Alachua Voter Guide

It’s been a little over a week since the Gainesville City Elections, and I am finally ready to weigh in on the results. I would have done this sooner, but I have been sick for a good part of the time, and I haven’t even felt like writing. In fact, between today’s abysmal weather and the return of my symptoms, this is the first time that opportunity and the right mood have coincided.

A 27% turnout is not a mandate, but it doesn’t have to be. Our elections do not require that we have a quorum to be official. If, on elections day, only 10 people bothered to vote, 6 of them would basically do all the deciding for us.

It is mark of profound apathy that it took so much outside money and outside manpower to rally 15% of the registered voters to come out and defeat Charter Amendment One and the 12% of voters who came out to support it. The conservative Citizens for Good Public Policy must be wondering what they could have done to draw out a few thousand more sympathizers, but there is actually a more important question than this. The questons is, how did we become a community that has no conservative representatives in our city government?

For years my fellow conservatives have told me, “Gainesville is such a liberal town! There is no hope for a conservative candidate here!” Yet, those rascally liberals keep winning so many elections with so many voters being left on the table. We routinely have turnouts in the 10-13% range. Are we really doing the best we can do?  Should  we just give up permanently? Does this enlightened University town only have room for one point of view?

Critiquing our performance

In retrospect, it was probably a mistake to get Charter One on the ballot. It was also a mistake for the city commission to blow off the concerns of the citizens who opposed the gender identity provisions in regard to restrooms, but it was a sustainable mistake. What was underestimated was the amount of resources that would be released to oppose a ballot initiative that would roll back the city’s ambitous civil rights laws to the state’s more modest ones. If Citizens for Good Public Policy had instead gathered a similar effort to support a candidate to defeat Jeanna Mastordicasa, they would have faced much smaller resistance and may have pulled it off.

This also would have required that conservatives do something they never do: think ahead. Their successful effort would have to be followed up by getting a new Mayor and District 4 commissioner after Pegeen Hanrahan and Craig Lowe are removed by term limits. Three new commissioners, with the amenable Sherwin Henry, would have made the majority needed to cherry-pick the changes they wanted to begin with while leaving the rest of the civil rights laws in place.

Of course, all of this falls apart if each opportunity brings a new crop of last minute conservative candidates tumbling out and getting each others’ way. If you are thinking about running for one of these seats, you should adopt the motto of, “If you don’t get in early, get out of the way.” City elections are non-partisan, so there is no party primary to give people a chance to choose which conservative they will have to vote for in the big one. And when you have a lot of candidates, it usually means a runoff. And runoffs go to the liberals who faithfully participate in elections, and everything that leads up to them.

In summary, conservatives need to change their ways, not their values. They need to show up on election days, but they also need to stay engaged year round. And that means that Citizens for Good Public Policy should NOT disband, but expand its mission.

Troy Blakely, supporter of Charter Amendment One, took his place on the corner of 8th Av. and NW 34th Street, and someone else tried to take his signs. The extra-large perpetrator, pictured with the police who nabbed him, told Blakely that he was offended by the signs that urged people to vote for Charter Amendment One, the ballot initiative that will roll back Gainesville’s expansive civil rights that include allowing people to self-identify which sex they are for the purpose of choosing a public restroom on private property.

When I arrived on the scene, I was just rounding the corner to head north on 34th Street and I saw that the police had a person handcuffed by the side of the road. I also saw a political sign waver, and since he was the first I have seen this season, I decided to pull over into Westside Park’s parking lot. It was only after talking to Mr. Blakely that I discovered that he had been accosted by the suspect who was only about 40 yards away. I asked him if the man was being charged with any crime, and he said that he thought he should be because the man was trying to deprive him of his rights.

After a few minutes it was apparent that the police were letting the man go, and I asked the police if the man was being charged. They said no, and they left me immediately, but then they stuck around a short distance away.

In some of the discussions I have had on this blog, I have talked about how there is only anecdotal evidence that women are having to put up with men in local restrooms. That is because the men cannot be charged under this current law, and business owners cannot make the men leave. What happened here, too, is only anecdotal. There will probably not be a police report. There was no arrest, although the man was handcuffed for awhile. And Mr. Blakely was not asked if he wanted to press charges. So, other than the fact that I was a witness to the handcuffs, and have a photo of the man with the police, it’s as if this event never happened.

I want to suggest that before you go out to hold political signs in support of Charter One that you make sure you don’t go alone. You might need a witness. You might also want to have a camera and a voice recorder. And you might also want to have your attorney on speed dial.

In the never ending quest to get more information into the hands of the voters, I am enlisting your help. I have made a couple of tri-fold brochures that have all the text from the last post about the League of Women Voters Forum. One is for the At-Large District 1 Candidates, and one is for just the Single District 1 Candidates. Why did I make two different brochures? Because there was too much text for one brochure, and I wanted to make this as easy as possible for someone to share with a friend or neighbor.

We are drowning on opinions on Charter Amendment One in this town, so I wanted to focus more attention on the candidates for the two city commission seats. If people want more, they can certainly come here and get it. But these two brochures can get us a foot in the door.

Below I have made a video to explain this a little bit, just in case you need a visual. But it’s really not too hard to understand.

You can print these on your own printer, or if you want to make a larger number, you might want to just email the PDF to your friendly neighborhood Kinko’s or Xerographic, or Renaissance Printing and let them print and fold for you. I recently got about 1,000 brochures made for a little over $100 at one of these places, including folding.

During the Sadie Darnell versus Lonnie Scott slugfest last summer, the Gainesville Sun printed not a word in its news reports about the aggressive charges Scott made against the incumbent sheriff. It was newsworthy. But the Sun was AWOL. I asked a Sun reporter about this strange absence from a real new story (when the headlines were reading that John Edwards’ mistress was an Ocala native), and I was told that they did not have the manpower to cover it.

Whenever I hear that there have been actual incidents in Gainesville in which a man uses a public women’s room at will, flaunting the immunity that the Transgender Bathroom Ordinance affords him, I also hear that the supporters of Charter Amendment One are, “just making that up”. And it’s easy for them to say so if the Sun or TV 20, or any other news outlet declines to do any investigative reporting. But what happens when there is an actual police report and surveillance camera video? The answer will still be, “they are just making that up” …if no one reports it.

Well, here is a start. I have a police report with the victim’s name and contact information blacked out. I don’t have the video…yet. But I am sure that someone with “legitimate” journalistic creds could get a look. But will they? And what else are we not hearing? Or seeing?

So far, we are getting a very selective view of this whole public safety issue. The Gainesville Chamber of Commerce has been cowed into taking a stand against Charter One because they have drunk the Kool-Aid. They are parroting the line that this is about discrimination. They are agreeing with the ideologically driven letters to the Sun that call Charter One supporters bigots. Meanwhile, when a local supermarket manager calls the police because women complain that a man just walks into the ladies room while they are in there, the police can only tell him that they are in “uncharted waters”.

We cannot depend on our institutions to protect us. They are selling out to politically driven policy makers who can make their lives miserable if they want to. Business people are worried about taking a stand because they feel threatened by the specter of being labeled “intolerant” in a University town. And I feel their pain. I know what it is like to have a customer drop my service because they disapprove of my stand on a moral issue. So much for tolerance.

In the secret place of the voting booth, no one will be able to watch what you are doing. No one will be able to exact revenge. But if you want to organize and work together with others who want to get the word out about Charter One, you may find yourself being defamed and intimidated. And it will probably go unreported.

In other food for the rumor mill: The ACLU has a full time staffer working with the Charter One opponents, Equality is Gainesville’s Business. And EIGB has hired a full time campaign manager. And the out of town money continues to roll in. EIGB has a $50K war chest as of the last financial report, and it’s coming from all over the US. Gainesville is a battleground city. Will you opt out of this struggle?

Rememeber, on election day they will count the votes, not the money.

Comments, please.

Although I have been busy trying to make a living, your intrepid blogger has stayed on the trail of this mysterious $5,000 donation to “Equality is Gainesville’s Business” (EGB). I finally got some answers.

The donor was another political action committee (PAC) called “Basic Rights Gainesville” (BRG). This PAC was created by Gainesville City Commissioner Craig Lowe. He also created the recipient of the donation, EGB. He created EGB in June of 2008. The first donation was recorded on 6/24/08.

On October 3, 2008, Craig Lowe filed papers with the Supervisor of Elections registering the creation of Basic Rights Gainesville (BRG). The first donation, recorded the same day, was a $5,000 check from another PAC, Basic Rights Montgomery of Silver Spring, Maryland. This money was then recorded as an expenditure, in the form of a donation from BRG to EGB. EGB recorded that donation on December 24, 2008. Then, last month, Craig Lowe notified the Supervisor of Elections on January 9th that the last quarter report from BRG was its last. BRG was disbanded. It had served its purpose as a conduit for the donation from Basic Rights Montgomery.

What most of us want to know is, is this illegal? No, I don’t think so. The next question is, why the subterfuge? Why not just take a donation directly from Basic Rights Montgomery instead of creating a Gainesville entity to pass it through? It looks deceptive.

The very purpose of all this reporting and making things a public record, and putting them online is to make campaigns more transparent. The people who championed these laws and practices did so because they thought that the people of a community should know when big donors from out of the area are trying to influence their elections. In the spirit of those laws, I will try to keep these issues out in the Sunshine. I’m sure our city commissioners will agree that this is the right thing to do.

I welcome Craig Lowe or anyone else in EGB to take all the space they need in this blog to respond.

In the previous post, Don talked about the planning charrette to discuss the future of Newberry Village and surrounding area.  What purpose does the charrette hold in the formation of public policy?

The misty-eyed answer is that charrettes provide a means of community participation so that all concerns are addressed and all voices are heard.

In fact, there is a textbook about charrettes and I’m not far off the mark:  In The Charrette Handbook, published by the American Planning Association, Bill Lennertz and Aarin Lutzenhiser say, “Charrettes engage citizens in envisioning new possibilities for their communities. They foster the collaboration, creativity, and consensus necessary to define a vision shared by citizens, officials, developers, and other stakeholders.”

Note the operative phrases: “engage citizens” … “collaboration” … and “shared by citizens.”

The answer in reality is significantly different.  Very few regular Joes and Janes attend charrettes for the obvious reason that charrettes are usually scheduled at times when most people are working.  They’re also all day events that are sometimes spread out over two or three days.  Very few ordinary citizens can afford (in either time or money) to sit through the whole thing.

Plus, charrettes are process-oriented.  They build to a conclusion, or “drive an outcome” as a planner once remarked to me.  Thus, one needs to participate in the entire charrette to really have an impact.  This becomes an excuse to reject public opinion when it emerges.  If a handful of citizens can make only a part of the charrette, here’s what they will experience.

At the beginning of the charrette, they’ll hear community leaders or invited speakers from other cities wax philosophical (er, “envisioning”) about the ideal living arrangements in a particular area.  If they show up midway into the process, they’ll get to write their concerns on the poster paper (e.g., traffic congestion) only to be told their specific issue was addressed earlier in the presentation.  If they show up at the end to complain about the results, they’ll be told they missed the important collaborative exercises earlier in the process.

The average citizen rightly concludes, “Even if I can squeeze out a long lunch to come to this thing, my view is still inconsequential to the outcome.”  It’s as if by design charrettes are used to exclude public opinion while laying claim to the exact opposite.

I’ve sat through a few charrettes, so I’m speaking from experience.  I’ve heard the dismissive remarks of planners and other government officials to some very legitimate concerns raised by citizens.  I’ve heard a public safety official (who was not on the agenda but came of his own initiative) express concern about how roundabouts would impede the movement of emergency service vehicles only to be told, “We’re confident you will be able to manuever fire trucks successfully and respond in a timely fashion.”  (You’ll notice there was simply no room on the agenda of a three-day event to cover public safety concerns regarding the transportation and land-use plans of this area.  Curious, no?)

I think readers of this blog would be interested in seeing exactly how many people attended the Newberry Village Charrette and, of those, how many are unaffiliated with government or special interest groups (developers, Sierra Club, etc.).  In other words, how many ordinary Joes and Janes took two work days and a Saturday off to participate?

So to get back to my initial question: What purpose does the charrette hold in the formation of public policy? Charrettes are used to legitimize planning decisions under the guise of public participation.  They claim to produce a “vision shared by citizens, officials, developers, and other stakeholders.”  What could be more representative than that?  They claim dynamic participation by all concerned people.  What could be more democratic than that?  Hey, wait a second … we’re a representative democracy, right?!  What a brilliant mechanism for policy decision-making!!!

Elected officials like charrettes because they can claim the results a) represent the will of the people and, when the people finally show up at meetings to object to the implementation of the results they can b) dismiss the will of the people.

This I’ve witnessed, too, especially on the controversial issues like the design of SW 24th Avenue and the narrowing of Main Street.  “All of these concerns were discussed in the charrette.”  “If you cared enough about this issue, we had a open event where you could have brought this up.”  ”It’s a little too late in the process to begin rewriting all of the hard work put into this.”  I’ve even heard elected officials express personal discomfort with the transportation plans but vote for implementation anyway because “the people weighed in on this at the charrette.”

The bottom line, therefore, is that charrettes enable planning ideas that are unpopular with the general public to gain legitimacy and approval from elected officials.  They allow unelected planners and special interest activists to drive policy decisions, and they allow politicians to both claim popular support for their voting decisions while dismissing popular opposition to their voting decisions.

In practice, charrettes do not ”engage citizens” or ”foster collaboration,” and their results are certainly not “shared by citizens.”

I just found out about this yesterday, and I was hoping to get more information by now, but I am as busy as the rest of you this time of year. That is why I think it is unlikely that any of the ordinary citizens who have 9-5 jobs will be able to attend anyway. But, you do deserve the opportunity to know how the sausage is made, so to speak. Here is an excerpt from the email I got from the Coalition for Responsible Growth, which is the only public notification I have seen so far:

Starting on December 11th, a 3-day planning program, called a “charrette,” is being hosted by the developer of Newberry Village, an approved development located at Ft. Clarke Boulevard and Newberry Road. The developer together with county planning staff, the MTPO (Metropolitan Transportation Planning Organization), Gainesville Regional Transit System, the University of Florida, the not-for-profit SantaFe HealthCare DRI (Development of Regional Impact), and Carey Graham of the City of Eugene, Oregon will present current ideas and seek input from interested citizens during this 3-day event to help shape the future development of the area north of Newberry Road between I-75 and Ft. Clarke Boulevard.  The plans made should guide the future evolution of the area and create the Santa Fe Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) corridor connecting Santa Fe College and the Oaks Mall.

The charrette will be hosted at Santa Fe College in Building R – Room R-01 on December 11th, 12th, and 13th from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.  A copy of the daily schedule is attached in a PDF format. Interested citizens are welcome and in fact are being sought to help shape future development plans for this are.

Here is the schedule of events, in pdf format.

I will not be able to attend this, except for a little bit on Saturday if I can sneak out of the house for an hour or so. Although I cannot actually participate, I would at least like to know who is there. These meetings are the places where your most dedicated activists show up, and those with vested interests. If you are one of them, I’d appreciate it if you could email me some details. Send them to dontwc@gmail.com.

Charles Grapski, former Democratic candidate for the Florida House of Representatives, former candidate for Alachua City Commission, and the bane of Mayor Jean Caderwood’s existence, is still in jail, according to the High Springs Herald and Alachua Today.

This is not to say that he has been continuously in jail since he was in the news for beiing a disruptive force in Alachua city politics. This time around he was incarcerated after breakiing into someone’s home on October 12 at 3am and refusing to leave.

According to Alachua Today:

Although Grapski has been largely silent on outside political matters since being held in the Alachua County Jail, he has been drawing attention from behind bars. Just last week, Grapski filed a formal grievance against the facility claiming several inmate rights violations. Among Grapski’s chief complaints are that the jail has been systematically denying inmates the right to communicate and meet with counsel. Grapski also alleges that living conditions are not safe citing dangerous and unhealthy temperatures and complaints about the food.

That report was online on November 27. A subsequent report from the High Springs Herald tells us:

After “disobeying verbal orders” on Nov. 26, Grapski was found guilty of breaking the jail’s rules and was sentenced to 20 days of confinement starting Dec. 2, said Emil Pata, Grapski’s supervisor at the Alachua County jail.

As part of Grapski’s punishment, he will not be allowed any visitors or phone calls except to his lawyer, Pata said.

Whether Charles Grapski is a political prisoner or an annoying pest with time on his hands, he is an example of what a passionate individual can do when he wants to be heard. He is at the opposite end of the scale where public apathy is weighed. That is not to say that he is right, but at least you know where he stands, and he is willing to come to grips with the political process.

I will let you decide whether or not you care about Grapski’s situation by providing you with links to his various web sites and YouTube videos. Then you can either speak up for him yourself, or determine that he is just getting what he has coming.

Early Grapski site at UF, 2 minute talk on YouTube, TruthOut article about Grapski, an Anti-Grapski Blog, Grapski.org, Students rate Grapski as a professor, Gatorpedia, Grapski’s MySpace page

Below is an excerpt from and email I got from Cain Davis. He wants to make sure that we know that the City Commission will be deciding whether or not to accept the ballot language, that has been prepared by their own attorney, of the City of Gainesville Charter Amendment that city residents will decide this March 24, 2009. The Amendment prohibits the city from providing civil rights, protections, and preferences that are NOT already provided for by the Florida Civil Rights Act. Passing this amendment would be the deal killer for the City’s controversial Transgender Bathroom amendment to its own civil rights ordinance that, in practice,  allows any man to self-identify as a protected “trangendered” person when caught lurking in the lady’s room at any private business. Schools and all government buildings were exempt.

The City Commission will be meeting this Thursday, December 4, to make the decision. It will be a great opportunity to see how they work, and how willing they are to let the citizens decide on this issue. A lot of people worked very hard to get this on the ballot. More people signed the petitions to get this on the ballot than normally vote in City of Gainesville Elections.

************************

“During their discussion on November 6, 2008, the Commissioners specifically asked for citizen input regarding the ballot language because several individuals who support their side were in the audience and presented what the commissioners thought were good ideas.  Let’s provide them the citizen comments they requested.  Below is the website you can go to and listen to the entire discussion, about 50 minutes:

http://gainesville.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=2&clip_id=450

“Once you get to the site, if you only want to listen to the part of the meeting which pertains to the gender identity issue please follow these instructions:

1. Look to left-hand side of screen, under the picture
2. Click on the up/down cursor which is located to the right of the words “jump to”
3. Once the listing appears,scroll down to the line which reads: 080410 “Proposed city charter amendment”

“The video will start playing at the beginning of the gender identity discussion.

“The following is the website which contains the agenda item for December 4, 2008, the item is on page 35 of the agenda:

http://legistar.cityofgainesville.org/meetings/2008/12/8654_A_City_Commission_08-12-04_Meeting_Agenda_(Long).pdf

“The following are the email addresses for our city officials, please send your email to all emails and blind copy citizensforgoodpublicpolicy.org.  The reason we are requesting for you to blind copy citizensforgoodpublicpolicy.org is so that we can have an accurate count of those who oppose what the city commission is attempting to do:

HanrahanP@cityofgainesville.org
hawkinswt@cityofgainesville.org
mastrodij@cityofgainesville.org
henrysl@cityofgainesville.org
poel@cityofgainesville.org
DonovanJF@cityofgainesville.org
LoweSC@cityofgainesville.org
legal@cityofgainesville.org
hauck@cityofgainesville.org

“Sorry for the long email, but I wanted to provide enough information for you to understand what and why we are requesting your support at this time.  If you have any questions please email to citizensforgoodpublicpolicy.com.

“Thanks in advance.

“Cain Davis
Chairperson, CGPP”
www.citizensforgoodpublicpolicy.org

Your synopsis of October 4, 2008’s League of Women Voters Forum implied judicial candidate Lorraine Sherman’s experience was based off only her “life experience.” This synopsis was misleading and could not be further from the truth. You described her opponent as having a mountain of legal experience when in fact her record is so ambiguous and nontransparent unless voters actually go to the clerk of courts office and research her record many voters will not know the facts of Miss Ferrero’s actual record is because she has been reluctant to disclose it.

On her website, Ms. Sherman’s opponent claims to have done “numerous” trials.  On October 4th, she stated that the amount of trials she has performed as “too many to count.”  Now, maybe for a few, that explanation is one that is clear; however, many of the voters I talk to everyday believe it is unacceptable to show a lack of transparency about your record. Her trial record has been vague and exaggerated because she has not given the voters clear information about her “real” trial experience.

There is also growing concern regarding the involvement of the State Attorney’s Office and State Attorney Bill Cervone campaigning, endorsing, and working on behalf of Ms. Ferrero. Support that appears to be coming from this Circuit wide office raises a red flag!  When the State Attorney or representatives from his office endorse a judicial candidate it demonstrates impropriety and a possible interest in receiving judicial favors. Justice should be blind and a candidate receiving such endorsements may feel indebted to the State attorneys office. It is not befitting for a judge to owe political favors to anyone in order to administer justice impartially. Mr. Cervone should recuse himself from endorsing judicial candidates.

Ms. Sherman, on the other hand, is not beholden to any political offices, elites, associations, or political figure heads – and that’s the way it should be. She is the People’s Candidate in this race. Lorraine Sherman has been clear about her experience and her record in both the court room and in our community.

As a voter, I have looked at both candidates and have found that Lorraine Sherman’s record is transparent and that she has more experience to be our next county judge.  She is the most qualified candidate to be our next county judge and has courtroom experience in 37 counties throughout the State of Florida. She has learned from her travels how other courts and judges operate and will bring that experience to the bench. Her opponent’s generalizations about her trial experience are a stark contrast to Ms. Sherman’s proven record.

She has represented over 1000 people and conducted over 100 trials. Unlike her opponent Ms. Sherman has conducted many more substantive hearings.  She has worked in both criminal and civil court.  I call that REAL EXPERIENCE we can believe in.  Ms. Sherman gives voters the facts about who she is because she believes in transparency, honesty and integrity.

The facts are, Lorraine Sherman is the most qualified candidate to be our next county judge, and considering the alternative we need a candidate who best represents and serves ALL Alachua County voters. On November 4, 2008 I will be voting for Lorraine Sherman to be our next Alachua County Judge and I invite all of you to do the same.

Armando Grundy

Gainesville, Fl