Kudos to County Commission Chair I. Henry Dean For Questioning Library Meeting Rules

Thanks, gratitude and praise to St. Johns County Commission Chairman I. Henry Dean for moving swiftly to delete from the October 18, 2022 Consent Agenda a misguided St. Johns County Public Library System Meeting Room Policy that would have violated our First Amendment values by banning people from holding campaign meetings or seeking candidate petition signatures..

The County staff and Commissioners will discuss the proposed policy at a future meeting or meetings.

Once again, a controversial item was inserted in the Consent Agenda under the maladministration of unqualified St. Johns County Administrator HUNTER SINCLAIR CONRAD.  We caught 'em again.

See my E-mails below: 

-----Original Message-----
From: Ed Slavin <easlavin@aol.com>
To: dgibson@sjcfl.us <dgibson@sjcfl.us>; bcc5hdean@sjcfl.us <bcc5hdean@sjcfl.us>; dmigut@sjcfl.us <dmigut@sjcfl.us>; hconrad@sjcfl.us <hconrad@sjcfl.us>
Cc: bcc1cwhitehurst@sjcfl.us <bcc1cwhitehurst@sjcfl.us>; bcc2sarnold@sjcfl.us <bcc2sarnold@sjcfl.us>; bcc3waldron@sjcfl.us <bcc3waldron@sjcfl.us>; bcc4jblocker@sjcfl.us <bcc4jblocker@sjcfl.us>; hgeorge@sjcfl.us <hgeorge@sjcfl.us>; ihdean47@gmail.com <ihdean47@gmail.com>; bcc5hdean@sjcfl.us <bcc5hdean@sjcfl.us>; gayphill@att.net <gayphill@att.net>; krystal.carter@tbo4you.com <krystal.carter@tbo4you.com>; clmcgyver@gmail.com <clmcgyver@gmail.com>; hconrad@sjccoc.us <hconrad@sjccoc.us>; dmigut@sjcfl.us <dmigut@sjcfl.us>; cvalliere@sjcfl.us <cvalliere@sjcfl.us>; ltaylor@sjcfl.us <ltaylor@sjcfl.us>; ferguson@sjcfl.us <ferguson@sjcfl.us>; bbulthuis@sjcfl.us <bbulthuis@sjcfl.us>; kwest@sjcfl.us <kwest@sjcfl.us>; ashley.moody@myfloridalegal.com <ashley.moody@myfloridalegal.com>; jim-watson@att.net <jim-watson@att.net>; vhs3@hsmith-inc.com <vhs3@hsmith-inc.com>; adamscience@windstream.net <adamscience@windstream.net>; elizabethguthrie4@gmail.com <elizabethguthrie4@gmail.com>; travisminch@gmail.com <travisminch@gmail.com>; jb-tmiller@comcast.net <jb-tmiller@comcast.net>; wflowers@llw-law.com <wflowers@llw-law.com>; shorty.lampsjc@gmail.com <shorty.lampsjc@gmail.com>; spvanews@comcast.net <spvanews@comcast.net>; jexecutiveinvestigationscomplaints@fdle.state.fl.us <jexecutiveinvestigationscomplaints@fdle.state.fl.us>; jessicaclark@firstcoastnews.com <jessicaclark@firstcoastnews.com>; sheriff@sjso.org <sheriff@sjso.org>; eddie@sjcpa.us <eddie@sjcpa.us>; voakes@votesjc.com <voakes@votesjc.com>; wfusco@votesjc.com <wfusco@votesjc.com>; mminer@stjohnsclerk.com <mminer@stjohnsclerk.com>; bpatty@stjohnsclerk.com <bpatty@stjohnsclerk.com>; inspector_general@stjohnsclerk.com <inspector_general@stjohnsclerk.com>; jdunn@sjcfl.us <jdunn@sjcfl.us>; jdunbar@gannett.com <jdunbar@gannett.com>; sgardner@staugustine.com <sgardner@staugustine.com>; sheltonhull@gmail.com <sheltonhull@gmail.com>; taxcollector@sjctax.us <taxcollector@sjctax.us>; electjoemack@gmail.com <electjoemack@gmail.com>; sheplaw@att.net <sheplaw@att.net>; rescuerick06@gmail.com <rescuerick06@gmail.com>; sheldon.gardner@staugustine.com <sheldon.gardner@staugustine.com>; tomcushman@bellsouth.net <tomcushman@bellsouth.net>; waltbog@nytimes.com <waltbog@nytimes.com>
Sent: Tue, Oct 18, 2022 12:24 pm
Subject: Thank you for deleting and postponing CONSENT AGENDA ITEM 27, OCTOBER 18 SJC BOCC Meeting: First Amendment and proposed Library Meeting Room policy

Dear Chairman Dean and St. Johns County Commissioners:

Thank you so much for voting this morning to table Consent Agenda Item 27 until a future Commission meeting, thereby vindicating our First Amendment values. 

Thank you for vindicating the free spirit of our late Commissioner Paul Waldron, who died last night.

Please see below.

Cheers! 

With kindest regards, I am,

Sincerely yours,

Ed Slavin

www.edslavin.com

www.cleanupcityofstaugustine.blogspot.com

904-377-4998

-----Original Message-----
From: Ed Slavin <easlavin@aol.com>
To: dgibson@sjcfl.us <dgibson@sjcfl.us>; bcc5hdean@sjcfl.us <bcc5hdean@sjcfl.us>; dmigut@sjcfl.us <dmigut@sjcfl.us>; hconrad@sjcfl.us <hconrad@sjcfl.us>
Cc: bcc1cwhitehurst@sjcfl.us <bcc1cwhitehurst@sjcfl.us>; bcc2sarnold@sjcfl.us <bcc2sarnold@sjcfl.us>; bcc3pwaldron@sjcfl.us <bcc3pwaldron@sjcfl.us>; bcc4jblocker@sjcfl.us <bcc4jblocker@sjcfl.us>; hgeorge@sjcfl.us <hgeorge@sjcfl.us>; ihdean47@gmail.com <ihdean47@gmail.com>; bcc5hdean@sjcfl.us <bcc5hdean@sjcfl.us>; gayphill@att.net <gayphill@att.net>; krystal.carter@tbo4you.com <krystal.carter@tbo4you.com>; clmcgyver@gmail.com <clmcgyver@gmail.com>; bcc1cwhitehurst@sjcfl.us <bcc1cwhitehurst@sjcfl.us>; bcc4jblocker@sjcfl.us <bcc4jblocker@sjcfl.us>; bcc2sarnold@sjcfl.us <bcc2sarnold@sjcfl.us>; bcc3pwaldron@sjcfl.us <bcc3pwaldron@sjcfl.us>; hconrad@sjccoc.us <hconrad@sjccoc.us>; dmigut@sjcfl.us <dmigut@sjcfl.us>; cvalliere@sjcfl.us <cvalliere@sjcfl.us>; ltaylor@sjcfl.us <ltaylor@sjcfl.us>; ferguson@sjcfl.us <ferguson@sjcfl.us>; bbulthuis@sjcfl.us <bbulthuis@sjcfl.us>; kwest@sjcfl.us <kwest@sjcfl.us>; ashley.moody@myfloridalegal.com <ashley.moody@myfloridalegal.com>; jim-watson@att.net <jim-watson@att.net>; vhs3@hsmith-inc.com <vhs3@hsmith-inc.com>; adamscience@windstream.net <adamscience@windstream.net>; elizabethguthrie4@gmail.com <elizabethguthrie4@gmail.com>; travisminch@gmail.com <travisminch@gmail.com>; jb-tmiller@comcast.net <jb-tmiller@comcast.net>; wflowers@llw-law.com <wflowers@llw-law.com>; shorty.lampsjc@gmail.com <shorty.lampsjc@gmail.com>; spvanews@comcast.net <spvanews@comcast.net>; jexecutiveinvestigationscomplaints@fdle.state.fl.us <jexecutiveinvestigationscomplaints@fdle.state.fl.us>; jessicaclark@firstcoastnews.com <jessicaclark@firstcoastnews.com>; sheriff@sjso.org <sheriff@sjso.org>; eddie@sjcpa.us <eddie@sjcpa.us>; voakes@votesjc.com <voakes@votesjc.com>; wfusco@votesjc.com <wfusco@votesjc.com>; mminer@stjohnsclerk.com <mminer@stjohnsclerk.com>; bpatty@stjohnsclerk.com <bpatty@stjohnsclerk.com>; inspector_general@stjohnsclerk.com <inspector_general@stjohnsclerk.com>; jdunn@sjcfl.us <jdunn@sjcfl.us>; jdunbar@gannett.com <jdunbar@gannett.com>; sgardner@staugustine.com <sgardner@staugustine.com>; sheltonhull@gmail.com <sheltonhull@gmail.com>; taxcollector@sjctax.us <taxcollector@sjctax.us>; electjoemack@gmail.com <electjoemack@gmail.com>; waltbog@nytimes.com <waltbog@nytimes.com>
Sent: Tue, Oct 18, 2022 6:53 am
Subject: CONSENT AGENDA ITEM 27, OCTOBER 18 SJC BOCC Meeting: First Amendment and proposed Library Meeting Room policy

Dear Chairman Dean, Messrs. Migut and Conrad and Ms. Gibson:

A. Would you please be so kind as to withdraw the proposed St. Johns County Public Library System Meeting Room policy from today's St. Johns County Board of County Commissioners Consent Agenda (item 27) pending further Commission review, consistent with  First Amendment values?  First Amendment values are violated by the misguided proposal, inter alia banning political meetings and signing of candidate petitions.   https://stjohnsclerk.com/minrec/agendas/2022/101822cd/10-18-22CON27.pdf. Or, failing that, please adopt the policy minus the offending language; it appears at paragraph 8, stating: 

8. No work or petitioning on behalf of candidates for elected office is allowed in Library buildings. You may invite political candidates to be guest speakers at your event as long as it is not designed as an endorsement of their political platform.

B.  How exactly would the St. Johns County Public Library System ever equitably enforce paragraph 8 against groups holding public meetings?  By having a monitor in every meeting room, electronic or human?  This proposal is unenforceable and unAmerican.  This restriction on First Amendment protected activity is contrary to the genius of a free people.  The American Library Association states "The First Amendment protects the right to speak, publish, read, and view materials in the library, but courts have recognized that libraries also must have reasonable rules in place for patron use of the library, consistent with the library's mission to provide access to library materials and services to the entire library community."  (Emphasis added).  No lawyer opinion is appended to the agenda item, and there is no explanation or redline version showing the changes in the revised policy.  Why?  The opaque memo to the County Administrator states that County Attorney's "staff" reviewed the policy, but the reader is given no hint or clue of what unnamed "staff" opined or was asked.  Why?

C. Unadorned by any citation to any legal authority, paragraph 8 of the proposed County Library Meeting Room policy is an affront to First Amendment values.  See., e.g., New York Times v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 270 (1964), which noted America's "profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open, and that it may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials. See Terminiello v. Chicago, 337 U. S. 1, 337 (1949); De Jonge v. Oregon, 299 U. S. 353 (1937)." 

D. Our Supreme Court unanimously ruled in Reed v. Town of Gilbert, 586 U.S. 215 (2015) that content-based laws targeting free speech rights require "strict scrutiny."Café Erotica v. St. Johns County, 360 F.3d 1274 (11th Cir. 2004) struck down our County's overbroad zoning regulation of a business owner's large billboard criticizing the County's code enforcement officer, Mr. James Acosta, as a "fat ass Barney Fife," one who allegedly cost our County thousands of dollars in "lost lawsuits" due to selective enforcement.

E. Our First Amendment deserves "breathing space."  NAACP v. Button, 371 U.S. 415, 433 (1963) New York Times. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254 (1974); Gasparinetti v. Kerr, 568 F.2d 311, 314-17 (3d Cir. 1977)(illegal restrictions on policemen’s First Amendment rights); Philadelphia Newspapers, Inc. v. Hepps, 479 767, 772, 777 (1986)(O’Connor, J.)(newspaper entitled to breathing space in defamation case); Hustler Magazine v. Falwell, 485 U.S. 46, 52, 56 (1988) (Rehnquist, J.) (magazine parody of TV preacher entitled to breathing space); Keefe v. Ganeakos, 418 F.2d 359, 362 (1st Cir. 1969)(Aldrich, C.J.)(chilling effect on First Amendment by illegal suspension of teacher over sharing Atlantic Monthly article on Vietnam War); Parducci v. Rutland, 316 F.Supp. 352, 355, 357 (M.D. Ala 1970)(Johnson, C.J.)(chilling effect in illegal firing of English teacher over Kurt Vonnegut’s Welcome to the Monkey House.

F. Despite constitutional law establishing that the First Amendment deserves "breathing space," St. Johns County Board of County Commissioners and its unqualified Administrator, HUNTER SINCLAIR CONRAD, et al. continue to show disrespect for dissent, chilling free speech rights.  Enough.

G. Supreme Court Justice Robert Houghwot Jackson, later our Nuremberg War Crimes prosecutor, wrote for the Supreme Court in the landmark flag salute case, "If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion, or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein." West Virginia Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (1943).  Supreme Court Justice Louis Dembitz Brandeis wrote that our "government is the potent omnipresent teacher. For good or ill it teaches the whole people by its example. Crime is contagious. If the government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy." lmstead v. United States, 277 U.S. 438 (1928)(Brandeis J., dissenting), dissent heeded and case overruled, Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347 (1967).

H. Please pull Consent Agenda Item 27 with instructions to staff to delete paragraph 8 and to examine any similar lawbreaking County policies with similar possible chilling effects.  It's our money.  It's our democracy.  Let's get this one right.

Thank you. 

With kindest regards, I am,

Sincerely yours,

Ed Slavin

www.edslavin.com

www.cleanupcityofstaugustine.blogspot.com

904-377-4998