On the agenda tonight for the City of St. Augustine Beach City Commission (COMCAST cable channel 2 and live streaming video on SAB wesbsite) is a "plaque" for City Attorney DOUGLAS NELSON BURNETT and his law firm, St. JOHNS LAW GROUP: he/it have quit, effective on hiring his/its successor.
DOUGLAS BURNETT is the favored son of Major General DOUGLAS BURNETT, the former Adjutant General over the Florida National Guard, DOUGLAS BURNETT, himself appointed by Florida Governor RICHARD LYNN SCOTT to the board of both the University of North Florida and the St. Johns River Water Management District, the malfeasant agency that at SCOTT's behest fires ethical employees and permits Orlando developers to waste our water from the St. Johns River watershed.
St. Augustine Beach City Attorney DOUGLAS NELSON BURNETT a/k/a "DOUGIE" is a former Assistant State's Attorney, a longtime supporter of rebarbative Sheriff DAVID BERNARD SHOAR and other Republican reprobates, the former understudy to the late corrupt ROGERS TOWERS developer lawyer GEORGE MORRIS McCCLURE.
DOUGIE BURNETT is the lawyer the St. Augustine Airport Authority (successor to GEORGE McCLURE), and was the City Attorney for St. Augustine Beach, 2009-2016 (successor to GEOFFREY DOBSON).
DOUGIE BURNETT is a Nice Guy.
But DOUGIE BURNETT:
1. Never disclosed his ST. JOHNS LAW GROUP client list.
2. Never provided evidence of a "conflicts check" by ST. JOHNS LAW GROUP.
3. Advertised his ST. JOHNS LAW GROUP law firm on City of St. Augustine Beach website.
4. Advertised on his website that he represented shopping center owner that wanted to buy City-County park for less than we paid for it.
5. Sent his ST. JOHNS LAW GROUP associates to meetings he did not attend, some who were not listed in engagement letter.
6. Gave conservative, pro-developer legal advice.
7. Represented 7-Eleven, a Japanese multinational corporation (through ST. JOHNS LAW GROUP associate JAMES GEORGE WHITEHOUSE) in efforts to inflict twelve gasoline pumps at May & Sam Marco in the the historic City of St. Augustine, which would have endangered deaf and blind students at the Florida School for the Deaf and Blind, and other residents, while adding to traffic problems at the failing intersection ("We, the People" defeated 7-Eleven, which sold the property to the City of St. Augustine for $1.4 million; the property will now be the locus of an elliptical roundabout to solve the traffic problem 7-Eleven would have exacerbated).
8. Quit as City Attorney just a few months after his ST. JOHNS LAW GROUP-SAB 2009 engagement contract was renewed in 2015, without readvertising the position.
9. Billed SAB taxpayers a quarter of a million dollars since 2009.
It's our money.
That ain't hay.
On each of these issues -- every single one of them -- St. Augustine Beach's outspoken, articulate, concerned Citizen Thomas F. Reynolds, Jr. did a yeoman's job of raising concerns about DOUGIE BURNETT's legal bills and other matters, including his Airport contract having expired unnoticed last year.
In short, Citizen Reynolds was "all over" DOUGIE BURNETT "like a chicken on a junebug's back," in the words of President Jimmy Carter.
Like so many of you, I have a problem with supine spineless local faux "governments" run by the 1% hiring conflicted developer mouthpieces to work for them.
Enough corruption.
Enough conflicts of interest.
Enough appearance of impropriety.
Enough winking at ethics rules.
Local government attorneys should represent "We, the People" and not the powerful.
Local government attorneys should be part of the solution, not the problem, giving meangingful legal advice and not merely "counting to three," like so many of them do.
What kind of "plaque" is the City of St. Augustine giving its soon to be erstwhile City Attorney, DOUG BURNETT?
The word "plaque" is susceptible of two meanings:
plaque
plak
noun
1. an ornamental tablet, typically of metal, porcelain, or wood, that is fixed to a wall or other surface in commemoration of a person or event. synonyms: plate, tablet, panel, sign, cartouche, brass
"a plaque in her honor was placed on the door to the auditorium"
2. a sticky deposit on teeth in which bacteria proliferate.
Developers are a barnacle on the underbelly of our town, destroying our nature, history and culture: developers are definitely an oleaginous "sticky deposit" on Commissioners, if not their teeth, on which corruption and other pathogens, if not bacteria, "proliferate."
SAB is probably awarding DOUGIE BURNETT this kind of plaque (found at Disneyland):
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