Smug, and Snug.

Last night's Commission meeting started out in an interesting way.  We had a presentation from FPL, about replacing the lamps we have with LED ones, and Tracy Truppman properly suggested that we take all issues related to that presentation back to back.  One entry was part of new business, which would have come at the end of the Agenda, so it was more efficient, and more respectful of the FPL guy, to address it early.  And then, there was Public Comment.

Several Village residents spoke, and almost all of them addressed the same problem: Tracy's having single-handedly (mis?)managed the matter of how to dispose of hurricane debris, and in detail how to apply to the State and FEMA for help.  The Commission had previously agreed to apply for a state grant of about $400K, and Tracy, either on her own or in concert with our Manager, Krishan Manners, decided to request about $1.2M.  Everyone who had anything to say about this criticized Tracy for taking up this matter alone, without consulting the rest of the Commission.  Tracy's excuse, at the time and reiterated now, was that there was a "state of emergency" (which she had also single-handedly declared, but didn't clearly announce to anyone), and a very tight deadline for applying for state aid, and Krishan was out of town for a couple of crucial days, and all she did was make a back-up phone call to the state, and somehow, that this matter was either entirely proper or easily understood and excused.  And to help her position, she threw Krishan under the bus.

What was even more interesting about this matter was that Krishan unwaveringly accepted his position under the bus.  Tracy overstepped, and Krishan apologized.  I have to say here that I think I may have been wrong about something Tracy did in the past, and why she did it.  She fired Sharon Ragoonan, seemingly without consulting anyone else (except we all believe she has active illegal conversations with her stooges outside Commission meetings), and I thought the firing was at least indirectly about Sharon.  I thought it was that Tracy didn't like Sharon, for whatever were Tracy's unrevealed reasons, and that she resented that she, Tracy, had nothing to do with Sharon's hiring, so she wanted to be rid of what she didn't choose and couldn't control.  But now, I think I might have made a mistake.  Now that I've watched Tracy over time, and seen what she does, and how certain other people (Krishan and John Hearn) react, I think she fired Sharon as a signal.  I think she did it to show what power she had, and to let Krishan and John know that they will do her bidding, or else.  And both of them seem to have gotten the message.

Tracy thinks Village government is all about her, and she has reassured herself that a majority of the current Commission will support whatever she says and wants all the time.  Which they have shown they will.  In that sense, Tracy is an autocrat.  She's' a dictator.  She's a tryant.  And one of the first rules in autocracy/dictatorship/tyranny 101 is to declare a state of emergency, so the budding autocrat/dictator/tyrant can expand him- or herself into the vacuum thus created.  Done.  Some Village residents last night said that even if Tracy had thought a "state of emergency" existed, she should have called an emergency meeting, so the other Commissioners could share in making decisions.  One person pointed out that Tracy appears to have declared a state of emergency a day or so before the actual hurricane.  Tracy never responded to any of this, except to implicate Krishan.  She did not otherwise try to defend what she did (which everyone who addressed the matter seemed to consider indefensible anyway), and she didn't apologize.  She ignored all of it, apparently because she really doesn't care.  She does whatever she wants, and no one has the nerve, or whatever, to stop her.  We listened to this throughout the evening, when Jenny Johnson-Sardella kept repeating her favorite phrase--"I concur,"-- Harvey Bilt agreed, too, and Will Tudor launched himself repeatedly into aimless and self-contradicting ramblings that seemed almost always to end in some kind of endorsement of whatever Tracy wanted.

Another example of this pathetic Commission uselessness had to do with a proposal from Roxy Ross.  Roxy introduced as new business a request that the Village write an Ordinance outlawing "conversion therapy" in people not yet of majority.  I will be entirely candid here to say that at first, I thought this was a ridiculous use of Commission time or the Village's time.  And money, since Roxy's proposal was to create an Ordinance.  Roxy never asked me about this (even though I'm a psychiatrist), and I never discussed it with her.  When the matter was introduced as New Business, and Roxy explained whence she was coming, I saw it in an entirely different light.  I saw why Roxy was right.  First, although my initial reflex was to say to myself that it made no sense to outlaw a professional business practice in a municipality that doesn't have any businesses, Roxy pointed out quite correctly that the Village does in fact have businesses.  For all I know, it might have lots of them.  And it is entirely possible that one of those "home" businesses is one or another form of psychotherapy.  So "conversion therapy" might be happening in the Village right now.  Roxy also pointed out that the legislature of the State of Florida recently refused to outlaw such therapy, but that there is a growing number of municipalities that have created exactly those Ordinances outlawing this "therapy."  Roxy's thinking was that it did societal good to increase the number of municipalities that had these kinds of Ordinances on their books, to pressure the State.  So once Roxy explained this, I could see that she was right, and that the Ordinance she proposed was the right thing for us to do.

But Tracy and the two stooges who were left (Harvey had been present by mobile phone, the reception had been useless, and he had dropped out of the meeting) couldn't see that Roxy was right.  Their embarrassing argument was that Ordinances cost money (a few hundred dollars, all tolled), so we shouldn't use Village money for this one.  And this from Tracy Truppman, who wastes vast amounts of Village money, hiring our Attorney to be present at the meetings where Tracy can't shut up.  But Tracy got stooge Johnson-Sardella and stooge Tudor to agree that an Ordinance was too expensive, and we should do the free Resolution instead.  And here's the difference.  Tracy herself (how bizarre could this get?) pointed out that she has heard of young people literally being killed in these "conversion therapy" exercises.  In theory, Tracy might be expected to think it's a bad idea, both to go to extraordinary lengths to stamp out homosexuality in a minor, and certainly to kill them over it.  We're talking about Tracy Truppman here.  The result of a Resolution against this "therapy," when a minor complains, or is killed, is that the Village can then say we really wish the parent and therapist hadn't done what they did.  We had suggested they not.  The result of an Ordinance against such pseudotherapeutic misbehavior is that the act is illegal, and can be prosecuted.  But in Tracy's relentless crusade to frustrate everything that Roxy suggests, Tracy acts not only against the best interests of Village residents, but even against her own best interests.

And she gets away with it, every time, because she has three stooges who blindly "concur" with any nonsense Tracy does or says.

An Attempt to Share Values

The way it was told to me, it started with Janey Anderson, seemingly representing some others of our neighbors, approaching Mac Kennedy.  Mac had been unloading on "Nextdoor" about the Village's failure of "vision," and Janey reportedly contacted him to ask him to present his idea of vision, to a small group of BP residents with whom Janey was apparently having a parallel discussion.  So Mac met with the group, several times, and all of them composed a document to share with the neighborhood, by sharing it first with the Commission.

For what it's worth, the group Janey represented came to include Linda Dillon, Nicole Susi, Brian McNoldy, Brad Piper, and Art Gonzalez.  Mac was included in the final grouping, as was Dan Schneiger.  I'm told their strategy to go public with this was to divide themselves up into single person or two-person task forces, and each person or pair of people would approach a Commissioner.  So one or two of them would approach Tracy Truppman, one or two Roxy Ross, one or two Jenny Johnson-Sardella, one or two Will Tudor, and one or two Harvey Bilt.  The purpose of these outreaches was to inform the assigned Commissioner of this group effort, offer to explain it, and ask each Commissioner to co-sponsor a presentation of it.

Here are the two problems.  First, only Roxy Ross would even listen, look, or discuss the matter with whoever approached her.  The other four Commissioners ignored, blocked, or refused any effort to talk to him or her about it.  Apart from Roxy, we're talking about four new Commissioners who ran explicitly, and reassuringly, on a promise that now, with a new posse in town, Village residents would finally-- oh, yes, finally!-- be listened to.  There would be no more ignoring them, not listening to what's important to them, and "legislating" in spite of them.  Well, we've already been given several doses of what the fulfillment of that promise looks like, and several of our neighbors have just gotten a booster.  The message was clear: drop dead; no one cares what you think, or how much effort you might have expended; and most certainly no one cares about your vision for the Village, or your suggestion that anyone else form a vision for the Village; we only care what we think.  That was problem number one.

Problem number two was what happened to Roxy Ross' placement of this matter on the Agenda for the Commission meeting.  This group of new Commissioners has already deflected a suggestion for a visioning session (an exercise all or most Commissions do at the beginning of a new term).  They neither have nor want a vision.  But now, Roxy has imposed on them their neighbors' serious request, and they, or maybe just Tracy, have found it a little too delicate just to file it in the circular file, as they do with most or all of what Roxy tries on her own to introduce.  It's the kind of initiative that any other Commission would list as "New Business," for inclusion in the 12 section, with an expectation of Commission discussion, and possible voting or other action.  But that, too, was too much dignity to give this group of neighbors, so the matter was placed as a "Presentation," at the beginning of the meeting.  That way, Tracy and the bobbleheads could "listen" (zone out), thank the group for its thoughtfulness, and move on, without any discussion or real and meaningful consideration.

This is an interesting and different Commission.  It is unique in its refusal to acknowledge or honor anything past Commissions have done, anything its neighbors think or want, and even rules of government.    It's really been one bullish, insular, and autocratic move after another that have defined the attitude of the majority of the current Commission, from day one.

So the matter was heard as a Presentation.  Even critics agreed it was a wonderful and carefully crafted presentation.  Each member of the group read his or her part, until the whole project was shared with a room full of people.  At the end of the presentation, Janey Anderson suggested to Her Majesty, the Most Powerful Empress Truppman, that the group could maybe take comments or questions from the room full of people.  But Her Majesty was entering intense deflection and destruction mode, and she refused to permit such an activity, on her personal time.  She partially relented, though, and she agreed, reluctantly, that during the next section of the meeting, Public Comment, anyone in the room full of people could then make comments or ask questions, and the group could answer them.  But when people actually did ask questions or make comments, the Omnipotent, and now annoyed, Empress refused to allow the group to respond.  So the "discussion" moved to the Commissioners.

The group had asked really only for one thing.  That was that the Commission lend its endorsement to an imminent series of wider public conversations, to which Commissioners were enthusiastically invited, and then, perhaps the Commission would like to take up some of whatever turned out to be salient issues.  Roxy Ross thought this was a fine idea.  The rest of them retreated to sputtering, blustering, and drooling down their shirts.  Jenny Johnson-Sardella and Harvey Bilt generally didn't seem to like the idea, and both of them went on about some grossly irrelevant nonsense having to do with this informal group's not being a proper Board.  So what?  They never said they were.  And then, they added equally vapid dodges about how sudden this was, and what an unthinkable idea it would be to try to plan public gatherings, near, um, Thanksgiving.  Will Tudor could find a way to accept people's talking about things, but he, too, thought this was just too abrupt.  He thought maybe after the first of the year.  Her Highness, thought that was pushing it, too, and suggested maybe let's say spring.  Neither Will nor the Empress specified which year they were considering.

No, they were all just disinclined.  Except Roxy Ross, but she doesn't count.  But the fearless group "wouldn't take 'no' for an answer," one of them said, and they pressed and finally "won" permission to have two meetings in the recreation center, and have the fee to hold those meetings waived.  Unanimously?!  I wouldn't say so.  La Truppman and her sidekick Harve stuck to their guns.  But our new we-don't-care-what-VBP-residents-want-or-think-and-we-will-never-listen-to-them Commission only agreed to allow meetings to be held (as if they could stop anyone from having meetings), and a bare majority of them agreed that the fee could be waived.  Big whoop.  We can shut you down now, or we can shut you down later.

It was clear what kinds of values were shared by a group of eight of our neighbors,  Some others expressed values of their own, in reaction to the presentation the eight made.  And everyone had a reasonable point.  The "values" of our new Commissioners?  Tracy values absolute power.  Jenny values her resume.  Will is still trying to protect himself from having to create a driveway.  And Harvey found an easy way to get himself a Commission seat, which means who knows what to him.  But none of them value anything that is connected to Biscayne Park.

Right, or Responsibility?

What a mess hurricane Irma created, here in BP and in various other parts of the county and south Florida.  And it could have been a lot worse.  We did not take a direct hit, as we thought we would, and there wasn't much rain.  The two things that happened most were downed branches and trees, and power outages.  Frequently, it was problem one that led to problem two.  That was certainly true in BP, where whole trees fell over, and they took lines with them.  The trees simply weren't strong enough and stable enough to resist the wind.  As an aside, I still say that the problem trees were banyans/ficus, australian pine, and seagrape, more than any others.

In any event, the reasons for the damage we all suffered were trees that could not withstand hurricane force winds, and trees that were not adequately and appropriately pruned for maximum strength and resistance.  Last year and the year before, our then Manager, Heidi Siegel, with the support of the Commission, engaged a company called Raydel to do Village-wide tree work, to improve our canopy, so it would be stronger and more resistant.  I can only assume the damage we suffered from Irma would have been worse, if we had not hired Raydel.  But we ran out of fiscal resolve to continue the tree maintenance program, and we got the result we got.

Raydel was hired to prune trees in the medians and other public spaces.  They were not hired to prune trees on private properties, or even in swales.  It's been our general understanding that such attention is the responsibility of property owners.  On the other hand, FPL, out of its concern for power lines, has been known to prune trees on private properties, because those trees, or specific branches of them, have represented more or less direct threats to the power lines.  Some property owners have been exercised about FPL's taking this kind of initiative with their-- the property owners'-- trees.

Every municipality served by FPL, most certainly including BP, has a contract with this electric company.  The contract allows FPL to sacrifice at least specific tree branches, if they threaten power lines, and that includes branches on private property.  It absolutely and without question includes branches and trees in public rights of way, including swales and other easements.  FPL is not wrong, then, to remove all or part of a branch that they think threatens the lines.  They're not obligated to be "nice" about it, or to employ the most pleasing pruning design.  Again, the assumption-- my assumption, anyway-- is that if you want pruning done "right," you get your own tree service, and have them remove branches as you think they should be removed.  But removing those branches that threaten the power (the power coming to your house!) is not your call.  And that's by contractual agreement.

The City of Coral Gables (CCG) has interpreted the contract to say not only that FPL has the right to do tree maintenance with a goal toward preserving the delivery of electric power, but frankly, and contractually (according to CCG governors and attorneys), they have the responsibility to deal with the trees.  CCG is suing FPL for not having been more aggressive about tree maintenance, and thus jeopardizing the delivery of electric power in CCG during and after hurricane Irma.

It's a different view to take, and I don't know how successful CCG will be in proposing to shift blame for the power outages from themselves, and all the owners of private property in CCG, onto FPL.  In theory, if CCG wins, the public will be excused from worrying about, and paying for, tree maintenance, but it will also be deprived of the opportunity to demand a specific approach to the task.  FPL's goal is to keep the power lines free.  It's not to make your canopy as pleasing and pretty as possible.  If that's what you want, you have to do it yourself.

One question is what would happen, and what would have happened, if FPL had known what we didn't know, or pretended not to know, and if they had done what we didn't do?  What if FPL had come through BP and removed all the banyans/ficuses, austalian pines, and seagrapes we left standing?  Presumably, there would have been a greater outcry than there was a few years ago, when the county removed several australian pines on Griffing.  But FPL would have been right, and those of us who would have insisted the trees were no threat would have been wrong.  And apart from whether anyone is right or wrong, no one who lost power failed to complain about it.  It's a huge trouble and expense to FPL, when they have to clean up the power outage mess, and no one else likes it, either.

This, of course, raises the other question of who's going to pay for tree maintenance.  Part of CCG's argument is that FPL's profit last year was about a half billion dollars.  Presumably, CCG is trying to argue that FPL has tons of money, and they should easily be able to pay for tree maintenance.  But FPL is a private company, not a public service, and their goal is to make as much money as they can.  They're not in any way looking to "do the right thing," even if a better canopy would have saved them the time, trouble, and expense of dealing with lost power, downed lines, and the reason the lines were down.  You'd think that as a private business, they'd be smart enough to think about that, but they're not.  Almost no business is smart that way.  And anyway, they just shift the cost onto their customers, pleading to the Public Service Commission that it cost them $______ to restore everyone's power.  So if you don't pay the cost by hiring your own tree service, or by paying enough extra tax to the municipality to do this for you, you'll pay it to FPL.  And you'll lose power anyway, because FPL isn't smart enough..; oh, never mind.  Or maybe they are smart enough.  Maybe they've figured out that it's easier and more successful for them to get the PSC to let them raise rates in response to the extra expense of hurricane clean-up than it would be to get the PSC to allow them to build a larger fund in advance, on the actuarial assumption that the expense will come eventually.

We should try to keep abreast of CCG's campaign to get FPL seen as the responsible party, when it comes to power outages caused by branches and trees that shouldn't have been there.  Maybe it's a suit (excuse the pun) we should follow.  In the meantime, it would be really stupid of us to forget what this is all about: trees and branches that should have been removed, but weren't (because everyone got cheap and short-sighted) and which should be removed now.

Correction

For many years, the Village has had a requirement that parking should be provided "on the property," not just in the swale.  Some homeowners never followed this requirement, and for whatever reasons, the Village did not enforce it.  In 2015, the Code Review Committee presented to the Commission a new proposed Code, and it strengthened and clarified requirements for parking.  The requirement for parking "on the property" was retained in the 2015 proposal.

At that point, there were over 60 properties that were out of compliance, and they always had been.  The Commission adjusted and ratified the CRC's proposal, but there were still some issues that were in some dispute, among Village residents and among Commissioners.  So there were ongoing efforts to further adjust the Code.  For the moment, the 2015 Code was the Code of record.

At that point, Village homeowners who were out of compliance, and always had been, did one of two things.  One was to adhere to the new Code, and that adherence took the form of designing and constructing proper parking where it should be, and where it should always have been.  About half of the 60+ property owners took that route.  The other half decided to do nothing, either because they didn't want to (they never wanted to), or because they wanted to wait for the final adjustment.

One thing that is important to realize here is that if homeowners whose properties are out of compliance felt more confident about what the Code was, and that it would not change, more of them would presumably have made the changes necessary.  So most Village residents, even among those whose properties were out of compliance and had always been so, actually want to do the "right thing."  Half already did, and more would have, if the last Commission had not hung them up by still considering possible changes.

From 2015, there has been a driveway and swale Code, and it required, as has always been required, parking "on the property."  Toward the end of 2016, there was another proposal, but it didn't pass.  So the controlling Code was and still is the 2015 Code.

When I quoted in the immediately preceding blog post that there were 12 properties out of compliance, I was wrong.  The correct number is 31 such properties.  It's still true that Will Tudor's property, and his sister-in-law's property, are among those out of compliance, but they are two of 31, not two of 12.

There's a "big picture" here.  Tracy Truppman's posture is that she doesn't want to ask her neighbors to spend money to improve their properties.  She doesn't argue that adherence to the old and new Code isn't an improvement.  She just doesn't want to be the "heavy" who makes this imposition on her neighbors.  That's the little picture.  The big picture is that what the old Code required, and the new Code reiterated, represents an improvement in the neighborhood.  Some people are asked to make a sacrifice for the good of the whole Village.

It's true that this kind of improvement costs money, and people don't like to spend money.  I myself was sensitive to that during my tenure on the Commission, and I advocated allowing people in less generous fiscal circumstances to have more time to make the changes.  In reality, the deadline for the change was September of 2015.  I have spoken to Village residents whose properties are not in compliance, but who recognize the value of complying, and who simply couldn't afford to comply by September, 2015.  Their intentions are good, and I lobbied to give them more time.  But I never took the position Tracy takes, which is to construct a Code that allows the weakest homeowners to control the look and functioning of the whole neighborhood, and thus to sacrifice the neighborhood and its appearance and its functioning and its good intentions for the lack of ambition of a few of its residents.  That's not how you protect and improve a neighborhood.  It's not how you try to enhance things like property values.  Frankly, it's a gross failure of leadership.  (Tracy told us previously that she doesn't think the Commission should, as she put it, "legislate from the bench."  Now, she shows us that she doesn't think the interests of the whole Village should be imposed on a very small minority of Village homeowners.  Those two things represent almost everything the Commission has to do.  So it's unclear why Tracy worked to get a job she doesn't want to do.)

And it wouldn't make any difference if Tracy is a failed leader, except that she controls the thinking and the behavior of three other Commissioners.  It is those three other Commissioners who make Tracy's failure a failure of the whole government of the Village, and thus of the Village itself.  It's now about one year down, and one to go, for two of the pets Tracy keeps on a short leash.  And it's three more years of Tracy and her other pet.

There Isn't Much to Say. And Not Much Point in Saying It.

Commission meetings are increasingly poorly attended these days.  Last week, we had the second reading of the budget Ordinance, and I think Linda Dillon, Chuck Ross, and I were the audience.  Tonight, we had the October Commission meeting.  Maybe there were eight of us.  At the beginning.  When I left, there were about four.  I've sat through plenty of bad and oppressive Commission meetings, but it's getting impossible to sit through these.

The bobbleheads were bobbling tonight.  It was clear they didn't really even know about what they were agreeing with each other, but bobble in agreement they did.  The first matter was a Resolution Roxy Ross introduced in support of federal sanctions imposed against the autocracy in Venezuela.  I have to say that when I read the proposal, I rolled my eyes.  This has nothing to do with BP, and it's a kind of clutter in the Agenda.  Harvey Bilt felt it was important to make that point explicitly, and he voted against it.  Jenny Johnson-Sardella couldn't support it, unless some of the language was adjusted.  Tracy Truppman was resistant, but she was ultimately content with Jenny's insistence that something be changed.  Will Tudor clearly couldn't have cared less, and seemed to know nothing about it.  But when Roxy was challenged as to why this was our business, she pointed out that we have some BP residents who are Venezuelan or have Venezuelan connections, and since it's an international concern, we should get on board, too.  Tracy was slightly mollified when she was reassured that the document Roxy presented was from the County, and not from Roxy.  But all in all, the bobbleheads made way too much out of this and gave Roxy way too hard a time.  But they passed it 4-1 (you show 'em, Harvey; you da man).

Then, it was our new driveway and swale Ordinance.  It's new, because even though Tracy lamely tried to claim it wasn't her Ordinance, it was in fact hers and hers alone.  She single-handedly rewrote the Ordinance the Code Review wrote, and which was then adjusted by the last Commission, in response to feedback from many residents, and which has consumed 2-3 years of Village time and attention.  But Tracy has no use for anyone except herself, and she simply discarded the whole thing.  Fortunately for Tracy, she has complete ownership of three other Village residents, who all happen to be on the Commission, and she simply forged ahead, rewriting, and lying about whose product this was.  It was so obnoxious and insulting that Roxy Ross got up, gathered her things, and withdrew from the meeting.  I mean really, what was the point in being there?  Tracy plus three other stooges equals whatever Tracy wants it to equal.  "Listening to residents?"  The only BP resident to whom Tracy ever listens is Rhonda's housemate.  And since hardly anyone bothers to attend meetings any more, Tracy can make up any story she likes about what some anonymous resident allegedly told her, and just do whatever she wants.  Which is what she does.

The only other funny thing was from last week, when we had the budget meeting.  For whatever nonsensical reason, Chester ("Doc") Morris made a special appearance specifically and explicitly for the purpose of thanking the Commission for hiring Grubbs, the company that did part of our hurricane clean-up.  I think Chester thought he was thanking those five Commissioners for having hired Grubbs.  But it was the last Commission that made the contract with Grubbs, and Roxy Ross is the only remaining member of that Commission.  If you think Tracy or anyone else corrected Chester, and told him they were glad he was satisfied, but they weren't the ones to thank (except Roxy), you can forget it.  I'm telling you...  Truppman, Trump...  Coincidence?

Come to think about it, there was one other comical thing from tonight.  While Tracy was trying to explain why the driveway/swale Ordinance should be written whatever way she wanted to write it, she got someone to acknowledge that there were 12 properties completely out of compliance with what was everyone's plan (until tonight).  She wanted to write an Ordinance that would satisfy those 12 properties.  As they were discussing this, Tracy and two of her dopes agreed with each other about writing an Ordinance that wouldn't threaten those 12 properties, and then they all looked at the other bobblehead: Will.  Will couldn't speak.  He probably wasn't sure what to say.  He couldn't admit that he should at least recuse himself (knowing his pals would cover him anyway), and he couldn't disclose.  His is one of the 12 properties that was never in compliance, and his sister-in-law's is another.  The fact is that preventing the Village from making him put a driveway on his property is the one and only reason Will ever wanted to be on the Commission.  And there it was, the table set for him.  He could have been graceful and open about it.  He was going to get his way anyway.  But no.

How to Bully Proof your Child

Saturday September 23rd, 2017

10 am to 11:30 am

With a new school year starting having to meet new teachers, spending a bunch of money on school supplies, new clothes, new shoes and the occasional “I don’t want to go to school” you will have to deal with a fresh new batch of bullies.

Bullying is all too real. Did you know that 25% of public schools report that bullying among kids happens on a daily or weekly basis? And that 1 in 5 high school students report being bullied in the past year?
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The good news is that because bullying has made national headlines, schools and communities (and even celebrities) are taking a strong stand against bullying.

For real confidence and safety an ongoing self-defense program is a choice of many parents.  Although it may be easiest for parents to tell kids to ignore the bully, walk away or tell a teacher, that is not always the safest, easiest thing for a child to do.  Kids don't want to be in fear of school or other kids.  Parents want to make sure their kids are safe.  This is often a have/need choice.  Kids and parents would rather have their kids know self-defense skills and not need to use then than to not have the skills and someday need them.

HOW TO PREVENT BULLYING THROUGH MARTIAL ARTS

Enrolling a child in a martial arts program is one of the best actions a parent can take to prevent bullying.
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Why? Because martial arts can help children on both sides of the bullying equation. By providing benefits such as confidence, discipline, respect, self-control, leadership, stress relief, and self-defense; martial arts helps both the children who are being bullied, and the children who are bullying others. Here’s how:

​​So whether you believe your child is either bullying or being bullied we can help. All our classes are high energy and super fun while reinforcing the family values you want your child to have.
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• RESPECT
• DISCIPLINE
• LEADERSHIP
• CONFIDENCE
• SELF CONTROL
• CAN DO ATTITUDE

For more information or to register please click on this link...

https://www.miamishoreskickboxing.com/bully-proof-your-child

And It Could Have Been a Lot Worse.

We all thought hurricane Irma was heading directly toward us, a maxed out level five storm.  But we lucked out, and it took a different path.  The West Indies, especially Barbuda and St Martin, didn't luck out.  Neither did Puerto Rico and Hispanola.  Cuba didn't luck out.  They all got badly slammed.  A co-worker yesterday showed me photographs of a small country village in Cuba after the storm.  The wood frame buildings were just piles of rubble, and the inhabitants had no place at all to go.

The storm was then supposed to ravage the west coast of Florida, but by the time it got there, it was a level two, and it did much less damage than we thought it would.

Here, we got much more wind than rain, and not nearly the wind we thought we would get.  But it was enough to take out power starting Sunday morning, 9/10, and it brought down lots of branches and a noteworthy collection of whole trees.  Over-represented among the fallen trees were the Australian pines and the ficus/banyans.  The former are already recognized as menace invaders, and the county has outlawed them.  I hope the county, or the Village, will outlaw the latter.  They have very shallow root systems, and they can't take storms.  I saw many large ones down after the '05 storms, and a bunch more this week.  And with the large canopy, they always take power and other lines with them, as do the Australian pines, which are too tall to miss doing considerable damage when they fall.

We were all out working in the yards and streets by Monday.  There was lots and lots of debris, and we piled it where we could.  Swales and medians were loaded with it.  The Village engaged a company called Grubb to do the storm clean-up.  The word on the street at one point was that Grubb would be making its sweep on Thursday, 9/14.  Frankly, I'm not sure if anything happened on Thursday.  Clearly, the debris didn't disappear.  Today--Saturday, 9/16-- I was out walking, and I encountered a crew on upper Griffing.  I thought it might be Grubb, but it was FEMA.  They told me Grubb had concentrated the debris onto the medians, to work to get it out of the streets.  They--FEMA-- were now removing it.  They will make three passes through the Village, taking the largest loads first, then some of the left-overs, then using the fine-toothed comb at the end.

Some people on my street (119th) got power back by Monday morning, 9/11.  Mine came on Friday afternoon, 9/15, at about 4:00.  Much or most or all of Griffing still doesn't have power.  It'll all come.  We have been told everyone in BP will have power by the end of the day Sunday, 9/17.  I have no idea what the pace is for the rest of the county.   One guy I encountered this AM was a FEMA employee who happens to live in west Broward, in a relatively newer community in Pembroke Pines.  He told me the power lines in his community are all under ground, and they never had a flicker of lost power.  One BP resident I saw on Monday, 9/11, said he was glad for the concrete poles.  He was one of those whose power came back on Monday AM.  He said he hadn't favored them at first, but he likes them now.  I've noticed others of the old wooden ones leaning or down again this time.  Maybe eventually, we can get all the poles changed to the concrete ones.  It's too late to bury all the lines.  But if we had all concrete poles, and we got rid of the most vulnerable tree species, we'd do ourselves a big favor.

I thought we would have much more flooding than we did.  It turns out rain was not a major feature of this storm, and we didn't have large pools of water left.  The main area of flooding I saw was in front of the Rosses' house, across from the church.  And it's possible that that flooding was only because the canal got backed up, also flooding the open lot just south of the 6th Avenue bridge, next to the Rosses.  Maybe it backed up from there onto the street.  I heard that some houses just north of that bridge, on the north part of Griffing, and houses south of there, on the south part of Griffing, also had flooding from the canal.  As far as I know, it's all resolved now.

I hope everyone is OK now.  If not, let someone know.  You can tell me, or Roxy or Chuck Ross, or Krishan Manners, or Nick Wollschlager.

Lebensraum

It was not easy to stay for the first three hours of tonight's Commission meeting.  I assume there was another hour.

It was once again the Tracy Truppman Show, Starring Tra-cy Trupp--man.  This time, there was a bit more of a twist.  I think Tracy is perfecting a system for herself.

Tracy couldn't even allow Daphne Campbell to spin out the Daphne Campbell Show without frequently interrupting and trying to have a private conversation with Daphne.  Frankly, I suspect this was due to Daphne's too frequent references to her past collaborations with Roxy Ross to make the accomplishments Daphne tells herself she's made.  I think Roxy is to Tracy what Barack Obama is to Donald Trump: any traces must be eradicated.

We got through several Resolutions without much extraneous meandering.  Then, it was onto the "old business" of driveway and landscaping considerations.  Specifically, it was Tracy's considerations.  Last month, Roxy introduced a driveway plan.  Tracy immediately and unceremoniously ignored it in favor of her own proposal.  Tonight, the proposal came back for continued discussion.  What initially came back was a combination of Roxy's proposal and the proposal from the Code Review Committee.  But Tracy again immediately superimposed her own version.  She simply ignored what was on the table.  Tracy made clear to her colleagues what she expected of them.  But her three stooges were somehow getting excessive minds of their own, as if they were entitled to their own views of things.  So Tracy announced that they were moving on to something else, and that they would return to the driveway proposal later.  The kids had lost sight of who their daddy is, and Tracy allowed them an opportunity to think about it.

Then, there was the matter of a landscape proposal.  On the Agenda, there were two such listings.  The first was proposed by Roxy, and the second was proposed by Tracy.  Roxy introduced her proposal, and Tracy immediately-- again-- ignored it and simply went on to discuss her own proposal.  Just like last month, and again this month, Tracy treated Roxy as if she wasn't there.  This was when I remembered I had to go home to, um, I forget why I had to leave to go home.  Oh, yeah, to walk my dog.

One of the remaining issues-- a leftover from last month-- was Tracy's alleged concern about how to communicate more fully with BP residents.  She gave us yet another demonstration as to what that would look like.  The room tonight was unusually empty.  At one point in the driveway discussion, Bob Anderson raised his hand.  He wanted to say something.  Tracy shook her head no.

Tracy did say one funny thing tonight.  The Commission was discussing driveway surfaces, and Roxy-- oh, yeah, the beast-- took issue with Tracy's insistence on making asphalt an unacceptable surface.  Roxy asked or suggested that it seemed that what Tracy was trying to do was avoid impervious surfaces, to which Tracy agreed, and Roxy pointed out that there is pervious asphalt.  So maybe we should ban impervious surfaces, not asphalt.  But Tracy again brushed Roxy off, telling her "we're not engineers."  Usually, the rank Tracy likes to try to pull is to suggest to everyone that she is, in some sense, an engineer.  But I guess when you have to fight the beast, you have to get a bit creative.  Or inconsistent.  Or you just make stuff up.

And On the Eighth Day... (Part I)

There was a bit of good news in the Commission meeting last night.  For some reason, our new Commission has figured out what to do with a Consent Agenda.  Each Commissioner had seen it, there was nothing requiring deliberation or comment (the definition of a Consent Agenda), and all it needed was to be passed.  So they passed it.

It's difficult in retrospect to remember if the Commission got through half of its remaining agenda.  It could even have been a bit more than half.  But whatever proportion was addressed (not completed), the meeting got horribly bogged down.  And not in the most likely places, either.

The Police Chief's report and the Village Manager's report didn't need to take long, but they took longer than seemed necessary.

I would have figured the first millage discussion as a black hole for the Commission, but it was over before long.  I would have figured a bigger crowd, too, but the room was not packed, as it usually is for that conversation.  No real decision was made, and the conclusion was to schedule a separate meeting just for that.  Next Monday, July 17, at 6:30.  We have deadlines.  Last night's quickie agreement was to start the conversation at our good old friend, the irrational 9.7 mills.  We're kind of stuck on that number, even though it has no meaning.  It is, however, more than 10% higher than the "rollback" property tax of 8.8 mills, so agreeing to it might require the assent of at least four Commissioners, instead of the usual simple majority.

Oh, the yard trash.  Man, did that topic eat up time.  And here was the big issue:  WastePro comes here to collect yard trash on Mondays.  They take whatever is there, unless the pile is more than an estimated two cubic yards.  In that case, they alert the Village Administration, which warns (or something) the homeowner, and WastePro comes back on Wednesday to collect those larger piles, which results in an extra charge to the homeowner.

A very bad construction was made of this phenomenon in last night's meeting.  These larger loads were described as "illegal," "violations," evidence of "non-compliance," and other similar histrionic characterizations.  They are nothing of the sort.  They are, as they were occasionally described, "oversized" loads, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with them.  If anything, they are the results of more ambitious yard maintenance.  What a wonderful thing!  And the extra charge is for the extra work, not as some sort of punishment to the ambitious and tidy homeowner.

The fact is, we and WastePro set a fee for predictable yearly service.  This fee includes two weekly garbage collections (Tuesday and Friday), one recycling collection (Friday), and one yard trash collection (Monday).  We did not set an amount of garbage or recycling that would be the prepaid maximum, but we did set an amount of yard trash that would be prepaid.  We are welcome to put out as much yard trash as we like, but anything over two cubic yards per week is not prepaid.  We pay for the overage additionally and in arrears.

Not only did this matter get way too much chatter, and not only were the results of more ambitious landscaping somehow characterized as misbehavior, but somehow (I'm still  not clear how), some on the Commission wanted to blame WastePro for something to do with the piles of yard trash, and for the profusion of waste containers that are visible in the Village for too many days.  It was a little nuts, frankly.  It's a very good thing when Village residents do big landscape clean-ups and projects.  It results in a lot of debris?  Yeah, so?  And it took too long (although not as long as under the prior Commission) for Commissioners to suggest simply that WastePro just pick up the debris on Monday, take a photograph, in case anyone disputes, and have the Village charge the resident.  What on earth is the big deal?  And why this preoccupation with blaming, accusing, and wanting to punish?

The other side issue (more or less a complaint, or at least a matter of possibly manufactured concern) was that it's much, much easier to dispose of large piles of landscape debris with a power scooper than by hand.  Some people spoke as if they thought it would be a bad thing to have one available as part of the collection effort.  But again, what's the big deal?  What's wrong with power scoopers (the things with the big claw, that grabs up a large pile of something, and dumps it in a truck)?  They would be used to collect only the large piles, so they wouldn't slow anything down, and they wouldn't leave scars on everyone's driveways and swales.

Speaking of which (slowing things down), there are still (more than able-bodied) Village residents complaining that they don't want to bring their refuse out to the curb.  They want side yard pick-up.  Some Village residents who want, and get, side yard pick-up are too busy to bring out their own refuse, in part because they're at the gym.  You need exercise?  Um...

The time we wasted on that issue.  More than one person summarized this exchange as our having beaten up Kenny Rivera of WastePro.  The way he scurried out of there when the matter was finally over suggested he felt that way, too.

And on the Eighth Day... (Part 2)

I sat through almost four hours of this meeting.  Shortly after about half the agenda got postponed, because the time was gone, I left.  So if I can have invested that much time (three hours, 45 minutes) sitting there, you can spend a few more minutes reading about it.

On the eighth day, "god" considered all he had done the week before, decided it wasn't what he wanted it to be, and created Donald Trump and Tracy Truppman (what a cheap give-away that he used such similar names).  He respun the universe, so it would revolve around them, told the kids to "make it work" (oh, that's who Tim Gunn really is), and retired.

In the public comment portion of last night's meeting, I made what was probably a bit of a wisecrack.  (Who, me?  I know!)  I was thinking about Tracy's item 12.a, which I (mis)interpreted as a wish for more and better communication from non-Commission Village residents to the ruler(s).  I pointed out to Tracy and the bobbleheads that they get plenty of very clear communication from their neighbors.  Then, they ignore it, tell their neighbors to drop dead, and do whatever they want.  So I asked for an explanation as to what Tracy and the bobbs thought they wanted.  But I now think I was wrong.  I don't think Trace and the kids wanted to hear anything more from their neighbors.  I think they wanted a better mechanism for their neighbors to hear from them.  I guess they think that when they tell their neighbors that the neighbors' opinions don't count for anything, the neighbors would like that message to be easier to understand.  TT, et al, shouldn't worry.  We got it.

Agenda item 11.a was the trash.  Item 11.b was a proposed driveway and swale Ordinance.  And item 11.b.1 was Tracy's personal reworking of the driveway and swale Ordinance.  Tracy swept 11.b off the table.  It wasn't hers, and she had no use for it.  Whose was it, Ross's or someone's?  Yeah, well Ross don't matter.  Only Tracy matters.  And she gave us all a nice dose of it.

Tracy launched into an encompassing (and monopolizing) exposition of her driveway and swale Ordinance.  But as humble as Tracy is, she reassured us she's not "married to the language; [she's] just married to the concepts."  Hey, you give Tracy exactly what she wants, and you can call it anything you like.  So Tracy walked us through the magnificence that is her Ordinance.  And don't be concerned that she ignored the Ordinance that was sent to the Commission by the Code Review Board.  Tracy researched this matter herself.  She drove around.  She made phone calls.  Even to municipalities in Canada.  Stones left unturned by our Tracy?  No, I wouldn't think so.  And if anyone was still unconvinced, Tracy threw in some engineering terms.  Case closed, I would think.

At one point in Tracy's verbal odyssey, Roxy Ross was trying to say something, and she reminded the group that she's the "fifth Commissioner."  Really?  We have five?  We don't need five.  We have four who always vote together (the heads always bobble in unison).  But we really only need three, as Tracy pointed out on one occasion.  She and her two pet boys agreed on something.  I don't remember what it was.  Roxy Ross interrupted the steamrolling to register her disagreement.  Tracy told her it didn't matter, because she and the lads already comprised a majority.  She didn't even bother to ask what Jenny thought, because that was irrelevant, too.  It was sad, possibly even pathetic, to see Roxy having to remind the group that she's the fifth Commissioner.  She exists, too, she tried to imply.  Not for them, she doesn't.  And really, not for anything.  What's the difference between 5-0 and 4-1?

Funny enough, Tracy told us when she ascended to the throne that she was going to streamline meetings.  Starting when?  So far, they take much longer than is necessary, and much longer than they used to, because Tracy can't get enough of herself.  She did make one interesting revelation last night, though.  She figured out that now, having come to learn more about the issue, it turned out not everyone was going to be pleased.  Some would be, and others would not.  Amazing insight, Tracy.  Maybe you should have listened more when others with actual experience tried to tell you that.

Well, the question I asked-- why does Tracy want improved communication-- was in response to item 12.a,  We never got near concluding the 11 section of the Agenda.  So when it got late enough, and I'd stayed awake and listened long enough, I left.  Honestly, I wasn't expecting an answer anyway.  Of course, I wasn't expecting the nonsense spewed in this long meeting, either, so who knows?

Slow Down.

There is an ongoing sentiment among some BP residents to lower the speed limit in the Park.  This sentiment comes from two places.

Old time BP residents recall with pride and satisfaction the days when people in two counties knew of BP as the place that told motorists "Don't Even Think About Speeding," and we meant it.  Enforcement was tight.  Now, the perception is that people speed, and no one inhibits them.  So some yearn for the good old days of what they recall as tighter enforcement.

Other BP residents, old and newer, also want to slow the flow of traffic, but they have another reason.  They want traffic impediment, for the expressed (sometimes) reason of making driving through BP so annoying that people will prefer not to do it.  These residents don't want "cut-throughs."  Some of these residents want slower traffic, and some just want less traffic.

This theme-- of traffic slowing-- got some attention at last night's Commission meeting.  Specifically, there was discussion of methods to slow traffic.  These methods included tighter enforcement, as well as installation of "traffic calming" mechanisms and devices.

I put the term traffic calming in quotes for a reason.  The mechanisms used don't really calm traffic.  They slow it.  Drivers whose progress on the roads is slowed by rotaries/roundabouts/traffic circles or various kinds of bumps are not calm.  They are aggravated.  And they are paying more attention to the slowing devices than they are to traffic and pedestrians.  An experiment in one of the Scandinavian countries showed that eliminating most traffic control resulted in fewer accidents, because drivers had to be more attentive and careful at intersections.  They couldn't simply assume that the traffic control devices would control traffic.  They realized they had their own responsibilities to control themselves, and be mindful of others.  Other problems with many of the kinds of traffic control mechanisms discussed last night include that they are traumatic to the vehicles, and they cause damage to suspensions.  And if they slow regular drivers, they also slow drivers of emergency vehicles.

None of this got much discussion last night.  Instead, there was the usual (especially for this Commission) intensity and urgency to do something, whether or not what was proposed was rational or adaptive.

In an attempt to deflect concern, Harvey Bilt told us that we should just lower the speed limit, and that doing so would not cost anything(!).  Harvey said he had researched this carefully, having made what he counted as 35 phone calls on the matter.  Others who also researched it made only one or two phone calls, and what they learned was very different from what Harvey thinks he learned.  For example, we cannot lower the speed limit-- let alone install traffic obstacles-- without the County's permission, and the County requires us to get a traffic study first.  Traffic studies are not at all free.  There's also the cost of the signs announcing the speed limit.  Tracy Truppman says she learned that if we use devices, such as speed cushions, they cost $3000 each.

Funny enough-- or perhaps not so funny-- we got a traffic study back in about 2006 or 2007.  A driver hit two children in the Park, and there was a lot of energy to lower the speed limit.  Curiously, there was no indication at the time that the faulty driver was speeding.  But there was that intensity and urgency at the time, and some simply wanted to bull ahead.  So we got our traffic study.  At the time, the permitted speed limit on all Village streets was 30.  The traffic study showed that few drivers in the Village drove faster than 25.  So we changed the limit to 25, by which action we accomplished nothing.  It did cost us, though.  And now, despite what Harvey Bilt thinks he has reassured himself, we are considering costing ourselves again.  And that's to make of the County a request they might not grant.

The alternative suggested by some, including our new Police Chief, was that we wait to see what the new administration (Manager and Police Chief) accomplish, before we start doing things.  They want to increase enforcement, and they have already begun doing it.  It seems eminently sensible, but we now have a Commission that shoots first, and asks questions later, so there's no real confidence available that the sensible will prevail.

It's not clear that traffic needs to slow down much.  Some residents who don't have speed guns have a sense that people drive too fast.  I walk for exercise, and I have that sense, too.  I sense it especially on Griffing.  Our Police Chief does have a speed gun, and he says most traffic is between 22 and 29 mph.  More than 25 is not legal on any street except 6th Avenue, but up to 29 is not blazing speed.  And the effect of that slightly higher than maximum permitted speed is mitigated for pedestrians by those pedestrians walking against the flow of traffic, so they can see cars coming (at any speed), and step onto the swale or the median.

Sure, drivers should do the right thing.  So should pedestrians.  We should all be careful.  And no one should get hysterical.  We should find solutions to problems, not invent problems, because we're eager to do something.

I think the Chief is right.  He's new at the job, we just welcomed him, and we should see what he can accomplish for us.  He knows to try to slow the traffic down, and we should slow ourselves down.

I Was Wrong, and Harvey Bilt Was Right.

I made a mistake a month or so ago.  The matter of Will Tudor's new pet Boards was presented, and I made the mistake of speaking against them.  I completely disoriented Janey Anderson, who was mindlessly compelled to disagree with whatever I said (either she got this from Bob, or he got it from her), and she spoke in favor of these useless and meaningless Boards.  Well tonight, when the second reading of the Ordinance for the Boards was presented, I didn't bother to say anything.  I see how the bobbleheads act, and there's no point in trying to communicate with them.  They just do whatever they want, regardless of what any of us think.

So this time, since I didn't present a target or a distraction, probably half a dozen of our neighbors, including Janey, arose to speak strongly against the Ordinances.  Janey even remembered that she had spoken in favor of it before, but I don't know if she remembers why she did.  Not tonight, though.  Janey, Bob, the Kuhls, Dan Keys, and I think Chuck Ross all spoke against it.  And they offered a variety of reasons the new Boards were a bad idea.  No one spoke in favor of it.

Harvey Bilt, in reviewing his experiences with Commissions, talked about Commissions that don't listen to non-Commission residents of the Village.  And he was right.  Sometimes, they don't.  Harvey and the bobbleheads gave us a good dose of it tonight.  They completely ignored a collection of their neighbors, in favor of no one, and they passed the Ordinances everyone who expressed an opinion asked them not to pass.  Jenny Johnson-Sardella made some reference to positions she took when she was running for Commission.  She didn't seem to remember the bit about listening to neighbors.  Neither did Will Tudor.  And neither did Tracy Truppman, who was talking about something else later when she mentioned "complete disregard."  Yup, that's what it was: complete disregard for neighbors and the neighborhood.  Harvey sure was right about Commissioners who don't listen.  Well, four out of the five didn't listen.  Or maybe they did listen, but they just didn't care.  It was actually somewhat comical, in a twisted and pathetic kind of way.  Poor Roxy Ross.  On the short end of two more 4-1s.

"I" Have an Idea. I Think I Can Save Us a Lot of Tax Money.

I admit I didn't just think this up myself.  I took the idea from a number of Village residents.  Here's my current synthesis.

For a tiny and limited municipality, we have a noteworthy amount of overhead.  And our ad valorem tax rate is high to accommodate our needs, since we have no other real way of raising revenue.  And most of the non ad valorem revenue comes from us, too, in the form of user fees and utility charges.  Very many of us complain about all of this.  I think our real complaint is about the taxes, and if everything we did was free, we wouldn't be complaining about it.  That's what I think. If someone thinks I'm wrong, I hope they will correct me.

So the question is, could we have what we have, and not have to pay for it?  And I think there are some who think we could.  Here are some examples:

One current Commissioner pressed us into appointing a group of residents who will plumb the outside world, to see if we can get someone else to pay for us by granting us money.  And the resident group who will supposedly do this will do it for free.  They'll donate their time.  Another current Commissioner--actually our Mayor-- has suggested that some other imagined Village residents will also complete grant applications for us for free.  Unfortunately, one of our past Commissioners offered to do this for us, then reneged.  Our current Mayor claims expertise in this area, but she would never do it, either.  So I'm not sure this will ever happen, but the theory is that if it did, it wouldn't cost us anything.

Another of our current Commissioners sponsors a yearly gardening event on some public tract in the Village, and she calls it an MLK Day of Service.  Some of us help, and we do it for free.  Not only do we not get paid, we actually pay the Village!

Another resident a few years ago offered to donate to the Village a lawn mower.  There was a condition for the donation, though, and the condition was not met, so the neighbor did not donate the mower.

A year or two before that, a Commissioner-- the Mayor then-- offered to donate his own money to pay for a tiny public copying center at the recreation center.  I'm not sure that ever happened, but the offer was made.

Another resident, who happens to be a gun enthusiast, told me he thought we had, and paid for, too many police, and we could really contribute to our own security, literally by arming ourselves.  I suppose we would have to patrol, too, but we already have CrimeWatch, so maybe it would only be a short additional step to being organized vigilantes.

So here's what I'm thinking.  We could pretty much eliminate all of our expenses simply by doing for ourselves.  One neighbor will donate a lawn mower.  The condition was that we do our own solid waste collection, which would require us to buy at least one garbage truck.  Let's say we do that, too, and we can do it either with donations, or maybe we have to tax ourselves just a little bit.  Richard Ederr's son once spent a year as a Village employee, picking up garbage with our other hired guys.  But Richard's son got paid.  We can do this for ourselves with volunteer shifts, so we simply save the whole expense.  (Except the cost of the truck, maintenance, licensing, gas, and other possibly minor incidentals.)

We can get rid of the Manager and almost all Village employees.  Instead of volunteering to clean up one little patch of public land one morning per year, we have shifts to maintain all the public tracts all year.  By the way, we would need a Charter change for this, so that's an expense, too, but it's only one time, and it's not that much money.  We're already OK with blatantly miserable-looking medians and unrepaired streets, so what do we care if it stays that way?  We can just keep saving the money.

We already have two Village residents who volunteer at Village Hall and the recreation center, and they're both retired.  So we get more residents like that, and switch those two to full time.  Cha-ching.

Raise your hand, if you think we spend just too much money for our recreation function, and it serves people who don't even live here.  Exactly, just what I was thinking.  So we dump the whole business, and save ourselves the dough.

Our current Commission has hit on the brilliant idea of using more "reserve" ($1 per year, possibly negotiable) police officers (this is one of the great things about our new Commission: they think of the things that never before occurred to anyone).  So let's do that, supplement with ourselves on a real volunteer basis (not beating the Village out of $1 per year), go back to donated cruisers, instead of paying to lease new and reliable ones, and become truly hands on.  We have some firearm experts in the Village, and we can run our own training program.  In fact (oh, I did think of this myself), we can even train outsiders, and we can charge them for the training.  Cha-cha-ching!

And by the way, guess who gets in really good physical condition doing all the yard work, and chasing thieves.  Our new "tax" rate?  What taxes?  You're welcome.

Local Treats and Treasures.

I love gems.  And I love them even better when they're local.  Recently, I discovered two local gems.

At a MOCA art opening a couple of months ago, there was food service, as is typical of MOCA art openings.  One of the items was popsicles.  These were unique popsicles, with very unusual flavors.  And they were amazingly good.  I don't generally care for popsicles.  They're sweet and standardized.  Not these popsicles.  They didn't taste overly sweet at all, and they were a frozen version of gourmet dessert.

The person behind these popsicles is Megan Danko.  Her popsicle store, Ladyfingrs (no, I did not forget to type an e), is on 6th Avenue, just above 123rd St, on the east side of the street.  Her sign in the window says Popsicles, and she keeps a little bistro table and chairs outside during business hours.  Her slogan is "Fresh Popsicles Handmade with Love."  Do you think that's a bit too flowery?  You think it's a bit much?  Go taste one of Megan's popsicles.  Then tell me what you think of the slogan.

This is how Ladyfingrs' website describes the birth of this business: "It all began with two girls from fashion school and a love for ice cream. After working in the corporate world for several years, they both decided that bringing their passions together and starting their own business was the way to go. Mariana, already having amazing success with an ice-cream business in Brazil, brought the idea back to Miami to link up with business partner Megan and from that moment, Ladyfingrs was born."

I never met or spoke to Mariana, but Megan might be all the heart and soul this business needs.  And here's what they sell: "natural and hand-made ice cream popsicles with ooey-gooey surprises in the middle...sourced from the best chocolates from Italy, the freshest local fruits, and the most unique fillings from all around the globe."  They make their proprietary "Booze Pops, which are famous classic drinks served as a popsicle."  Their range of flavors includes coconut pineapple, lemon basil, passion fruit with condensed milk, strawberry mint, lychee rose water lemonade, mango ginger, chocolate lava (yes, "chocolate fudge gooey filling"), cream 'n' nutella, oreo madness, strawberry and condensed milk, watermelon flavor (sounds tame by comparison, right?), strawberry cheesecake, and dragonfruit blueberry.  Are you still reading this, or have you gone to Megan's place by now?

I know you're going to say $5 is too much to pay for a popsicle, but I think you should try "one" before you make up your mind.  If you love these as much as I do, and you really think $5 each is too much, ask Megan how many you would have to buy-- you know, to keep handy in your freezer, just in case you should ever want another one-- for her to give you the wholesale price.  And for what it's worth, not that I ever care about such things, but Megan is a delightful woman.  The address of the shop is 12327 NE 6th Avenue, and the phone number is 305-970-9252.  Megan's not always there when she's supposed to be, so maybe call first.

Last week, I went to the last installment of this season of musimelange.  I've told you about musimelange, and if you don't go, that's your problem.  It's quite an amazing cultural treat, like nothing you ever attended.  One of the central features is food.  The other central features are music and wine.  The food offering is always different from one musimelange evening to another.  This last time, they featured a bread offering (along with all the other food, the main course of which was extremely unusual tacos), and bread-based desserts.  The reason for this focus was the discovery of Bryan Ford and his wife, Alycia Domma.  They run a brand new bakery called Lesage.  Lesage is so new that they don't even have a storefront yet.  They work out of "shared [commercial baking] space" in Hallandale, and they deliver whatever their patrons choose.  They have two main offerings.  One is bread, which is fundamentally sourdough, and the other is croissants.

I love bread.  That, and tomatoes, are my favorite foods.  And I love sourdough bread.  For the past couple of years, I have bought little else, and I get Zak's bread, which I buy from Marky's gourmet grocery store on 79th Street.  I was completely content with Zak's bread, and I would not have considered getting any other bread, until I encountered Lesage.

Here's what Lesage sells: multiseed sourdough baguette for $3, plantain sourdough loaf for $6.75, papaya almond sourdough loaf for $6.75, multiseed sourdough loaf (the full size one, not the baguette) for $6.75, country white/wheat sourdough loaf for $5.50, croissants for $18 for six, pain au chocolat (chocolate croissants) for $24 for six, and fruit danish for $24 for six.  The sourdough loaves (probably 2-3 pounds)  are at least as good as Zak's-- probably a bit better-- and the croissants are the best I have ever tasted.  Bryan and Alycia, since they do not have a retail outlet, do not bake up a batch of goods to sell over the course of the day.  They custom bake what their customers order in advance.  And they deliver Mondays and Wednesdays.  So you tell them the week before what you want, and you'll get it on Monday or Wednesday.  If you're home, they'll hand it to you, and you can pay them.  If you're not home, they'll leave it for you, and you can pay them later or next time.  If you order on a given week, the prices are what I quoted.  If you commit to regular, predictable deliveries, a month at a time, you get a 10% discount.  And that discount is generous, because the bread is worth every bit of the retail price.  If you're interested, you can go to Bryan's and Alycia's site-- www.lesagebakery.com-- or you can call Bryan at 305-310-1487.  Funny enough, Bryan and Alycia live in Miami Shores, so it's easy for them to serve us on their way home.

Don't make a mistake.  Go see Megan, and give Bryan a call.  If you don't absolutely love what you get from them, I'll buy the unused portion of it from you, for whatever you paid.  And if you do absolutely love what you get from them, you're welcome.

Tracy Truppman Agrees With Me. Up to a Point. Sort Of. Maybe. Oh, Let's Just Wait and See.

Last night's meeting was one of those typically aimless ones that was not actually about anything.  Except we predictably hired Krishan Manners to be our new Manager.  We'll see if he stays on Tracy's good side.  Does Tracy have a good side?  Oh, yeah, it's if everyone does whatever she says.  So we'll see how Krishan "manages."

There really wasn't much else on the agenda.  That's why the meeting flew by in just over two hours.  Two school teachers wanted to use the log cabin for free for some awards dinner or something for their teachers group.  We gave them a hard time about it, until Tracy offered personally to provide free opening and closing of the log cabin, so they wouldn't have to pay.  Our regular charge was $500 per hour, the resident charge (one of the teachers is a BP resident) is $350 per hour, and we eventually reasoned that our only real expense was hiring some member of Village staff to open and close the log cabin.  So, if Tracy would do that, we had no expense (except the cost of electricity, which we agreed was nominal).  And Krishan also offered to be on hand for free.  And Dan Samaria offered to pay something or other.  But it was taken care of by Tracy and Krishan.  The discussion took way longer than it should have, though.  We paid John Hearn for that.

Will Tudor's ideas were back, this time at actual Village expense. Will wants us to have two new Boards.  He envisions one as a Safety Board or something, and the other as a Grant-Writing Board.  The Safety Board is supposed to be some collection of Village residents who will decide whether we need more lighting, sidewalks, or some other public safety-related feature.  Most likely, these residents will just dream up what seems to them to be safety enhancements, since no one said we had residents who were expert in this area.  And we do have a professional Police Department.  And a professional Manager.  And an amazingly effective CrimeWatch Chairman who has several yearly meetings which are attended by interested Village residents, the Police Department, all or most (until now) of the sitting Commissioners, and invited experts who make presentations.  So really, it's just not clear what this new Board is supposed to do, and on what its imaginings will be based.  And perhaps more to the point, if they do decide we should have more lighting, or sidewalks, or whatever else, which they will then suggest to the actual decision-makers (the Commission), we're limited by our real problem.  In any case, we moved this from Will's good ol' boy, plum common sense, folksy, inclusive wisdom to an Ordinance, which cost us money in legal fees.  The bobble-heads agreed with Will, too.  4-1, they agreed.  Poor Roxy Ross.  She's just spitting into the wind with those four.

Then, Will had us buy ourselves another Ordinance, too.  This one was his handy-dandy Grant-Writing Board.  Some imagined Village residents are going to meet to think of grants for which we can apply.  For, um, something.  I sure hope they're not those pesky matching grants, as almost all are.  We're going to match the grant money with what?  And who, exactly, is going to write these grants?  I reminded our fearless and thoughtless leaders of Bryan Cooper, who ran on a platform that included his offer to write grants for the Village (since he alleged he had lots of experience), but then, he got mad, because some Commission vote didn't go the way he wanted, and he refused to help us at all.  And I reminded Tracy/Will/Jenny/Harvey that Tracy had said at the last meeting that she had written many grants in her life (after my comments, she adjusted many to a few), but that in all the years she's lived here, she's never once offered to help us write a grant.  I neglected to mention the night Barbara Watts asked Candido Sosa-Cruz and me to come to her house to write a grant for something, as if any of the three of us knew how to write a grant.  So, after all these imagined grant inspirations are materialized, I still wanted to know who's actually going to write the grants.  That question remained unanswered.  Roxy Ross pointed out that any Board also makes its little claim on staff time.  But she was on the short side of yet another 4-1.

Tracy did at some point(s) come back to the matter of our real problem.  That's the one she and Jenny and Will agreed was our biggest problem, but which none of them has proposed to address.  Specifically, she reminded us that this year, there is the possibility/likelihood/guarantee that the Florida Legislature will offer a law expanding, yet again, the homestead exemption.  We used to be able to exempt $25K from being part of assessed value, then, it was/is $50K, and now, it may/will go to $75K.  That's value that will not be assessable for taxation purposes, which means assessed valuations will be that much lower, which means that property taxes will be that much lower.  There was some reference to the Village's ad valorem hit being about $200K for the coming year.  If (yeah, right, "if") the voters of Florida agree to have their property taxes reduced, which means a reduction of support for the municipalities.  And Tracy, being a good Commissioner/Mayor, said she hoped Village residents would vote against this expansion of the homestead exemption.

It's a different story-- isn't it-- when you don't just get to sit in the audience and criticize.  When you're actually responsible to do something, supposedly in support of the Village(!), you look at matters like this one a bit differently.  Roxy Ross related a comment once made to her by former Mayor James Reeder, who just died.  Reeder told her that the task in elected office is to "do something.  Just do something."  And Tracy wasn't exactly proposing to "do [anything]."  She was asking her neighbors not to do something.  She was acting as if she was worried about Village finances.  Good for her!  But later, she said in passing that we were maxed out on our millage.  We're not.  We have a little way to go to get to 10 mills, and it would make about $50-60K difference to the Village to go there.  I'm giving Tracy credit for actually knowing very well that we could raise the millage a little, but I'm interpreting that this was her way of saying she didn't have the courage and resolve to go there.  And Tracy owns three other Commissioners.  So if she wants us to increase our taxes, we'll do it.  If she doesn't, we won't.

But that wasn't what Tracy said or suggested.  She doesn't want to raise taxes.  She doesn't want to take that particular heat.  Rather, she'd like us to vote against the expansion of the homestead exemption.  We should do the heavy lifting, so she won't have to.  And won't be conspicuous for failing to do the little bit she could do.

So for a fleeting moment, and with her trying to dodge responsibility for it, Tracy agreed with me that we need to be more committed to our Village, and generous to it and ourselves.  She urged us to do what we can to keep our taxes just a bit higher.  She doesn't want to do what she can, and she'd like us to bail her out.  You got it, Tracy.  I'm voting against the expansion.

Miami Symphony Orchestra: An even Better Deal!

This is MiSO's last concert of the season, and it's this coming Saturday, May 6.  The venue is the Arsht Center, and the concert starts at 6:00.

The title of the concert is "Beethovenmania."  The program is the Leonora Overture No. 3, the Concerto for Piano and Orchestra No. 1, and Symphony No. 7.  There's a guest pianist for the Piano Concerto, and the guest pianist is not Beethoven.

I have season tickets, and my cost for a concert is $64 per seat.  The extra special deal for this concert is tickets for $20 per seat.  So that's a really good deal.  There are limited seats (50) at this price, and it's first come, first served.

If you're interested in this MiSO season finale, you can call Beatriz Cosson at 305-275-5666, or you can buy tickets through the website: www.arshtcenter.org.  The promotion code is MISO20.

4-1

There were several votes like that at the Commission meeting last night.  And Roxy Ross was on the very short end of each of them.  I don't think Roxy was having a good time of it, either.  It's not fun being on the short end of 4-1 votes, even when you're right, which Roxy was, each time.

There's an odd phrase to describe being happy about something.  The phrase is "like a pig in shit."  Everyone likes to be happy, but it would be hard to imagine finding it pleasing to be wallowing in shit.  I'm not sure even a pig would like that.  But that's what the four dominant Commissioners were doing, and they didn't seem to recognize for what it was that they were swimming in the stuff.

Harvey Bilt is our newest Commissioner, and he showed himself to be the fourth Tracy Truppman bobble-head doll.  I calculate he's the fourth, because I'm considering Tracy herself to be a Tracy Truppman bobble-head doll.  As someone in the audience last night said, maybe there should be a rule that new Commissioners are not allowed to speak.  They just have to listen.  And learn.  And if that meant that four of them were still silent, and only Roxy Ross was allowed to speak, we'd be far ahead by now.

The four very clearly have no idea what they're doing, or where they're trying to go.  Mostly, they just lurch around like Keystone Kops, unable to form any sort of meaning.  They have conversations that don't need to be had (clearly for no purpose than to hear themselves talk and fall in love with their own reflections), and last night, they specialized in trying to re-invent the wheel, on many occasions.  One discussion was about our new interim Manager, and whether the Commission should empower him to hurry up and hire a new Police Chief, or alternatively it should direct him to delay this hiring.  The "Commission" clearly had not the slightest understanding that Krishan Manners is the (interim) MANAGER.  He wasn't hired to be a secretary, or Tracy's assistant.  (I know, Tracy thinks everyone is hired to be her assistant.  I'd say she'll get over it, but she never has, and now, we've created a monster who will never, ever understand that she's not the center of the universe.)  He's the (interim) Manager.  That means he's the Manager.  And he has all of the responsibilities and prerogatives of the Manager.  Because he is the Manager.  The right to hire a new Police Chief, any time, and any way in the world he wants to do it, is not something the Commission can bestow on him or withhold from him.  And Krishan was graceful enough not to remind them of that fact.

It was both amusing and tragic to watch the four as they circled around the necessity to make decisions.  Jenny and Harvey should be more than familiar with the task, both of them having served on the Code Compliance Board.  But both of them, and Tracy, and the caricature that is Will Tudor, were every bit the deer in the headlights when they had to confront real issues, and conclude something.  I guess Harvey had an inkling that it would be like this, and that's why he ran like hell when I proposed a Meet the Candidates exercise in which he would have to have Commission-like discussions, and form Commission-like conclusions.  The four couldn't begin to do it.  They sputtered, and talked around, and possibly wet their pants.  They wanted delay, "workshops," and anything that would get them out of the hot seat.  But the hot seat is precisely what they asked for when they ran, and not one of the four could handle it.

They hid behind the concept of trying to get their neighbors to make decisions for them.  Tracy, for one, had the dodge that given enough "workshops," for example, "everyone" would agree about driveways, or whatever else.  News flash for ya, Tracy: "everyone" will never agree about anything.  The best you can hope for, if you want to hide from the responsibility to make decisions, is to identify and satisfy some sort of majority of your neighbors.  You can tell yourself that if you can find a majority, then they must be right.  Or at least that it's that many fewer people who will be mad at you.

Jenny Johnson-Sardella had an idea like that, too.  Somewhere in the discussion of choosing a new Manager from the meager list of mostly unimpressive applicants, Jenny said we "want to get it right."  News flash for you, too, Jenny: we already did.  We started out with about 57 applicants last summer, and very many people, including your neighbors, worked very hard to find the right Manager.  It was fine, until Tracy and you and the other bobble-head doll made Sharon Ragoonan's life miserable, and ran her out of here.  Do you know what consensus of how many people you overthrew to create the problem you now think you're going to solve?  And you three (now with a fourth, for extra padding, and to make yourselves imagine that might must, of course, make right) ran on an offer to "listen to [your] neighbors?"  Well, if you were listening, you were demonstrating a breathtaking failure to hear them.

The Agenda last night was actually very short.  It wasn't easy for the bobble-heads to torture it into a 3 3/4 hour meeting.  But that's what they did, bungling around, observing themselves talk and posture, and trying desperately not to make decisions that would 1) maybe be unpopular, and 2) screw up anything else.

Never Assume

I was not able to attend the overflow meeting last Friday, March 10.  I will be at the continuation overflow meeting on Wednesday, March 15.  For someone who promised to shorten meetings, Tracy Truppman seems to make them essentially endless.  In any case, I have begun listening to the recording of that 2 1/2 hour long March 10th slog.  And I found something important in the 40+ minutes of public comment at the top of the meeting.

Several speakers who were in support of the Truppman regime, and even some who weren't necessarily Truppman hounds, not only urged patience with Tracy, and confidence in her, but they also relied on a theory: that elected officials all want the best for their constituencies.  It was presented as a reason not even to criticize the regime, at this early phase.  I had to admit that that's quite an assumption to make.

Frankly, I don't think anyone, or certainly not most people, make assumptions like that.  And the more heated the campaigns, the less blind confidence people have in the commitments of the opposing side.  Just to take a highly visible example, I would say a very large proportion of conservatives did not assume that Hillary Clinton wanted what was best for the country, or even what she thought was best for the country.  And I would say almost no liberals assumed Donald Trump wanted what was best for the country.  Almost no one was agreeing to disagree, on the theory that we're all honest brokers at heart.

Not only do people tend not to make that assumption about "the other side," but it's not rare that people turn out to be right to be skeptical.  So why should we here in BP make the assumption that any elected official wants what's best for the Village, or even probably does?  There are various reasons to want to hold elected office, and not at all all of them are based in honesty, real concern for the whole constituency, or anything like altruism.

Noah Jacobs, for example, pointed out to the audience that no one would want to be a BP Commissioner for the money.  Money could certainly motivate some people in some places to want elected office, but I agree with Noah that the money is so meager here that it's very highly unlikely that it's the money that's of interest to office-holders.  But... some of our Commissioners have seemed to want every fiscal benefit they could lay their hands on-- some of them have seemed to nickle and dime the Village-- while at the same time, these Commissioners have not wanted to part with any of their money to donate to the Village.  For example, the Village has acquired three public sculptures, and it was three different Commissions that approved these acquisitions.  Some of the Commissioners were the same from one Commission to another, so it wasn't 15 different Commissioners who voted in favor.  And an uncommon Commissioner was opposed.  So maybe 10 different Commissioners voted for the Village to accept the gift of public sculpture.  And each of these sculptures was provided by a relatively small group of Village residents, who pooled money to buy the pieces of art.  But of the maybe 10 different Commissioners who approved these gifts, maybe only four of those Commissioners, or their families, donated.  So the other approximately six Commissioners may not have "made" a lot of money being Commissioners, but they sure didn't give anything back.  (There were several Commissioners I couldn't persuade to give $20 a year to the Foundation!)  Looking just at Noah's case, he received the high Village stipend: $4000 per year for two years.  And he voted in favor of the Village's receiving one of those sculptures.  So did he donate back $500 to contribute to that purchase?  $100?  $50?  $20?  $10?  Nope, not a cent.  Was Noah wrong, even about himself?  Was he in fact in it for the money?  Only Noah could know that.

And money isn't the only thing, apart from actual interest in the constituency, that would motivate someone to want elected office.  Some people like the power.  Or some sense of acclaim, or specialness.  As if it appealed to their personal narcissism.  Some might be padding resumes.  For example, there have been plenty of Commissioners who have served the Village on the Commission, but not on the volunteer Boards.  And most won't attend Commission meetings, either before they became Commissioners, or after they're not Commissioners any more.  It's as if if the meeting wasn't about them, or they didn't have ultimate power, then there's nothing to interest them even in being there.

So no, I wouldn't make the assumption that people who are Commissioners must, necessarily, obviously, automatically, want the best for the Village.  I wouldn't assume that at all.  And anyone who might criticize me for not making that assumption is seriously kidding him- or herself.  Or being disingenuous.  Or not paying much attention.

We can take as a perfect example the matter at hand.  The issue, before anyone tries to shift attention away from it, is the departure of our most recent Manager, and whether Tracy was being honorable or dishonorable about it.  Tracy has made a show of expressing concern over the Village's fiscal situation, and she tries to portray to us her conclusion that Sharon was either irresponsible or dishonest in addressing it.  What Tracy is trying to act out is what is supposed to look like her efforts, based on what she would like us to believe is her wanting the best for the Village.  That's the assumption.  It's the one speakers referenced when they asked that we not criticize Tracy, or when they themselves criticized those of us who did criticize Tracy.

The problem is that what Tracy tried to portray to us wasn't true.  Tracy did not find that Sharon did this, that, or the other thing, which Tracy then determined was faulty.  Tracy was out to get Sharon from the start.  Or just before the start.  Tracy was warning us that Sharon would make a poor Manager before we hired Sharon.  It was when Sharon was one of three finalists that Tracy was calling the then Commissioners (of which I was one), telling us what a mistake it would be to hire Sharon, and that Tracy's preference was someone who had already been dropped from consideration.  Tracy wasn't being fair or careful or protective of the Village when she laid into Sharon, from the moment Tracy took office.  Tracy does not in any way deserve that we should make the positive and politically correct assumption about people in elected office.  Not even close.  And if Tracy did not own and control two other Commissioners, Sharon, and the rest of us, would have ignored her foolish and undermining campaign.  It meant nothing, and would have been seen for what it was, except Tracy has stooges.  And we can't make the nice assumption about them, either.  Because they're not careful or decent or respectful.  They're simply dutiful, and their duty is to Tracy.  Not to the rest of us.

In fact, the reason we can't simply assume that Tracy and her pets have the Village's best interests at heart is that they don't make that assumption about us.  They didn't care about Sharon, they didn't care about the deliberations of the Commission that hired Sharon, and they didn't care about the deep well of positive sentiment of all their neighbors who very much favored Sharon.  I'm on record at the time, and I'll repeat here, that my first choice for the Manager position was not Sharon.  It was Mark Kutney.  But I liked Sharon very much, and when I could hear how Village resident after Village resident extolled the desirability to them of having Sharon as our Manager, I agreed to vote for her.  And it didn't matter if I didn't.  David Coviello, Roxy Ross, and Bob Anderson all preferred Sharon.  So Sharon was our choice, 3-2 or 4-1.  But she was the overwhelming choice of our neighbors in the Commission room audience.

So I heard it.  A number of our neighbors pleaded for the feel-good assumption about Tracy.  And they said it as if it should be the assumption about all elected officials.  It never is, and it isn't in this case.  And Tracy doesn't for an instant deserve that assumption.

If anyone has anything to say about my opinions, the comment opportunity of this blog is the place to say it.  Be honorable, and have courage, if you disagree with me.  Don't run behind my back, accusing me of  "cyber-bullying."  Is all editorializing, or reporting of news, "cyber-bullying?"  I'm stating what I observe and what I think.  You're welcome to do the same.  If you think I'm wrong, say so.  Publicly.  Here.  Have the courage of your convictions.  I do.  And whatever exposure or consequence anyone fears in stating his or her opinion is identical to the exposure and possible consequence I accept in presenting myself here.

You Can Put Your Party Shoes Away.

Oy, what a silly odyssey.  No one planned a Meet the Candidates event for this election, so I planned one.  I had in mind to make it different and more interesting (and illustrative) than the ones we typically do.  It was more unstructured, and it involved actual unrestricted conversations among the candidates.  The conversations were to be about various issues that have been or could be the stuff of Commission Agendas.  Instead of hearing what candidates A, B, and C would say about how they would think through one vague, hypothetical, and overgeneralized issue or another, I wanted them to have the actual conversations, exactly as they would if they were Commissioners.

Here are the Agenda topics I planned:

1)  Annexation.

As you know, our biggest problem is our finances.  Last year, the County Commission refused to hear our application for annexation of an area to our east, just over the track.  We have just gotten word that the reason they wouldn't consider our application is that they thought we were "cherry-picking," and not solving enough of the County's problem with unincorporated areas.  We have been informed that they could look much more favorably on an application from us, if we agree to annex the area we requested last year, and two residential blocks south of there, too, as well as a commitment to continue to annex gradually over the years, until we reach 108th Street.  Do we want to re-apply?

2)  Feral cats.

Residents continue to complain about the populations of feral cats in various parts of the Village.  They want something done.

3)  "Public" Art in BP.

Some residents of the Village appear to be art lovers.  They so much like art that they display it on their front lawns.  Some of these displays are quite conspicuous.  Other BP residents, however, do not appreciate this kind of imposition, and a few of them have lodged complaints.  Our Code is an "inclusive" one, meaning that anything not explicitly included in the Code is not permitted.  Public display of private art is not cited in the Code, and the offended neighbors want these private installations removed.  They consider them Code violations.  The Code Compliance officer is not sure whether this is the proper interpretation of the Code.  Neither is the Code Compliance Board.  They are all now turning to the Commission.

4)  Outsourcing.

The Commission has been receiving what seems like a flood of e-mails.  Some neighbors are complaining about WastePro, and they want you to end the contract, and revive a sanitation program run by the Village, as it was before we outsourced.  Other neighbors (about as many) are preoccupied with Village finances, and they want to outsource more Village functions.  They are aware of a lapse in leadership in the Recreation Department, and of the recent resignation of the Manager, and they consider this to be a perfect time for the Village to outsource many or most of its management functions.

For what it's worth, question 1 was Chuck Ross' idea, question 2 was Barbara Kiers' idea, question 3 was my idea, and question 4 was Roxy Ross' idea.  I was waiting for ideas from a few other people.

I asked the Commission for permission to hold this event in the log cabin, and to excuse me from paying for premises rental (as all Commissions give such permission and excuse such rental for this event) on Tuesday, March 7.  By the end of that day, all three candidates had agreed to the MTC plan for March 16, and the Commission had approved it.  And that's when things began to fall apart.  Or when some candidates began to get very cold feet.

First, it was Harvey Bilt, who wouldn't participate if I was the moderator (which was absolutely the plan).  I could never get Harvey to tell me what problem he was imagining, but I think, as best I could tell, that he thought I was somehow going to ambush him or fool him.  The most specific he would get was to say he objected to my authoring the questions.

Then, it was Dan Samaria, who told me he wouldn't participate unless the questions came from the audience, and told someone else he was worried about what Harvey was worried about.  I should say that I have never been unsupportive of either of them, and I offered, and delivered, help to Dan when he ran against me last fall, and to both of them regarding using this blog to publicize themselves, and appeal to their neighbors.  Harvey even took me up on the latter in 2013, when we opposed each other.  But now, both were in terrified mode and could not participate in any event that involved me.

Mac Kennedy was game from the outset.

I had a lot of back and forth with the three of them (not much with Mac, though) in the past week.  I couldn't get Harvey or Dan to flinch from their refusals to participate, and I decided their participation was vastly more important than was my fully controlling the event.  So I reached out to three people to moderate.  Drew Dillworth and Richard Ederr couldn't, and John Hornbuckle could.  So there it was.  And I made two other modifications to the original plan.  One was that I sought questions from neighbors other than myself (although I had reached out in advance anyway), and the other was that I gave the candidates the questions in advance.  And I told them that only one of the four was mine.  The only concession I would not make was to turn the event from a conversation among mock Commissioners into the stilted system we always use, where each candidate in turn has the same number of minutes to respond to the same questions.  It was essential to me that we try a different system.  It was to be an experiment.  It was to be fun.

But no, no matter what I did, I could not assuage Harvey.  As it turns out, I couldn't assuage Dan, either.  I took away every complaint, concern, or element of paranoia they had, except one, and they would not budge from their terror of this event.  And I have to say, I was very provocative with them.  I told them, and so did Mac, that it was wrong of them to try to control this event, and to try to minimize discomfort for themselves.   The thing they were afraid of is precisely the characterization of being a Commissioner.  Mac told them to "man up," and to "grow a pair," and I supported the challenge.  But no, they were not going to waver at all.

So Mac dropped out of the race altogether.  He wanted no part of such behavior.  I couldn't blame him.  I told him so.  I told him that the most he could accomplish was to be part of a 3-2 minority in which Tracy Truppman and her puppets would simply steamroll him and Roxy Ross.  So what was the point?  No one would listen to him anyway.  And it's not that I agree with every leaning Mac has or position he takes.  It's just that I think he's open-minded, reasonable, fair, and has the interests of the Village at heart.  If he's coming from the right place, I would trust his conclusions, even if I don't agree with all of them.

Does it make any difference whether Dan wins, or Harvey does?  No, not at all.  It seems to make a difference to Tracy, though.  She's been out campaigning with Harvey.  What does she want with him, though?  Is she afraid she's losing complete control over Jenny and/or Will?  Maybe.  I don't know the content of all the colluding that's very clearly going on among the three of them outside of Commission meetings, and I haven't seen the faintest suggestion of independence from either of them in meetings, but maybe Tracy knows what she's doing, or at least what she has to worry about.

So don't bother to come to the Meet the Candidates event on Thursday evening.  There's no event to attend.  But I'm told (not by our fearless candidates) that they're having their own event on Sunday.  I don't know the place or time.  But it doesn't matter.  I'm not voting anyway.  We're getting a new Commissioner on 3/28.  It'll either be Dan or Harvey.  You decide which one it is, if it matters to you more than it matters to me.