Palm Beach County Commissioner, Shelley Vana, an easy "mark" for bullies, is your typical "bad" politician. Elected to office to represent the people in her district, she instead represents special interests, big business and shills for other politicians behind the backs of her own constituents. She even threw Century Village under the bus. She, like Scott Maxwell, NEVER reached out one time to get a point of view from those living adjacent to or across from John Prince Park..never contacted or called the ROLOH president...NOT ONCE. There is nothing worse than a self-serving, self-absorbed, narcissistic politician.
With municipalities trying every way possible to come up with revenue, neighborhoods are often sacrificed by politicians to achieve more tax base or in this case, hope that those attending Spring training baseball games will meander over to the City of Lake Worth before or after a game and spend their money. They believe in the Field of Dreams.
I remember when I used to like Shelley--when she was running for county commissioner the first time. I trusted her then--how naive of me. Boy has she learned the political, corrupt ropes of politics since that first day I sat down with her at the Lake Worth Towers for coffee. I've learned something too--how unscrupulous politicians are.
My apologies to Bob Kanjian, Republican--I should have listened to his mother. Shelley Vana beat him by 57% of the vote in a Democratic majority District and I voted for her. This was right at the time my politics began to change and my eyes were opening. Kanjian had been appointed to the seat vacated by convicted felon Warren Newell by then Governor Charlie Crist in 2007. Just taking over Newell's spot (and this was blasted all over the news) was an image buster for him. In retrospect and as development minded as Bob was, I believe that the people would have had a better playing field with him as county commissioner.
Photo credit: Sun Sentine by Carline Jean l
