Dozens Speak In Support of 450th Contract Compliance Audit

Two dozen residents spoke in support of a 450th Commemoration contract compliance review and audit tonight. Commissioners voted for Mayor Nancy Shaver to meet with City Manager John Patrick Regan, P.E. about three questioned contracts, then report back on how to conduct a contract compliance audit of some 80-100 contracts.

Some $3.6 million has been spent on the 450th, including no-bid sole-source high-price contracts, with none of the usual City contract controls.

Lengthy public comment concluded with everyone agreeing that there needed to be a contract compliance review and audit. People who helped elect Mayor Shaver joined people who had never spoken to Commissioners before, a diverse group of people wanting government accountability and process review.

Cronies of ex-Mayors JOSEPH LESTER BOLES, JR. and CLAUDE LEONARD WEEKS, JR. do not want questions asked. They demand what the St. Augustine called "Business As Usual" in its endorsement of BOLES last year. They refuse to admit any errors were made, and were anxious for Mayor Shaver to spill the beans in public, acting like criminal defense lawyers at a deposition (a noisome Florida procedural nuance not allowed elsewhere).

Mses. Peggy Bliss, Sandy Lenny, Nancy Hubert, Helene Sullivan, Laurel Welch, Patricia Riley, Judith Seraphin, Pamela Farnsworth, Deltra Long, Susan Rathbone and B.J. Kalaidi, and Messrs. Richard Thompson, Hunter Miller, William Hamilton, Ronald Mickler, Michael Gold, John Versaggi, Roger Bansemer, Andrew Shirmacher, Jay Bliss, Thomas Day, Peter Englebrecht and Ed Slavin (that would be me).

ALL spoke in favor of government accountability. Not one speaker was against. (Postscript: as of St. Augustine Record now has an anonymous poll on its website, allowing multiple voting by the same IP address: how gauche and louche).

Not one person spoke against an audit. As Legal Counsel for Constitutional Rights of the Government Accountability Project (1989-1993), I am so proud of our fellow residents for supporting government accountability.

Questioning the city -- "It's what we do best," said Mr. Mickler.

"We learn from the past," Ms. Bliss said. "Everyone wins," she said.

Mr. Versaggi and Ms. Riley spoke of the corporate standard of care for auditing, not rebutted by Commissioners.

Yet four fearfully fetid Commissioners --- other-directed -- would not modify the agenda, forcing nearly three dozen concerned residents to stick around until the contract discussion, which did not begin until 9:47 PM.

Chagrined looks marred the contorted countenances -- and marked the "funny walks" (worthy of "Monty Python") -- of City Hall apparatchiks REGAN (a/k/a "Minister of Propaganda"), Assistant City Manager TIMOTHY J. BURCHFIELD, Comptroller MARK LITZINGER and 450th Director DANA STE. CLAIRE (a/k/a "PRIMA DANA").

We wear their scorn as a badge of honor.

After nearly ten years -- my first City meeting was April 11, 2005, and i was threatened with arrest by City Manager WILLIAM BRUCE HARRISS for defending African-Americans' civil rights against annexations -- our Nation's Oldest continuously occupied European settlement is starting to look more like home and less like the "most lawless city in America," as Dr. King called it.

Yes we can!