January 28th, 2010 6:30 p.m.A few months back, when I needed to complain
about something the Broward County School
Board was doing, I was told I needed to contact
the South Area office, which was located in either
Plantation or North Dakota, which ever was further
north.
Sure, Plantation is south when you stand on the
Broward and Palm Beach County line but otherwise...
Is that why this decision on 150 guaranteed seats
for South Broward High's zone was decided in
Plantation instead of someplace closer to the school
itself, where more Hollywood parents/citizens
could attend, like the Lippman Community Center
or dare I even say, Hollywood City Hall?
http://www.browardschools.com/
According to what I'm told by a very well-informed
person, the decision to have the South Area
office in Plantation is because of a deal that
Frank Till made while Broward Schools Supt.,
but I'm told it'll be expiring in the not-too-distant
future, so that, presumably, the South Area
office will actually be in our part of the county.
Sort of like the geographical incongruity of both
the Atlanta Braves and Cincinnati Reds being
in the West Division of the National League for
over 20 years, while the Milwaukee Brewers
were in the East, prior to the creation of the
Wild Card and three divisions in MLB.
I'd been planning on running something on
my blog this weekend about School C,
including this flyer put out by the City of
Hollywood, above, and wanted to get this
straight before I posted it.
In case you were curious, the meeting site
in Plantation last night is 14.6 miles from
Hollywood City Hall.
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=
I was fortunate enough to speak with
Kareen Boutros of the Broward Workshop
after Tuesday's Broward Legislative
Delegation meeting on Ethics before I
left, and she told me about the Ethics
Committee meeting today being canceled.
If it wasn't for her comment to me...
When I went to
http://www.broward.org/
directly from the county's main website,
it said: 404 NOT FOUND
I've been trying for awhile and no luck.
I suppose they could be updating the web
page, but if so, why not simply run something
that says that and to try back later like most
websites do?
The county website DEFINITELY looks
different than it did a week ago, and I mean
more than just the group photo in the upper
left.
Very curious.
A few minutes later..
Shortly before 5 p.m. I spoke to Dee Platt
from Comm. Gunzburger's office,
who's always so helpful and friendly,
and told her about the problem.
Dee agreed with me about the website change
and had the same problem accessing the
Ethics Committee homepage.
I called her mainly because I was concerned
that the meeting was tomorrow.
While talking to her, I clicked the links for
each commissioner from the main page and
guess what?
The Commissioners' web pages also don't
come up.
Dee said she was going to contact someone
to try to fix the website problem but in the
meantime, if you go to Hot Picks in the
middle of the main county webpage,
Ethics is listed and it currently shows that
previously-scheduled evening meeting of
next Thursday, on Feb. 4th, as the next
meeting.
http://www.broward.org/
If you really want to spend some time
chasing your tail, try going to the website
of the Broward School system group I've
been referring to here in emails and in
blog posts as the Three Amigos, but
more formally known to some by the
tongue-twisting Commission on
Education Excellence Through Integrity,
Public Ethics and Transparency,
http://
Using their own website, try to find the
time, date and location of their next public
meeting.
Go ahead.
Really, go ahead.
It's not there.
In fact, the only thing that has been added
to the website since it came online are links
to news articles about the group.
And nothing since January 12th, the day
after their first and only public meeting
so far.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/
Sounds like hiding in plain sight.
In fact, to me, it sounds a lot more like a
fan's celebrity website than an actual
Watchdog group's efforts to get the public
engaged to solve a real problem.
Time's a wastin'.
7:10 p.m. The links to the Broward commissioner's
pages now work but not so the Ethics Committee.
And so it goes in Broward County at the dawn
of the year 2010...
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