My Mistake. And Rafael Is Good For His Word.

Rafael told me in an e-mail which I included in this blog two posts ago that he hoped for what he called a "random act of kindness" from me on "1/4/20."  He made further mention of his reference to this on Nextdoor.  I told him I'm not on Nextdoor.  I didn't hear back from him about this.  I then wrote a post yesterday, and I referenced two assumptions I made regarding his hope for a "random act of kindness" from me on "1/4/20."  I was wrong about both assumptions.

I got curious about Rafael's mention of something on Nextdoor, and I looked for it.  I can view Nextdoor.  I just don't have an active account there, and I can't comment.  So I never look.  Except this time, because I wanted to know whatever Rafael wasn't specifying.

In fact, Rafael did mean Saturday, January 4, 2020, and he was referring to what he presented as a day of service in which he hoped Village residents would participate.  His proposal had nothing to do with voting for him, which is what I thought he meant when I also thought he meant Tuesday, January 7, 2020.

Rafael promised us two things.  One was that he is unfamiliar with many things going on in the Village, and the other is that he would learn fast.  He was right about both.

One thing Rafael learned very quickly has to do with the Village's problem about communication.  The current Commission has talked about this problem many times.  It seems the Village government and administration feel too much communication has been happening, and the goal is to stop it.  Ways of accomplishing this goal have included refusing to communicate at all (not announcing things, not responding to outreaches, and not answering questions), and communicating in such a minimal way, and with such unreliable offerings, as to be ineffective.  And Rafael has been mentored well already.  He offers as little substance as possible, and when there is ambiguity and lack of understanding, Rafael does not elucidate.  And Rafael has streamlined the process of learning about the Village and its functioning by relying on very few people to inform him.

As for the content Rafael intended regarding his proposed 1/4/20 day of service, because Rafael never told me what he meant, I don't know how Rafael understands this proposal.  For example, does Rafael think he came up with this idea himself, or does he think there was ever in the past a Village day of service, let's say in January?  If the former, I wonder how Rafael got this idea.  It sounds like a good and friendly and community-spirited idea.  We have Griffing Boulevard, named for Arthur Griffing, and Ed Burke Park, named for Ed Burke.  I wonder if we should memorialize Rafael's idea for a day of Village service in January by calling it the Rafael Ciordia Day of Service.

Or, does Rafael think anyone else ever thought of a Village day of service, in January?  Does Rafael think such a thing ever happened here?  If so, I wonder who Rafael thinks came up with this idea, when, and when and why it stopped happening.  Rafael says he moved to the Village in 2012.  I wonder if there was ever a Village day of service, in January, any time after 2012.  If there was, I wonder if Rafael ever participated in it.

I'm asking a lot of questions, I know, and I guess I'm unlikely to get the answers to them, now that Rafael has learned how to deal with the Village's communication problem.  But I'm still curious.

Kumbaya? That Paul Harvey...

Our Village special Commission election is the week after next, and Rafael Ciordia has made a suggestion to me.  Perhaps it was a request.  Rafael said he "hope[d] to catch [me] doing a random act of kindness come 1/4/20."  I'm making two assumptions here.  One assumption is that he meant 1/7/20, and the other is that the "random act of kindness" he had in mind is that I vote for him.

On the surface of it, Rafael's suggestion seems as if it could be friendly and inclusive, and meant to forge a nice connection between me and him.  He's running for Commission, and I'm welcome to get right on the Rafael Ciordia bandwagon.  If that's not Kumbaya...

But here's the problem.  Three people are running for two seats, and Village voters are only allowed to vote for two candidates.  For one thing, and most conspicuously, I've already chosen two candidates whom I support.  Their campaign signs are in the swale in front of my house, and Rafael's isn't one of them.  So, if Rafael has in his mind that I would change my own mind, and vote for him, then he's advocating that I withdraw my support from at least one of the candidates I already support.  What Rafael sees as an "act of kindness" toward him is an act of marked unkindness, and even betrayal, toward someone else.

And further, I didn't have to support the two candidates whose signs are in my yard.  I chose them.  And I chose them, because I decided they would be better Commissioners, and be better for the Village, than would Rafael.  It's my prerogative to make judgments and conclusions like that, and I made them.  So again, if I do the "act of kindness" toward Rafael that he suggests I might do, then I vote for someone who I think will represent the Village, and me, and all the rest of us, worse than the people I already chose.  The "act of kindness" Rafael suggests I do for him is an act of unkindness, and even sabotage, to the Village.

Is this what Rafael had in mind when he made his suggestion?  Is this seemingly friendly and inclusive idea of his really disruptive, destructive, and divisive?

The point is that everything in the world has various ways of looking at it.  Everything has pros and cons.  Rafael makes a big mistake if he thinks a good-natured suggestion like that I should vote for him is uncomplicated, or even, in any sense at all, the right thing to do.  I suppose that on the other hand, Rafael might have been sending me a subtle message, or even a threat.  He could have been telling me that I vote for him, and support him, and don't criticize him, or else.  If he wins a seat on the Commission, he won't be the only Commissioner who relates to me, and many of us, that way.

I've already said, repeatedly, that I like Rafael.  He's a nice, friendly, seemingly intelligent guy.  I'm less impressed with his judgment.  He makes a decision to run for Commission, on whatever basis he made that decision, without critically important local background (or any prior manifestation at all even of interest).  And he adopts understandings that are peculiar and not reality-based, like his conclusion that any Commissioners were ever threatened, or that a Commissioner would need extensive legal counsel on the basis of being criticized.  I've witnessed a number of Commissions, and I was on one.  Every Commission, and every Commissioner, gets criticized.  No one ever gets threatened.  And no one suddenly can't make a move without extensive consultation with whoever is the Village attorney.  This is all invented.  And Rafael swallows it, hook, line, and sinker.

Rafael is told a story, and it's a very quirky and unsupported one, which is not remotely true, and he doesn't fact check it.  He never learns what Paul Harvey called "the rest of the story."  He has no perspective, and he's not looking for one.  Rafael has told us repeatedly that he will compensate for his areas of knowledge deficiency by learning quickly.  Is this what he means?  He'll ask Tracy Truppman and Krishan Manners, and consider himself well-informed?  Yikes, Rafael!

Rafa Has Given Me His Permission to "Cut and Paste" This e-Conversation.

Rafa wrote to me regarding the last post:

Now you’re just auditioning to be my chief of communications.  And for the record, the full line was “when a woman tells you she feels threatened, believe her”.  

Hope to catch you doing a random act of kindness come 1•4•2020. See my challenge to our village neighbors on Next Door.

Have a great holiday and healthy, prosperous new year.

Rafael

I replied:

I'm not on Next Door.

I hope we all see a non-random act of decency from you before 1/7/20.  If we see it very soon, you'll save your Village over $16K.  But if you think either of your opponents would make such a terrible Commissioner that it's deeply important that you do something to prevent it, then you should stay in the race.  And I'd be curious to know which of your opponents strikes you as that bad, and what's so bad about them.  I myself must have missed it.

Fred

PS: PPS: Since you're correcting me, and quoting your line more precisely, I gather it was a staged and pre-planned quip.  Interesting.  Tracy and Krishan really do have you very tightly by the balls.

Also, I'm sure it's clear to you that you could have responded to me in the blog, so the conversation would have been public.  I encourage that.

Rafa wrote back:

My friend, journalism with integrity 101.  The video is there, you didn’t even have to take notes.  Quoting partials takes them out of context, and that’s the stuff of hyper-partisan politics.  I told you I strive to be ,ore public servant. And my prepared thoughts included adding “and children too.  And men won’t tell you we are threatened.  But sometimes we are... yadda yadda.  

Also - I said trying not to be trite … “Residents come and go, the village is forever” but really *at least hopefully* 25 more years until Biscayne’s wondrous shore is creeping up to our elevation.

So much to say, so little time.  And the questions were pretty softball, don’t you think?  I was sure there’d be some good ones like the OCITT audit, and details about the negotiations with CNM and the 121 street maintenance split, and the FEMA reimbursement delays.  Alas.

I’m totally OK with you thinking Tracey/Krishan have my in their court.  You are predisposed to that notion, and anything I could say would only have you double and triple down. 

I won’t be commenting on your blog. I will have conversations (face to face, or digitally) with you, and you can cut and paste to your blog all you want to, if you need to. All I would ask is that you are faithful in the representation of my words.

Best,

Rafael

I concluded:

Rafa,

I don't consider myself a "journalist," but it seems to me journalism 101 can be a two-way street.  It is certainly the responsibility of the "journalist" to report accurately.  But it is the reciprocal jeopardy of the "journalist" to have to be revealed to be wrong, when s/he is wrong.  You have two kinds of opportunities to "out" me.  You can ask me for access to the blog, in which case you have to reassure me you won't sabotage anyone else's material, or you can post any comment you like, with no restriction from me.  And you've taken that second opportunity, so you know it's available to you.  Frankly, I think that on the surface, it's unfair of you to communicate with me only privately to tell me I was wrong about something.  But you've resolved that unfairness by giving me permission to "cut and paste...all [I] want to," and I accept your offer.  What I plan to do is "cut and paste" the entire back and forth we're now having (unless you tell me you've changed your mind, and withdrawn your permission), so there's no danger to you of my not being "faithful in the representation of [your] words."  They're your words.  All I'm going to do is cut and paste them.  By the way, there are many* typos and incorrect usages.  I'm going to cut and paste your comments precisely as they are.  I'm not going to fix anything for you.  If you want something fixed, you'll have to do it yourself.

You should not feel there's little time to say as much as you want said.  Take the time.  Say it all.  You have an audience.  You have made zero outreach to me.  (You only eventually accommodated Chuck and me when we reached out to you.)  Political candidates are not permitted to campaign on Next Door.  I have no idea what method you're using to try to introduce yourself to your neighbors in such a way that they would want to vote for you to represent them.  It all seems unbelievably sketchy to me.  I don't tell you how to run your life, or how to run for office, but if you didn't have abundant secret help, you would be dead in the water in this campaign.  You couldn't do what you're doing without Tracy and Krishan working for you.  And as I said in the blog post about which you commented to me, you adopted a very peculiar angle about our exploded attorney's fees and the sergeant-at-arms, and almost no one in the world, except Tracy and Krishan, would look at it that way.  Everyone who has said a word about it thinks one way, and Tracy and Krishan, and now you, think another way.  Coincidence, huh?

I'm going out to do yard work.  When I come back, and maybe after I get cleaned up, I'll do the "cut and paste" task.  If I haven't heard from you to ask me not to do that after all, then my light is green.

Fred

*I said "many," but on review, there are only a few.

Also, I forgot to respond to Rafa's estimation that the questions were what he called "softball."  I agree with him.  I, too, would have liked to see more probing questions.  What was interesting, coming from someone who has not been involved with the Village in any way, nor come much to Commission meetings, was what Rafa was expecting.  Why would he have expected questions about CITT, the various negotiations with CNM, and delays in reimbursement from FEMA?  He doesn't, from the context of an uninvolved and uninformed Village resident, have any awareness of these issues.  Whoever told him what questions would be on the exam didn't tell him the right questions.

You Pick the Title of This One.

I don't always know I'm going to blog about something.  Sometimes, as I experience it, the idea comes to me that I have something to communicate, and what is the most relevant angle.  That's what happened at the Meet the Candidates event tonight.

My first thought (the idea for a title comes to me before I'm fully aware of what I want to discuss) was "Well, We [Met] the Candidates."  If I had used that title, I would have talked about what the candidates said.  But frankly, most of what all of them said was, apart from being answers to questions, and not their own agendas, essentially non-provocative pablum.  Each of them wanted as much to make nice with the others as they did to tell us what was on their minds.  And I'm not complaining.  The evening was structured that way.  I suppose it was nice to see that they could make nice with each other, and find lots of areas of agreement.

My second thought for a title, which came not long after my first thought, was "I Said It Before, And I'll Say It Again."  If I had used this title, I would have focused on how civilized and engaging they all were, how Mac Kennedy was slightly more substantive than was Ginny O'Halpin, but that Ginny acquitted herself well, and what an undiluted charmer is Rafael Ciordia.  I still like Rafael, and I still don't trust him.  He could have been running for anything anywhere, and he would have presented himself the same way.  At one point, he forgot the question, after Ginny and Mac had answered it, so he asked for it to be repeated and had to offer something completely off the cuff.  And where Rafa said he "doesn't want to be trite" (that's what he said), trite is precisely what he was.  He knows next to nothing about the Village, and his best offer was to promise to learn quickly.  One example of that delightful and enthusiastic gentleman's output had to do with a question about speed bumps.  Rafa talked about what a great thing it would be for us to start by putting those crossing warnings on 6th Avenue, so lights would flash, pedestrians would cross, and drivers would decide it's easier just to drive on Biscayne Boulevard than it is to "cut through" BP.  It was obvious that Rafa does not know 6th Avenue is not ours, that it's a state property, and that we can't do things like that.  And that was one of Rafa's few mistakes, in offering an opinion that was not simply trite sloganeering, resorting to platitudes, and agreeing with whatever the other two said.

What came along near the end of the event was my last choice for a title.  And that one was "Now We Know the Answer to the Question."  There was frankly pretty good and uniform agreement among our three candidates, about more or less everything.  Until we talked about the budget.  Ginny started, and she complained about the explosion of the legal expense.  It was a pretty cheap example of shooting fish in a barrel, but she wasn't wrong.  And Mac, who spoke next, completely agreed with Ginny.  They both said we've spent way too much on our attorney.  Rafa looked at it in a different way.  Oh, he, too, talked about the legal expense, but he wasn't blaming the Commission, or the mayor, or the manager, or the attorney.  No, Rafa blamed us.  Rafa explained that the mayor had been so beset with complainers so early in her term that she had no choice but to check, double-check, and triple-check everything she did, by consulting liberally with the attorney.  Because we criticized so much.  And that wasn't the last time Rafa used that perspective.  A little later, the topic of how the Commission could get along better among itself, and with the non-Commissioner BP residents, came up for discussion.  And again, Ginny and Mac agreed about one thing: we need to lose the sergeant-at-arms who sits at the Commission desk, and has the effect of intimidating BP residents.  But Rafa didn't see it that way.  He let us all know that it was our fault, and that someone(s) at that Commission desk said she/they felt threatened, and that "when a woman says she feels threatened," Rafa admonished...

Now, the fact is, Rafa, who has no experience with the Village and its functioning, and has never come to meetings until very, very recently, could only have heard an angle like this from two or three people in the world.  He could only have heard it from Tracy Truppman or Krishan Manners, or maybe the legal scam from Rebecca Rodriguez.  And there he was tonight, at the Meet the Candidates event, letting us all know who controls his thinking.  And showing us that when he doesn't know something, he'll believe any nonsense Tracy Truppman or Krishan Manners tells him.

My question about Rafa all along has been who's behind him.  Propping him up.  Feeding him.  Molding how he would understand things (about which he doesn't know).  I had my suspicions.  Tonight, he told me I was right.  He told that to all of us.

I Want to Go On a Bit About Rafael Ciorida

I've already said I don't trust Rafael, and I believe I made clear what my issues are.  At the same time, I like him.  I like him a lot.  I would like to have Rafael-- he says to call him Rafa-- as a friend.

And here's a potentially important consequence of not trusting Rafa.  Mac Kennedy is a guest author on this blog.  So is Ginny O'Halpin.  There are 18 guest authors, apart from me, on this blog.  Guest authors have complete access to the blog.  They can do anything I can do.  They can publish anything they like.  They can also have access to anything that's been published.  They could edit something that was already published, or that's a draft, even if it wasn't theirs.  They could delete a post, or a comment, or a draft, even if it's someone else's.  I have to be able to trust guest authors not to do that.  I wouldn't do it, and no one else is allowed to do it.  I have removed three guest authors, either because they did that, or because I came to suspect they would.  I want Rafa to be a guest author, if for no other reason, then because it would help him in his campaign.  I've told this to Rafa.  But for me to have the blog send him an invitation to be a guest author, I have to trust that he won't make mischief.  One of the three people I have removed as guest authors is Tracy Truppman.  She posted something once.  It was a post in favor of outsourcing sanitation.  But I didn't make her a guest author, because she happened to agree with me about that.  I wouldn't have cared what position she espoused.  I made her a guest author, because I thought then that I could trust her not to mess with anyone else's stuff.  When I decided I could no longer trust her that way-- that I couldn't trust her to be honest and respectful-- I removed her.  If I have to worry that Rafa and Tracy are more in league with each other than either of them is admitting, then I can't trust Rafa.  And I will say again, Tracy is extraordinarily controlling.  She's off the charts controlling.  And if I know that Mac Kennedy can't possible be a Tracy stooge, and I'm sure Ginny O'Halpin couldn't, either, and Tracy didn't put up any of her usuals, and I know she desperately needs one more stooge, then to me, Rafa is it.  Especially if his connection is Krishan Manners, who is very, very firmly under Tracy's thumb, and who will evidently do anything for her.

I don't like it this way.  I don't like not trusting Rafa.  I want to trust him.  But he's not giving me a basis to do it.

Anyway, here's what I really wanted to discuss about, and with, Rafa.  Rafa is a comparative unknown in BP.  And he's doing a very unusual style of campaigning.  I haven't heard of any events for him, and he reportedly won't use yard signs.  He's running for office, and he wants votes from people who don't know him, but he's flying under the radar, and campaigning in a stealthy way.  So the thing that springs to mind for me, conspiracy theorist that Rafa says I am, is that he's getting help that's not visible.  He's getting help from Tracy Truppman, in the form of phone calls or whatever style of leaning on people that Tracy does.  And if recent history is any indicator, then this might be very effective.  Rafa might very well win a just under three year seat or a just under one year seat on the Commission.  So my question is, then what?  And I'm asking specifically.

For example, the thinnest possible majority for a BP Commission-- two out of three remaining Commissioners-- just passed an Ordinance on second reading.  The Ordinance was to spend money the Village really doesn't have to waste on a Code infraction special magistrate.  And not one Village resident who is not one of the two Commissioners who just passed this Ordinance spoke in favor of it.  Everyone who had anything to say, except two Commissioners, was against it.  And it's now an Ordinance, passed into Village law by two Village residents/Commissioners over the objection of everyone else who expressed an opinion.

But the other Commissioner, Dan Samaria, the one who voted against this scheme, says he intends to bring this issue back for reconsideration when there's a full Commission.  Dan asked the skeletal three-person Commission not to consider this matter for second reading, because the Commission was too small to be fairly representative, and we're about to get two new Commissioners in one month from now, but the two majority Commissioners refused to wait.

So my question to you, Rafa, is this.  Supposing you somehow get elected, which, without help from Tracy Truppman, would seem out of the question, and supposing the magistrate Ordinance finds itself immediately back on the agenda.  How would Commissioner Rafael Ciordia vote?  I'm asking.  Rafa, Dan Samaria will put this back on the agenda.  Tracy and Will will vote as they did before.  Dan will vote as he did before.  Either Ginny or Mac will vote some way.  Let's imagine, to make the discussion interesting, that either of them votes to return to a Code Compliance Board only.  How will you vote?  I know you'll remind me that you don't know much about the issues, and you intend to learn, but the issue is now.  You were at the last meeting, where the issue passed on second reading, and I'm not sure you weren't at the meeting before that, when there was first reading.  All of your neighbors who expressed themselves don't approve of this.  How will you vote?

And I'll ask you the same question about the other Ordinance on this past week's agenda.  It was the rules and procedures Ordinance, and it was for first reading.  It was a terrible idea, and not one of your non-Commissioner neighbors liked it.  Dan Samaria didn't like it.  The only two people who liked it were Tracy Truppman and Will Tudor.  So those two people voted to pass it on first reading.  And again, to make it interesting, let's suppose you win a seat, and either Commissioner O'Halpin or Commissioner Kennedy doesn't like this Ordinance.  You're the tie-breaker.  Break the tie.  How will you vote on this one?  (Dan Samaria persuaded his two Commission colleagues to set this for second reading in February.  He's saving it for you.)

Or, let's make the same suppositions, and assume Tracy and Will think Tracy should be the mayor, and Dan and either Ginny or Mac think she shouldn't.  Break that tie.

I hope I'm wrong, but I think Tracy still has juice around here.  I think she's going to get you elected.  And as one of your constituents, I want to know what you're going to do.

Ginny O'Halpin and Rafael Ciordia, the Other Two Candidates.

I met with Ginny O'Halpin last week.  Ginny posted a small amount of information about herself on this blog.  I've met Ginny a few times, I like her, and I trust her.  She does not have extensive knowledge about the Village's functioning and its particular problems.  She just feels, as she said in her short post, that somehow, the government here is not working, and since she's gotten over the loss of her husband, and she has time, she thinks she should try to help, or confront whatever is faulty.  As I said, her specific grasp on what is faulty is tenuous.

Ginny told me one story that she found interesting, and illustrative, and I agree with her.  After she submitted her paperwork to declare herself as a candidate, she got a call.  From Rebecca Rodriguez.  The Village attorney.  Rebecca personally called Ginny to give her a helpful heads up.  She pointed out that in her application, Ginny said she owned properties other than the one in which she lives in BP, and Rebecca was advising Ginny to report income from these properties.

So, here are the problems with this helpful little phone call.  First, Ginny didn't say she derives income from these properties, and she doesn't.  One of these properties is in the upper Keys, and the other is somewhere else, and Ginny and her late husband used to use them for vacations.  Why Village attorney Rebecca Rodriguez took it upon herself to assume these were income-generating properties was not stated and was unknown.  Second, even if these had been income-generating properties, and even if Ginny hadn't reported this as a source of income (you have to report sources of income in your application to run for elected office, presumably so it can be determined if there are any possible causes of conflict of interest), Rebecca Rodriguez, the Village attorney, should have been the last person to have called Ginny with a helpful heads up.  Village attorney Rebecca Rodriguez should never even have known about these properties, or the content of Ginny's application.  The Village clerk would have known about and handled that, or she would have brought it to the Village manager.  Ginny told me this story to illustrate one of the problems she wants to confront (or maybe several of them), and it was a pretty good illustration.

I met Rafael Ciordia this week.  Chuck Ross and I intended to talk with him together, and we tried to make arrangements.  But Rafael portrays himself as an almost hopelessly busy guy, and it was not easy to get him to agree on a time and place.  Chuck and I were intent, and we accepted Rafael's offer to meet at Alaska Coffee Roasters at 7:00 AM.  Frankly, Chuck and I had the same thought: that Rafael was offering something he thought we would reject, because it was so inconvenient.

Anyway, Rafael is a ball of enthusiasm.  He's all smiles and some version of happy talk.  He likes slogans, like that you should always ask a busy man to handle a responsibility, because busy men are so intent on getting things done.  Rafael has a lot of slogans like that.  And everything excites and inspires him.  Rafael knows next to nothing about the Village and how it works, and every topic that is raised, and every question that is asked, inspires Rafael to reassure that this is exactly the kind of thing he wants to learn.  (He's much more willing to learn on the job than many other people would be, and than some people would be to "hire" someone whose first mission is to try to figure out what the job is.  But that's Rafael.)

I like Rafael.  He's a delightful person.  He's very outgoing and friendly.  I told him I like him.  I also don't trust Rafael.  I told him that, too.  He's willing to do stupid things, like learning on the job, and he expressly considers it unnecessary to start anywhere near the bottom of the ladder.  He has, at best, tremendous confidence in himself.  That's the careless part.  If Rafael was only careless and didn't have the world's best judgment, I could maybe forgive him for that.  I think Rafael considers himself very smart, and I don't disagree with him.  I do think Rafael gets a bit ahead of himself, since he isn't deterred by finding out how little he knows, and he's an early morning person who is taking on a responsibility part of which occurs at night, and even relatively late at night.  Rafael fell asleep during this week's Commission meeting.  Would Rafael force himself to stay awake if he was on the other side of the Commission desk?  Maybe.  Probably.  But as Chuck Ross said to Rafael and to me, Rafael is doing the equivalent of cramming for an exam.  All of a sudden, Rafael is coming to Commission meetings, and board meetings.  If he can't stay awake when he's cramming and the exam is the next day, it's maybe not looking great.

But that's not my big problem about Rafael (who, by the way, is on the circulation for this blog, and is more than welcome to post a comment).  My big problem is the other reason I don't trust Rafael.  I don't know where Rafael's candidacy came from, and Rafael isn't saying.  I know, and Rafael acknowledges, that he's friends with, or thinks particularly well of, Krishan Manners.  I have no reason to think Rafael would even have known about the Commission or the openings had it not been for Krishan tapping him on the shoulder.  Rafael knows I'm skeptical about this, and in his stated attempt to prove to me at least that it isn't Tracy Truppman seducing him into running, he told me some story about Tracy's having approached him after this week's Commission meeting, to confirm that he was Rafael, as if Tracy wasn't sure who Rafael Ciordia is.  But Tracy is a control freak.  Even if it was Krishan who dug up Rafael, Tracy would have known all about it.  And no doubt have met and spoken at length to Rafael.

Rafael also told me and Chuck his version about how he decided to run for Commission, and why, for example, he didn't start out at some other level of "service" (Rafael likes to say he's inspired to "serve" the Village).  He simply got the calling.  It was simply time.  He didn't get the calling two weeks or two months or two years before Betsy Wise and Jenny Johnson-Sardella resigned, and we declared we had to have a special election, and there were empty board seats.  No, Rafael got the calling only when we suddenly needed two new Commissioners.

And then, it gets slightly worse.  In recent weeks, there's been a lot of talk about a proposed agreement between us and CNM.  The subject was the medians on 121st St.  The bottom line is that the agreement was in some sense terrible for us.  There have been e-mails circulated around about this problem of the terrible proposed agreement.  No one who had a word to say about it thought it was anything but bad.  It came up at this week's Commission meeting.  And important background is that it is alleged that it was either David Hernandez, Krishan Manners, or both of them who hatched this terrible proposed agreement with CNM idea.  The Commission had to decide whether or not to resolve to accept it.  Bizarrely, this hot button, highly scoffed at, proposed agreement that would be dramatically disadvantageous to BP was placed on the consent agenda.  This is supposed to mean it's so obviously acceptable that it doesn't require any discussion.  Who on earth placed it there?  Beats me.  But it was only Dan Samaria who had sense enough to take it off the consent agenda, so it could be discussed.  By the time the discussion was over, not one of the current Commissioners approved of this obviously acceptable (placed on the consent agenda) agreement, and even David Hernandez admitted it had some, um, drawbacks.  But the very next day, in a group e-mail discussion, Rafael was still saying-- and he was apparently by then the only one saying this-- that he liked the proposed agreement.

I don't trust Rafael, because I don't know who is his sponsor, or his client, or whom he represents.  I don't know what he's about, and apart from the slogans and the platitudes, he isn't telling.

As I said, I like Rafael.  I would like to trust him.  I would like to be behind him and his alleged wish to "serve" the Village.  But he's making it impossible to do it.  It's a great deal of song and dance, but no substance.  And he unwaveringly rejects advice like that he should not run for Commission now, but get on a board, learn what he admits he doesn't know, and run in the future.  He's in a big hurry.  Just when Tracy Truppman happens to be desperate for one more stooge.

Oh, Judith...

The most recent meeting of the so-called Charter Review Committee was last night.  I didn't go.  I had made commitments to do two other things yesterday evening and night.  Frankly, from what I experienced at the CRC meeting before last night's, I would have preferred a root canal to sitting through another of those.  And from what I'm told, I guessed right.

I don't know what happened at the meeting.  I hope someone who was there and who reads this blog post will give some of the knock down, drag out.  What I was told was that Judith Gersten harassed and unloaded on Dan Keys in the same way she harassed and unloaded on Roxy Ross, and Dan Keys, and me, in the prior meeting.

As I said, I don't know what this was supposedly about.  If it was anything like the last meeting, it wasn't about anything, except being nasty.  What a waste of an opportunity to have the honor to review the Charter.

I don't know if it should be counted as a further waste, or the opposite of a waste (it depends on your perspective), for me to suppose that Rebecca Rodriguez was there, too, merrily experiencing the ticking of the lawyer's clock.

One of the Stepford CRC members, Kate Eaton, was appointed to the BP Foundation just this week.  I don't suppose Kate thought maybe she shouldn't be on two unrelated work groups at the same time.  I hope she thought that.  It would be great not to have her vacant smile and bobbing head on the CRC.  The CRC is supposed to be a serious endeavor, although clearly, neither the CRC nor the current Commission treats it that way.

Is It Friday, December 6, Already?

Apparently, it is.  I'm reminded of that fact, because Art Gonzalez just sent out an e-mail to let his neighbors know to come to his house from 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM today.  Art is hosting a Meet Mac Kennedy event, and he and Mac are eager to meet and be met by neighbors.

Art lives at 10926 Griffing Boulevard.  He says he'll answer the door from about 6:00 to about 7:00.  If anyone arrives after that, they should just make their own ways around the side gate to the back yard.

So, go meet Mac, if you don't know him already.  Tell him you'll vote for him, or you have reasons why you won't (and it's his job to change your mind), or grill him until you've decided.

The election is on Tuesday, January 7, at the recreation center building.  (That's where elections held in BP always are.)

On another note, Linda Dillon just sent out an e-mail to say there's a formal and highly structured Meet (All) the Candidates event on Thursday, December 19, at 7:00 PM, also at the recreation center.  If the meet Mac event is sort of partisan, Linda's event, which is co-sponsored with Judi Hamelburg, is not.  So, try to get to both events.  Not to be too heavy-handed about it, but it might make a huge difference for whom you vote in January.

Bunker Mentality

What a sad Commission meeting we had last night.  The fact that we only have three Commissioners was offset by the momentum Will Tudor felt to forge ahead with anything at all, because a quorum is a quorum.  Technically.  This meeting was so sad that it could have made you feel like you wanted to cry.  Linda Dillon has been coming to Commission meetings for 40 years, more or less without fail.  She sits in the front row, and she observes.  Only since the reign of the current Commission (the Truppman/Johnson-Sardella/Tudor/Bilt/Wise iterations of it) have I seen Linda arise to speak.  Most of what she says is complaint about this Commission (these last two, since 2016).  Last night, I thought she was on the verge of tears at one point.  And I'm not criticizing Linda Dillon.  I, too, was on the verge of tears last night.

Biscayne Park's "squad" (Tracy "Big Mama" Truppman, her boy, Krishan Manners, and her best/last girl, Rebecca Rodriguez) entered the room together, like a little clot, and the show started.  It's so in-your-face provocative when these three enter together, having completed their pre-meeting strategizing over at the bunker.

There were a couple of minor and uninteresting, and irrelevant, presentations, and then, it was time for the consent agenda.  The consent agenda is a collection of matters that are considered so mundane, so self-contained, so minor, and so patently acceptable that they could be approved as a bundle, with no discussion.  A common component of the consent agenda is minutes from other meetings.  Also included last night was the acceptance of a donated police car.  And an agreement with the state Attorney General's Office about cost-sharing.  This is boilerplate stuff.  It's routine.  It doesn't need any discussion.

So, imagine how peculiar it was to find on the consent agenda the minor, unimportant little matter of a proposed Memorandum of Agreement with North Miami, regarding tree and plant maintenance on medians we share with them on 121st St.  This issue has been the topic of lots of concern among Village residents lately, and it has led to various e-mails sent to Commissioners, asking them not to approve this very faulty Memorandum.  But Tracy and Krishan-boy and Rebecca-girl thought this matter could be approved without any discussion, on the consent agenda.  Dan Samaria didn't think it was that simple and straightforward, and he pulled it from the agenda.  By the time the matter was discussed, much later in the meeting, all three of our remaining Commissioners agreed the agreement should not be approved, and they asked PW Director David Hernandez to go back to CNM to rework it.  Even David Hernandez, who says the agreement was his idea and his baby, admitted it was not a wonderful deal for the Village, but he considered it a foot-in-the-door starting point in an effort to come to agreement with CNM about something.  Anything.  And this is what seemed to the current ruling class like a matter that didn't require, or perhaps deserve, any discussion.

And then, there was the second reading of Tracy and Will's special magistrate Code Board scheme.  It was Mac Kennedy in his public comment who described what it's like to try to communicate with these two autocrats.  One gives you a dead stare, and the other flips papers.  And at the end of public comment, they both ignore everything anyone said-- they don't even comment on it-- and they do whatever they want.  They work as a "majority," in the thinnest sense of the word.  And that's what they did last night.  Dan Samaria said that if they pass this, knowing that two new Commissioners will be joining the Commission in just about a month, Dan will put this new and expensive Ordinance back on the agenda, so representatives of the rest of the Village can have something to say about it.

Precisely the same thing happened about the first reading of the next Ordinance, which was a "rules and procedures" suppression measure.  Resident after resident commented publicly in fierce opposition to this proposal.  Dead-eye stared, and the page-flipper flipped his pages.  And then, they passed their abortion on first reading.  The only thing that represents anything like good news is that second reading won't happen until February, so the new Commissioners can have something to say about it.  (Please vote on January 7, and be very careful with your vote.  Please don't vote for anyone who will function as the newest Tracy Truppman stooge.  This is toxic and destructive, and it needs to come to an end.  Soon!)

She's a funny one, that Tracy Truppman.  I first saw her do this early in 2017.  There was a proposed Ordinance to make it a crime in the Village for anyone to impose "therapy" to try to change people/teens/children from homosexual to heterosexual, and Tracy argued against this Ordinance.  Many municipalities across the state passed Ordinances like this one, and it was the City of Miami Beach that asked us to get on board with it.  Tracy wanted the Village's position to be represented by a Resolution instead.  We just want to say we sort of don't prefer this kind of pseudo-therapeutic abuse of people/teens/children.  But we don't want it to be forbidden.  You would think Tracy, who is herself homosexual, would have had more compassion for homosexual people, and wanted to protect them from abusive parents and pseudo-therapists, but that wasn't her leaning.  And of course, whatever Mama wanted from her Jenny-girl and her Willie-boy, she got.  And last night, Big Mama did it again.  But this time, she had total backing from her Krishan-boy, a manager she completely controls, and her Rebecca-girl, an attorney to whom Tracy gives so much of our money that the so-called attorney can't think straight, except always to do whatever Mama wants.  This issue last night was a whistle-blower protection effort.  Big Mama and Willie-boy and Krishan-boy and Rebecca-girl could think of all kinds of reasons why not.

Similarly, Linda Dillon and Judi Hamelburg requested free use of the recreation building for our used-to-be-invariable Meet-the-Candidates event.  We always had this event, until Tracy encouraged her stooges to refuse to participate, and the fee to rent the building was always waived, until Tracy instructed her stooges not to agree to waive it.  But this time, good Rebecca-girl and Tracy concocted some bizarre argument by which perhaps it wouldn't be a good idea for the Village to waive the fee.  It would somehow make the Village partisan regarding elections.  This approach is not substantive.  It's just nasty.  And just this one time, as hard for him as I'm sure it had to have been, Will Tudor voted with Dan Samaria, and against his Mama.  And let me say, Mama was very displeased.  I don't remember her exact words (she mumbles so quickly and softly that it's hard to understand much of what she says anyway), but she considered this to represent great jeopardy to the Village, and to have been an awful tragedy.

That's pretty much all that happened last night, although there was one more interesting exposee.  During the discussion of the "rules and procedures" suppression of Village residents, the issue was raised about the new placement of the sergeant-at-arms.  We've always had one, or two, and they sit at the back of the room.  This was true when meetings were at the recreation center, and it's been true since we moved meetings back to the log cabin.  But Tracy decided we needed a sergeant-at-arms right at the Commission desk.  Well, this struck some Village residents as unfriendly, and even intimidating.  Tracy's lieutenant, Rebecca-girl, stepped in to explain.  First, she alleged, some Commissioners reportedly said they felt in some way threatened by their neighbors.  Rebecca-girl never named any Commissioners who allegedly claimed they felt this way.  And this was Rebecca-girl's reason for thinking we needed a sergeant-at-arms very close to the delicate and allegedly threatened Commissioners.  But it wasn't just her own idea, she explained.   She had many meetings and conversations with our police chief regarding this issue of placement of the sergeant-at-arms.  Really?  Someone asked her if any of the Commissioners were present for these reported meetings.  According to Rebecca-girl, Tracy Truppman was present for "some, but not all," of these meetings.  Now, the fact is, discussions like this have nothing to do with the Village attorney, or any of the Commissioners (or the Commissioner who is the mayor).  This is something that should have been handled only by the manager.  If he-- Krishan-boy-- wanted to discuss it with the police chief, that's what he could and should have done.  But Big Mama kept her Rebecca-girl on the clock for things that had nothing to do with the Village attorney.  And she paid her attorney with our money.  So the attorney would always protect her.  Which she always does.

New commissioner

My name is Virginia O’Halpin.  I am asking for your vote for Commissioner of Biscayne Park.

My husband, Richard Schmaeling, and I decided to leave condo living and return to a house.  We loved Biscayne park, and we decided to make this our forever home. Unfortunately Richard died 1 1/2 years ago.                

I am a former New Yorker. My first husband and I raised 5 children in Garden City, Long Island. I graduated Adelphi University, majoring in criminal justice and business administration. I completed my graduate work at CW Post University.  I retired from the Nassau County sheriff’s department as a deputy undersheriff.  
                                                                                                                                                                  I decided to run for Biscayne Park Commission, because I believe strongly in government's transparency.  I think we have lost our way. Article I in our charter says it all: “ this government has been created to protect the governed, not the governing...”. Government should be a place to ask questions and get answers.  And respect should be mutual.            

Please feel free to ask any questions of me.  And please vote.

Thank you.

musimelange. It Doesn't Get Any Crazier Than This.

We've talked about musimelange.  It's four evenings, always Mondays, 7:30 PM (doors open, and hors d'oeuvres are available, around 7:00), starting in January, and including a cheese and bread, and silent auction, reception, followed by as much gourmet bites and good wine as you like, followed by a chamber concert in a salon setting (usually classical, but sometimes jazz, flamenco, or other genres), followed by gourmet desserts.  The setting is the M Building, at the corner of NW 2nd Avenue and 30th Street (194 NW 30th Street).  These are unbelievable evenings.

The usual price is embarrassingly low at $65 per evening.  Unless you subscribe, in which case it's $200 for the four evenings.  This year, the price (finally) increased, so the subscription price is $210 for four evenings.  But...

There's a "Cyber-Monday" special.  If you go to www.musimelange.com, you can subscribe to the season.  You use the code MUSI-CYBER20, and you get the four-evening subscription for $180.  That's $45 per evening.  That's only good until Monday night, December 2.

Or, if you're not persuaded you'd really like/love this, you can try out an evening.  You can reserve at RSVP until one week before the evening, and pay $60.  Or, you can reserve at Regular through the Sunday before the event, for $65.  If you just show up for the evening, without having paid in advance at all, it's $70.

$45 per evening is a shocking deal, and it's even a wonderful deal if you pay as much as you could: $70 per evening.  There's no part of this that isn't spectacular: the ambiance, the setting, the food, and the music.  And the socializing.  There's lots of mingling with everyone, including the artists.  Speaking of "artists," the woman who owns the M Building has a very funky and interesting collection of art in this building.

If you want to know what the upcoming season is, it's as follows:
1/27/20, "Diamonds Are..."  Music is from Rachmaninoff to ABBA, and the featured guest performer is pianist Konstantin Soukhovetski.  I've heard him several times, and there is little more musical fun to have than listening to and watching Konstantin Soukhovetski.  His backing group is violinist Anne Chicheportiche, who happens to be the founder and artistic director of musimelange (and a very delightful individual), and cellist Ashley Garritson (a cellist who appears frequently at musimelange evenings, and other classical places around Miami, and who is a wonderful cellist).
2/24/20, "Melodies with Susana."  Anne Chicheportiche describes Susana Behar as hypnotic.  I would say that's a perfectly fair place to start with Susana Behar, and her voice, and her presence.  I've only known her to perform in flamenco ensembles, although she's also oriented toward Judaic music.  In my opinion, Susana Behar is off the charts.  There's no mention of anyone backing her.
3/9/20, "Flourished."  The description starts with "A baroque evening," and I don't bother to read much after that.  Baroque?  Oh, yeah.  But, since I'm talking to you, I'll also say there is a countertenor (can it get better?), and the thoroughly engaging and fabulous local alto, Amanda Crider.  To round this out, there's a flute, a cello (not Ashley Garritson), a violin (yes, Anne), and a guitar.  The guitarist is Brandon Acker, who plays very unique and custom made guitars, uniquely tuned, and he's a wonderful person.
4/6/20, "Tutti." "A concert based on friendship, and showcasing musimelange artists and their friends."  I have no idea what program Anne is planning, presumably with a variety of musicians who have played for her, but I will be there.  Sight unseen, and it doesn't matter.  I'll love it.  So would you.

www.musimelange.com

The Stealth Commission Candidacy of Rafael Ciordia

Here's what's now coming into focus.

The first weird thing I heard about Rafael, apart from the fact that he has no reason in the world to run for BP Commission, was that he, Rafael, whom no one knows, decided he shouldn't have yard signs.  The alleged reason is that Rafael is environmentally conscious, and he doesn't want to have created for him yard signs that will wind up in land fills.  It's also true that signs cost money, but why would anyone think Rafael doesn't want or need to spend money?

The next odd thing I heard about Rafael is that you can't easily reach him.  There's a phone number available, and it's the same phone number he listed on his application for candidacy, but it's not Rafael's phone number.  It's the phone number of his partner, Eddie Bridges.  Some people reached Rafael using the e-mail address he included with his application.  I was not told if Rafael was upset about that.

Once those Village residents met up with Rafael, they discovered that he knows nothing about BP, its government, or how it works.  Rafael has no agenda or platform.  He is, as one person described him to me, "basically clueless."

This is a little bit crazy.  We're talking about representative government, and the idea that constituents would be represented by someone who knows nothing about the constituents, the place, or the government.  Who would think of such a thing?  I guess we already talked about that.  Steve Bernard would think of it, and so would Tracy Truppman.  And so far, each of the times it's happened, it's been a disaster.

I guess the idea here is that some fake candidate will be put up for office, and a selection of the voters/constituency will be asked to vote for them, sight unseen.  And if recent history is any indication, this approach will work.  It will "work," that is, to get the fake candidate elected.  It does not work to contribute to the betterment of the Village.  But very clearly, that's not the goal of the candidates, their sponsors, or the people who blindly vote for them.

By the way, it occurred to me I didn't start the adaptive vs maladaptive Commissions story back quite far enough.  I started with the destructive manipulations of Steve Bernard.  But just before that, starting in 2006, we had a normal Commission, which didn't include Steve Bernard.  For a while.  That Commission got us started with professional management, and it got a Public Works building constructed.  It was a very civilized and smooth-running Commission.  It was the last Commission whose meetings took no more than 2-2 1/2 hours.  That Commission made only one mistake.  When Ted Walker died, three of the four remaining members of that Commission made the really bad blunder of appointing Steve Bernard to fill what was left of Walker's term.  Only Kelly Mallette detected an odor no one else recognized.  And it was that stench that brought us Bryan Cooper, Barbara Watts, and Noah Jacobs, and paved the way for people like Tracy Truppman, Will Tudor, and Betsy Wise (I'm giving Jenny Johnson-Sardella a little bit of credit for having at least been part of a legitimate work group, and seeing the commitment to the end), and which is now gearing up to try to deliver to us Rafael Ciordia.  What is it about learning from mistakes, and history?


PS: I was supposed to meet Rafael yesterday.  I was supposed to join Chuck Ross.  But Rafael never responded to Chuck's offer to meet.

The Contempt is Breathtaking.

We've seen this before.  Since I moved to BP, we saw Steve Bernard do it.  He tapped people-- I'm thinking of Bryan Cooper, Barbara Watts, and Noah Jacobs-- who were completely or largely detached from the Village, its traditions, and its functioning, and he worked to get them elected to the then Commissions.  The results when it was just Steve and Bryan on the Commission, were obnoxious.  The results when he arranged a whole majority-- Cooper, Watts, and Jacobs-- were disastrous.  And Steve bizarrely orchestrated among his proteges that Jacobs, who had been here the shortest time, did not own the home in which he lived, and only got a two-year term, should be Mayor. 

Then, we had three peaceful and productive years, with only Watts still on the Commission, and Bob Anderson, who was angry and had lost interest completely, to join forces with her, and an adaptive majority that made a number of dramatic accomplishments for the Village.

And then, it was back to lawlessness and disorder.  Tracy Truppman got herself elected to the Commission, and following in the pattern of Steve Bernard, she chose underlings who were uninvolved, unknown, and disinterested, but who would do whatever she told them to do.  And she apparently had enough juice in the Village that she could get them elected, too, as Steve managed to get elected grossly inappropriate people.

After David Coviello resigned, Harvey Bilt got elected to fulfill David's term.  It didn't take long to realize that Harvey, who is a long time resident, and very involved with the Village, and who should have known better and been independent, also collapsed and became a stooge for Tracy Truppman.  Harvey finished David's term, and he did not run again.  But Will Tudor did, and Tracy worked to get him the best deal she could, which turned out to be another two year term.  Will had shown absolutely nothing during his first two year term, and although he later made very brief, tentative, and inconsequential noises which could have suggested he might have a little bit of independence from Tracy, he soon enough collapsed again, doing whatever was Tracy's bidding.  And with Will, Tracy supported the successful candidacy of Betsy Wise, who was exactly like Bryan Cooper, Noah Jacobs, and Will, in that there was no connection to the Village, apart from living here, and no commitment, except to Tracy.  None of these people know anything about the Village, and none of them care.  They all only have one patron, and that patron either was Steve Bernard or is Tracy Truppman.  The whole sense of Village government is badly corrupted by this dynamic.

Now, Betsy Wise and Jenny Johnson-Sardella, both dutiful Truppman clients, have resigned, and we are about to fill their seats.  Our choice is one candidate (Mac Kennedy) who owes nothing to Tracy, one (Ginny O'Halpin) who probably has no connection to her, and one (Rafael Ciordia) who is most likely the next bobblehead.  The best evidence for this likelihood is that Rafael, like Cooper, Jacobs, Tudor, and Wise, is uncontaminated by any connection at all to the Village, apart from the fact that he lives here, and what is known of him includes a connection of sorts to Krishan Manners, who will do anything to save Tracy (and his own job, apparently), and the fact that Tracy did not put up anyone else whom she more conspicuously backs.  Tracy wants stooges, and she's not subtle about it.  If one of her known stooges isn't running, and she didn't put up anyone else, then Rafael is it.

The issue, though, is the mindsets of people like Steve Bernard and Tracy Truppman.  Both are dramatically manipulative, and neither seems to feel remotely bound by any concept of the truth, or any apparent obligation to tell it.  Both are self-serving.  Neither one cares about the Village, its laws, rules, and traditions, or how anything affects other Village residents.  Both will work to foist onto Village residents both representatives and consequences that are not in the interests of Village residents, but are intended only to protect and elevate the patrons themselves.

It's a level of contempt-- of disdain-- that's hard to fathom.  It's a terrible way to be treated by some of our own neighbors.  But we're back where we were in 2013, and we have the opportunity to shake this off, and elect Mac Kennedy and Ginny O'Halpin.  It remains to be seen how much influence Tracy still has with the people who, like her clients, are completely out of the loop, and will believe and respond to whatever Tracy tells them.  Will they somehow come to believe that Mac Kennedy and Ginny O'Halpin are terrible people, which is what they will be told, that Tracy is working hard, and at the disadvantage of being completely unfairly under siege from evil-doers, and will they bother, which they would normally never do, to come out for a special election in order to vote for Rafael Ciordia, who, they'll be told, is the only person who can save their dear, special Tracy from the forces of the dark side?  Rafael Ciordia, they'll ask?  Who's he?  I've never heard of him.  Oh, he's great, Tracy will reassure.  Very involved, and very concerned.  Do me and all of us, and yourself, a favor, and vote for him.  It's really important.

We shall see.

If You Don't Know Mac Kennedy. Or If You Do.

Mac Kennedy is running in the special election to fill two Commission seats.  The election is on Tuesday, January 7, 2020.  Long before anyone knew about these two open seats, Mac made plans-- holiday plans and business plans-- that will keep him out of town for part of the time in which he could do the usual style of campaigning.  So he's eager for chances to meet and talk to as many of his neighbors as possible, and concentrated opportunities to do that are really efficient right now.

Art Gonzalez is having a meet Mac Kennedy event at his house on Friday, December 6, from 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM.  Art, and Mac, would love for you to come by.  If I were Mac, I would be more interested in meeting people I don't already know, and particularly people who don't agree with me, than in huddling with people who are already on the bandwagon.  But Mac, and Art, say everyone is welcome.

"Wine and appetizers."

Art's address is 10926 Griffing Boulevard.

Art would like to know how many people to expect, so let him know at usaart@yahoo.com

And...They're Off!

On January 7, we're having an election to fill two Commission seats, and there are three candidates.  They are listed on the Village website as Mac Kennedy, Rafael Ciordia, and Virginia (Ginny) O'Halpin.  This is not alphabetical order, the lady isn't first, and I don't know what accounts for the order of candidates listed.  It's possible it reflects the order of when candidates turned in their paperwork to declare themselves.

Mac Kennedy hit the ground running, BP resident-wise.  He made himself well known as soon as he moved here, which was probably around five years ago.   He's been on a board, he's volunteered in other ways, he comes to meetings, he has strong opinions, and he's outspoken about them.  In full disclosure sort of thing, I have become friendly with Mac.  I like his brashness, I like his style-- especially his writing style and word usage--, and I have complete confidence that he has the best welfare of the Village centrally at heart.  I don't always agree with him about particulars, but he cares very much about the Village.  And perhaps most critically right now, I know that Mac fully understands the disruption and corruption that are Tracy Truppman, and he wants her displaced.  There is nothing more important and more urgent in Biscayne Park right now.

I know nothing at all about Rafael Ciordia.  My friend, Chuck Ross, knows who Rafael is, and he pointed him out to me at one or two of the most recent Commission meetings.  I've never heard of Rafael.  If it weren't for the fact that Chuck knows everyone, he wouldn't have heard of him, either.  I'm assuming, because Rafael is an approved BP Commission candidate, that Rafael lives in BP.  He has no involvement with the Village in any way.  I have no reason to think he knows anything about the Village, apart from the fact that he lives here, presumably.  I'm going to make one guess, though.  I'm going to guess that he knows Tracy Truppman, or she knows him.  Rafael is exactly like Will Tudor, or Betsy Wise.  These are people who are totally disconnected from the Village, except that they happen to live here, and Tracy finds them, persuades them to run, and they then become bobbleheads.  Jenny Johnson-Sardella could have been somewhat more independent, but she wasn't.  So Rafael is fairly standard Tracy Truppman material.  Tracy demands to control everything.  For a little while, it appeared that maybe Will Tudor had developed some independence, but he's surrendered it.  He's back to being Mama's good boy.  So Tracy only needs one more bobblehead, and I'm guessing this is where Rafael comes in.

I've known Ginny O'Halpin, at a distance, for several years.  I don't know her well.  I don't know when she and her late husband moved here, but they alternated their time between here and one or two other places for at least a few years.  As best I know, Ginny is here full time now.  Ginny is not involved with the Village.  She has not been on any regular boards (she might have been on one or two ad hoc committees), and she does not generally come to meetings.  In that sense, she looks, superficially, like Tracy, Jenny, Will, or Betsy.  Or Rafael.  Except I do know Ginny at least a little, and she's a very nice person.  And as often as I've spoken to her, which isn't often, she always seemed to care about the Park.  And Chuck has confidence in her.  But there's a really weird factor about Ginny, and it cements my confidence in her candidacy: Milt Hunter.  Milt Hunter?  Yes, Milt Hunter.  The rumor I heard is that it was Milt Hunter who persuaded Ginny to run.  So, who cares what Milt Hunter thinks about anything, including who should run for Commission?  That's what you're asking yourself, right?  It's a good question.  And let me tell you the answer.  As best I understand, Milt Hunter hates my guts.  I have guesses as to why he does, but he never said.  We used to be "friends," but then, he suddenly hated my guts.  So we weren't friends any more.  And as part of his declaration of enemyship, he dedicated himself to keeping me from getting re-elected to the Commission.  Milt worked very, very hard to get Tracy Truppman and her then two stooges elected.  He couldn't think about anything else, and he couldn't think straight.  He was in a blind frenzy to do anything he could to get Tracy et al elected.  And he succeeded.  But then, poor Milt Hunter came to realize he had made a really big mistake in getting Tracy/Jenny/Will elected to the Commission.  He's railed furiously against them since.  And against Betsy Wise.  (Funny, and sad, enough, on top of whatever Milt was so mad at me about before, he then got even more mad at me, because I didn't defeat his efforts to get Tracy elected.  This is what I mean about a blind frenzy.  Mrs Bonadies, my high school calculus teacher, used to ask students who got certain things wrong "Are you deaf, dumb, blind, and stupid, Mr_____?"  And you have to read that with a southern accent.)  All Milt wants-- now-- is to displace Tracy and her domination over the Village.  So if Milt Hunter got Ginny O'Halpin to run, then that tells me something about whence Ginny is coming, and what she wants.  And doesn't want.  And that's what I need to know right now.

I'm very happy to vote for Mac Kennedy.  I'm going to campaign for him.  I hope I hear something from Ginny O'Halpin, and assuming I get confirmation of what I already suspect about her, I'll be happy to vote for her, and campaign for her, too.  Rafael Ciordia?  No.

"UnChartered" Territory

Yes, of course I know the correct term is uncharted territory.  That's why I put "unChartered" in quotes.  And why I capitalized "Chartered" in "unChartered."  I'm talking about the Village Charter, and the current effort to manipulate it.

From time to time (three times, including now, since I moved here in 2005), the Village Commission appoints a committee to review the Charter.  We creatively call this the Charter Review Committee.  It's not uncommon that most of the members of the Charter Review Committee are nominated by individual Commissioners, with maybe a couple added "at large."  That's sort of what happened this year.  Sort of.  It turns out that most of the then Commission, before almost a quorum of it resigned, don't really have any connections in the Village, and therefore, couldn't nominate anyone.  And most of the nominees live very close to and/or are known by, Tracy Truppman.  If anyone imagined that Tracy came up with almost all of the nominees, and had her stooges on the Commission, while there was the whole complement of stooges still there, name them as nominees, that person would probably have hit the nail more or less on the head.

We have a Committee composed of people almost all of whom know nothing about the Village or its Charter, who are not parts of any Boards or work groups (until now), and who do not attend meetings.  Just to give one comical example, one of the members actually did attend a Commission meeting, once, a month or two ago.  It was unclear why she was there, but she introduced herself by letting everyone know she and her husband were new Village residents, having lived in Colorado, and they had gotten a Code infraction citation.  Well, she told us, she and her husband never even knew there was such a thing as Codes.  I guess we're asked to assume they don't have Codes in Colorado.  Or maybe they weren't in touch enough to know about those Codes, either.  But such a new resident is supposed to read and understand the Village Charter, and consider whether or not it should be changed?  It's unimaginable she knew we have a Charter any more than she knew we have Codes.

So, these people have been entrusted with reviewing the Village Charter.  The Charter is to the Village what a Constitution is to the United States or a given state.  It's not for sport, and it's not trivial.  For example, for us to change our Charter, which we have done, a proposed change has to be agreed upon by a referendum vote by Village residents.  The last time we changed the Charter, to move our elections from private elections in off years to the general election, there was a popular movement to make this change, a Charter Review Committee agreed this change would be a good idea, the then Commission made its recommendation (which was not to move the election: we can talk about that dysfunctional Commission some other time, but let me only mention the names Jacobs, Cooper, and Watts.  'Nuf said?), and the public voted in agreement with the change.  The Charter is not just words any idiot can read.  It's a historical document, with a background, a context, and an important functional implication.  It should take more than knowing Tracy Truppman, or having a nice smile, to qualify someone to consider the Charter, and whether or not it needs to be changed.  By the way, the last Charter Review Committee, which, interestingly enough, included Jenny Johnson-Sardella (more shortly), made the one recommendation about moving the election.  The Committee before that couldn't find anything to recommend changing.  So, considering changing the Charter is something that is very carefully done, unless someone tells you it's really simple, and you don't need to know much of anything.  Which is what happened this year.

Just to complete the reference, Jenny Johnson-Sardella submitted a list of proposed changes.  Her list, although brief, was more extensive than the one-item suggestion made by the Charter Review Committee she chaired.  And it tended to be in line with some of Tracy Truppman's suggestions.  Something has inspired Jenny's creative ambitions about the Charter since she was part of a more normal Committee.

As I said, the Committee was conspicuously distorted from the start, because of who were its members.  By the first Committee meeting, one of the Commissioners who appointed a member had herself resigned from the Commission.  By the second Committee meeting, another Commissioner had resigned.  So, two of the Committee members no longer had sitting patrons on the Commission.  Unless they all really only had one patron, and it was Tracy Truppman.  But it gets worse than that.  It gets a lot worse.  As the name clearly states, the purpose of the Charter Review Committee is to review the Charter.  We have a Charter, and copies of it were made available to Committee members.  There was no evidence as to whether or not any of them read it.  We can only say they had access to it.  What the Committee reviewed was not the Charter, but it was instead a sizable list of specific suggestions for change, and that list came mostly from Tracy Truppman.  The list was of specific provisions and citations in the Charter, and what was Tracy's recommended new language.  Tracy did not give any reasoning, unless she contacted Committee members privately to twist their arms, and no reasoning was discussed by the members as they dutifully entertained each of Tracy's suggestions.  And all of them, except Roxy Ross and Manny Espinoza, mindlessly agreed to whatever Tracy wanted.

And here's an interesting illustration of this problem.  One of Tracy's preferred changes was that the Mayor be elected at large by Village voters, instead of being elected by the Commission.  As it turns out, this idea has been kicked around from time to time by various Village residents.  A prominent such resident is Kelly Mallette, who was herself a Commissioner, elected at the end of 2005, and not re-elected at the end of 2009.  (Kelly was, by the way, a fine Commissioner, but her day job keeps her in Tallahassee much of the time, and she "attended" a noteworthy number of Commission meetings by phone.  It's possible Village residents and voters never got a good enough chance to witness her in action and be engaged by her.)  In that sense, there's a history to this proposal.  But to know that history, or even to care that it exists, Committee members would have had to be involved enough in the Village, and to know people like Kelly Mallette, and that she was a Commissioner who felt this same way, in order perhaps to reach out to her.  None of that happened.  All that happened was that Tracy Truppman said she thought the Mayor should be elected at large by Village voters, and her little group of followers nodded.  None of them knew anything about this issue, that it had some support from some Village residents, or why it hasn't been adopted in 86 years.

Other suggestions were even more nonsensical and unsupported, but all of them got affirmation by Tracy's appointees.  Except, as I say, Roxy Ross and Manny Espinoza.  Roxy was so grossly and disrespectfully mistreated in the second meeting, openly insulted and suppressed by the Chair of this group, that she resigned from the Committee.  I have no idea what Manny thinks he's doing there.  He appears to be the only remaining thinker in a group of Stepford Committee members.

I've said it before, and I'm saying it yet again: hell of a Commission and Village government we elected for ourselves.

Gentlepeople, Start Your Engines.

Jenny Johnson-Sardella tendered her resignation from the BP Commission today.  We are now electing two new Commissioners on January 7.  The qualifying period for candidates begins next week, on Wednesday, November 13.

If two people who are not under Tracy Truppman's sway are elected, then Tracy is no longer in charge of anything (or everything), she no longer runs anything (or everything), she no longer intimidates and punishes people, and the Village can function.

If anyone is interested in serving a one or three year term , they should declare a candidacy as of November 13.  The two seats available are to complete terms.  Betsy Wise's term has three more years on it, and Jenny Johnson-Sardella's has one more year on it.  Next year in November, we will hold our regular election, and the terms of whoever took Jenny's seat, as well as Tracy's and Will Tudor's terms, will be over.  Any of those people can run again, or they don't have to.

Our Charter provides for election of the highest vote-getters.  In a normal election, when we elect three people, the two highest vote-getters get four year terms, and the third highest vote-getter gets a two year term.  There is no reason not to assume that in the special January 7 election, the highest vote-getter will get the three remaining years of Betsy Wise's term, and the second highest vote-getter will get the one remaining year of Jenny Johnson-Sardella's term.  That would be consistent with how we normally approach elections.

So, think it over-- but don't take too long-- and declare a candidacy during the two week period beginning Wednesday, November 13.  "May the force be with you," or whatever.

All Dressed Up, and No Place to Go.

Bob Anderson announced with special pride that he showered for the Commission meeting tonight.  Although Bob is always appropriately tarted up for these dos.  I bet he smelled nice, too.  Jeff Drayman looked nice.  So did Jared Susi.  Dan Ward was casual, but he thought he should show up, just to be sure no one was making any mischief with his tax bill.  David Raymond, sans Amy, had on his guitar tee shirt.  I liked it.  And Janey Anderson looked very nice, and so did Barbara Kuhl (Gary wasn't there), and Linda Dillon.  Ernesto Oliva was his usual dressed down self.  Dan Keys has been looking consistently sharp this past year or two.  I'd even say dapper.  Dapper Dan.  And he did tonight, too.

I don't know what was so interesting on tonight's agenda.  It was some standard nonsense, including the second reading of the magistrate Ordinance no one except Tracy Truppman wants.  And a first reading of a particularly idiotic Ordinance about establishing rules and procedures for Commission meetings.  See, here's one of the disadvantages of having a Commission composed almost completely of people who have no familiarity with how normal Commissions operate in BP.  It's true they could simply have read the Charter, but I think they think they're too unique for that.  And they clearly generally can't be bothered with the Charter anyway.  Meetings are run more or less according to standard procedure, like Robert's Rules of Order, and with adjustments made by the Mayor or the Commission.  This works perfectly well, and each Commission can have its own style.  But this Commission doesn't know anything about that, and besides, Tracy Truppman is almost single-mindedly devoted to unloading Village money on her staff of attorneys.  So she likes Ordinances, so she can pay the attorneys to do what the Village doesn't need done.

We did have one unusual guest, though.  Actually, there were two of them.  They were the county Inspector General and her assistant, and they were there to talk about the whistleblower matter.

And there was some other stuff, too.  None of it worth having on an agenda, but enough to fill time, and get the attorneys paid.  But not tonight, though.

Will Tudor had already announced he wouldn't be there.  One story was that he might have claimed he would be out of town tonight.  But two people saw him at home tonight, so it wasn't clear why he took a dive on this meeting.  Tracy Truppman was there, and so was Dan Samaria.  Who wasn't there was Jenny Johnson-Sardella.  I think we've all lost count at this point, but one person sort of tabulated that Jenny has missed five or six meetings-- Commission and workshop-- in a row!  So, with only two Commissioners in attendance, there was no quorum, and therefore no meeting.

The problem of Jenny and her apparent abdication of responsibility has come up quite a bit lately.  I wrote to her in July, to ask her to resign.  Mac Kennedy wrote to her, completely unaware that I had written to her, last month, also to ask her to resign.  And both of us, independently, cited the same two problems: she misses way too many meetings, and when she's there, she contributes nothing.  None of us could get this Commission, that is clearly on the ropes, to address the Jenny problem, the obvious solution to which is to remove her from office.  I have no reason to doubt she continues to accept the checks we send her.  She just doesn't do her job.  She doesn't even bother to show up.  And tonight, the result was a room full of people who arrived for a meeting, and an Inspector General who drove up here from Palmetto Bay for this meeting, and an attorney who will wind up charging us for whatever is her minimum fee to attend a meeting, plus whatever amount of time Tracy spent with her today before the meeting (it's so uncool to see Tracy, Krishan Manners, and the attorney all walk in together before the meeting), and all for...nothing.  Because Jenny Johnson-Sardella decided not to bother to show up again.

Chuck Ross suggested another title for this post.  He was thinking of the movie "Animal House," and the line "a new low; we're so ashamed."  Yup, that works well, too.

It Could Cost You, or You Could Break Even, or You Could Come Out Ahead!

Orchestramiami's "Friendraiser" is on Saturday, November 9, at 7:00.  The location is the offices of Shulman and Associates at 100 NE 38th Street (in the design district).

Very cute.  A "Friendraiser" is of course a fundraiser, and they're trying to be "friend"ly about it.

Orchestramiami (OM) is a wonderful local music organization.  The founder and artistic director, and pianist, and conductor, is Elaine Rinaldi, who is a purely delightful person.  Elaine does everything for the organization.  She has a board of directors, as is required, and of which ("full disclosure," and all that) I am a member, but it is Elaine who does all the work.  She seems to like it that way.

Anyway, this year, she is/we are doing a more or less typical fundraiser.  Admission is free, which is not always the case for fundraisers.  Some are frankly expensive to attend.  The offers are these: "meet new friends and fellow music-lovers;" "enjoy free drinks and light refreshments" (Elaine commonly provides wine and cheese/fruit after chamber concerts, and both the wine and the eats are good.); "musical performances by members of the orchestra" ("the orchestra" is an interesting phrase.  Elaine has many musicians who play for her.  Some play in full orchestral ensembles, and some play in small chamber groups.  She doesn't specify how many musicians will play, or in what configurations.  But I've never heard any Orchestramiami performance in which the music was not wonderfully well-performed, so I'll vouch for whatever Elaine does.); "a 50-50 raffle, door prizes" (I told you you could leave with more than you brought.); "a silent auction and much more" (you know about silent auctions, and I have no idea what the "much more" is.)

Elaine ends her e-flyer with "All proceeds from the raffle and auction go to supporting your orchestra, Orchestramiami."  Elaine underlined your, so I'm telling you what she wants you to know.

And Elaine is right.  Orchestramiami is "your" orchestra.  Or it could be.  And it should be.  Orchestramiami is accessible, and it has a personal style to it.  You don't just "meet...fellow music-lovers."  You meet Elaine.  And the other musicians.  And Elaine's parents.  Just to concretize how accessible is Orchestramiami, some performances are free.  The ones for which there is a charge are very inexpensive.  I've told Elaine that she/we should charge more, but she likes it this way.

I'm inviting you to come to Orchestramiami's "friendraiser" on November 9.  No one asked for a head count, and there are no "tickets" to reserve.  So just show up.  If you want to.  If great people, mingling, wonderful music, wine and "light refreshments," and a chance to acquire something interesting float your boat.  If they do, I'll see you there.

We Had to Pinch Ourselves.

Not one.  Not two.  But three meetings tonight.

The first one was about our fearless Commission's decision to replace 80 years' worth of Code Compliance Boards with a magistrate.  The stated reason to do this wasn't what you would call real.  It was more theoretical.  Well, Will Tudor's explanation was theoretical.  Will's idea was that we had somehow always been doing this wrong, and Will, who isn't an attorney, decided the right way to have a Code Compliance Board was to have an attorney magistrate, who would, according to Will's imaginings, have the right kind of experience or qualification or something, and whose expertise would shield the Village from the liability under which we simply must have been laboring all this time.  And Village attorney Rebecca Rodriguez reassured Will, and Tracy "Big Mama" Truppman, that she could not ethically allow the Village to have a Code Compliance function that wasn't staffed by an attorney.  Ah, those attorneys.  They do look out for each other's incomes.

Apparently, according to Will, we're skating on very thin ice with our Code Compliance Boards composed of people who are not what Will would call experts, even though they know the Village and the Codes backwards and forwards.  And the jeopardy we create for ourselves, according to Will, is that we could get sued.  Gary Kuhl reviewed for Will our history of getting sued, because of bad Code Compliance Board decisions.  The score so far is zero.  We've never been sued.  Suing a Code Compliance Board is not provided for by law.  But a dissatisfied Village resident could appeal a bad Code Compliance Board decision to the District Court.  That hasn't happened, either.  I did mention that Will's concern wasn't what you would call real.

So, the gang busied itself figuring out which Code functions would be assigned to the magistrate (essentially all of them), and which to a newly constituted Code Compliance Board made of Village residents lovingly selected by Tracy Truppman.  It was an exciting (oh, no it wasn't; but it had lots of inaudible mumbling in it) discussion that somehow, amazingly, resulted in Tracy's triaging Code functions exactly as she wanted to.  Dan Samaria was poised to protest, but apparently, it wasn't too hard for Tracy to hypnotize him with suggestions like "I think we should assign items 1-5, 7, and 8-13 to the magistrate.  What do you think, Vice Mayor and Commissioner Tudor?"  And those boys were just as good as girls for Big Mama.  Which was a good thing, because there were no other girls there, apart from Big Mama.  And Rebecca girl.  And Rosanne "Madame Clerk" Prado.

But the problem was that in public comment, every person who spoke complained about this scheme.  Everyone thought it was wrong.  And botched.  No one thought it should happen.  In part, it was because the Commission was reduced to Big Mama, Dan Samaria, and Willy Boy Tudor.  Betsy Wise has resigned, and Jenny Johnson-Sardella has apparently stopped coming to meetings.  And what's left of the Commission is under investigation by the county Ethics Commission.  It was a hell of a "quorum," which Willy Boy reminded us it still was.  And the discussion in which the three mouseketeers engaged made clear they had no experience with what our Code Compliance Board does, and has been doing over the course of many decades, and no idea how it works.  No idea at all.  So, every person who spoke pleaded with the Commission not to go forward with this ill-conceived scheme.  But it seemed Big Mama was on a mission.  Mac Kennedy didn't use this term-- although he described it perfectly-- but Big Mama has weaponized the Code Compliance function to punish her critics, and she can control the function better if it's one person she personally hires, instead of five of her neighbors.  So, the three agreed.

Meeting #2 was a Resolution to set a date for the election to replace Betsy Wise.  Yes, of course we have to do that, because Betsy lasted less than one year before she resigned.  But there was another pressing matter.  Jenny Johnson-Sardella has now missed four of 10 Commission meetings, and at least two workshops, this year.  She failed to show up tonight, too.  Her name was called, and she was noted absent.  It was clear she had not called in to say something prevented her from attending.  She's just stopped coming.  So again, every non-Commissioner Village resident who spoke during public comment pointed this out, and how Jenny has gotten e-mails from some of us, letting her know she should resign, and most important, that it is the Commission's responsibility to discuss this matter, and either get Jenny to resign, or remove her from office.   And it's time-sensitive, too.  We're about to spend $16K on an election to replace Betsy, and it wouldn't cost us any more, or very little more, to hold elections for both of their seats.  So, we asked the Commission to discuss this matter tonight.  Well, they were so busy talking about meaningless things, like what a shame it was that we have to do this on short notice at a time of year that people's thoughts, and maybe the people themselves, are elsewhere, that they never said one word about the Jenny problem.

Did I wait around to audit tonight's alleged version of the branding workshop adventure?  No, I did not.  There was a rumor that Betsy Wise, whose "baby" this was, was going to make an appearance for this project, but who cared any more?  (Another rumor was that Betsy might have claimed that she resigned, because of either "death threats" or "threats."  Both are preposterous, and either the rumor was false, or Betsy made up a doozy as an excuse to get off this bus.)

You sit there, for hours, and you raise issues, which all of your neighbors echo, and ask questions, and the meeting proceeds as if you never said anything, or weren't even there.  You have to pinch yourself, to see if you're still alive, or maybe you've turned into a ghost, and that's why you're so completely ignored.  It's a hell of a Commission we elected for ourselves.

Yeah, Well...

There's been a flurry of e-mails in the past couple of days.  There was something about some meetings that weren't exactly noticed in the usual way, and about which most people found out, because Janey Anderson talked about them on Nextdoor.  Apparently, one of the meetings, or possibly two of them, are tonight.

Here are the text messages I just got from someone in attendance at one or both of these meetings:

"Betsy quit!!"  I assume that means she resigned her Commission seat.  The next text message said
"Special election in 90 days."
Then, "Now they are going to recruit a new Code Compliance Board...Old members can't reapply."  And "Tracy just said 'I'm concerned about attorney fees for the Board.'"
And finally, "Code Compliance workshop," and "Now a communications workshop with only two Commissioners."  It was not specified which two.

So, I wasn't told why Betsy Wise resigned, or if she gave a reason.

Yes, of course we now have to have a special election to fill her seat.  For what it's worth, that special election will cost us several thousand dollars.  Not that it isn't better to spend several thousand dollars than to have Betsy Wise on the Commission, but it's just noteworthy that we have yet another expense.  And I think it was at the last Commission meeting, or maybe some meeting shortly before that, that Betsy was asked if she really donated her stipend back to the Village, as she had previously said she would, but she never answered.  I'm guessing the answer was no.

Interesting about resurrecting the Code Compliance Board, after Tracy Truppman insulted all the members to the point that they all quit.  And no discussion about making an exception, in view of Tracy's trampling of everyone, so that the prior members, who were doing a wonderful job, could reoccupy their seats.  Apparently, Tracy sees yet another opportunity to control a new group of members, and she doesn't let pass opportunities like that.

And what's this concern about the cost of an attorney?  Since when does Tracy Truppman care how much Village money gets diverted to her attorneys?  Usually, it's the more, the better.  And she was willing to pay some magistrate what an attorney would cost, or maybe more.  Frankly, I'm not even sure it was past practice to have the Village attorney at the Code Compliance meetings.  I'll find out.

A communications workshop with only two Commissioners present?  I wonder which two.  The only one who alleged an interest in this is the one who just resigned.  Although Will Tudor, in some of his past ramblings and incoherent sputterings, did once or twice talk about improving communications.  But neither he nor anyone else ever actually did it (except Dan Samaria and his televising Commission meetings), or even discussed a real plan.  So, I really don't know which two Commissioners bothered to pretend to be part of a discussion like that.

Well, I suppose I'll find out more tomorrow.  And if I do, or if anyone who was there elaborates in a comment, I'll let you know.