Month: January 2014

      Jack Seiler has been good for Fort Lauderdale, let me tell you why I think so.

                                           

      First …..  let me assure you that I am not a Seiler lackey, and am ready to criticize him when I think he does wrong, but I think Seiler has done far more right than wrong over the last 5 years as Mayor……  ( I’m sure you’ll let me know if you disagree!)

      And I’ll add that I don’t think I have any particular right to give Seiler a score card either way, but I’m going to do it anyway.

      We’ve had only 6 mayors in the last 40 years, but thankfully we instituted term limits in 2000,  (thanks to some successful brilliant legislation from an aggressive cub Commissioner :-), so we should have a lot more turn over in the future.

                                 

     Two of the five former Mayors left us this past year – Clay Shaw, ( second from left). and Bob Cox, (middle).

                                    

      Jack Seiler has taken his job of Mayor of Fort Lauderdale very seriously.

     The rap on Jack is that he is taking aim at higher office, and I’m sure that is true, but by taking his current job so seriously, he just might have that chance.

                          

                                     

                                

                                                    
      Seiler  has had some difficult times as Mayor, and has taken some difficult votes that not everyone agreed with, (including me), but that goes with the territory.

                                                

       But Seiler’s predecessor, (Jim Naugle), at the end of his very long Mayoral career, was no longer serious, and was making our City a laughing stock. (If you have lived here a while, you know what I mean.)

                                              

     Seiler seems to have turned the City’s reputation around.

     For the last five years, Jack has been the City’s top  cheerleader.  He works long hours, (besides working as a lawyer in the daytime),  and will cut a ribbon, throw a first pitch, or join a neighborhood in a trash pick-up, any time asked.

                                             

                                        

                                          

                                                         

                                       

                                          

       So I give Jack Seiler a solid …. B – Grade ……  and if he can get the downtown back on track, push the burglary rate back to tolerable, and continue to make Fort Lauderdale a serious, respectable town  ……..

                      …. he can count me in as a strong supp
orter  !

 
                                                                                               
 

 

    

     

    

    

     

       Sistrunk Boulevard has had a good year.

      First, they got respect…  A brief controversy ended when the Sistrunk street name was extended all the way down to US 1, ( even though Charlie King opposed it !)

     Then, Sistrunk got a whole new, multi million dollar makeover on the street itself ….

                                    

     And today they got their cherry on the top of the sunday – a spankin’ new
                                                      Police Substation !

                      

     Many of the city bigshots were there to cut the ribbon ( though Trantalis and Rogers weren’t there).

      Interestingly, both the Chief (Adderley) and the assistant Police Chief (Anthony Williams), grew up in the area, and Adderley lives just off Sistrunk today.

                            
                               Williams on left, Sistrunk District Commander London on right

     Now – let’s get that BB King’s House of Blues – Fort Lauderdale  built there!

     
       The City/City Commission has done a good job controlling our homeless issues, but when the temperature falls into single digits up north –

               

      This morning, there were homeless advocates, with about 4 vans full of food and warm clothes, attending to what looked like over 100 homeless.…

                                    Here are the stories of three of them

                     

      On the far left is Thomas, 57, from upstate New York. He said he can’t stay in shelters (HAC) because of his alcohol problems.

      Thomas seems very weak, trembly, says he has been on the streets of Fort Lauderdale for about 3 years. He survives on $780 a month in disability payments.

     Next to him is Elizabeth. She is 59 and came to America as a teen from Glasgow Scotland. She says like most women on the street, she has been sexually molested. She says she has reported it to the Police, but “the guy is still on the streets”. Says she also can’t stay in shelters due to a serious drinking problem.

                                      

     Then there is Joseph Anthony Jones.

     Quite a character – Jones, 44, says he is a hobo, “been in 52 states”. Says he gets a Navy pension of $700 a month.  He says he drinks a lot, and to prove it pulled a beer out of his blanket and put it on his head, his “breakfast”. Told me to take a picture.

     I asked him what the solution was for people like him and his friends, to get them off the streets…

      He just started quoting the Steve Miller Band – “people living on the streets, there’s a solution, you’ve got to fly like an eagle …”

      I left as confused with the issue as ever  ………

                                        

 …….  I know what you are thinking …Oh No  …not another post on that damn history house and the little juveniles screwing it up !! …..

       Well not exactly  …

        Yesterday there was black smoke billowing out of the city park where the historic house sits, and my wife flew over there thinking they were burning down the house this time  …

                       

      ………….    Nope, they just lit the trash can on fire ( Fireman on left…remains of the melted trash can on right!)

      …….. yes,  they stole the friggin surveillance cameras !

                                   

      …………….   The FLPD ( Fort Lauderdale Police Department), pointed cameras at one of the  oldest structures in the City –  the Annie Beck House  (1914) , that was moved to the Middle River Terrace Park, (from off Las Olas,) to save it from demolition, and has been violated repeatedly by juvenile delinquents …..

                                                 

                               ( these are the brackets where the stolen cameras used to be ….)
   …………………………………………………………………………

        The FLPD isn’t giving up   ..  they are installing new cameras  … but inside the historic Annie Beck House, to catch the vandals  !!

                                            \
                                                                    view from inside

                            
                                                                 Stay Tuned ……  Tim
                 
                                        

      Caution:  This post might make you scream!
      

       

      We have been talking a lot this year about crime and juvenile delinquency.

      And you might remember that burglary in my neighborhood, Middle River Terrace, is way up. And you might even remember that one of the oldest houses in the City, the Annie Beck House (1914), located in Middle River Terrace Park, has been vandalized by juveniles on multiple occasions.

                                         
                                Here comes the screaming part ….. read on

     I was disappointed that the Police and the City weren’t doing more to stop the continuing and costly damage to the Center, until I got a call from a Police Sergeant yesterday. She told me that the Police hadn’t shared with us that they had placed security cameras nearby, trained on the Annie Beck House, to catch those throwing the rocks through the windows, marking the House up with graffiti etc….  ..

                                 

     
       And when I went to the park to see for myself, I  saw that a Police Officer was actually  there, doing some paperwork, keeping watch over the scene.

                                               

     So why would you scream? …. The Sergeant said that there was a problem with the $500 worth of security cameras that were installed to catch the delinquents –

                          ….  they had all been stolen !!!

 

 

    

     

      In the South Middle River neighborhood in Fort Lauderdale, they have some challenges for sure ….

                  ………   but they also have some interesting things that the refined neighborhoods do not !!  ….

                           

      They have lots of beautiful peacocks walking about  ….

               Some times (though not much), the peacocks take flight ……

                             

       And when they do fly, this is usually where they end up  ……

                       

       Today, I must have seen 50 of them in a couple of blocks   ….

                …… So there, fancy neighborhoods !   ……..

     ….. This car was just in front of me at the McDonalds drive thru,  on N. Federal  …

                 

        The Florida specialty tag reads …. ‘helping sea turtles survive” ….

                                        Please Comment !

     Happy New Year!

                                 

     But back to business!

     Burglaries ……..

    …..    The latest crime stats show that the Middle River Terrace neighborhood in Fort Lauderdale,  ( I live there) –  is a burglar haven, and getting worse ! The burglars are jumping in people’s windows, (sometimes armed) at an alarming rate.

                     

     …..  a 150% increase in burglaries for the last five years….. and up until December 1st,  98 burglaries in a neighborhood that only has 450 homes! ( a 49% increase over last year)….

     

     
     The FLPD say they are perplexed…..working it….trying to figure it out   …. putting new resources to the problem ..

     And unfortunately, the leaders in the neighborhood responses to the problem,  has been very weak ..

         … The neighborhood secretary, Dick Eaton, says the rash of burglaries is to be expected in the current economy… says the stats should get better soon  …

        ….   Former President Laura Croscenco has ignored the burglary rate until recently, and is now pushing the City to build a juvenile jail, though that is not possible…

        And the current President, Domingo El Cid, wrote Mayor Seiler, asking him to change the laws in Tallahassee !

     ……………………………………………………………………………………………………..

        I’ll keep you informed, but for now,  I’m getting a big mean dog!