Wiping Up the MessHow could the commission ignore the pleas of already financially strapped IRB residents for tax relief? These are not strangers; they are neighbors and friends—who these five commissioners were ultimately elected to represent. Some commissioners cited their “duties” to effectively run the city as mandated by the City Charter as their reason for supporting a millage increase.
What is this “City Charter” anyway--that gets referred to so often? The IRB City Charter is the document in which general policies for city operations are spelled out. If you’ve never read it, it is Part 1 of the Indian Rocks Beach Code of Ordinances, which you can access online. (Link provided at the end of this posting.)
There is one oddity about the City Charter in IRB: It seems rather selectively embraced. The commission violates it out of one side of their collective mouths and then uses it as their shield on other, more convenient, occasions. Some commissioners, who voted to “put the bicycle pump to” the millage rate, allegedly out of deference to the Charter, have ignored the fact that the loans/transfers which have (supposedly) necessitated this increase are a clear-cut violation of the charter in and of themselves!
Per the charter, the responsibility for the authorization of loans lies squarely with the commission, yet no documentation has ever been provided to show that these transfers/loans from our General Fund were ever authorized by ANYONE. And, that includes the last few months, with the current commission fully aware that enterprise fund subsidies continue month after month.
When Commissioner Wollin recommended firing City Finance Director Marty Schless some months back, her reasoning was that he had failed to provide certain financial reports to the commission as mandated by the City Charter. What about this same commissioner’s “YES” vote (along with Commissioners Valery and Johnson) to, in essence, give IRB resident Virginia Armstrong a life estate usage of a public beach access—a clear charter violation under Section 10.7 of the City Charter:
Section 10.7. Real property interest. No real property interest held by the City of Indian Rocks Beach which provides public beach access, parks or recreational lands, or administrative and support facilities for city government, shall be sold, traded, given away, vacated or alienated in any way except after referendum approval of electorate.
Since the City Charter is something that only gets respected when it suits the occasion, perhaps printing it on Charmin might be more apropos. (And that's Charmin---not to be confused with the other "Scharmen"--who we all know and love!)
Nancy Obarski
Beach Trail/IRB
IRB City Charter: http://www.municode.com/resources/gateway.asp?pid=12039&sid=9
4 comments:
I wonder how the fan clubs like the people they elected now or are they still listening to them thinking "boy the last people really screwed things up in our little town and I am glad my friends are going to save us"......You poor brainwashed suckers, go to a meeting, open up your eyes and brains....then try and think for yourselfs.
The only one on the commission that seems to be trying to think things through and decide what is for the good of the city and not a special interest group or fan club is Torres.
Although a surprise, thanks to Cookie for the no vote on the library board.
I agree about Torres, and poop on the rest of them. What is with TW, has anyone ever seen her smile? Oh well, I poop on her for being a sour-puss. Lets get these turds out of office before we have a new city library inside the new publix.
I don’t understand. There has to be more to this. Doesn’t the city have an attorney that would review this sort of thing? Which beach access? Who is Virginia Armstrong? Any relationship to Publix Armstrong? What is going on in our city?
Jose Coppen’s dastardly deeds will forever haunt this city. He and Leo ran City Attorney Andy Salzman out of town. Convincing Commissioner’s Wollin and Valery to side with their ridicules accusations. No evidence, no proof, just lies. Did they have something to gain? Mr. Salzman would have never let this happen.
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