Blast from the Past - Culture of Corruption under Ramiccio?

Back a few years ago when Tom Ramiccio was Mayor of Lake Worth, there was a lot of corruption at City Hall. It existed off and on for 20 years until Mayor Mark Dratuz was elected. Even then, Drautz was stopped from even reading the Greater Bay lease. Retha Lowe grabbed it from his hands and signed it (without reading it) and look what happened...a $40 mil dollar lawsuit. Instead of stopping corruption during his term, perhaps Tom was confused on how to do business within the City?

In fact, by what appears to be his ignoring the whole unsavory mess, he was part of the problem and maybe a reason why corruption was so prevalent and why it survived for so long. He should have taken strong action particularly when it happened to him and he knew what was going on. He says that Lake Worth needs a leader but Tom was anything but. He should have taken charge and stopped the bribes and had those employees fired. He forgot that the city manager works for the Commission, not the other way around.

LAKE WORTH TRASH WORKER CHARGED WITH TAKING BRIBE

BYLINE: Scott McCabe, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
July 6, 2000
SECTION: LOCAL, Pg. 1B
LENGTH: 413 words
DATELINE: LAKE WORTH

"Police arrested a garbage department worker Wednesday on a bribery charge after a resident reported he paid the worker $ 30 to erase a $ 75 city fine.It is the second investigation of the public works department this year that has yielded a felony arrest.

Sixteen-year employee Clayton Campbell, 41, of Lake Worth was charged with bribery and petty theft. He had not been booked into the Palm Beach County Jail by late Wednesday.

Campbell hung a notice on the door of a rental home at 901 N. D St. telling owner Paul Britt he would be fined $ 75 for having too much trash piled on the curb, according to the police report. The ticket is only a warning, but doesn't explicitly say so. It only says "$ 75: 24 hours to correct." When Britt called the city's garbage department, Campbell told him he could "make the fine go away" if he taped $ 30 to his mailbox, the report said. When Britt complained that he only had $21 on him, Campbell told him it was $ 30 or the full $ 75, according to police. Britt agreed, and the trash and taped-money were picked up. Clayton told police that he considered the $ 30 a tip.

"You know, at first I wasn't real bothered with it," Britt told police. "I think where it started getting underneath my skin was I started thinking about the fact that I told Clayton I only had $21, and he said 'It's gotta be $ 30 or the fine.'

Britt later complained to Mayor Tom Ramiccio, who had his own concerns with collection habits. He mentioned one driver, since retired, who picked up garbage at his carpet business on Dixie Highway. "He would literally stop the crane and wouldn't pick up any more garbage until I either gave him a six-pack of beer from the convenience store next door or $ 5," the mayor told police. He said he's complained to garbage department staff, but they only shrug their shoulders, according to his statement to police.

Police have forwarded the sworn statements of five employees about garbage collection practices to City Manager Wendy Newmyer for her review, said Lake Worth police Lt. Raychel Houston. Newmyer could not be reached late Wednesday. In February three parks employees were arrested for grand theft. Groundskeeper Alton Robinson admitted to ordering thousands of dollars of cleaning supplies for himself. Supervisor Fran Clark hoarded expensive equipment at his home, and his cousin and neighbor, Fran Clark, admitted keeping a welder for months."

The culture of corruption seemed to have permeated City Hall during the Ramiccio regime.