On June 6, 1944, my late paratrooper Father parachuted into France and helped liberate the first French town from the Nazis, before the sun even rose that day.
My Dad taught me, as JFK's dad taught me him, that "you have to stand up to people with power, or else they walk all over you."
In his spirit, my Mother helped organize the employees of Camden County College in Blackwood, N.J. into what became International Union of Electrical Workers Local 440. Mom got some 40 union cards signed in an hour in 1970. The clerical and custodial employees prevailed.
One of my law professors in Memphis told a mutual friend that I was a "natural born attorney." My Mother said, "I always knew you were an S.O.B."
My late mentor, the Honorable Nahum Litt, was the Chief Administrative Law Judge of the United Staes Department of Labor, 1979-1995.
Chief Judge Litt stood like Horatio at the bridge, protecting the independence of hearings in whistleblower and workers compensation cases for Black Lung disease sufferers from the coalfields.
Judge Litt helped me to understand We worked to understand administrative law's perversion of justice by rich and powerful corporations.
I later wrote about ACUS for Common Cause Magazine. In response, Congress defunded a federal agency from 1995-2010: the prestigious Administrative Conference of the United States lost funding because it wasted federal tax dollars on worthless studies by pro-agency law professors. ACUS sought to inflict Alternative Dispute Resolution on workers and corporations. ACUS sought to defang and declaw the Freedom of Information Act. ACUS sought to stifle lawyer representation of workers in cases against powerful employers, while encouraging non-lawyer representatives.
My Mother, my Father, and Chief Judge Litt taught me valuable lessons.
Here in St. Johns County, we're learning what happens when soulless corporations control and contaminate our governments.
Deforestation.
Flooding.
Unplanned overdevelopment.
Overcrowded schools with hundreds of unsafe portable classrooms.
Since 1981, I've investigated and helped expose corruption in our country.
I've lived in St. Augustine since November 5, 1999.
We've seen the murder of a Sheriff deputy's girlfriend reported in The New York Times and PBS Frontline,
My Mother had decades of experience in purchasing for Camden County College and corporations like F.W. Woolworth.
When I learned that our Mosquito Control Commission bought a $1.8 million no-bid helicopter, I asked my Mother if she would buy a helicopter withoutn competitive bidding: "absolutely not."
Working with the late Robin Nadeau, John Sundeman,Jeanne Moeller, Don Girvan, and other community leaders,
We, the People helped persuade our Mosquito Control District to cancel the no-bid contract. Taxpayers won a full refund of our MCD's 10% deposit.
Chief Judge Litt was tight as a tick with government money. Judge Litt taught me that any government budget can be cut by 10%. Here in St. Johns County, we have a $4.5 million mosquito museum, with 41% cost overruns. There's too much waste in government.
Mosquito-borne diseases kill one million people annually. My Father was bitten by a mosquito in Sicily in 1943 as an 82nd Airborne Division paratrooper.
I believe in miracles. They called me a "miracle baby."
Likely due to my Father's suffering from malaria, it took my patents a dozen years, praying to Saint Jude, (patron Saint of hopeless causes), before they were able to have their only child (me). Mom said the chances of my being born were less than one in 100,000.
We've achieved dozens of public interest victories.
We can control pestiferous mosquitoes.
We can control corruption.
Help me help you save money and save lives.
I would be honored to have your vote to serve on the board of the Anastasia Mosquito Control Commission. Vote on or before November 3, 2026.
Thank you.
With kindest regards, I am,
Sincerely yours,
Ed Slavin
Box 3084
St. Augustine, Florida 32085-3084
www.edslavin.com
(904) 377-4998
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