complete the event and required reporting before any money changes hands. Throughout 2009 and 2010, the SHADOW and others requested copies of such event reports and evaluations and were repeatedly told, in writing, that no such reports were ever submitted on anything. So this “grant” is really $5,000 to a friend; and no accountability. Also, nobody has ever explained how she was involved since she got money for a Safari Club event.
Poster Child 3: Chad Schilsky: The Mayor, a close friend, appoints you to the CRA Board. As a Board member, good old Chad proposes a grant to himself of $20,000. He does not vote, but, surprise, the rest of the Board never saw such a good deal. Chad then hires the Mayor’s construction company. Did we mention on a no-bid deal! We suggest you ask the Mayor how he thinks this is responsible “leadership”? He does have a PhD in Leadership, albeit from an on-line university.
Poster Child 4: The SVAA Board wins this year’s award. The Board’s actions are descriptive of the worst example of arrogance. This is quite an accomplishment when compared to the activities surrounding the Hampton Inn, waste of money at the CRA, and the Mayor taking credit for spending your money on projects like Esther Street. Three separate shots at an arbitrary salary for a friend without posting and with no job application or review of the applicant’s qualifications. This even beats the Boyd and Dennis junket to NYC for a party weekend.
Any trips to nice Cities we do not know about?
1. ABUSE OF AUTHORITY, A TIN EAR AND ARROGANCE. APPARENTLY THE COUNTY DOES NOT CARE ENOUGH TO FIX IT RIGHT. ADD THE SOUTHEAST VOLUSIA ADVERTISING AUTHORITY BOARD TO THE NEW SMYRNA BEACH POSTER CHILD ROSTER FOR TAXPAYER RIP-OFFS SEE ARTICLE 3 BELOW, FOR MORE ON THE POSTER CHILD LIST.
The SVAA is given about $1 million a year in bed tax money from tourists and is supposed to spend the money solely to promote tourism in its territory, e.g., Southeast Volusia County. It raises no money on its own and every nickel spent is designated, by law, to put heads in beds. It was not created to subsidize the Flagler Avenue Bar and Booze Club, better known as the Flagler Avenue Hospitality Group. The Shadow exposed how this Board and its’ past Director put almost no heads in bed and wasted tons of money on payments and GIFTS to their friends. We exposed such shenanigans as unwarranted travel, an absorbent rental expense, cost of supplies, and repeated and uncorrected failures to follow their own written rules for grants. Remember Karen Clancy, $20,000 to the State Fair, and $40,000 to the Chamber of
Date: 10/28/2011, 2:33 PM
10/28/2011, 2:33 PMName: Pookie
I am confused. Gubment hires a person to cut the grass at 8 bucks an hour and has to go through a process that looks at his life. SVAA manager hired by gift job? REALLY! Like Pearl Harbor, we're all sunk!
Date: 10/27/2011, 12:40 PM
10/27/2011, 12:40 PMName: Clint Eastwood
Is the mayor that desperate? Deep inside he knows he is not doing anything for New Smyrna, he has to pretend and pose like Superman to make people think he is taking care of the run down areas. Oh! demolish this, oh! demolish that but at the end the abandoned and deserted areas will be there for years to come. The Mayor, needs to get some help, he needs to deflate an over-inflated ego.
Can somebody put wonder boy in a spaceship heading to the planet Earth with a zoom in on New Smyrna Beach , FL Stop acting and pretending like everything is alright, you are not fooling anyone, you are making a FOOL out of yourself.
Members of the Southeast Volusia Advertising Authority Board and Their Real Employment Printed Here for Your Information
The SHADOW Comments:
The SHADOW requested a copy of this unsigned letter from the County and after reading it, called back and requested a copy of the submitted job application, credit check, and any background report that may have been written. We were told by the County that no application that one could consider to be a job application was submitted and they would check on the release of the other information, if they exists, and get back to us. The letter clearly claims that a job application was submitted. The SHADOW intends to follow up on this with County Personnel on Monday.
This letter (posted to the right here) appears to be the same as referenced in the minutes, but there was no copy of it attached to the minutes.
The SHADOW was also concerned about the reference in the letter to an agreed upon "monthly stipend" of $8045.00 for health insurance. That worked out to $96,540.00 a year of taxpayer supported health insurance and therefore must be an error. Regardless, the letter itself speaks volumes about the writer's business writing skills and, assuming the health insurance dollar value is not correct, her attention to detail. Both of these are, in the SHADOW's opinion, critical skills one would expect any applicant for a job who is demanding $110,000.00 a year.
The SHADOW remains unconvinced that she is worth the $71,000 she is getting for the SVAA job. The SHADOW is further convinced that the County Council should immediately rescind its approval of the SVAA budget until such time as this fiasco is straightened
out and a conforming job advertisement and open search is conducted for more qualified persons. We are sure if you put this position on Monster.com, at the current salary of $71,000, the County will be awash in more qualified applicants from right here in Florida.
Date: 10/28/2011, 7:52 PM
10/28/2011, 7:52 PM Name: T Paine
To 533:
250 gal of water @ 8 lbs per gallon= 2000 lbs on a half ton vehicle; that's the ticket!
Those palm trees on Canal may be just a small example of how the good old boy networks function. Did you see (Saturday) contractors trimming to those same palms come into play? Over the last few years we've seen P&R, CRA and Street division trucks doing trimming and putting up Holiday lites. Also check out the new Orange Ave street scape. Look at any city project. Plantings that require hand labor intensive maintenance are alive and well still in the city purview. Is hiring friends and relatives (contractors or on payroll) an occurrence?
The city projects all have one thing in common, EVER LASTING INCREASING MAINTENANCE COST. This choice of design has built in, escalating costs that are now and will continue to be an expense that is a burden to tax payers. Some will say you should have the downtown core shine. There are many ways to plan projects that shine with reasonable maintenance costs but is there no one in our fair city that has the where to facility to plan ahead. Remember a few years ago “ I can not cut the budget any more without affecting my department”. Maybe if department heads planned future projects in part by maintenance costs it would save a few bucks and this problem will go away.
New Smyrna has several qualified people (P&R, CRA, City Project Manager) to make sure an acceptable project Green Wise but choose not to. All over this country cities are taking out grass and flowers and putting in drought and bug resistant plantings. NSB keep putting in ferns and such so workers have to hand weed and spray for weeds. Does anyone know how many times the fire house on 3rd Ave has been replanted? How about the Oak tree out front that had to be removed because fireman could not see traffic coming? How about the dead tree replacements on the West Canal magnolias? How about Christmas Park (put in fern take them out)? Planners have not even measured correctly in planting foliage causing small hand mowers to be used when a yard stick could leave a worker on a riding mower, much faster and less hours to do more work.
We have a department head making in excess of $100K. What kind of input does she have other than all maintenance responsibility? Why would you not look ahead and plan better. If you loose people to budget cuts you make, then you hire contractors to do work that may not be necessary in the first place, how does this help your expense column? Some of these people brought the idea of city workers power washing the Canal sidewalks with a pick up truck loaded with a huge tank.
Maybe our budget crunch has been helped along by wrong people, in the wrong place, at the wrong time. 3O years experience does not mean anything when can't look at an operation and find improvements. In this economy there are bright, well educated, motivated people who would love to be given a chance. Our situation with disappearing revenue could be slowed down by better planning, innovation and dedicated people.
The SHADOW thought the following blog was exceptional and reprints it here.
This one should be food for thought by all NSB taxpayers as we may well be facing this same situation because of the Mayor and City Commission failure to address the ever growing deficit in the public safety pensions.
Date: 10/29/2011, 9:40 PM
10/29/2011, 9:40 PM Name: Think about this...
Can Rhode Island be forced to pay its pension promises?
http://blogs.wpri.com/2011/10/28/can-rhode-i...
On Thursday, I noted in response to a reader that states cannot file for bankruptcy. That led to this provocative reply from another commenter, Jim Donahue:
There is no law which allows it but there is no law denying it either. It’s never been tried although there are a couple of instances where states have just defaulted on their debts. Arkansas in the 1930′s and Mississippi in the early 1800′s. Call it what you like but default is default.
Jim’s comment made me think about the pension debate in a different way, and I wanted to throw the question out there for discussion: Could Rhode Island selectively default on some of its pension obligations – just decide not to pay them? Isn’t that, in a sense, what’s on the table right now?
Think about it. Let’s say some version of the Raimondo-Chafee bill passes, which seems highly likely. The unions and/or retirees will fight the law in court, saying pensions are a contractual promise that can’t be changed. A long litigation fight will ensue. And let’s say that at the end of all that, the judges side with the workers: Yes, COLA formulas are a contractual right and the state is obligated to pay them.
Then what happens? Can the courts force Rhode Island’s governments and taxpayers to pay the full original pensions if they’ve decided not to and still don’t want to? How?
Usually, people pay their debts because the consequences of not paying them are bad. And the human consequences of a partial pension default undoubtedly would be very painful for retirees, as we’ve already seen in Central Falls. But what would be the financial consequences for Rhode Island’s governments? For them, not paying the pensions in full would be a form of debt relief – the equivalent of bondholders taking a haircut. They could spend their tax money on other things. Bond markets, which usually punish governments that default by charging higher interest or refusing to loan them money, will apparently applaud a default on money owed to workers rather than investors.
The message this year from workers and retirees has been simple: “Keep the promise.” But promises get broken all the time, and it appears Rhode Island’s leaders have come to think the consequences of keeping pension promises would be worse than the consequences of breaking them. That’s happened in American history before.
A lawyer without a dog in this fight made the same point to me the other day. “Ted,” he said flatly, “there’s just no way judges are going to force lawmakers to pay up in full for these pensions if they’ve decided not to. It’s just not going to happen.”
None of this may be fair, or just. But isn’t it conceivable? What do you think?
Update: The SEIU’s Philip Keefe, who served on the Chafee-Raimondo pension advisory group, tweets in response: “There would be too many legal alternatives before th (rest was dropped off the blog)
And Here is One for the Henry Fans Out There!! You Know, The Little Guy with the Barbi Car.
Date: 10/29/2011, 5:05 PM
10/29/2011, 5:05 PM Name: Barringer AND Burns
What is funny is how the mayor took a hissy fit and removed his ads from Henry's NSB News. Then he turns to Burns at the crappy Observer and has a picture taken like he's Rocky Balboa for having a condemned building torn down 3 years into his post. Burns brags about it on his Facebook page with Holly Smith and Sue Williams and then a day later it is removed from his page. Talk about making the Mayor look absolutely stupid. Barringer and Burns: Quite the dynamic duo.
