In secret, behind locked gates, our Nation's Oldest City dumped a landfill in a lake (Old City Reservoir), while emitting sewage in our rivers and salt marsh. Organized citizens exposed and defeated pollution, racism and cronyism. We elected a new Mayor. We're transforming our City -- advanced citizenship. Ask questions. Make disclosures. Demand answers. Be involved. Expect democracy. Report and expose corruption. Smile! Help enact a St. Augustine National Park and Seashore. We shall overcome!
Tuesday, February 03, 2015
St. Augustine 450th: Where did all our money go?
Has Our Nation's Oldest City frittered away some of the millions of dollars spent on our 450th birthday?
Commissioners Leanna Freeman and Nancy Sikes-Kline rightly questioned the expenditures and voted against the budget sought by Mayor JOSEPH LESTER BOLES, Jr. Mayor Nancy Shaver and Todd Neville were elected as a result of accountability concerns, and ask tough questions that City Hall denizens are unable or unwilling to answer.
Among the questionable no-bid expenditures was $15,000 and a 15% commission for a "professional fundraiser" in Jacksonville.
Meanwhile, questions remain about where the money from the annual Noche de Gala went. City officials have no records, they claim.
Wonder why?
While the annual Noche de Gala (held in honor of the birthday of city founder Pedro Menendez de Aviles_ is supposed to benefit the Lightner Museum, the City's website reported last year that the money went to the St. Augustine Trust for Historic Preservation, Inc., a supposed non-profit, incorporated by former Mayor JOSEPH LESTER BOLES, Jr., with City Manager JOHN PATRICK REGAN, P.E. and City 450th Director DANA STE. CLAIRE (a/k/a "PRIMA DANA") as directors of BOLES' putative non-profit corporation.
Messrs. REGAN and STE. CLAIRE resigned from this board late last year, and claimed BOLES incorporated the organization to "save the name."
So who or what does the money from the Noche de Gala annual $195/person "benefit" actually benefit?
All of the top City managers (and the City Attorney) are budgeted "free" tickets for themselves and their spouses.
Comptroller MARK LITZINGER says it is "in the budget," and that it was "legally adopted."
Freebies for the highest-paid employees?
Perhaps not this year.
City Commissioners Nancy Sikes-Kline and Todd Neville, and Mayor Nancy Shaver, have all declined free tickets, which are offered to them as a manipulative "perk" by City Manager JOHN PATRICK REGAN. No response from Commissioner Leanna Freeman and Vice Mayor Roxanne Horvath.
The Florida League of Cities is unaware of any other Florida city that organizes galas.
Our City of St. Augustine has two (2) galas each year. Why?
Is holding two annual fancy-bears balls a legitimate governmental function?
You tell me.
Expect more flummery -- and now possible fraud -- from the mendacious managers who put a landfill in a lake, emitted sewage and sewage effluent in our San Sebastian River and saltwater marsh, in a City Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. called "the most lawless" in America.
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