Alachua Voter Guide

If politics is indeed the art of the possible, in the District 1 campaign we did what was possible.

In two months of last minute campaigning vs. six and eight months of campaigning by two opponents in a district with a difficult demographic divide we needed more time to unite — what was possible for us was to bring into better focus the looming GRU-GREC biomass electric rate hike disaster.

After two and a half years of trying to pretend this bad decision never happened, biomass-at-any-cost-to-ratepayers city commissioners — in an effort to keep biomass rationalists off the city commission — went public and on the record leaving  a paper trail of attempted obfuscations and specious justifications that, in the fullness of time, will show  who is responsible and who should be held accountable.

This was what was reasonably possible to achieve in the District 1 race, and we achieved it.

Now that the general election has resolved itself in the manner in which it has been resolved, the insular Gainesville City Commission majority is conducting a runaway train headed for a crash of historic proportion — assuming the GRU-GREC biomass contract is not reformed or cancelled, which they seem hell bent on preventing.

These would-be conductors in the election just passed began what appeared to be the first stages of an orchestrated campaign to smear candidates who would speak truth to power.

For me, that incipient smear campaign is yesterday’s news, and largely irrelevant. The District 1 race yesterday was decided in favor of the conductors’ handpicked candidate Yvonne Hinson-Rawls.  The result, in my opinion, was not substantially affected by the inept City Commissioner Susan Bottcher led smear campaign against me. The result — a second place finish, a 78-vote swing from a runoff — was, in my opinion, the legacy of  a District 1 demographic divide that there was insufficient time  for us to bridge.

It was a different story in the At-Large city commission race that was not decided yesterday. In that race, largely because of political machinations, the city commission conductors’ handpicked At-Large candidate, Lauren Poe, is headed for a runoff with former Florida Public Service Commissioner Nathan Skop. In that race the city commissioner conductors’ disreputable smear campaign against candidate Skop appears likely to become nastier and more outrageous.

It is what it is.  But what goes around comes around, in politics as in life. The worm will turn.

My wife has brought to my attention the following assertions by City Commissioner Susan Bottcher.  Bottcher apears to have become the current city commission majority’s group-think purveyor of misinformation and attack in a desperate attempt to influence the outcome of Tuesday’s City Commission election.  If hand-picked new commissioners can be elected, past commission actions related to the irregularly negotiated more than $3 billion GRU-GREC contract may be kept from public consciousness. Bottcher has written the following version of the “FACTS” as devoutly wished by her and those who wish to re-write GRU-GREC history and thereby continue to mislead the public.

COMMISSIONER BOTTCHER’S INCREASINGLY DESPERATE PERSONAL ATTACKS AND ATTEMPTS TO MISLEAD THE VOTERS:

“Skop and Washington apparently learned nothing in law school about contracts, the Sunshine Laws or how bond ratings work. Both these candidates are promising that, if elected, they will force the city to break the contract with the owners of GREC (biomass plant).

“FACT: The contract was not done in secret. It has been a long standing policy that negotiations with a private contractor or business are conducted between city staff and the contractor. Once terms are set the contract goes to the full commission in a public forum for ratification. This is how it was done for GREC. This is in no way a violation of the Sunshine Laws since elected officials are not involved in the negotiation process. At the May 2009 commission meeting Commissioner Braddy made the motion to ratify the GREC contract, there was no public comment against it, and it passed unanimously.

“FACT: There was never a so-called buy-out clause in the GREC contract. The idea was discussed and after careful consideration between both parties it was decided that it was in the city’s and contractor’s best interests not to insert such a clause. Claiming such a clause existed and then was surreptitiously removed is patently false.

“FACT: Breaking the contract would ruin the proud AA bond rating this city enjoys. Not only would it cost the city hundreds of thousands if not many millions of dollars to break the GREC contract, it would have a long term devastating impact on the city’s ability to borrow money for future infrastructure projects (roads, new GPD building, RTS transfer station, etc). Anyone who advocates for now going back and breaking the contract is advocating for bankrupting the City of Gainesville.

“FACT: No one commissioner can force the city to do anything. There are seven voting commissioners and any changes require a majority of at least four. Even if any anti-GREC candidates is elected, the remaining commissioners have all voiced support for GREC. Even Commissioner Chase was quoted at two commission meetings last fall saying he is “committed to making GREC successful” and is “not interested in getting out of the contract.’”

RESPONSE TO COMMISSIONER BOTTCHER’S LATE ATTEMPT TO KEEP THE GRU-GREC CONTRACT SKELETON’S HIDDEN FROM THE PUBLIC:

FACT: Terms of the GRU-GREC biomass contract were secretly communicated to members of the Gainesville City Commission but not to the public. Gainesville City Commissioners and those who negotiated the GRU-GREC contract conspired to keep those ultimately responsible for paying for the cost of the GRU-GREC biomass project — GRU’s rate payers — from knowing how much the project was going to cost. Individual city commissioners also knew that the GRU-GREC biomass contract contained a provision under which details of the contract would be kept secret from the public until at least 2043. Aside from the breach of trust with the community that is inherent in these backroom dealings, what these commissioners did was to violate the Florid Government in the Sunshine Law. It has been admitted by the Mayor on the public record that he knew that the other commissioners knew key details of the project when they voted on it. The Mayor’s knowledge of what other commissioners knew is evidence of information Daisy Chaining, which is prohibited by the Florida Government in the Sunshine Law. As a result of these actions taken by commissioners in violation of the Sunshine Law, the GRU-GREC contract is void as a matter of law.

FACT: The negotiation of the GRU-GREC contract with the private contractor GREC’s predecessor in interest, Nacogdoches Power LLC, was authorized by the city commission in May 2008 to be carried out by new GRU General Manager Robert Hunzinger as a one man negotiation. A one person negotiation, under the Florida Open Meetings Law, allows negotiations to take place in secret without the need for public notice and public attendance.  Mr Hunzinger, contrary to his explicit instructions, organized a negotiating “team” headed by two co-lead-negotiators Ed Regan and John Stanton. This team-based negotiation required notice to the public and required negotiating team meetings to take place in the Sunshine.  As a result of actions taken by the negotiating team in violation of the Sunshine Law, the GRU-GREC contract is void as a matter of law.

FACT: At the May 7 2009 city commission meeting members of the Gainesville City Commission (but not Commissioner Ed Braddy, who was no longer on the city commission) — without notice to the public of the secret terms of the GRU-GREC contract, and without notice to the public that the the contract did not contain the back out clause that Commissioner Braddy and every other then commissioner by a public vote on May 12, 2008 in a public meeting required to be included in any contract executed by GRU General Manager Hunzinger — unanimously approved the GRU-GREC contract. As a result of these actions taken in violation of the Sunshine Law, the GRU-GREC contract is void as a matter of law.

FACT: A back-out or buy-out clause was specifically included in a version of the GRU-GREC contract the developer GREC had agreed to in September 2008. The clause existed and was removed, without the public being informed. Subsequently the city commission, without notice to the public, voted to ratify a version of the contract signed by General Manager Hunzinger. As a result of these actions taken in violation of the Sunshine Law, the GRU-GREC contract is void as a matter of law.

FACT: The action of the city commission in violating the Sunshine Law and then attempting to proceed with a void contract may threaten GRU’s and the city’s AA bond ratings. But while the city commission’s actions in entering into a contract void as a matter of law may threaten GRU’s and the city’s AA bond ratings, the “breaking” of a bad contract
through the legal process historically has not harmed GRU’s or the city’s bond ratings. The city on at least three occasions since the construction of the DeerHaven Generating Station has “broken” bad contracts when the public interest has required it, and neither the city’s nor GRU’s bond ratings have suffered as a result.

FACT: One or more commissioners’ bringing to light deficient negotiating and actions taken by the city not in the public interest can and has changed bad decisions made by the majority of the city commission. In December 2011 there were five commissioners, including Bottcher, who supported a scheme for the installing red light cameras at four intersections in the city under a contract that would have harmed citizens without substantial benefit to the community and a cost of more than $12 million to the citizens. Two city commissioners, with the assistance of members of the public, were able to demonstrate the folly of the Bottcher’s majority reasoning. As a result Bottcher’s support for the red light camera contract was abandoned, and the red light camera contract rejected by a 7-0
commission vote. Commissioners who have all voiced support for a contract can and do change their minds when held to account by other commissioners and the public.

The $64,000 question is:

How much more sheer nonsense and personal attack against independent-minded candidates will Bottcher spew forth in her continued attempts to influence the outcome of Tuesday’s election?

All are invited to Leonardo’s 706 (at 706 West University Avenue in District 1) for a “Final Nail in the Biomass Rate Hike Coffin Campaign Fund Raiser” from at 6 p.m. – 8 p.m. on Monday, January 23. It is my only fundraiser of the election. The purpose is to raise funds to ensure voters in District 1 have vital information about the GRU-GREC biomass deal.  It will have an additional purpose of helping fund further communication of information to At Large 1 voters.

We hope to see you there!

In another section of this forum I was asked what I would do, if elected to the City Commission, to get out of the GRU-GREC contact. Below is my answer, which I have provided in other places and at other times, but which I may never have provided in quite this form.

1. I would attempt to secure three other votes on the commission to require GRU officials to immediately provide information to the commission as to what construction has been completed at the GREC site and at what cost, and approve an independent report as to whether the initial infrastructure that has been put in thus far (presumably piping, electrical connections and reinforced foundations) could be used, or could be adapted to, some much less expensive and much less locally environmentally deleterious form of electric power generation. (As one example: A 100 MW combine cycle natural gas plant could be built at less than half the cost of the biomass plant, could be operated and maintained at far less than the cost of operating and maintaining the biomass plant, and, at current natural gas prices, could be fueled at less than the cost of extracting wood products from area forests. As to local environmental impacts, a combined cycle natural gas plant would draw only about one quarter the water needed by the biomass plant, would use fuel brought in by existing natural gas pipeline rather than requiring, as would the biomass plant, about 50,000 annual heavy diesel truck trips — 100,000 counting trucks coming and going; would emit only a fraction of the carbon that would be emitted by the biomass plant gas plant; and would emit almost no particulate matter of the sort that would be emitted by the biomass plant, and as has been condemned as damaging to human health by numerous independent medical groups and officials, including the president of the Florida Medical Society whose warnings were in large part responsible for stopping the construction of a biomass plant in Tallahassee and in the nearby African American Community.)

2. I would attempt to secure the cooperation of at least three other commissioners to approve a buy out of the GRU-GREC contract under terms that would favor the ratepayers of this community, with the upfront knowledge as to what use, if any, GRU might later be able to make of the initial infrastructure that has been laid down by GREC thus far. (We know that the major construction has not yet begun, but, thus far, no information has been provided to the pubic as to what construction has been completed, and at what cost).

3. I would support the filing of a lawsuit seeking a declaratory judgment as to whether the GRU-GREC contract is in fact, as it appears to be, void ab initio as a result of having been entered into in violation of the Florida Open Meetings Law. (There are several Sunshine law violations that individual commissioners have already acknowledged having occurred, including (a) the commission’s 2009 approval of the GRU-GREC contract that differed substantially from the 2008 commission negotiation authorization, without having noticed the public about some of the changes and without discussing some of those changes in a public meeting; (b) the appointment by the GRU general manager of a team headed by GRU Assistant General Managers Ed Regan and John Stanton, which team’s deliberations, crystalized and communicated privately to individual commissioners, which team meetings were required to have been noticed and opened to the public; and (c) the admitted (by the Mayor) daisy-chaining by GRU officials of information between the Mayor and individual commissioners as to what the other commissioners knew and what actions the other commissioners intended to take. There are other Sunshine Law violations that I believe have taken place and that, if established, could be separate bases on which a court could make a ruling that the GRU-GREC contract was void ab initio and thereby without force or effect, but I mentioned these three violations specifically because they have been revealed in the public record since April 6, 2011, the date on which several public spirited citizens, opposed by the majority of members of the city commission, in settlement of private litigation, finally secured the unblackening of previously hidden GRU-GREC financial details. The fact that these particular violations of the Sunshine Law were widely known — and, indeed, were part of the public record as a result of having been discussed by myself and others at post April 6 city commission meetings — has the effect of having put GREC officials on notice that the contract through which GREC expects to begin receiving its more than $3 billion payments beginning in 2013 may be a void contract. If a court determines the GRU-GREC contract to have been void ab initio, no payments would be due, unless GREC were to sue the city and seek damages as a result of city commission actions that resulted in the contract being void. But if GREC officials knew or should have known that the contract might be void, GREC officials’ ability to claim damages may be limited by the fact that GREC could have gone to court to seek a declaratory judgment as to the contract’s validity at any time before filing its notice to proceed on June 30, 2011, or any time thereafter, and by such timely action have avoided the substantial expenditure of construction funds that began to flow after June 30. GREC by its failure to take this protective action may have handed this community a great gift, resulting in the community’s extrication from the contract at little financial costs. The great cost to the community in terms of trust in government to look out for its citizens is another matter.

One side note on Florida Open Meetings Law violations: As every attorney familiar with Sunshine Law issues is aware, a contract found to be void ab initio as a result of having been approved in violation of the Open Meetings Law can have new life breathed into it by being “cured” by the body that illegally approved it — in this case the Gainesville City Commission. In order to be cured, the commission need only follow the law the second time around — properly notice a meeting at which the void contract is brought up for reconsideration, openly discuss the relevant contractual provisions in the Sunshine, and vote again to ratify the contract. GREC and its partners drawing public salaries as GRU executives so far have not sought to do this, perhaps because to do so might spook the overseas lenders who have agreed to finance the project (at junk bond rates of 14 to 15 percent interest, according to ad hoc GRU-GREC committee co-lead negotiator Ed Regan). This is a risky choice that depends for its success on the continued passivity of the Gainesville electorate. In the upcoming city election should Gainesville voters elect those candidates who have been hand picked by GRU-GREC-biomass-deal-at-any-cost city commissioners GREC investors will feel safe in having a commission that when the time comes will vote to cure and reimpose on GRU’s already-beleagured ratepayers the onerous terms of the the void GRU-GREC contract.

(In the upcoming elections GRU-GREC biomass-deal-at-any-cost commissioners Mastrodicasa, Bottcher, Henry, Hawkins and Mayor Lowe have all contributed funds they hope will ensure the election of the only three candidates who agree with their pro-biomass positions and have stated they will do nothing to disturb the GRU-GREC contract. Those three GRU-GREC-supporting candidates are: Lauren Poe, seeking the at large seat, and Yvonne Hinson-Rawls and Armando-Grundy, seeking the District 1 seat.)

Commissioners Henry and Mastrodicasa will be gone this year as a result of term limits, the result being that only three of the five above-cited GRU-GREC biomass deal at any costs commissioners will remain on the commission after this election. Should the citizens of Gainesville see fit to elect me as commissioner for District 1 and see fit to elect anyone except for Lauren Poe as the commissioner for the At Large seat, the GRU-GREC end game will have arrived.

We’ll see.

On Monday evening (December 5) at the African American Accountability Alliance’s 2012 City Commission Candidate Forum, our community witnessed the clearest signal yet that the crack in the information wall that has been obscuring the Gainesville City Commission’s GRU’s biomass electric rate hike scheme has spread beyond the point at which the GRU-GREC-biomass-deal-at-any-cost backroom dealmakers can hope to contain it.

Prior to Monday’s 4As forum, Armando Grundy, one of three candidates for the District 1 City Commission seat, had carefully towed the pro-GRU-GREC-biomass-rate-hike line espoused by his mentor and political sponsor, current District 1 City Commissioner Scherwin Henry, who has voted in favor of the GRU-GREC-biomass deal at every opportunity and who is among the biomass-rate-hike’s most ardent supporters.

At every previous forum, Mr. Grundy had refused to stray even an inch from his mentor and sponsor’s pro-GRU-GREC position
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At previous forums, Mr. Grundy — as justification for his support for the GRU-GREC-biomass-rate-hike that will disproportionately hurt the residents of District 1 — has insisted that he understands the people of District 1. According to Mr. Grundy’s prior statements, the people of District 1 simply do not care about the biomass issue.

But at Monday night’s first District 1 forum, Mr. Grundy – faced with the undeniable fact that the citizens of District 1 have great common sense and overwhelming want to get out of the financially onerous GRU-GREC deal – Mr. Grundy finally, and definitively, stepped away from his mentor and sponsor Mr. Henry.

The abrupt change came after I pointed out, once again, that the GRU-GREC biomass plant has not been opposed by the other two District 1 candidates — not Mr. Grundy, a newcomer to District 1, who moved to District 1 after losing a previous election in which he attempted to become City Commissioner the city commissioner for District 3, and not Yvonne Hayes Hinson-Rawls, who lived in East Gainesville as a child and student and more recently retired to District 1 after a career in New York and Dade County. It was at that point that Mr. Grundy — facing a District 1 crowd with opinions distinctly different than those Mr. Grundy had represented to be their opinions – turned on his mentor and sponsor Mr. Henry.

As accurately reported in The Gainesville Sun:

“Washington also criticized his two opponents for not opposing the biomass plant, prompting Grundy to say he does indeed oppose it.”

It is too early to tell how Mr. Grundy’s split from Commissioner Henry on the biomass issue will play out in the final lap of the City Commission election season.

But it is clear that public outrage that has been boiling has continued to boil hotter ever since the April 6 unblackening of GRU-GREC financial details that the city commission had sanctioned being kept secret from the public until nearly 2050 continues to boil.

And it is clearthat pressure generated by that boiling has cracked the city commission’s carefully constructed two-and-a-half-year GRU-GREC biomass information wall of silence.

And it is clear, now that Mr. Grundy has abandoned his political sponsor and mentor on the biomass issue, that the crack has now spread to the point where there is nothing the GRU-GREC-biomass-deal-at-any-cost backroom dealmakers can do to stop the ill-conceived and irresponsibly negotiated biomass edifice from crumbling to the ground. When that will happen, and how, remain to be seen. I’ll keep you posted.

Nathaniel Sperling for Gainesville City Commission

On March 16^th, the voters of the City of Gainesville will be able to send a glaring message to our local elected officials: we are sick and tired of the irresponsibility that seems to pass for governance these days. Right now, the City of Gainesville is current over $7 Million in the red with no end in sight.

Instead of cutting costs where possible (oh, Mayor Hanrahan has claimed that the city has tried cut all the fat off this year’s budget, but I will show where that is just flat out wrong), the city is just finding nifty little ways of getting our money into their empty coffers. For example, did you know that, since GRU is owned by the City of Gainesville, our utility company has become a giant cash cow to the tune of $34 Million (plus another $9 Million in collected utility taxes) in this year alone? Have your utility rates gone up in the past few months? If so, blame the City Commission and its continued mismanagement of the budget. Is this responsible governance? Oh, we have a shortage of funds…I know, we’ll just spend more and leave the citizenry to foot the bill? It certainly is not realistic…only in government can one legally seize other people’s money to make up for poor spending decisions.

Now, where is all this money going? How about $600k per year for Ironwood Golf Course (another $450K is being spent this year to renovate it…thus, over $1 Million this year is going to pay for a golf course). Approximately $900K per year is being spent so that city employees have access to three fully-equipped and staffed private fitness centers (these centers are only for city employees and their families, the general public who is footing the bill is not welcome) and Proclub services. Then there is half a million dollars being spent per year on a City Communications office. If this office is so indispensable, why did our City Commission function just fine for decades without it? Right here I have mentioned easy ways to eliminate over half the current deficit. I have not even touched on the Mom’s Kitchen boondoggle or the Biomass issue (high startup costs plus potentially high cost of “dead stuff” equals a hefty bill for the taxpayer to foot).

How about all that money that the city is going to waste on a one-stop homeless shelter? Instead of working with local charities (i.e. St. Francis House) and making use of existing social organizations, the city is going to spend a lot of money to put this one-stop center out in the middle of nowhere (how much is it then going to cost to get the homeless out there?) and likely continue to squelch private sector attempts to help alleviate the problem. How much do you think the lawsuits are going to end up costing when something goes terribly and tragically wrong at this one-stop center–what usually happens when you put single mothers and young children in a poorly supervised area with potentially dangerous derelicts?

As Mayor Hanrahan wastes our money on a golf course, she condemns our police and fire fighters for wanting to be treated fairly and the city manager wants to lay off a few dozen police officers. That seems like a fair trade: an unprofitable golf course but a more dangerous and crime-ridden city. Perhaps the only group to benefit from this cut in police officers will be the less responsible members of our college student community who will now be able to party and drink and play loud music because you can bet ‘party patrol’ units will take a hit in these foolish across-the-board cuts the city manager is proposing–sort of like doing brain surgery with a meat cleaver.

At the same time as we waste money, we scare businesses away with draconian regulations and an air of unfriendliness. Now, we have an even weaker tax base and serious underemployment problems. Unless you work for UF or Shands, it is very difficult to find a good paying job with benefits. Our city’s unfriendliness to business hurts our working families and professionals by denying them access to good job opportunities and forces small businesses out of business.

The City Commission shows a great disconnect to the people of Gainesville. It is time we change this. The irresponsibility of our local government seems downright criminal: endangering the welfare of young children by exposing them to dangerous elements of society in a poorly conceived one-stop center, endangering our residents with unnecessary cuts to public safety services, failing to address the Koppers Superfund site and putting the surrounding neighborhoods and the aquifer at extreme risk, even increasing congestion by narrowing major thoroughfares (it will be infuriatingly interesting to see if the number of accidents and road rage incidents increase as the number of lanes on Main Street and University Avenue decrease).

There are those who say that we need people experienced in the working of local government to serve as our new District 4 City Commissioner and Mayor, but I say we need individuals with common sense and a firm grasp of reality. Political experience just means they know how to play the game and we see where that has gotten us: HUGE deficits, underemployment, a severe environmental catastrophe in the making and burdensome regulations and fee.

The reality is that:

1) We need to stop wasting money on boondoggles (i.e. Ironwood Golf course, Mom’s Kitchen, etc.)

2) We need to strengthen our business community and promote greater job development through intelligent deregulation and ending the air of unfriendliness toward business that permeates our local government. The jobs and the businesses are there: look at the town of Alachua, they are doing quite well because their city government shows some common sense.

3) We need to live within our means and stop just increasing taxes and fees (i.e. through siphoning money from GRU)

4) We need to keep our city safe and functional by responsibly allocating our funds (i.e. for police and fire protection)

This is what needs to be done to make our city prosperous and safe. The City Commission needs to stop buying into the failed dogma of New Urbanism and instead listen to the concerns of the people: we want good jobs, we want government to stop wasting money and then hitting us with the bill, we want the government to show the same managerial responsibility that any head of a household or business owner must show in order to survive.

On March 16th, the voters of this city can send a message that even our City Commissioners (who seem to consistently have their head in a land of fantasy) will hear: WE ARE SICK AND TIRED OF IRRESPONSIBILITY AND UNREALISTIC GOVERNANCE AND WE WILL BE HEARD!

Call and e-mail your candidates and ask the tough questions and demand a straight answer. No circumspection, obfuscation or pontification allowed. I can be reached by phone at 352-214-3170 and my e-mail address is nathanielsperling@yahoo.com. Other candidates’ contact information can be found at the Alachua County Supervisor of Elections website.

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There are three ways to cast your ballot in the City of Gainesville elections:

1) Regular voting will occur on March 16th. You can find your polling place on the Supervisor of Elections webiste.

2) Early voting: March 8th-13th at the Alachua County Administration Building (12 SE 1st Street, Gainesville, FL). Hours of operation are 9 AM to 5 PM each day.

3) Absentee voting: Contact the Supervisor of Elections at 352-374-5252 to learn more and request an absentee ballot.

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If you want responsibility and a sense of reality back on your City Commission, if you want a person who will truly listen to your concerns and approach city government with an air of common sense, then please consider voting for me, Nathaniel Sperling, for Gainesville City Commission (District 4).

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Political advertisement paid for and approved by Nathaniel Sperling for Gainesviille City Commission District 4.