COUNCIL ON AGING HEARS CANDIDATES

This morning I was honored to speak to some 80 people at the Council on Aging (COA) at their first candidates' forum, addressing what we need more of from our City of St. Augustine government -- Listening, Openness and Thought, talking about just a few of the issues outlined below in this blog.

I was inspired by the people I met and spoke to at the COA. I would be honored to serve as a St. Augustine City Commissioner. Incumbent District Four City Commissioner Donald Crichlow did not attend and his spokesman did not speak in rebuttal.

This year's election is about "consequences," as Sir Winston Churchill so aptly said. (See below). Incumbent County Commissioner Bruce Maguire received no applause when he stepped up to defend his pro-developer record, and reform County and City Coommission candidates Ken Bryan, Peter Romano, et al. were warmly received.

Our City of St. Augustine is worth saving. It is being ruined faster than a speeding developer's dump truck.

As Robert Kennedy said 39 years ago, "it is not enough to allow dissent, we must demand it, for there is much to dissent from."

We dissent from illegal dumping of the entire contents of the old illegal city landfill in the Old city Reservoir.

We dissent from mismanaged growth and overdevelopment (without roads, parks, schools and services).

We dissent from harassment of artists and entertainers, running them off St. George Street.

We dissent from document withholding. We dissent from Sunshine violations and junkets. We dissent from white elephants and waste in a $45 million annual budget, while persistent drainage problems persist, threatening inundation, while our city mindlessly allows developers to build underground parking garages, threatening flooding and subsidence in a future hurricane.

Shouldn't new development result in repaving of bumpy streets? Do our cars have to "shake, rattle and roll" like a 1970s garage band on wheels?

Shouldn't our City be accessible for persons with disabilities, as required by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)? Shouldn't there be sidewalks that can traversed by wheelchairs, as the late Robert Jones eloquently and diligently sought?

Mayor Gardner and City Commissioners Crichlow, Jones, Burk and Boles, why are our streets so bumpy? Why are there still dirt streets in some of our neighborhoods?

This is a beautiful city and we're going to make it a better place for all of our citizens.

We dissent from City Manager WILLIAM B. HARRISS refusing to pay for a civil rights monument after what our city did to its citizens in 1964. -- these are the works of our City Manager, WILLIAM B. HARRISS. Mr. HARRISS is routinely rubberstamped by our Commissioners.

We dissent from City Manager WILLIAM B. HARRISS obstructing Gay Pride flags on the Bridge of Lions (resulting in federal court judgment against our City for its First Amendment violations).

We dissent from our City's sweetheart contract with Time-Warner (ten year franchise) against the express wishes of every single one of the public hearing speakers, refusing to provide adequate public access (and refusing to carry local low power Channel 22), refusing to hold a promised workshop or revise TWC's unconscionable form contract.

We dissent from discriminatory levels of services provided to communities, without accountability, particularly in Lincolnville and West Augustine and North City.

We dissent from discrimination against our citizens, including police abuses and unequal services.

We dissent from incumbents who said they were reformers and who have reformed nothing and who have become the rubberstamps for WILLIAM B. HARRISS that they campaigned against when they were elected (see bellow).

Mayor George Gardner, descended from upstate New York city government reformers, had our support in 2002 when he ran for Mayor of St. Augustine. He and the current crew of St. Augustine Commissioners have reformed nothing. Worse, they can't stand criticism. As Harry S Truman said, "if you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen."

Robert Kennedy was right 39 years ago and right today: "It is not enough to allow dissent, we must demand it, for there is much to dissent from."