The incumbents can brag and brag and brag about?--
What they shouldn't brag about are:
- Their pushing the general obligation bond for $63 million for 30 years of debt and using public money to "educate."
- 30 year contract with Siemens for $32.5 million. I have to wonder if one of them even read the contract. Siemens makes a small fortune off the City.
- Every business license fee up 5%, water up 3.5%
- The certified taxable value of real and personal property within the City of Lake Worth increased by 10.47%. The city commission elected to not roll-back the tax rate to reflect the increased property values. Therefore, ad valorem taxes were higher in spite of the rates staying the same.
- Upzoned the Gulfstream parcels ignoring the vote and never sent the vote results to Tallahassee. Waited 3 months to see if some future law would apply and then convinced themselves. Now there will probably be another lawsuit.
- Considered more commercialization at our beach with Hudson Holdings and knew about their interest there well before the ITN process was voted upon and in process.
- Voted to operate our beach park in the red.
- Called citizens "liars," "broken" and worse at public meetings.
- Did everything within their political power to bring a national ballpark to John Prince Park.
- Changed the description of "resident" so that snowbirds could participate in our 50 beach decal spaces going around the intent of the resident decal parking.
- Approved $15 million to put in infrastructure at the Park of Commerce in order to attract businesses/development instead of fixing the potholes.
- Voted to criminalize the Homeless by voting in an Ordinance to open and close public spaces at set times.
All legit decisions and when uncovering the gobbly-gook and the misinformation, the right decisions for the City.
ReplyDeleteTaking $7 million from our utility fund to pay for infrastructure at the Park of Commerce instead of directing it towards fixing our potholed cracked streets shows a lack of care for us residents and a lack of vision in managing and maintaining our infrastructure.
ReplyDeleteLet them know on March 15th that you want our streets maintained.
Name the "misinformation."
ReplyDeleteI am a supporter of the trio. So to address your gripes, one by one:
ReplyDeleteWe elected them to address the crumbling infrastructure. Instead of doing a patch job, they wanted to take the wider view and fix several things as well. I think they tried to bite off more than we could chew. I think if they had turned around and reintroduced a measured approach, since it only failed by a handful of votes, it would have been successful. Looks like they honored the voter's decision.
Changing all the lighting that we pay for to light our streets is also looking to the long term. It will save us much in the long term because, as you know, we don't generate our own electricity and have to buy it on the open market. This is green technology at its best and I'm happy to have them represent our interests going forward.
You are complaining about business licenses up only 5%? and Water up only 3.5%? What does that come out for a business? $7.00 a year? A little picky aren't we?
Taxable value is finally going the right direction. Many programs had to be shelved, people laid off due to property values being so depressed. Those shelved projects still need to be done, staff needs to be brought back up to handle the services we need. So is the complaint that our property values rose?
The owners of the Gulfstream property cannot proceed with their plans unless the parking garage can be built. You cannot build a parking garage on land zoned for multi family residential. It needed to be rezoned to allow for the parking garage. What can be built in that zoning will apparently be determined by courts, but if you want the Gulfstream to come back on line, the zoning would need to change.
I agree that they probably knew about HH's interest in the part of the casino building that has remained unoccupied for what, going on 5 years now? The invitation to negotiate, I suspect, was based on this interest. Since 3 years of working with a real estate professional or two was getting nowhere, I appreciate them trying to find a way to make use of a huge design flaw. Saving the historic building never should have included adding a 5,000 square foot restaurant space upstairs. They were simply trying to make something good out of that problem.
Therefore we have to operate the beach with out that income, hence the red.
Pot calling the kettle black??? Don't you refer to them as liars, cheats, corrupt and incompetent? I've been lied to by your group and heard of others being lied to. So what?
Some liked the ballpark idea, other's didn't and it became a very divisive issue thanks to you and some close to you. So now West Palm gets the stadium and you should be happy.
I use my resident decal all the time and rarely have no place to park.
Park of Commerce and fixing potholes. Again, one is short sighted and one is long range. They do still "fix" pot holes and will continue to do so until we have a comprehensive plan to re-do streets, sidewalks and underground utilities.
Finally, they are doing SOMETHING about the disgusting state of our public spaces so that we, the tax paying public might be able to use our own parks, cultural plaza and not be harassed by those who DON'T WANT HELP. The trio are compassionate with anyone needing and wanting help, down on their luck through no fault of their own. But if you affer them help and they are happy living like that, we need to encourage them to go someplace they are welcome and let them know they are NOT welcome here.
So you are right, there is much more and every coin has two sides. One man's trash and so on. But you get the gist. I read that you think we should take a turn toward anarchy? That will help the above problems?
I can tell that you are a supporter of the Trio...long epistle.
ReplyDeleteYour opinion.
I am just pointing out facts, anonymous and you are welcome to tear apart the truth any way that you wish.
You misread things I write as well as misinterpret the facts. Again, that's what you like to do. I never said that we "should take a turn toward anarchy." How stupid. I vote for the person.
As far as the POC, I stand on my beliefs, "short-sighted" or not. This commission has one hell of a nerve spending that sort of money when we can't take care of a pothole or solve the escalating crime in our neighborhoods. We spend over $15 mil a year on PBSO to be reactive. Unreal.
LW2020 was the biggest boondoggle, would have decimated our business community and no one would have bought a home worth more than a $75.000 b/c they would have been saddled with a huge and unknown debt bill on their tax bill for LW2020.
ReplyDeletethey promised they would come back with a more reasonable proposal, one w/o the park of commerce, and what have we gotten? crickets, why is that? B/c they only care about park of commerce and could care less about neighborhood streets.
Wrong o anonymous one. They never promised to come back with a more reasonable proposal. I have an issue with that. I guess they got pretty beat up over the more comprehensive plan.
ReplyDeleteSo let me ask what is the Electric Utility going to use now to rebuild our infrastructure when the money reserved for that is gone, actually the bond was meant for that only. Makes you go hhhhhmmmmmm and have you looked that the new lighting, not much coverage from them. But we love law suites and PO'd citizens so again hhhhhmmmmmmm
ReplyDeleteMaybe you elected them to fix infrastructure, but I didn't vote for them. Andy is a self-serving vindictive porn peddler who sells amyl nitrate to juveniles. They peddled a bond that gave them each $800,000 to do with as they wish, without your input. That's become standard operating procedure for this crew. Screw you and your input, we don't need it. If they had honored the voters' wishes to present a more concrete plan that didn't include $11 million to beautify an industrial park, then maybe the bond would have passed.
ReplyDeleteThe baseline calculations and proposed savings should have been reviewed and confirmed by a third party engineer before they obligated us to a $32 million loan from a bank to enrich Siemens. I guess we'll see how that turns out.
Water rates up 3.5% and sewer up 3% according to Oct 2015 utility bill. That's $10.75 per year for water and $6.50 for sewer for a resident like me who averages 1500 gal/month. Compared to the $9.12 per year that their supposed electric rate reduction has saved me. This is called a shell game. And the water/sewer will keep going up every year to pay for the loan they took from the state. Thanks Pam. And my business tax went up. We're open for business, you betcha!
People haven't been laid off by this crew, their HR director is firing people left and right. The entire finance department is gone and we have to hire bottom-of-the-barrel finance directors because good professionals don't want to work for Bornstein and these idiots. We've had three different finance directors in the last 12 months, looking for our fourth victim while our city slips back into the mess that it took an ethical commission 3 years to clean up.
The owners of the Gulfstream intend to proceed with a sale of the property, knock off the tired bullshit about restoring the hotel. We've heard it all before. They want permission to put private development on our beach to enhance their profit when they flip it. Szerdi made a deal with them before they bought the property and they're going no where until they get what they want. The Hyatt in Delray has more rooms than Hudson has said it needs to make the Gulfstream project work. the Delray Hyatt is on a parcel 2/3 the size of the vacant Gulfstream parcel, it's only four stories, and there's a parking garage on the second floor. So cut the crap. We're not stupid and we're not liars either.
This majority has worked with ZERO real estate professionals to lease the second floor space. Maybe you should actually get your facts straight before blathering on Lynn's blog. The beach makes a profit every year without that income, hence your towering level of ignorance. If they said the sky is green you would believe them. Engage your brain. There is NO RED at the beach. They are liars. Their own budget and audit show a profit. You can't get more dishonest than that.
They are liars and you are repeating their lies. They are corrupt or we wouldn't have so much trouble keeping finance directors. They are definitely incompetent or the bond would have passed.
We pay PBSO $1.2 million per month. Why do we have to make it illegal for me to walk my dog in order to eliminate crime from our public spaces? We pay people to clean our public spaces, why are there needles and feces all over the place??
Of course, when all else fails, let's bring up the anarchists. That always works. Or does it? We elected one, and then re-elected her. Maybe you should try scaring us some other way, but you better hurry. March 15th is coming.
Water rates were set by your favorite commission. They chose to delay the increase to 2015 when they were out of office Hmmmm.
ReplyDeleteCan't get away with that one, anonymous--
ReplyDeleteIn May 2012, this commission did the following on the water--
In 2013 we didn't have a rate increase.
They adopted a new multi-year schedule of rates that showed rates increased through 2016:
4.50% in years 2014, 2015 and 2016
Building our RO plant was cheaper than going with the County Water and one of the better investments that we made.
He who controls the water, controls the world. :)
re the comment that you, and by inference others, voted for this trio because of the bond: reality check. No one voted for them this last election period. There was no election, no one else ran for office. More blurred lines. That was a huge money grab period. They repeatedly refused to even consider a plan B. And it was a David and Goliath victory that the people spoke and did not endorse this. 50 grand of our own money was used against us. We are not broken people, we don't trust a trio who acts in secret and uses our money against us and for taking our public lands and donating to developers.
ReplyDeleteAnnon @6:15, you make very valid points but also inlcude that the city has raised water rates and various taxes that you referred to but yet can not give employees a raise. Yes they settled with IBEW but not the other 2 unions and have they seen that raise yet? and will they get another one or have to wait 7 years again for a raise while these commissioners take care of themselves. Of course the HR Director can continue firing people as she is directed to do by the Cm and loves her job. Yes employees will continue to just get the hell out of here and go where they are appreciated and paid well. I have never worked for an organization that is so mis-managed, where employees are so disrespected and undervalued. ANyone who works here that adds value to us leaves once they get a chance. Look at how many engineers come and go in the Utility and how many Directors,lineman, supervisors get the hell out of here. Ever ask why???
ReplyDelete