Watch Your Back.

This past Saturday, Joe Chao offered an orientation to self-defense.  He called it a Situational Awareness Workshop, and he introduced his audience to a few of the themes and even techniques in being careful in an environment that is not always friendly.

Joe described alertness and attitude as four levels.  The white level is the person whose guard is completely down, who is paying no attention, and who is the perfect victim.  The orange level is the person who knows basic approaches and techniques and can be properly vigilant and at least minimally capable of self-defense.  The best offense is a good defense, and Joe's advice is always geared to how to avoid confrontation or how to escape it.  Joe does not advocate that people look for fights, and certainly not that they find them.

But (sh)it happens, and the red level is actual battle.

Black is the color of mourning.  'Nuf said.

Joe's audience on Saturday was very spare.  There were more BP police officers there than there were civilians.  But a few of us were there.  This was a free, introductory session.

Joe does real trainings, intended to teach reliable approaches and attitudes, and to instill practiced techniques.  He'll help you develop "muscle memory" for the techniques, and you'll wind up getting in better shape, too.  He runs his sessions twice a week.  If students attend once a week, it's generally on Saturday mornings.  If they attend twice a week, the other session is Thursday evenings.

Although Joe has a day job, he is in fact a professional, with decades of experience, at Situational Awareness and martial arts.  Apart from the occasional free session, like the introductory one on Saturday, he charges for the education he provides.  He charges about $50 per month for once a month attendance, and about $85 a month for twice a month.  There is a discount for BP residents.  Classes are organized by level of experience and expertise of the students.  There is very definitely a basic or entry-level class.

If you're interested, which you should be, contact Joe through www.MMA-F.com, or call him at 305-542-5549.  He's an expert, he's a good guy, and he's your neighbor.

Background on the Movement for Annexation in Biscayne Park, and Don’t Lie on the Track:

In September, 2013 Rox Ross submitted a detailed Agenda Memo as support to move forward with a formal application to the County to annex certain properties to our east.  That Agenda Memo contains a detailed history of the Village Comprehensive Plan amendments adopted in 2008 and formally approved in 2010.  The plan amendments were shaped after more than 10 public hearings, held between 2007 and 2010.

What is our Comprehensive Plan?

The Comprehensive Plan is essentially the Master Plan for the Village.  It is a document required by Florida Statute, submitted to the State, which defines the goals for the Village to accomplish in the future. 

For the future of Biscayne Park the train is in motion, attempts to derail annexation could permanently jeopardize the best opportunity the Village has to diversify its tax base.

​  

Steve Bernard, the person pressing for the “people to vote” on a referendum against annexation, voted to adopt and approve amendments to the Village Comprehensive Plan in 2008 (Ord. 2008-2) in Aug, 2008 and again in 2010 (Ord. 2010-3) in October, 2010.  These amendments included ADDING a policy to annex unincorporated areas.  Let me repeat that the amendments proposed in 2008 included adding a plan for annexation!  The motion to adopt the 2008 amendments to the Comprehensive Plan was made by Chester “Doc” Morris; the motion to approve the 2010 amendments to the Comprehensive Plan was made by Steve Bernard.  The votes were unanimous for approval of the amendments to the Comprehensive Plan —votes made by two separate Commissions. 

So, Steve voted for annexation twice, once in 2008 and again in 2010; and Doc Morris voted for annexation in 2008 (Doc’s term expired in 2009).

One policy amendment to the plan was to provide ​as a first priority ​for annexation, specifically certain properties to the east of BP and as a secondary priority certain properties to the west towards 2^nd Ave.  I refer to policy 1.9 of the Intergovernmental Coordination Element, page 32 of the Comprehensive Plan.

Both Steve Bernard and Doc Morris sat as commissioners and actually adopted amendments providing for annexation WITHOUT A VOTE OF THE PEOPLE!

​These Commission actions did two things, as we look back on it.  

First, Commission votes twice established annexation as a firm goal and committed plan.  The tracts to the east identified by the previous Commissions included an area substantially larger than the area that is subject to the Village’s current application.  The difference is that the current Commission has narrowed the request and the current application is only for commercial properties.  The current application is less in scope than the policy adopted by prior Commissions, and does not include the area known as “Peach Tree”.

What’s more, the second thing these Commission votes did was to create and affirm a precedent regarding Village protocol for changes to the Comprehensive Plan, including annexation.  The established protocol is that Comprehensive Plan amendments including annexation are initiatives implemented by Commission vote.  --- No requirement for a referendum was asserted by the Charter Review Committee on which Steve Bernard sat, nor by the two Commissions which included Steve, and one  which included "Doc."  No referendum was suggested by the last Commission (ended in 2013), which included Barbara Watts, Noah Jacobs and Bryan Cooper.     

The current commission is now acting on a policy that was put in place and reaffirmed by two prior ​Commissions, unanimously!  A plan that has been a work in progress for close to ten years.

    

It has been determined by our finance director among other experts going back to 2004 that we need to diversify our tax base.  The last 10 years evidence the fact that we need to bolster our revenues.  So in my mind there is no alternative to annexation and no alternative has been proposed by those for the referendum or against annexation. 

So Really What’s the Point of a Referendum at this time? 

The current Commission has reduced the scope contemplated in the Amended Comprehensive Plan, and has taken the path of least impact to the Village, strictly commercial properties (the two residential apartment houses are commercial properties).

Ross Memo on Annexation:

http://www.biscayneparkfl.gov/vertical/sites/%7BD1E17BCD-1E01-4F7D-84CD-7CACF5F8DDEE%7D/uploads/Agenda_Item_12.a_Regular_Commission_Meeting_10_01_2013.pdf

Link to Ord. 2010-3:

http://www.biscayneparkfl.gov/vertical/sites/%7BD1E17BCD-1E01-4F7D-84CD-7CACF5F8DDEE%7D/uploads/%7B3461ADB3-BE7C-4F07-90CE-F28144255185%7D.PDF

Link to Ord. 2008-2:

http://www.biscayneparkfl.gov/vertical/sites/%7BD1E17BCD-1E01-4F7D-84CD-7CACF5F8DDEE%7D/uploads/%7B83588EAB-4B4E-493D-8052-7706DD11619E%7D.PDF

Link to comprehensive Plan:

http://www.biscayneparkfl.gov/vertical/sites/%7BD1E17BCD-1E01-4F7D-84CD-7CACF5F8DDEE%7D/uploads/Biscayne_Park_Comprehensive_Plan_Final.pdf

Francis Bacon. (The Jacobean Philosopher, not the 20th C Painter)

In The Advancement of Learning, Bacon wrote:

"'The first distemper of learning' is denounced as that by which 'men study words and not matter.'"  He further argued that "men have withdrawn themselves too much from the contemplation of nature, and the observations of experience, and have tumbled up and down in their own reasons and conceits."  He added "this kind of degenerate learning did chiefly reign amongst the schoolmen, who having sharp and strong wits, and abundance of leisure, and small variety of reading, but their wits being shut up in the cells of a few authors (chiefly Aristotle their dictator*) as their persons were shut up in the cells of monasteries and colleges, and knowing little history, either of nature or of time, did out of no great quantity of matter, and infinite agitation of wit, spin out unto us those laborious webs of learning which are extant in their books ... cobwebs of learning admirable for the fineness of thread and work, but of no substance or profit." (1)

*Aristotle had taught, and many generations of his adherents had accepted, that an object of low weight would fall more slowly than an object of greater weight.  Galileo actually tested this theory and found it to be wrong, and Isaac Newton agreed with him, but by then, Aristotle was long gone and could not personally be corrected.

I know what you're thinking.  WTF, Fred?  Where are you going with this arcane and seemingly self-stimulatory nonsense?

Well, here's the thing.  I've been there myself.  I might even have perpetrated this fault on a bad day or two.  It's not hard to get so lost in your own thought process that you forget how insular and distorted it can become.  You can substitute theorizing and imagining for real reasoning, and even observation, and it leads to very wrong conclusions.  Now it's true that I may never have had a real gift of gab, as some people do, and maybe I didn't succeed much in persuading people to buy into some of the ideas of which I had convinced myself, but I won't lie here.  I did, on occasion, work myself around to distinctly faulty conclusions, paint myself into an untenable intellectual corner (which turned out not to be true), and communicate my brilliant, but wrong, bottom lines and underlying "reasonings" to other people.  Yup, I've done that.  And I'm not the only one who's done it.  Francis Bacon thought there was a whole system of learning and teaching, over centuries and millennia, that did that.  I suppose that if anything, I should be glad that I wasn't more successful in "baffling with bullshit" when I would have told myself I thought I was "dazzling with brilliance."

But, I try to do the right thing, and I know not to get too carried away with myself if truth and reality are the aims, which they are.  Although it's tempting to latch onto statements, postures and systems of reasoning that seem to be engaging to other people.  Everyone wants to be liked, right?

Take, for example, the matter of annexation of "over there" by BP.  I wrote a whole clever and wise-assed blog post explaining what a bad idea it was.  The date of that post was 10/3/12, and I called it "Prostitution."  (See how clever and wise-assed I was?)  Francis Bacon would have used that post as a perfect demonstration of the power of imagination and rote over reality.  By the time I wrote another mostly anti-annexation post on 11/13/12, I was still poised against, but I was starting to entertain questions, maybe even some early doubts about my resistance.  As I learned more, I came to see I had made a mistake, and the posts of 6/12/13, 7/12/13, and 10/30/13 were pro-annexation.  I even included the fact that I had changed my mind as part of one of the titles.

Likewise with outsourcing sanitation.  I'm proud, and a bit embarrassed, to say that in last year's election campaign for Commission, in the Candidates' Forum, I was the only candidate to receive applause for something I said.  The question was about outsourcing Village services, and I sweepingly said "I wouldn't outsource anything."  Boy, did that resonate with people in the audience.  But the subsequent process of learning more, and having to deal with facts instead of just my own fantasy life, led me to realize the error of my approach, and to change my mind and my position.  Bad, bad, bad.  But correct, correct, correct.  You might be thinking my change of position was like the line about the operation that was a success, but the patient died.  I'm thinking the opposite.  I could have performed a "successful" operation by upholding the stated wishes of a group of my neighbors/constituents, but I know this would have hastened the real death of the Village.  (Although, as it was alluded to by Bob Anderson, it's extremely likely that if we had not outsourced sanitation this year, we would probably have done it next year or so, just at a greater loss to the Village.)

Bacon was right.  When you confine yourself to what you tell yourself, or to what you and a close group of like-minded people agree to, you don't learn, and you don't function in reality.  If all you want to do is theorize, it's OK to be wrong.  But if there are practical and functional consequences, you can't afford to be wrong.  Not unless you're OK with the adverse consequences.  I wasn't.

(1) Rebellion: the History of England from James I to the Glorious Revolution, Peter Ackroyd.  Thomas Dunne Books.  2014

PETA

PETA sent out an e-flyer, which they called "What PETA Really Stands For."  I replied:

You've said something terribly important about PETA, and any legitimate effort to confront mistreatment of animals: "We are fooled into...cuddling with furry baby beings."  I'm not an expert on PETA, but I know some people who are very strong advocates for the "equal" rights of non-human animals.  They won't eat meat or anything that comes from an animal, and they won't wear leather.  But they do keep pets.  They seem to think that because it pleases them to domesticate non-human animals, and because they treat their "pets" well, that it's somehow OK to do this to animals.  I myself can't see why it is.  Those same people would protest stridently if someone talked about raising cows in cow luxury, in wide open pastures, with other cows as company, and slaughtering them in the most humane and painless way imaginable.  But they will "train" a dog and condition it to live as the people would live, very often not in the primary company of other dogs.  Or they similarly "keep" cats.

 

Keep up the great work of challenging people who mistreat animals in any way.  And make sure you add, conspicuously, that there is something very wrong, sadistic, with respect to these animals, with domesticating them.

 

Fred Jonas


And they replied:

Thank you for your inquiry. In a perfect world, all animals would be free from human interference and free to live their lives the way nature intended. They would be part of the ecological scheme, as they were before humans domesticated them. But the world we live in is far from perfect, and domestic cats and dogs are not capable of surviving on their own, so we have a responsibility to take the best possible care of these animals. 
 
PETA is absolutely opposed to breeding. In U.S. shelters alone, up to 4 million dogs, cats, puppies, and kittens are euthanized each year, simply because there aren’t enough homes for them. Given the astounding number of healthy and loving but unwanted animals, we believe that breeding more animals merely to satisfy the desire for a particular behavioral or physical trait is absurd. We do, however, encourage those who have the desire, time, and patience to take good care of an animal to rescue homeless strays or adopt animals from a shelter. In fact, most PETA staff members live with animals who have been rescued from abuse or abandonment.
 
Thank you again for your inquiry and for your concern for animals.
 
Sincerely,
 
The PETA Staff


So I replied:

Dear PETA Staff,

PETA is sometimes accused of uncivilized militancy in its advocacy of the rights of non-human animals.  I myself have occasionally felt on the fence as to whether I agree that PETA is overboard.  The alternative is that PETA is just single-mindedly zealous, in a way that deserves respect.  The one thing that would allow you to deserve that respect would be consistency.  Once you make statements like the one you just made-- that the animals many people like to domesticate would not be capable of living on their own anyway-- you surrender consistency.  I don't know where you live, but in the places I have lived, various places, there have been problems connected with "wild" cats and dogs.  They breed to their hearts' content, they prey on what they want, and sometimes, they attack people's "pets."  They are more than capable of living feral lives, and it is the people, not the dogs and cats, who are complaining.  Nobody thinks they're "cute," except the ladies (it's usually ladies) who like to leave food for them.  But looking cute or being cute is not of importance to the non-human animals.  They're more than satisfied living their feral lives.  They don't need people to pet them or cuddle them.  It's the people who seem to want that.  The non-human animals have each other, and that's all they want.  Isn't that sad for the people who wish the animals loved them?  These are often people who, by the way, will sometimes say (admit) that they get along with animals better than they do with people.  That's the people's problem, not the animals' problem.

I happen to be a psychiatrist.  One of my old friends quotes a professor of his on the matter of mental health treaters having sex with their patients: "get your lovin' some place else."  So it goes with people who want pets to love them.  Get yourself a person, and figure out how to love and be loved by them.  Don't domesticate animals and convince yourself that the animal loves you or needs you, by depriving them of what they really want and offering yourself instead.

I'll tell you a great story I hear from time to time, most recently a week ago.  This was in response to why one of my neighbors did not want to bring her dog to our "Walk a Hound, Lose a Pound" neighborhood event, and why she doesn't bring her dog to dog parks, either: "My dog doesn't like other dogs."  Yup, and it's not the first time I've heard some completely twisted up person make a statement like that.  She should ask Cesar Millan, "the dog whisperer," if her dog doesn't like other dogs.  He'd tell her that dogs are "pack animals," and there's nothing they like better than other dogs.  People should stop kidding themselves, and PETA should stop kidding itself, that dogs and cats need or want people, or to be domesticated by them, for their survival or happiness.  It's a fantasy of people.

To be perfectly honest with you, I'm disappointed.  I read, and quoted to you, your statement, and I thought you actually understood and believed what you clearly said.  You were right to have said it.  You're wrong to qualify it now.

 

Fred Jonas

 

 

I haven't heard back.

 

 

 

  

To Be Clear about Annexation

The gathering at the Commission meeting was unexpectedly small, considering the rumblings regarding discussion of annexation and referendum.  Only a few people addressed these issues in public comments.  About half suggested that the Commission should proceed on its own.  The other half either advocated or threatened referendum.

There are two issues regarding annexation.  One is whether the Village needs money it doesn't have, and the other is whether annexation is the way to get it.  In truth, those who didn't want annexation failed to address either issue.  Their one posture was that they didn't want annexation.  No reason was given, no statement was made about Village finances (even that they think, in theory, that Village finances are plenty robust already, and there is no need to try to improve them), and no alternative to annexation was proposed.

This posture was untenable.  It was empty.  Those who adopted it made no attempt to connect their argument to reality, or even, really, to the Village.  There was nothing but a slogan: "if the Commission tries to pursue annexation, the voters will rise up to take the decision away from you."  (I'm paraphrasing.)  And replace it with......nothing.  In the interest of......nothing.  The imagined victory is not the life and health of the Village.  It is the refusal to annex, or apparently to improve Village finances in any way at all. 

The implication, and the result, are a refusal to improve the Village.  Money is nothing, except what it can buy.  The reason the Village needs more money is that it needs better medians, and streets, and other fixtures, and equipment, and ability to do post-hurricane clean-up, and improved lighting, and any of a hundred other things.  The argument against annexation, and the failure to propose anything else, is an argument against keeping the Village healthy, vibrant, well-conditioned, and able to survive.

That was the argument we heard from those who wanted to farm out the annexation decision to the residents at large.  Because the truth is, those people were counting on the public at large to do what the current Commission majority will not do: repudiate annexation.  It was never true that the sponsors and supporters of the referendum idea fundamentally care what Village residents think and want, about annexation or about anything else.  They have shown that to us repeatedly.  They have failed to solicit, or accede to, the voice of the people about a range of issues, including annexation.  Their proposal last night was disingenuous at best, and dishonest at worst.

Was it Lee Iacocca who said it?:  "Lead, follow, or get out of the way."  The path to the health and life of the Village is a path toward annexation.  It is the recognition that conventional municipalities cannot maintain finances without a diverse revenue source.  Village residents are welcome to follow the lead of those who are pursuing annexation as the best way to provide that diversity, and stability.  Or, they can present something just as good and reliable.  Or something better.  They can lead, and the rest of us will happily follow them.  They haven't done this before, and they didn't do it last night.  No, they refused to follow, and they had no direction in which to lead us.  Their graceful remaining alternative was to step back, out of the way.  They didn't do that, either.

Being an elected official is a difficult job.  It's a huge responsibility, and it involves sitting at the desk where the buck finally stops.  Most people, most good, able, and talented people, will not choose this job.  I don't blame them.  But the people who don't want this responsibility have to leave the difficult decisions to the people who are willing to accept it.  You don't get to have "authority without responsibility."

We were reminded last night of the infamous "petitions" to which Commissioners were suppose to have acceded some months ago, when the matter was sanitation.  We were suppose to have heard the voices of our neighbors, our constituents.  If they--some alleged number of them-- didn't want to outsource sanitation, we were not to do it.  But the "petitions" were frauds.  They were scams.  The one I studied had forgeries, the weight of people who didn't exist or who didn't live in BP, and the petition statement was only partially and loosely connected to reality.  The issues had not been explained to proposed signatories, and almost none of them understood them.  The document was meaningless and irrelevant.  Now, we are asked to rely again on the voice of the people, regarding annexation.  This suggestion comes from exactly the same people who were behind the anti-outsourcing sanitation effort, and the "petition."  Are they confident that Village residents are easy to manipulate and bamboozle (they've already proven that to themselves once), and they should rely on their own ability to demagogue their neighbors into rejecting annexation, too?

Not on my watch.  I have a job to do.  I asked for it, and I accepted it.  One of my friends reminded me yesterday of my campaign slogan: "For the Best We Can Be."  I had a sign made of this slogan, and I placed it in front of me, next to my name plaque, at the meeting last night.  That mantra is every bit as important as who I am.  Maybe it's more important.  The Village should be the best it can be with or without me.

In medical ethics, an important area of concern is "informed consent."  At bottom, there is an understood right to refuse treatment.  Sometimes, this decision includes a "right to die."  People can exercise a right to refuse treatment, and they can act on their right to die.  But they have to do it with their eyes wide open.  They have to understand very clearly what decision they're making, and what its consequences are.  They have to understand the alternatives, and the treatments they are choosing to forego.  They can make that choice, if they are "competent."   They can decide that what is proposed to help them is so unbearable, and offering so little chance for meaningful survival, that they would rather die of their disease than undergo attempts to treat it.  But if a patient is simply resistant, and can demonstrate no ability to think through the life-and-death matter of treatment for a probably fatal disease, the decision is not left with the patient.  Treatment will be imposed, to save the life the patient does not have the wherewithal to preserve in himself.

So it is with the Village.  Anyone who clearly recognizes and understands the problem, and who equally understands the proposed solutions, and the alternatives to accepting them, can participate in decision-making.  But anyone who does not understand the problem, who makes no attempt to understand it, whose grasp of the proposed solution is no more than rudimentary and symbolic, who offers no alternative, and who has chosen others to make the difficult decisions must allow those chosen decision-makers to decide.  Last night, two non-Commissioner Village residents argued for referendum.  Last month, when the same matter was on the Commission Agenda, it was one non-Commissioner resident.  How many people would vote against annexation, or that the matter should always be left to the residents-at-large?  Hundreds, like the "petition?"  Where are they?  What do they know?  What questions have they asked?  What have they learned?  What alternatives are they proposing?  No, this is what an elected Commission is for.  The sponsor of the referendum effort knew last year that it was a Commission decision, when she made her own Commission vote on it.  She needs to remember that now.

"Win/Win:" Annexation.

I recently attended the AIEMO (Advanced Institute for Elected Municipal Officials).  This offering of the Florida League of Cities is, by the way, a remarkable resource for elected officials.  It is my plan to urge the Commission to require it of all Village Commissioners from now on.  Not only is it excellent training, but it is relatively convenient (the basic course was three full days, and the advanced course was two full days), and it is surprisingly cheap.  Tuition for the basic course was $300, and for the advanced course $245.  This is vastly cheaper than a similar offering by the Good Government Institute.  It's easy to afford out of the yearly Commission stipend of $2000, and $4000 for the Mayor, and it's designed to be taken only once.

The first speaker for the Advanced course talked about the dynamics of working relationships among Council/Commission colleagues.  The speaker categorized working outcomes in a variety of ways, including "win/win."  I mistakenly thought "win/win" outcomes involved what amounts to compromise, but the speaker pointed out an essential difference between win/win and compromise.  In a compromise, each party gets part (presumably the essential or core part) of what he or she wanted, but sacrifices some other part of what was desired.  In win/win outcomes, however, each party gets all of what he or she wanted.  Win/win outcomes are "synergistic," and they rely on novel and not previously imagined mechanisms of problem-solving.  This is their essential feature: they depend on finding a solution which neither party contemplated, and that solution is better than the one either party proposed on its own.  This is the synergy.  It involves "thinking outside the box."

As a frame of reference, here is the example the speaker gave of a win/win outcome.  One side wanted to preserve a bike/walk path in a Florida scrub.  The other side wanted to burn the scrub, to regenerate it, and this would destroy the path that was there.  The battle was about whether to burn, and lose the exercise path, or not to burn, and leave the scrub unhealthy.  The conclusion was to burn, but to rebuild an even better path elsewhere in the scrub.  Those who wanted a nice exercise path through the scrub got one, and those who wanted to burn the scrub to regenerate it, got their wish.

Here are the issues that led me to conclude that annexation was the best idea.  First, I think the Village has fiscal problems that result in very significant functional problems.  We do not have the money to fix the streets, improve the medians, maintain our Village Hall, erect a wall along the track, or do much of anything other than keep ourselves going day to day.  At that, our reserve has gradually, maybe even inexorably, eroded over time.  Second, I think these are functional problems we as a municipality should solve.  Third, I want to preserve the essential quality of the Village.  According to my vision, that essential quality is centered on our being charming, quaint, almost 100% residential, and possessing a modest polish.  One way to summarize this state is what one of my friends calls pride.  I do not consider it part of our essential quality that we are unkempt, deteriorated, and giving the impression of having given up and become depressed.

In order to achieve what I believe are our legitimate and essential goals, I think the answers are vision and money.  Assuming we have the former, we do not have the latter.  Proposals to acquire it have been few and unreliable, if not seemingly unattainable.  We cannot raise taxes any more.  At a millage of 9.7, there is significant resistance to going higher, even though the average increase to tax at 10 mills would be less than $40 per home per year.  So there's little meaningful room and no resolve.  (There is overpowering resistance to making a real problem-solving effort, and taxing ourselves at let's say 15 mills.) 

We cannot rely on the idea that property values will increase, resulting in increased ad valorem revenue.  First of all, values might not increase.  Second, it would take a great deal of time, and depend on residents selling their houses and moving away, to realize this benefit.  Third, even if values increased, and even if we could wait the years and decades until this had a meaningful fiscal result, we would have to hope that values would not again decrease.  I assume that by now, we all know better.

The other suggestion to improve our finances is to reduce expenses.  There is no more real room to do this.  We just reduced our PW expense by outsourcing sanitation, and this was met with vigorous resistance, even from many of the same people who say they want to reduce expenses.  The only other expense some people say they want to reduce is the expense of professional management, but so doing leaves us again with what we all already concluded was inadequate local/lay management.  "There's no there there."

Because I want to maintain the essential character of the Village, I have not favored the installation of a new school, and I have been opposed to erecting a retail installation on Village property.  Neither of these would be guaranteed to result in meaningful and consistent revenue anyway, but even if they did, they materially undermine our "persona" in a way that no one seems to favor.  Even the proponents and supporters of the school and the retail installation say they want to preserve our essential quaint, small town charm by avoiding commerce and industry even nominally associated with the Village.  Their gymnastic ability is apparently much greater than mine.

So I have been led to conclude that annexation of a high revenue area "off site" is the best way to solve the problem.  As I see it, it preserves everything I and the rest of us want to preserve, and it results in the increased revenue we need.  It is as reliable as possible.

But the whole idea of the "win/win" outcome includes the likelihood that there is a great solution that I haven't imagined, and maybe others haven't, either.  So I'm all ears.  I've said what's important to me, and those who oppose annexation have said what's important to them, at least insofar as saying that it's important to them that we not annex anything.  Let's find that solution that gives all of us what we want.  I will abandon annexation like a shot, as soon as someone presents an alternative that is reliable and satisfies what I believe are our needs.  "I don't care what we do, and I don't even care what happens--I don't care whether we solve our problems-- as long we don't annex" won't do it.  I care what happens.  I care whether we solve our problems.  You help me protect what's important to me, and I'll help you protect what's important to you.  We just need to find a reliable, goal-directed way of working together. As I said, I'm all ears.  Talk to me (don't bark at me).

As a point of departure, let me add that if a counterargument is that we really don't have fiscal problems, or that we don't have functional problems, or that we should not address our functional problems, I will consider this approach to be a non-starter.  Likewise, if our fiscal problems are attributed to a different problem we can't control, instead of what I think is the problem we can't control, that, too, will be considered to be an irrelevant misdirection.

I would really be happy to find a different solution.  There just has to be one, it has to work, and it has to be reliable and stable.  My limitation is that I can't think of one.  If you can, PLEASE, by all means!  Don't tease us.


PS: There are some Village residents who really don't want the Village to annex anything.  They will protest it vigorously.  This blog post, right now, is a critically important opportunity for them to offer something else.  I favor annexation, but I already said I'd drop it.  Just give me something better.   "Anything but annexation" is not something better.  If they'd rather try for a referendum than to tell it to all of us here-- to go for weight instead of substance-- there's a real message in there.  People who eat like that-- who go for lots of empty calories-- become fat, actually undernourished, and are unhealthy.  Not on my watch.

On the Prowl for "All [I] Can Eat."

The pickin's are getting somewhat slim.  If I weren't so relentless, I would be, too.

I love to eat, and little pleases me more than being allowed to eat as much as I want of good food.  If the price is low, I'm in heaven.

There are places that cater to people like me.  In some cases, this approach is their standard offer, and in others, they reserve the opportunity for special sittings.

Examples of the former include places like Jumbo Buffet or Pei Wei.  There's lots of food, and you can eat yourself sick, but the food is not top notch.  They tend to try to be "all things to all people," too, and often, particular dishes are just not expertly done enough.  If all you want is lots of calories for not too much money, they're fine, but if the goal is an excellent meal, they're not at the top of my list.  Frankly, they're not even on my list.  I was at Pei Wei once, and a Massachusetts place called Pacific Buffet once.  Got it.  Thanks anyway.

Many years ago, when I was a kid, the Jockey Club had a Sunday morning brunch buffet.  It was probably $15 or more a person, which was significant money at the time, but I still remember those amazing breakfasts.  There was another place in Miami Lakes that had one of those classy Sunday morning breakfast buffets a few years ago, but it stopped serving this breakfast before I had a chance to get there.

These days, all-you-can-eat offerings are confined mostly to dinner or lunch.  For me, lunch is only one place, and I'm there once a week, unless I get too busy.  The window I have to hit is Tuesday through Friday, 11:30 to 3:00.  It's Kebab Indian Restaurant on 167th just west of NE 6th.  The food is great, and the price is low.  After years, they finally raised it from $9.95 to $10.95.  I told them I was happy to see that they raised the price, even though it's still a terrific deal, and the waitress told me patrons were complaining.  Sheesh.  Such good food, so much of it, and people begrudge the establishment one lousy extra buck?

My other lunch place, but only on the rare Saturday, is Boteco on 79th Street, not far from the bridge to Pelican Island.  Actually, Boteco has a few a-y-c-e deals, but the Saturday one is my favorite.  The featured food is feijoada, which I love.  Theirs is exceptional.  And it's $17.

For dinner, the two regular good a-y-c-e dinners I know about are at an Indian place in Broward, and Texas De Brazil.  The place in Broward is Bombay Bistro, and it's just south of Oakland Park on Andrews.  I hate to say it, but the food is better than Kebab.  In fact, it's amazingly good Indian food.  The a-y-c-e dinner is Sunday night only, and it costs $15.  Spectacular.  Couldn't be better.

Texas De Brazil has a daily menu of Brazilian/South American food, but many people get the churrasco/rodizio/parrillada spread.  Texas De Brazil, by the way, is at the Gulfstream mall at the track.  The great thing about Texas De Brazil is that the food is unbeatable.  Every dish is perfectly made, and there's even more veggies and salad than there is meat.  But it's all there, and it doesn't stop until you do.  The problem with Texas De Brazil is that they charge about $45 for this.  It's sort of not worth it.  I am going on November 12, though, because they have a 50% off special for Veterans' Day.  Veterans' Day is the 11th, but there was such demand for this special that they extended to the next day, too.

Liza Meli used to have a-y-c-e events, at Ouzo's.  You paid a fee (about $35), and you got all the great food and wine you wanted.  She has a scaled down version of that at her new place, BarMeli.  The deal has gotten stingier, though.  Her deal now is once a week, and I think it's Thursday.  The cost is down to $25, but again, the service is not unlimited on food or wine.

At Gaucho Ranch (NE 2nd Ave at about 73rd St), about once a month (they're thinking about expanding to twice a month), they have a "tasting."  For $30, you get all you want of grass fed beef (usually about four different cuts, including tenderloin/filet), pork sausage, blood sausage (morcilla), and anything else they're serving.  Extras have included salad, and sometimes specialty artisanal foods made by local producers.  This past week, they had amazing fresh mozzarella, plain balls and stuffed, and they had local artisan gazpacho (three different flavors and recipes).  There was also locally made sorbet in unusual and interesting flavors.  Gaucho Ranch used to include unlimited wine (wonderful bottlings) within the same $30 charge.  They've now stopped the free wine part of the offer, but they didn't lower the price.  So it's $30 for the food, and you can either bring your own wine, or they will sell you a bottle of something you'll love.  There were about six wines for sale this week, and at least one of them was $25.  I didn't buy any wine, since I have loads at home, I didn't need to spend $25 for another bottle, and I wasn't going to drink a whole bottle of wine myself.  If someone had offered to go in on a bottle with me, maybe I would have done it.  The question is whether it's still worth it to get the food (more than you can eat, and great food) for $30.  I'll think about it next month.

Proper Sausages is a meat market (literally), and they make their own incomparable sausage.  They sell beef, too, as well as a number of other things.  They make their own potato salad, their own cole slaw, their own mustard, and a few other prepared foods.  They sell food made by other local artisans, too.  And they have a very nice selection of wines and beers.  Every couple of weeks or so, they have an event in the evening.  It's a similar tasting to the one Gaucho Ranch does, but it's sausage only.  They serve maybe five or six recipes.  They do sometimes add artisan bread or pretzels and their mustard.  And they serve either wine or beer to go with it.  It's very tight, and you have to stand up in the store.  But the food is unbelievably good.  It is very definitely a-y-c-e (and drink), and the price is $20.  It's a very good deal for such great food and alcohol, and you meet nice people there.  The only drawback is standing for about 1 1/2 hours while you have your dinner.

I'll be on the lookout for more places, and you can tell us all about the ones you like.