Showing posts with label John W. Scott. Show all posts
Showing posts with label John W. Scott. Show all posts

Thursday, July 20, 2017

#Ethics - More context, facts and fall-out to consider re Hallandale Beach Comm. Anthony A. Sanders' "misconduct" in office, per Broward Inspector General. Naturally, Sanders being Sanders, he views the public finally learning all the facts about what he has been doing in office as “an assassination on my character.” Surprise!

#Ethics - More context, facts and fall-out to consider re Hallandale Beach Comm. Anthony A. Sanders' "misconduct" in office, per Broward Inspector General. Naturally, Sanders being Sanders, he views the public finally learning all the facts about what he has been doing in office as “an assassination on my character.” Surprise!

What follows below is an updated version of an email that I sent out LAST Wednesday morning before Noon regarding the then-latest breaking news from the office of John W. Scott, the Broward Inspector General, regarding what most well-informed people in this area of South Florida have long considered to be the the longstanding, self-evident unethical behavior and actions of Hallandale Beach Commissioner Anthony A. Sanders.

I sent it out to roughly 175 interested parties ecompassing citizens, journalists, civic groups and state legislators throughout Broward County, South Florida and the Sunshine State.
That is to say, sent it to selected email inboxes of well-informed people thoroughout the State of Florida who have an abiding and longstanding personal and or professional interest in seeing to it that the government that is closest to the people in Florida, the municipal level, is NOT, in the end, simply a stealthy transference of wealth between a community's citizens and taxpayers to its elected officials and bureaucrats.
A members-only ATM for insiders who know how to fix or finesse the system they are supposed to be providing oversight over on behalf of... the People.

But what do you do when someone is perfectly willing to brazenly break the spirit and letter of ordinances, laws and basic morality in order to get their way, whatever that might be?
Someone who, basically, calls the bluff of civil society and law enforcement in Broward County, and literally dares any one of them to stop him from doing what he wants to do and will keep doing?
Someone like Commissioner Anthony A. Sanders.

The people who received that email of mine last Wednesday, and prior emails over the years regarding Comm. Sanders and his actions, are serious people of substance, purpose and public influence.
And what they also have in common, to varying extents, is being more than a little aware of the longstanding public corruption and financial chicanery that has taken place at Hallandale Beach City Hall for years, often in the person of Comm. Sanders.

Thanks in large part to my efforts over the years to publicize things on this blog and via the South Florida news media, as well as a handful of hard-working, high-minded friends who have wanted nothing less than for Hallandale Beach to FINALLY be a better, smarter, safer and better-managed community, not the public laughingstock it has been for many years under notoriously thin-skinned Hallandale Beach Mayor Joy Cooper.

To repeat the unhappy truth that I have written here so many times before today, literally, a reality where many South Florida print and TV reporters "joke" about how truly bad the state of things were and are in HB, and then use that as their own reason not to get involved and actually REPORT the facts and context of what's going on in HB, because, afterall, "that's just Hallandale Beach."

For those of you who are new to this fact-based bIog, I'm glad you came by to check it out today and get some more important facts on this matter regarding public corruption, as well as important context and nuance to better make sense of it all.

You should bear in mind as you read this that over the past ten years I have written DOZENS of fact-filled blog posts here about the VERY curious and dysfunctional actions and behavior of Comm. Sanders, connecting-the-dots on how VERY SHORT he has come up in the public's estimation on so many important areas of the job, compared to both what the community has a right to reasonably expect in an elected official -like actually doing your homework and being familiar with the facts being discussed on the dais for one thing!- and more importantly, what the community needed to see up on the dais in the way of resolve and fidelity to public accountability, oversight and transparency.

Over-and-over, Comm. Sanders has come up woefully short and usually been just about the least-informed person in the entire Commission Chambers when an issue or policy was being discussed, analyzed or voted upon, whether in his role as a City Commissioner or as a CRA Board Member.

But that unfortunate reality, that burden that Hallandale Beach's residents and Small Business owners have had to carry for so long, has never prevented the South Florida Sun-Sentinel's Editorial Board from endorsing Sanders, owing to their longstanding pledge to support diversity on the dais, even if it comes at the risk of complete incompetency.

What the Hallandale Beach community got in Sanders was entirely predictable, someone who felt entitled to do whatever he wanted, and to ignore rules and public expectations he found either troublesome or cumbersome.
I was one of a handful of people in this area who called it publicly many, many years ago, within days and weeks of him being apppointed to the HB City Commission under strange circumstances that were entirely contrary to the city's own written procedures.

But the South Florida Sun-Sentinel's liberal Editorial Board has never let self-evident facts-on-the-ground regarding Comm. Sanders performance in office get in the way of their efforts to make sure that he was on the five-member City Commission, even when he couldn't publicly explain himself or his troubling track record in the newspaper's very own pre-election group candidate interviews, according to people who were there.

In Hallandale, Sanders, London 
By Sun Sentinel Editorial Board
In Seat 1, four people are vying for office, including incumbent Anthony Sanders.The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board encourages voters to retain Sanders. His experience and knowledge of the issues make him the better choice for this southeast Broward city of about 38,000.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/opinion/endorsements/fl-endorsement-hallandale-gs1008-20141025-story.html


At this point, don't hold your breath that these same reporters and editors are finally going to publicly own up to their own serious and serial mistakes in judgment in a future editorial.
Meanwhile, look hard at what the Sun-Sentinel's selfish and short-sighted whims have done to this community.



Above, Broward Inspector General John W. Scott at a Broward League of Women Voters event in Coconut Creek, FL that I attended on January 24, 2013, with four other concerned Hallandale Beach residents and activists.

Let me put it this way... on the day that I took this photo of Mr. Scott in 2013,I all but knew most of the major points detailed in his office's preliminary report, the subject of last week's news articles.

Again for the benefit of newcomers to the blog, I'm a person who was constantly feeding the IG's office with tips consisting germane facts and context they weren't getting elsewhere.
Inconvenient facts for Comm. Sanders, who, for all his brazeness in exploiting his ties to nonprofits who receive money from the Hallandale Beach CRA, which has mis-spent and wasted millions of dollars over the years, and which Comm. Sanders never cared to know what happened to the money, or even whether it was spent for the intended purpose.
What he cared about was directing the money $$$ -deciding who would get it.
Now, you'll learn why.

There's one more thing you should know about Comm. Sanders before reading my comments. Call it context, call it nuance, call it whatever you like. 
As best as anyone in the city can figure, there has NEVER been a single proposed development anywhere in the City of Hallandale Beach in the 10-plus years since Anthony A. Sanders has been a HB City Commissioner that he did not vote FOR,.
No matter how ill-conceived it was, no matter how unpopular it was with neghborhood residents, no matter how unsightly or just plain ugly it was, no matter if the city's own professional staff recommended against approving it.

Even by the very, very low ethical/public policy standards of South Florida, that is a remarkably dubious track record and proof positive of Comm. Sanders always looking at well-financed developers and their large teams of experts and consultants as a means to an end. 
He has always claimed that there would be secondary economic (ripple) effects in Northwest Hallandale Beach -the area that he claims as his own desite the fact that everyone on the HB City Commission is elected citywide- but as we can see both then and now, the actual economic ripple effect that resulted was NOT the one that most reasonable people would've expected.

Even Hallandale Beach Mayor Joy Cooper, the ringleader of what I have long called the Cooper Rubber Stamp Crew that for so many years ran this city into the ground and disrespected its residents and small business owners, actually managed to vote against a few proposed real estate developments.
But not clearly disconnected-from-reality Comm. Sanders.


It's been common knowledge for the longest time -in part because I've mentioned it so frequently here on the blog and in my frequent emails after something Mayor Cooper herself said and did- that her biggest fear has long been that the true facts about the state of this city and its longtime mismanagement under her actually get out and penetrate the minds of the people in this state whose opinion she deeply cares about.
It helps feed her enormous ego.

That is to say, her pals throughout the area and up in Tallahassee, like the folks at the Florida League of Cities or former state Sen. Eleanor Sobel, the latter of whom as I've written here so often, was always happy to play guard dog for her up in Tallahassee, and help keep the germane facts from getting made public, as Sobel did in running interference for the mayor re the city's completely mismanaged and unethical CRA with the bicameral Joint Legislative Audit Commitee.

All to prevent an honest audit so that Hallandale Beach residents, taxpayers and small business owners could finally discover where all the tens of millions of HB CRA dollars went.
-----

Date: Wed, Jul 12, 2017 at 12:42 PM
Subject: #Ethics matters - More context, facts and fall-out to consider re Hallandale Beach Comm. Sanders' "misconduct" in office, per Broward Inspector General



Right now, I'm trying hard not to gloat about this long-overdue news and turn of events,
given all the dozens and dozens of fact-filled pieces I've written on my blog and in emails
to many of you over the past 11 years about Comm. Anthony A. Sanders, starting with his curious and completely illegal selection to the City Commission by Hallandale Beach Mayor 
Joy Cooper in 2006 to replace Comm. Francine Schiller, who was ill.

Mayor Cooper forced Anthony A. Sanders down the throats of Hallandale Beach residents 
by filling a HB City Commission vacancy that wasn't even legally vacant, and wouldn't be 
for another three weeks, days AFTER the scheduled second City Commission meeting of the month, which is to say, that there would have been plenty of time for public comments re the city's extant policies for filling vacancies.

But Mayor Cooper didn't want the best prospective candidate in the city to fill the position, she consciously wanted Sanders.  

Cooper she did so by blatantly violating the city's own rules and protocols -used just 
the year before for Keith London to replace then-HB City Commissioner Joe Gibbons on the Commission after his election to the Florida state House, in large part because she knew that then-City Attorney David Jove was a veritable bump on a log.

Jove was someone who wouldn't do anything to jeopardize his outrageously large pension by reminding the mayor that what she was doing was patently illegal under the city's very own rules.

Once on board as part of Cooper's Rubber Stamp Crew, Sanders was noticeable for his
almost-immediate very curious and confounding unethical ethical behavior and actions
-or complete inaction when positive action, oversight and genuine accountability were necessary but Sanders was NOT up to the task.
Not up to the responsibilities he owed the citizens of Hallandale Beach.

I gave SO MUCH information over the years to the Broward Inspector General via emails
about Sanders and his retinue of hacks and apologists in HB, sometimes including specific
information about the non-profits associated with him -including recipients of CRA loans
that didn't file required yearly reports to the IRS and didn't spend the money for their
stated purposes- to say nothing of the complete lack of public information and transparency
about the sources of the funding and where it all went.

And do I need to even remind you how many dozens of time I wrote on the blog and in emails that Sanders was so brazen from the get-go that that he didn't even bother to recuse himself from voting on the dais, as required, when the city wanted to buy his old property for more than it was worth, despite the city having no actual (written) purpose for the building if they acquired it.

You know, the former Sanders property at 501 N.W. 1st Avenue that became the city-owned
building that he could use for free afterwards, and which famously had Sanders, Cooper and
Bill Julian campaign signs all over it for weeks before elections?
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-city-of-hallandale-beachs-rules-are.html
Yes, despite it then being a city-owned building.



Check out this 2012 Local10 video with reporter Glenna Milberg: about what the Broward Inspector General had to say about the fishy deal with the purchase of Comm. Sanders' property.

She wanted to interview Sanders, but he didn't want to have anything to do with the questions that might come his way from one of the few widely-respected reporters in South Florida:
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/07/video-local10s-glenna-milberg-examines.html


In case you forgot some of the details, here's an excerpt from that 2012 email, that was
also received by the Broward IG.

Wednesday September 26th, 2012
3:05 p.m.

I received a phone call from Csaba Kulin this afternoon and he mentioned several
disturbing things to me that I believe that all concerned Hallandale Beach residents
ought to know about.

Some of the facts he shared are ones that we all might've predicted would happen
at some point in the final six weeks with Comm. Anthony A. Sanders re-election
effort, given,

a.) the truly abysmal job Sanders has done in office the past four years, and the 
fact that he's refused to meet with resident taxpayers like you and me in public 
and simply tell the truth about what really happened with that 2009 land sale to
the city, where the only parties who profited was Comm. Sanders and his wife,
Jessica, and,
b.) Sanders foolishly and illegally refused to recuse himself that Spring, and
actually voting to give himself free use of the building he "sold" until it is demolished,
courtesy of a motion by then-Commissioner Bill Julian that passed 4-1.

So you have the proper context, now that he has his own yards signs, Csaba has
been busy campaigning and walking neighborhoods in NW HB for the past week,
sometimes with Gerald Dean, sometimes by himself.

Csaba told me that he is being told over-and-over by residents that he speaks with
at their homes that someone from Comm. Sanders' campaign have been a very busy
beaver, indeed.
It turns out that someone from Team Sanders has been illegally placing Sanders 
yard signs in residents' front yards without their permission.

According to Csaba, they're everywhere- but not by choice.

When asked why they don't simply remove them or call to complain, residents say
that they know that regardless of what they do, another Sanders sign will be placed
there overnight if they do anything to remove it, which is apparently what has already
happened to some people who wouldn't put up with the effort to coerce the neighborhood.

Given these circumstances, some residents, esp. older residents, are quite understandably
intimidated, and reluctant to draw attention to themelf by removing the illegally-placed
campaign signs from their own yards,
They have become unwilling victims of Sanders' desire to stay in office and ride
the gravy train however long he can, by hook or by crook.

Not that Sanders is telling the truth to anyone in NW HB, either, since as 
we've all discussed previously, the truth is NOT Sanders' friend!
It's one of the reasons why Sanders initially refused to cooperate with the
Broward Inspector General and his team of investigators,

Yes, expect a lot more details to come out in the coming weeks and months 
regarding matters and behavior involving Sanders and his associates that I have 
pointed at and hinted at over the years, that were begging for some kind of 
plausible, reasonable explanation from him but which got... none.





Florida Bulldog
Report: Hallandale commissioner Anthony Sanders “engaged in pattern of misconduct”
By William Gjebre, FloridaBulldog.org 
JULY 11, 2017 AT 10:58 AM



A preliminary report by the Broward Inspector General’s Office says Hallandale Beach City Commissioner Anthony Sanders “engaged in a pattern of misconduct” when he “failed to disclose payments” made to him and other family members by a community group which Sanders voted to give thousands of dollars in city grants and other funding.
The July 7 report obtained by Florida Bulldog also said that Palms Community Action Coalition Inc. (PCAC) made contractual payments to Higher Vision Ministries, where Sanders is the pastor and the only paid full-time employee. The report adds that Sanders solicited and received contributions for the church from developers seeking to do business with the city.
PCAC is a Hallandale Beach-based nonprofit organization that provides job training and community development services to local residents.
Read the rest of the article at:
http://www.floridabulldog.org/2017/07/report-hallandale-commissioner-anthony-sanders/










South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Hallandale Commissioner Anthony Sanders engaged in misconduct, Inspector General says

Susannah Bryan, Reporter, Sun Sentinel

July 11, 2017 7:45 PM

Anthony Sanders used his position as a Hallandale Beach commissioner to approve nearly $1 million in funding to a nonprofit that made monthly payments to the church he founded and also paid his immediate family, according to a Broward Inspector General’s report obtained by the Sun Sentinel.

Sanders, 56, failed to disclose the payments he, his wife and two sons received from the Palms Community Action Coalition, according to the Inspector General’s preliminary report. Sanders’ wife at one point served as executive director of the nonprofit, which had a mission of job training, job placement and community outreach.

“Sanders engaged in a pattern of misconduct that violated Florida ethics laws, the Hallandale Beach city charter and the Broward code of ethics for elected officials,” the report says.


Read the rest of the article at:
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/local/broward/fl-sb-sanders-hallandale-oig-investigation-20170711-story.html








WSVN News
Video at http://bcove.me/295w22ub

Hallandale Beach commissioner accused of ethical misconduct involving non-profit
Brian Entin
July 12, 2017

HALLANDALE BEACH, FLA. (WSVN) - A Hallandale Beach commissioner is being accused of using his elected position to financially benefit him, his church and his family.

Hallandale Beach City Commissioner Anthony Sanders has another position as a pastor, but the Broward County Inspector General said Sanders voted to allow money to go to a non-profit, which was benefiting his church and family.

“I’m a pastor, so this is what we call an attack from the enemy,” Sanders said. “It is an assassination on my character.”


Read the rest of the article at:
http://wsvn.com/news/local/hallandale-beach-commission-accused-of-using-non-profit-funds-for-personal-use/


Florida Bulldog
Hallandale freezes payments for city development, jobs programs citing waste & fraud
By William Gjebre, FloridaBulldog.org
JULY 19, 2017 AT 6:00 AM

Hallandale Beach City Manager Roger Carlton has ordered what could be a multi-million dollar freeze on all payments under two city jobs and business development programs, saying they “have lost their way.”
Carlton acted about what he said was “waste” and possible fraud weeks before a report by county investigators became public last week that accused City Commissioner Anthony Sanders of failing to disclose payments he received from a local community group awarded city funds, including money under the two programs, with his backing.
In a June 5 memorandum obtained by Florida Bulldog, Carlton, who was appointed city manager by a new reform-minded city commission majority, expressed outrage about the flawed city programs and public apathy about them.
Read the rest of the article at:
http://www.floridabulldog.org/2017/07/hallandale-freezes-payments-for-city-programs/?mc_cid=aa57462b51&mc_eid=5dfd4ab366






Happy to share some good news with the long-beleaguered citizens and Small Business owners of Hallandale Beach and South Florida, who have desperately need more news and days like this one - where people in power who consciously do bad things, yet felt a sense of entitlement, FINALLY get caught and publicly held to account.

So, what's Broward State Attorney Mike Satz going to do?
Good question!

While we are asking good questions, here's another: Why is #SoFL media NOT asking #Broward's #UsualSuspects in government and public policy to speak publicly about what they think abt Comm. Sanders & Family's unethical behavior, helping themselves to #HallandaleBeach $?

Where's the great ethical insight from 
state Sen. Gary Farmer, or his predecessor, Eleanor Sobel, or Oscar Braynon II, the latter two of whom helped protect the HB CRA's butt for  so long in Tallahassee despite all the squandered millions of dollars because their pal Joy Cooper insisted on it.

You remember that, don't you?
I talked about it so often on the blog and on Twitter and in emails and...?

Florida Bulldog
Two senators short-circuit Legislature’s plan to audit troubled Hallandale Beach CRA
By Willliam Gjebre, BrowardBulldog.org 
NOVEMBER 26, 2013 AT 6:13 AM

A Florida Legislature’s joint auditing committee is dropping its inquiry of Hallandale Beach’s questionable use of local redevelopment funds at the urging of two area state senators, one a long-time acquaintance of Mayor Joy Cooper.
Democratic Senators Eleanor Sobel and Oscar Braynon II, representing portions of Hallandale Beach, could not be reached for comment, despite repeated calls, to elaborate on a letter they signed recommending against a state audit or any action related to the controversial city spending of Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA) funds.
In addition, the committee will not ask the Florida Attorney General for an updated opinion on how CRA funds can be used. This was a contentious issue between the city and the Broward Inspector General’s Office which found that Hallandale Beach had “grossly mismanaged” millions of dollars in CRA funds while ignoring a 2010 opinion that limited CRA spending to “bricks and mortar” redevelopment projects.

Read the rest of the article at
http://www.floridabulldog.org/2013/11/two-senators-short-circuit-legislatures-plan-to-audit-troubled-hallandale-beach-cra/#commentlist

My favorite line from above?
Neither Sobel nor Braynon responded to multiple requests for comment about their letter recommending against a state audit.





Where's the wise and learned counsel from the Broward League of Voters or The Broward Workshop or the Urban League of Broward County, whom the South Florida news media is forever telling us is still relevant to things in Broward County, all apparent evidence to the contrary?

What about some pithy comments from some reputed religious expert to comment on the idea of a pastor (who is also an elected official) deciding that charity, in the form of non-profit monie$, really DOES begin at home, as Sanders has shown?

What about former Hallandale Beach City Commisioner and state Rep. Joe Gibbons, or current state Reps. Joe Geller or Shevrin Jones?
I kid, of course, because the last three are well-known BS artists with a connection to Hallandale Beach, but whom nearly everyone who pays attention to things political herebaouts knows are three people who could really care less about what happens in HB, much preferring the sound of their own voice and its constant stream of false narratives and sweet nothings to the harsh glare of reality -their pal Sanders is a lying hypocrite who wants to play the victim after he broke the law.

Well, not to say I told you so but all-too-predictably, the South Florida news media is not doing anything remotely like asking people of any kind of power or influence in Broward County to weigh-in publicly on what seems like an easy softball of a question.
The sort of basic follow-up that for most of th 20th Century would have been expected by the press corps, regardless of the size of the city involved or the power of the public figure who had disgraced themself.

But South Florida's news media doesn't want to ask any probing questions of anyone about corrupt Hallandale Beach City Commissioner Anthony A. Sanders. or why the same news media didn't say anything about him when there was not just smoke billowing at Hallandale Beach City Hall, but a veritable Towering Inferno.

Just something for you all to consider the next time the press corps here in South Florida waxes philosophic and wonders aloud why most of them are neither trusted or respected by South Florida's residents.





Dave 

Wednesday, December 10, 2014

#Ethics in government still matter to some of us in #Broward County -why we need Tougher #EthicsReform: excerpts from my written comments to 2014 meeting of the Oversight Committee for the Office of Broward Inspector General under John W. Scott; the useful examples of the #HallandaleBeach CRA, Joy Cooper, Renee Miller, Shevrin Jones, Lisa K. Aronson

#Ethics in government still matter to some of us in #Broward County -why we need Tougher #EthicsReform: excerpts from my written comments to 2014 meeting of the Oversight Committee for the Office of Broward Inspector General under John W. Scott; the useful examples of the #HallandaleBeach CRA, Joy Cooper, Renee Miller, Shevrin Jones, Lisa K. Aronson 

What follows are selected excerpts from my written comments to the 2014 meeting last Thursday of the Oversight Committee for the Office of Broward Inspector General, via the group's liaison, Kevin Kelleher.
I will have more excerpts posted soon, as I had two other short pages full of facts and anecdotes that I want to share with you that I felt the Oversight Committe really ought to know about before Broward General John. W. Scott spoke and answered their questions, since he would NOT answer the questions about his Office's performance and resolve to improve when they were sent to him directly.

Recent useful predicates for understanding this matter are, in reverse chron order:








   
------
December 4, 2014

Dear Mr. Kelleher:

I'm writing to you today in your capacity as liaison to the Oversight Committee for the Office of Broward Inspector General.

Since I will be unable to appear in-person at this afternoon's meeting, I am sending my comments to you via email, with this being the first of three emails documenting my concerns.

I want to make sure that my voice, as well as the voices of other concerned residents of Broward County, have the opportunity to continue to push-back and call-out the stealthy, frequently anti-democratic and very antagonistic actions taken by so many elected public officials, who for some reason persist in thinking that they are beyond the reach of both the law and society's norms.

At last year's annual meeting of the Broward IG Oversight Committee, I spoke in some detail about some of the matters that I was most concerned with involving the evolving structure, operations and public outreach responsibilities of the Broward IG's office. I noted specific areas that I believed the office was deficient in and called for much-needed improvement in those areas IF it wanted to truly satisfy Broward County's much-beleaguered citizenry's very strong interest in seeing unethical behavior investigated, pulled-out by the roots and fully-prosecuted.

I said that in my opinion, IF the Broward IG's Office wanted to continue to maintain the public's trust, the area that most-needed tangible improvement was the allocation of adequate resources and personnel to public outreach in cities that were being formally investigated, so that the public would know with certainty just what WAS and was NOT being investigated, and how the public could best assist the office with respect to perhaps gathering additional relevant facts and evidence, to say nothing of context.

The latter was something that, to my astonishment, was NEVER done in Hallandale Beach in 2012 and 2013 when the Broward IG was investigating the longstanding Hallandale Beach CRA scandal involving tens of millions of dollars, since in my opinion, it would have produced a LOT more useful information and context for the IG's Office to peruse and consider.
In my opinion, they barely saw the the tip of the iceberg.

As someone who was frequently the only member of the public attending those early morning meetings years ago of the appointed Broward County Ethics Committee, someone who actually videotaped many of them so that I could later describe in accurate detail what had transpired in those meetings, esp. with respect to which appointed member was consistently voting FOR meaningful ethical standards and thresholds and which appointed members had consistently tried to obfuscate, misdirect or otherwise water-down any serious effort to hold people with power, influence and opportunity to account, I take what happens with the Office of Broward IG very seriously.

I don't think I or others need to apologize for wanting to make sure that the will and best interests of the Broward citizenry is represented as often as possible, NOT pushed to the side of the road by self-interested politicans, government employees and outside groups, esp. ones with zero public oversight like the Broward League of Cities, a group that STILL clearly wants its member cities and officials to have as low a threshold as possible, to meet and carve-out exceptions to common sense -as if common sense was something that we'd been enjoying too much of over the years, instead of its opposite.

Obviously, many of these individuals and groups would very much like to keep their perks and the trappings of the pay-to-play culture that had long flourished in Broward, and want to un-do the very small, positive things that have FINALLY taken place.
Sorry, that ship has sailed!

Despite my fact-filled warnings and anecdotes last year to the IG Oversight Committe and the public attending that meeting about the reality on-the-ground at Hallandale Beach City Hall, that same corrosive attitude and anti-citizen culture I described then persists from top-to-bottom at HB City Hall.

As my other emails today make clear, there has been no let-up by Mayor Joy Cooper and City Manager Renee Miller since either the April 2013 issuance of the IG's damning report on the Hallandale Beach CRA scandal that involved tens of millions of dollars, or, even since Mr. Scott and the Chief Counsel's own descriptions last year of the sorts of foolish and entirely self-serving gambits and attempts at misrepresentations engaged in by those women and the city.

Right down to Mayor Cooper intentionally sending her inaccurate letter and account of the facts to everyone scheduled to attend last year's IG Oversight Comm. meeting
That is, everyone BUT the IG's Office itself.

Yes, it was hard not to see that desperate and pathetic effort for precisely what it was. A shameful effort to obfuscate and blame others for their own unethical behavior and lack of proper governance, due diligence and meaningful oversight for SO MANY YEARS, which is just how I described it last year since that's precisely how the majority of Hallandale Beach's best-informed residents and Small Business owners see it

Despite his office having my contact information from my previous email over the years, after my testimony before you last year, here's the totality of what I heard back from Mr. Scott and his staff: NOTHING.

Nothing at all.
Not one phone call and not one email about about any of the useful suggestions that the Committee, any member of the public who testified, or that I made myself to tangibly improve the Office and the public's support of it.

It's important that members of the Oversight Committee fully understand one thing.
As someone who has followed this ethics and enforcement issue closely from the beginning, more than 99% of the county's populace, I strongly support a pro-active person in a leadership position at the Broward IG Office.

I am NOT wedded at all to the idea that Mr. Scott gets to keep that position indefinitely if he continues to ignore the advice and counsel that the Committee and the public gives, but which he and his staff seem to have no intention of taking and implementing.

Frankly, I'm sorry that I can't be there in-person to say that in front of Mr. Scott so that he can know how thin the ice is that he is on these days as far as I and many other civic activists are concerned.
If he is to succeeed, he has to be MUCH MORE accountable to the public and get outside of his current comfort zone.

I mean at what point do you insist that someone who is stubbornly refusing to adapt and evolve to the circumstances -and engaging in what is, ultimately, self-defeating behavior- that they have had their
opportunity and that the time is right to make a change?
And it's not like I'm the only one who thinks this, even if I'm the only one willing to say it publicly today.

There are many hundreds of concerned people throughout Broward County and up in Tallahassee who know how important establishing this IG Office is in the larger scheme of things.
People who know that it's very important thet the Office succeeed, and yet because of what I have learned and experienced first-hand -and shared with them- they wonder what's really going on, too.
Why so little apparent effort to improve and make things better?

The residents of this county need the office, we do not need necessarily the person in office now.

I should also mention that in the view of many people, including myself, having the office physically located where it is, in Tamarac, does NOT properly serve the long-term interests of the public, since it is not convenient to either Downtown, 1-95 or Tri-Rail. It's almost as if they are a collection of old historical parade floats being stored in a warehouse, and are wheeled out once a year -like today.

I'd be remisss if I didn't close by again emphasizing the importance of the Committee strongly urging the the Broward IG's Office to wake-up and smell the coffee about their current failed communication outreach to the public, whose support it so desperately needs.
It continues to be so inadequate to the current task and when you combine their elementary and unsatisfactory current use of Social Media, it almost makes the whole enterprise comical.
But nobody's laughing, certainly not me or other concerned Broward residents who see how for themselves everyday how much current ethics laws need to be strengthened, NOT weakened.

DBS, 11-year Hallandale Beach resident

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Below are just three recent examples of many dozens that I could choose from throughout the area that amply demonstrate that things have NOT changed for the better regarding elected officials adhering to the spirit and letter of the ethics law throughout Broward County since last year's Oversight Comm. meeting, which I attended and spoke at.

Whether it's the matter of lobbyists who are elected officials lobbying other city's elected officials, complete compliance with the ethics rules, or simply elected officials actually paying attention to what the Broward IG says and does, these are some rather self-evident examples that MUCH MORE work needs to be done in changing the pay-to-play, "special rules for special people" political culture of Broward County, via City of Hallandale Beach Mayor Joy Cooper, City of Coconut Creek Commissioner Lisa Aronson and FL State Rep. Shevrin Jones.

The latter represents the part of Hallandale Beach that was the epicenter of the longstanding HB CRA scandal, and admits that he was NOT paying any attention to it at all, despite the millions of dollars involved and the years of wasted opportunities it represents.
That certainly explains a lot of what we see with our own eyes:

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: DBS
Date: Wed, Apr 30, 2014 at 12:17 PM
Subject: Hallandale Beach Mayor's latest example of revisionist history, re Broward IG; I'll be writing something about this on blog over weekend and will be highlighting her self-evident lies and mis-truths

Hear the latest from the woman who told the Broward IG's office that the campaign aide of hers that filmed her appearance and testimony at their office was actually an attorney.
But wasn't, of course, as we heard from the IG himself at last November's annual IG Oversight meeting in FTL that I attended and testified at.

The very meeting where Cooper's name was mentioned more frequently by the IG and the Oversight Board than any other individual's, and NOT in a positive way.
Joy Cooper just can't help lying, even about small things.

South Florida Sun-Sentinel
OIG's recommendations should be opposed
Joy Cooper , mayor, Hallandale Beach
April 27, 2014

Last week the a task force meeting was held to review the OIGs recommendation to establish yet another new position of ethics czar and establish a Broward Commission on Ethics to centralize ethics opinions.

I have written before about my objections to the OIG recommendations. It is akin to having the jury, judge and executioner in one position. Currently there is a state Commission on Ethics paid for by our tax dollars. There are also State Attorney's offices around the state to prosecute violators.

Having gone through an investigation that was prompted by a former commissioner and candidate, I understand how centralized power and the current system can be utilized for political reasons. To create another layer of government that would duplicate the work of the county attorney, every city attorney and state Ethics Commission and State Attorney's would be an ineffective use of our taxpayer dollars.

A vote was taken by the taskforce to support the OIG's recommendation with a 3-2 vote. The separation of the two offices was included. The problem is this action nor the creation of yet another layer of government does not address the root problems that prompted the OIG's report; a poorly written ordnance.

Rather than wasting more taxpayer dollars over and above the $3 million-plus for the OIG's office, the ordinance needs to be amended. With or without the establishment of the czar and commission, the County Commission needs to clarify the poorly written sections of the ordinance that were mentioned in the OIGs report.

Every elected official should have the ability to due process. The current ordinance provides a safe harbor clause that provides there is a fair and equitable process for all elected officials. The County Commission should work with all the stakeholders to amend the ordinance before spending another tax dollar.

Joy Cooper, mayor, Hallandale Beach
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Broward Beat
Attacks Begin in County Commission
Race
By Buddy Nevins 

April 18, 2014


The gloves are off in the five-candidate race for an open County Commissionseat in North Broward.
In what is the first attack in the campaign, former Commissioner *CharlotteRodstrom* of Fort Lauderdale branded Mayor *Lisa Aronson* of Coconut Creekan enemy of ethics reform.
Aronson and Rodstrom are both vying for the seat now held by long-timeCommissioner *Kristin Jacobs*, who is term limited after 2014 election.There are three other candidates.
Read the rest of the article at:
http://www.browardbeat.com/attacks-begin-in-county-commission-race/


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excerpt from my email of Tue, Mar 18, 2014 at 3:04 PM, titled, More proof -as if needed- that Broward's state legislators AREN'T paying attention -State Rep. from area where most of wasted HB CRA millions were mis-spent, now publicly claims to know nothing about the issue, or the efforts to get a JLAC audit.

My comments are below the email I received this afternoon.

---------- Forwarded message ----------











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So, given how open Shevrin Jones is about now acknowledging NOT knowing anything about this important issue of longstanding public interest and controversy in Hallandale Beach, and within the district he represents, do you want to bet that he also never got around to reading the Broward Inspector General's damning report from last April either, re the lack of official oversight by Mayor/Chair Joy Cooper and the HB City Comm./CRA Board?

The Broward Inspector General’s final report that labeled as “gross mismanagement” the way millions in tax dollars by Hallandale Beach were mis-spent and the lack of attention to detail and lack of common sense oversight by Mayor Cooper and her Rubber Stamp Crew.
The detailed report that said that Cooper & Company have shown a “basic misunderstanding” of what’s gone wrong."

Yes, the IG final report that never appeared on the city's website, along with the city's own response because Mayor Cooper wants to keep everything about that matter on the down low?

Guess Rep. Jones also never heard about the collective attempts of myself and so many others for months to get that much-needed independent JLAC audit to find out where the millions really went, and why none of the many elected officials and highly-paid city officials at Hallandale Beach City Hall who were/are directly responsible for the ingrained and palpable culture of perennially looking the other way, obstinate stealthiness and craven crony capitalism, were ever properly punished.

Given that, I guess Rep. Jones still doesn't know what we do, 

That many of the people who are most personally responsible for that scandal -the wasted million$ and lost opportunities to really put a dent in the self-evident problems- are STILL drawing paychecks from Hallandale Beach taxpayers.