One superficial St. Johns County Commissioner, SARAH ARNOLD, was allowed to phone it in from vacation on Monday March 18, 2025, a date that will live in infamy.
She was on vacation, There was no emergency. There was no good cause. There was no legal basis for her phoning it in. I cited State Attorney General opinions dating back to 2000 about the issue.
But one louche lackadaisical conflicted corporate lawyer hired on 4-1 vote as the "friend" of then-Commissioner ROY ALYRE ALAIMO, JR. issued an edict. The Interim St. Johns County Attorney is not one lawyer, but his law firm, and he seeks to have his law firm designated as the permanent County Attorney. This unscholarly hired knife thrower advised Commissioners that SARAH ARNOLD had the right to attend meetings by phone, ignoring the weight of authority. SARAH ARNOLD informed County Administrator on Friday March 14, 2025 that she would attend by telephone, County Commission Chair Krista Keating-Joseph was not informed until the evening of March 17, 2025, the day before the meeting. So much for "transparency."
During the March 18, 2025 County Commission debate over tree protection, ARNOLD was not on video (she could have used Zoom). Thus, we could not know who was in the room with her, advising her to make petty porcine debate'r's points, interrupt, and disrespect Chair Krista Joseph. Anyone who has ever participated in a telephone deposition knows that its can be abused if someone is in the room with the deponent, as when NORMAN R. AUGUSTINE, the LOCKHEED MARTIN CEO gave a deposition in the landmark environmental and nuclear whistleblower case of Varnadore v. Oak Ridge National Laboratory, with the late GAITHER WILSON HORDE, JR., a dodgy corporate lawyer was in the room with him, unseen by the complainant, or me, or the Administrative Law Judge in that case.
ARNOLD repeatedly expressed the need to have "stakeholders' involved in the process, as if they weren't already. Commissioner CHRISTIAN WHITEHURST repeatedly urged that "industry experts" be consulted, as if they weren't already.
I think the term "stakeholders" is offensive; reflects a bumptious bias toward the Money Power in St. Johns County.
ARNOLD and WHITEHURST tried to delay the tree protection ordinance, demanding it be rescheduled on March 2025 because of "Spring Break."
I first heard the term "stakeholders" in 1993, used by Clinton Energy Secretary Hazel F. O'Leary, a former electric power utility executive.
"Stakeholders" sounds like "snakeholders" to me. (corrected)
I once thought that St. Johns County was as crooked as a dog's hind leg.
I know believe that St. Johns County is as crooked as a barrel full of snakes.
Three of five current Commissioners --- Chair Joseph, Vice Chair Murphy and Ciommissioner Taylor -- are trying to make St. Johns County a better place. They deserve our support.
We need thorough reforms, starting with tree protection. We need lobbyist registration and the other reforms that I proposed three years ago, when all the the then-majority on the County Commission wanted to talk about was raising our sales taxes by 15%. We, the People defeated them .
3 comments:
People are crooked because they have good relationships with other people who also serve the community. Proof and evidence is "I think so." I'm overwhelmed and quite convinced by this man's paranoia and aggression despite lack of proof and evidence.
The Tea Party rants and raves about government abuse then puts a right wing mad man in charge of the country. Will they call his actions tyrannical? No, they won't. Government is good when a billionaire snake oil salesmen from NYC is in charge. Doesn't matter what government does to people now. All of a sudden their anti-government ideology doesn't apply.
"Conservative warriors" for state this and that serve the goals of the right wing police state, low budget concentration camps, understaffed and unsanitary, violence and death. It's all fine and dandy until it's one of your relatives who goes in there for something relatively petty and then dies.
Post a Comment