Hurricanes and the FEMA Fiasco

This is a blast from the past as hurricane season will begin in just one month's time (June 1) and the city manager brought FEMA up at Tuesday's city commission meeting.

If you recall, we went through three major hurricanes in 2004 and 2005--Through the course of the three hurricanes (Frances and Jeanne in 2004 and Wilma in 2005 whose eye of the hurricane went over Lake Worth), approximately $26 million in reimbursement for damages was given to Lake Worth from FEMA and distributed to the city from the State of Florida.  Included in all of the wreckage and losses was damage to our Pier shown above.

For a small little city, 5.945.2/sq miles, we suffered the most damage when it came to our Utility. The various damages included (but were not limited to) downed trees, our electric grid, poles, switches, transformers, meters, city buildings.  We on Lake Osborne were without power for 12.5 days and cold showers got to be the norm.  They ended up removing 18,148 CY of debris in 2004 and 19,111 CY in 2005. The City received invoices from all companies as well as linesmen from outside the State that were involved with helping to get our city back on track after the hurricanes in order to restore our power.

FEMA wanted proof for the $26 million and we got involved in a mess trying to prove our claims. The utility department, the biggest culprit, had lost invoices and documents and the city commission didn't feel we should be responsible to pay it all back due to those document losses from so many years ago. Millions were not paid from FEMA's original requested amounts--Read blog and they accepted the City's pathetic plea.

FEMA still is asking for $4 million to be reimbursed to them from the City of Lake Worth  because they don't believe in Lake Worth's rationale to justify all the millions they were given. Carolyn Ansay of Torcivia's law firm is working on the FEMA issue.  She is the former General Counsel to the South Florida Water Management District. She is going through the documentation to make sure that what FEMA has, matches up with our records. The City says that there has been a million dollar discrepancy that has been discovered. 4,000 load tickets (no one explained what a 'load" ticket is--value could be up to $1.3 million) that were submitted have not shown up on the FEMA web site. Torcivia is going to try and settle for $25,000 as he has connections with a former FEMA attorney?

Quote of the day - Scott Maxwell

Comment Up

• We're going to set this new commission off on the right foot.

• We're going to tell the truth when we sit up here.

• We're not going to distort reality.

• We're not going to massage what you think your version of  history was.

all the while raising his voice and pointing his finger at Commissioners McVoy and Maier regarding Maier's request to cancel the Invitation to Negotiate that was set up originally by city manager Michael Bornstein without it coming to the Commission or agreed to in the Sunshine. The mayor referred to it as "secret." And that's the problem. For the Vice Mayor to constantly be disrespectful, not only to  these two commissioners but the public as well by accusing them of being racists and liars, is outrageous.

Even former commissioner John Szerdi who suffered a resounding defeat only winning 37.39%, weighed in asking why the pool was not part of the original project.  He was not at the meeting in the city chamber the day that city manager Paul Boyer negotiated our pool away over lunch to Greater Bay. Originally, Paul Boyer recommended that we NOT contract with Greater Bay but the arrogant commission in place back then did not listen. Retha Lowe signed the contract as she was sick and tired of that "football" being kicked around for 30 years. (Sick and Tired is an expression used by Lowe and now adopted by Maxwell).

Tuesday night, Szerdi was rude to Commissioner Maier and still visibly upset about losing his election. He compared Maier to a Cheshire cat saying that the rumor regarding our beach and Hudson Holdings was being "spread by the Cheshire."  He doesn't understand why he lost. And Scott Maxwell has no clue as to whom is lying and who is not.

The Commission voted to put Maier's request to cancel the ITN on the Agenda. The vote was 3/2 with Triolo and Amoroso dissenting. No public discussion regarding our casino complex was going to be allowed by those two. The public had their 2 minutes to weigh-in  (most did not know about this inclusion or even if it would be approved to add to the agenda) and they will have it at some publicly noticed meeting in the future before the commission decides the fate of our casino or approves of any expansion by John Szerdi's employer, Hudson Holdings. 

Paul Boyer, former city manager Lake Worth

Paul Boyer
 Former city manager of Lake Worth
I don't remember him ever smiling when he sat on the dais here

I was in the city commission chamber the night Nadine Burns made a motion to fire Paul Boyer.  It was  shocking as the commission made him sit there until Midnight before they fired him. The City Commission did not listen to him when he said not to go with Greater Bay. They did it anyway. Paul Boyer could not persuade any of them to come in out of the rain and he was manager for the worst city commission ever. So what happened? He went along with the politics. He went along with it so well that he gave away our pool as part of the Greater Bay deal. Everything ended up in lawsuits.

It seems from this article that Mr. Boyer retired from Columbia, Tennessee in 2012, a city with more pre-civil war homes than any other county in the state. He had five successful years there as city manager. No beautiful 19 acres of valuable beach property there that flim flam artists wanted.

I got to thinking about him as I listened to the mayor last night and the cheerleader speech that she does so well.  She talked about POTENTIAL. We had so much of it back in Mr. Boyer's time too. The big difference with then and now is, we had lot's of money.