The Best of Times, The Worst of Times

Here in St. Augustine, we've achieved some 31 progressive victories in a place that former St. Johns County Commission Chairman said in 2008 was "one of the last bastions of the Ku Klux Klan."
We have excellent schools, among the best in Florida. Teachers, not businesses, are the true job creators. But our teachers are vastly underpaid, with an inept teacher's union that does not understand how to bargain, and an authoritarian school superintendent who thinks God appointed him to run a plantation. Teachers need a union that bargains collectively in a meaningful way. We need to raise teacher pay and make wealthy businessmen pay for the benefits of an educated employees. Rose Kennedy's favorite Bible verse was, "To whom much is given, much is expected."
We've got wonderful history, but we hide our light under a bushel basket, with mediocre, ethnocentric and dull historic interpretation for the most part.
We have beautiful beaches, state parks, forests and wetlands, but little in the way of interpretation, trails or federal protection, and only two small national monuments (Castillo de San Marco and Fort Matanzas). We need a St. Augustine National Historical Park and National Seashore. www.staugustgreen.com
We've got cool people, and cool people keep moving here. But we've got some stodgy, dull, inept, uncompassionate government officials, employees and officials, some of the worst I've ever seen at the county level. In our City of St. Augustine, we've made progress, but our county commissioners remain a narrow-minded bunch of reactionaries, led by a former corporate executive whose company paid out more than $60 million in government contract fraud settlements lsat year -- a bunch of developer-driven Babbitts who know not that they know not that they know not, who actually voted against endorsing the National Park and Seashore on November 1, 2011, a date that will live in infamy.
Last night, I saw one of the answers -- a gathering of some 200 cool people under the auspices of the St. Augustine Initiative for Compassion, hearing and watching short presentations of the sort favored by Japanese business people and American architects, called pecha kuchu -- twenty powerful PowerPoint slides (mostly pictures), each accompanied by a powerful 20 second narrative.
These are not political speeches so much as conversation-starters, soulful monologues that invite dialogue.
Photographer Walter Coker and other local residents gave heart-felt presentations on topics ranging from protecting human rights to raising teacher pay to saving Florida's natural water and springs.
At least two City of St. Augustine City Commissioners were present.
How cool is that?