Author: commtims

     Help Me Howard Finklestein says the Fort Lauderdale Police are mistreating the black community by using DWB ( driving while black) , BBB (biking while black) even WWB ( walking while black) to unjustly stop and arrest black people.

                             
                                    Help Me Howard

     But Fort Lauderdale community activist (and black man) Torren Poole calls Finklestein’s stance –  “racial profiling garbage spin!”.

     Poole disagrees with Finkelstein, says he wants to “go on record”, that he supports the local Police. Poole, who recently organized a community get together to fight crime in his N.W. neighborhood, calls himself “just a guy who woke up”.

     Literally, Poole woke up a few years back when he was awakened one morning at 5 a.m. by his wife who said, “somebody’s coming in the house”!
 
     Poole confronted Alonzo B. Brown ( a black man about Poole’s age) breaking into his house.
 
     Alonzo Brown, who had earlier served time for molesting a 12 year old, had broken into the wrong house this time. When Brown pulled his knife on Poole and tried to stab him, Poole hauled off and punched Brown so hard he knocked him “clean out!” Poole says he hit Brown so hard, “I even dislocated my knuckle with the punch”. Before the Police could arrive, Brown woke up and Poole knocked him unconscious again.

     Brown says it’s time to stop crying foul about Police stops.

     The Chief of Police is a black man, for God’s sake” he says. Poole thinks the profiling is a necessary evil that people in his community are going to have to live with to fix his area. “What are we gonna do, sit around and sing Kum-ba-ya?” he asks. 

                                          
                                              black Chief
 
     “We gotta shake ’em ( the community), shake the tree! ” He says part of the problem is the community, who are sometimes afraid to back the Police.
     “We gotta let the Police do their job”. “Black people gotta do their part”.”We need to come together, specially my black people”.


                               
                                                     Poole
    
     Poole is passionate, and pissed! Shortly after the home invasion by Brown, Poole says his shed was broken into and all his work tools, his air compressors, even his kids bicycles were stolen.

     A few weeks later, Poole saw a young black teen riding down the street on one of the bikes. “I ran out and grabbed the bike, called the Police.


                                     
                                                teen thief

     When the teen went to his hearing, so did Poole. A public defender came over to Poole and asked if he was a relative, there to support the thief. “No”, he said “that is the fool that broke in my tool shed”.


 

     Seen today at the beach  …..

          Death defying high wire act !


              

     Well maybe not high   … maybe not death defying  …
 
              ….but he also juggled when he walked the rope! – pretty cool !

     It’s called the Bonus Incentive For Early Retirement Program, (BIFERP) and it’s purpose is to get the older, more expensive Fort Lauderdale City Employees to retire early and save the City some big bucks!

     Now that the City’s top earner, City Attorney Harry Stewart, is one of the employees retiring, the buy out plan that saves the City the big bucks will probably cost, well – some big bucks !

                 
                        Stewart

     Stewart’s been the City Attorney for about a dozen years. He was considered quite a coup for the City when hired in 2002, being one of the most knowledgable, and most experienced attorneys in Florida law, affecting cities.

      Insiders will tell you that Stewart has saved the City millions in lawsuits during his tenure, and cautioned politicians not to pass laws that would draw more. On the negative side, some neighborhood activists say he is anti-neighborhood, that he backs up his bosses (the Commission) regardless of the law.

     Anyhow, the way the Early Retirement Plan works, in order to talk the old timers to bail out early, they can get up to 32 months of time added to their pension calculations. About 400 employees were eligible for the program, and something like 130 opted in.

      I’ve e-mailed numerous people to find out the exact amount of the costs/savings in Stewart’s case, but haven’t had any luck getting the hard numbers, yet.

        Here’s how the bureaucratic description of the program clears it all up! 

            ……. Employees that terminate their employment under an ERP under this program and elect to begin receiving an immediate pension will have their retirement reduced  by the early retirement reduction factor, 5/12’s percent for each month preceding a Group 1 member NRD (up to a maximum of 60 months), and 1/2 for each additional month, the retirement preceding the Group II member NRD. On the other hand, employees that terminate their employ under an ERP under the program and elect to defer their monthly pension benefit until their NRD will not have a reduction factor applied against the monthly pension benefit.

     Now that we’ve cleared that up ( Yikes!) let me take a guess what we’ll all be paying Stewart in his golden years !!  – 

                             ………………………………………….
                                
                                  My Guess

     Stewart now makes somewhere around $300,000 a year to be the City’s top attorney…..



      He would have normally retired with a yearly pension of somewhere around $60,000 a year….

      When you add the buy-out, he’ll get somewhere around another $1200.00 per month ( about enough to gas up his fishing boat), or around $14,000 more per year.
  
      So instead of paying Stewart his current $300,000 salary, and have him stick around for more years, we’ll only be paying him $74,000 ( and he’ll be fishing!). Sounds like a good deal for everyone!

      Of course that’s before we hire the new, highly paid City Attorney!
 

          
    

     Preservation activists are still in the middle of trying to save “the house”.


              


     It’s one of the oldest homes in the City -( 1914 )- referred to as the Shippey House, named after it’s long time owner ……..

                      … 
                           Judge Fred Shippey,
 
     Broward County’s second Judge. 

     Shippey was well known in his day. He was a “marryin” Judge, who married most folks in the area, including “Tarzan”! 

     The house fell into serious disrepair over the last decade or so, and was about to be demolished, when local citizen activists decided to try and save, and restore it.

     The restoration effort is being led by …

        
                        activist Alysa Plummer, (shown here with Mayor Jack Seiler)  

     It’s been a tough road for Alysa and her “Friends of the Shippey House“, and it’s not over yet!

     A “memo” from the Fort Lauderdale Legal Department highlights the challenges. The memo tells City Manager Feldman that “the House is still sitting on the Moving Company’s girders awaiting attachment to the non-existing foundation”.

     The foundation was to have been in by now, but a dust-up with the House moving company owner had him request that his “name be removed as contractor from the permits”.

     Also, the memo states that the house is sitting on city parking spaces that are costing the city “$218.00 per diem”.


       
                      hole the house is supposed to be in by now

     Plummer is undeterred, in her standard, pleasant way.

     This morning she reports that there is a new contractor on record, that a fund raising  effort last week raised the funds needed for the completion of the foundation, and that the fact that 3 members of the Fort Lauderdale City Commission attended the fund raiser is a good sign that things are still on track.

                         …… I’ll keep you informed   .

                                                Tim



 

     So, a reader sends me this picture and it got me to thinking….

     Which of our leaders ( Local, State, or Federal) do you think has the attributes so clearly evident in this fellow below? …

     Let me know …




        

     Former beach President Steve Glassman is feeling downright snubbed by the Fort Lauderdale City Commission.


                                   

     Glassman has been trying to volunteer his efforts on a Fort Lauderdale
advisory board, for quite awhile, but to no avail. Glassman thinks he’s being ignored for consideration due to his 2009 run for the City Commission. Glassman lost his effort to the incumbent Charlotte Rodstrom.

     So Glassman’s frustrations with his failing effort had him send the following e-mail to the Mayor (and then the Commissioners, this week).


     Jack,
    First, let me congratulate you on your re-election – all the best!

    Watching today’s meeting (and prior meetings), I am reminded of a
conversation you and I had at a function in South Middle River after the
2009 election. You told me to stay involved because the City needed people
like me to contribute and stay active. I said I would apply for a few of
the Advisory Boards where I felt qualified to assist.

     Subsequently over the past few years, I have witnessed openings on several
of these Boards and when my name is called by the Clerk, Charlotte typically
begins to babble some nonsense and then you say, “Let’s get some names.”

     That happened again a few minutes ago, and so I am wondering, am I
blacklisted for some reason? Having served on several Boards including P&Z
for three years, I believe that I am qualified for Board of Adjustment and
the other Boards where I have applied.

     Thanks for listening.

                  Steven 

                             ………………………………………………

     So far, only Commissioner Rogers has replied to Steve. Rogers says there is ” no problem from his end”.

     So whose end has the problem? …. I’ll keep you informed – 

                                    Tim

     The first election is over, and the generally expected  fall out has happened in the completed Fort Lauderdale Commission – District II race.

     But maybe the more interesting development is the unusual fall in ! –
                                 
                                      Let me explain …..

     Commissioner Charlotte Rodstrom had a big win last Tuesday. She had two challengers, Mike Ferber and Lester Zalewski.


                                    
                                                   big winner



     The fall out


        Lester Zalewski


   Zalewski is a former Vice President of the Central Beach Alliance. He is currently a Board Member of the Central Beach Alliance. 

     But Zalewski angered many of his Board, when he sent out, just before election day, an e-mail from a similarly sounding new group, the Beach Alliance, endorsing Zalewski.

     Seems to me that the Beach Alliance endorsement was sent to beach residents in an effort to confuse the voter into thinking that the real Central Beach Alliance endorsed Zalewski. It didn’t work.

     Today, this message came out from the real Central Beach Alliance….

CBA Board,

Attached is the agenda for the special Board of Directors meeting.

It will be held at 6:00, this Thursday, before the regular board meeting.

It concerns the removal of a director. 

     Looks like Zalewski is history.


       The fall in



                       Mike Ferber



     There was a lot of insider talk during the campaign about Ferber being a crimi , (a put up candidate to force a primary). 

     Ferber strongly denied it.

    But today, just one week after the election, Rodstrom’s opponent in the District II race was reinstated to his former position on the Planning and Zoning Board …. appointed by ….  that’s right – Charlotte Rodstrom! 

      Maybe Rodstrom was feeling charitable…or,

      Maybe there was something to that insider talk after all.

                             






 



 




    

     Richard Mancuso

                      a decent man …. gone too soon……

               
                              Richard hard at work, civically, as usual!


     Richard was one of those rare human beings that earned the respect of all who met him.

     He succumbed to pancreatic cancer a week back, and will be memorialized on  
Monday, Feb. 6th at noon at St. Anthony’s.
         
                             ………………………………

     I last saw Richard a few weeks ago. The Mayor was holding one of his “Jog with Jack” runs, and we ran right past Richard’s house. 

     Richard was out in the parking lot, greeting those rolling past. I stopped to give him a hug, but there wasn’t much left of him to hug. I asked him how he was. He said “just fine, doin good”. He joked that his Doctor wanted him to gain some weight, that he was drinking milkshakes.

     Looking back, I suspect he knew he was on his way out. But Richard wouldn’t want to bother anyone with that.

     That’s how Richard was.

     I hope to see you Monday at the service. Richard earned it.    

     So, I’m sitting at the counter of my favorite diner, the Quality Diner, in Wilton Manors, eating my scrambled eggs and cheese, reading the paper, minding my business.

                   

     Over my right shoulder, I catch a discussion between the waitress, Kimberly, and a diner, eating alone at a booth –

      “yea, I ran for Mayor, and got 798 votes!”, the man is chuckling with delight.

     I’m thinking – who? – what? – and sure enough …

           

       
      I spin around on the rotating bar spool and lock eyes with the chuckling  – 

                         Crimi – Gabriel Crimi  …

     ….. Crimi is the shadowy candidate in last Tuesday’s Fort Lauderdale Mayoral race. The “fake” candidate put in the race to force a primary. 

     Crimi sees me and knows me as the guy who exposed his fake candidacy – “Oh no” ( he quits chuckling).

     “Can you believe it though”, he asks. “789 votes, and I wasn’t really running!”

     We chat a minute and I return to my cold eggs –  ” Now I’m thinking maybe about running next year”  – he calls after me. 


                          Crimi – for Mayor? …again                       
                                ( you couldn’t make this stuff up!)  
    

     When Pat Mayers, a well known crime activist and President of a group called Citizen’s Crime Alert died last May at the age of 66, most of us that knew her were shocked at her untimely death.

    
         Mayers


                                            


     But when the organization’s Vice President, Linda Gibboney, got a hold of the organizations’ financial records, a month or so after Mayer’s death, her shock and sadness turned into “just a sick feeling – all the money [in the organization] was gone”, says Gibboney.

                           Here’s the story

    
     The Fort Lauderdale City Commission helped start the Citizen’s Crime Alert group in 1983 to help fight crime in the City by giving it $25,000 in seed money. It developed it’s mission, “neighbors looking out for neighbors, citizens being the additional eyes and ears for the Police”.

     Sometime around 2000, Mayers became the President of the group. 

     Mayers became well known as the voice of the group, and ran the organization for some years successfully, without incident. But then, according to Mayers herself, (she confided to me) things got tough for her, financially.

      At the start of 2005, the organization had over $10,000 in it’s coffers.

     I know that Mayers was in some financial trouble in November 2005, because she called and asked me for a $1000 loan to “make her mortgage”.  I did.

     About that time, according to Gibboney, Mayers began to use the organization’s ATM card for her personal use. Gibboney says (and others back up) that no one other than Mayers had access to the funds during this period, and that none of the purchases or withdrawals were for Crime Alert Business, with the exception of the purchase of crime alert signs and bank and other standard filing fees.

      Here is a chart showing the downward trajectory of the group’s funds from 2005 on.

 

     The Bank of America bank records show patterns of major ATM cash withdrawals, as well as purchases with the ATM card at grocery stores, gas stations, Home Depot, Costco, even a stop at an Italian bakery for some goodies.

     The greatest amount of pilfering took place in 2009. Here is a list of all the purchases and cash withdrawals Mayers reportedly made with the group’s ATM card that year. 



     Gibboney still seems traumatized by the travesty. She told me the story last Saturday during an area anti-crime march (ironically). I was wearing an old Citizen’s Crime Alert T-Shirt, and she was walking behind me and says she couldn’t stand it anymore, had to get it off her chest.

     Gibboney told me she went to the Police after finding out about the theft, but the Police told her there was nothing they could do, as Mayers was deceased, and there was no one to prosecute.

         

     Gibboney also went to the Mayor to let him know about the issue.

      As for me, Mayers paid me back most of the money she borrowed from me before her death. 

     Now I’m wondering if it was Citizen Crime Alert money she paid me back with!

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

      * ( Cal Deal prepared all the charts and graphics for this post)