Above, a self-evident public testament to the continuing inadequacy, incompetency and obliviousness of Hallandale Beach City Comm. Dotty Ross while in office: the HB city water fountain off of State Road A1A/South Ocean Drive and Hallandale Beach Blvd., that has remained broken for well over a year, directly in front of the iconic HB Water Tower, and the so-called A1A/North Beach Community Center below it, that remains closed to Hallandale Beach's citizens taxpayers, today, marking exactly 37 months!August 6, 2010 photo by South Beach Hoosier -looking west towards the HB water fountain and State Road A1A/South Ocean Drive. & HBB.
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Hallandale Beach's Dotty Ross: "It's just inconceivable to me that there's one area in this city that I don't know about."
Oh, really?
It sure doesn't seem that way to us.
In fact, it doesn't seem that way to anyone in the immediate area of this small ocean-side city who's paying close attention and who opens their eyes even occasionally.
No, Dotty Ross's large and continuing role in the reign-of-ruin all around us is quite secure and well-known to us.
As you can see for yourself, below, the Hallandale Beach Blog Time Machine comes in handy once again.
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Miami Herald
HALLANDALE SUED OVER AT-LARGE VOTING
January 16, 2002
By Hector Florin
A lawyer for U.S. Rep. Alcee Hastings filed a class-action lawsuit accusing Hallandale Beach and its commissioners of limiting black voters' rights by holding at-large elections that reduce blacks' chances of getting a commission seat.
Mikel Jones, an attorney in Hastings' office, said single-member-district voting is the remedy. Under single-member districts, voters would elect commissioners who live in their respective districts. The County Commission, the School Board and various municipalities have recently changed to single-member districts.
The suit was filed Tuesday in Broward County Circuit Court, on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s 73rd birthday.
"The city of Hallandale has used, and continues to use, voting procedures . . . to create, enhance and promote the opportunity for and existence of discrimination against minorities,'' the lawsuit reads.
Jones pointed to the city's October special election when the Rev. Josh Brown Jr., the only one of nine candidates living in the primarily black northwest section, received an overwhelming number of votes from his region but finished third overall.
More than 70 percent of Hallandale Beach voters are white. Many live in high-rise condominiums in the city's east side.
Mayor Dorothy Ross, however, feels Hallandale Beach - a rectangular city of 4.5 square miles - is too small to cut up into five districts. She scoffed at the idea that commissioners are not attune to concerns in all areas.
"Most people, when they have district voting - it's a big area that they're talking about,'' Ross said. "It's just inconceivable to me that there's one area in this city that I don't know about.''
Jones said Anthony Musto, the winner of October's election, gained much of his support from white voters.
"A good number of white folks voted for him because he's white,'' Jones said. "I'm not saying he doesn't have credentials . . . but color really does matter apparently.''
Musto said he had not read the lawsuit.
Assistant City Attorney David Jove referred all inquires to City Attorney Mark Goldstein, who did not attend Tuesday's commission meeting because of a bout with the flu.
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Oh, really?
It doesn't seem that way to us.
In fact, it doesn't seem that way to anyone in this small ocean-side city who's paying attention.
Paying attention, something that you've NOT been doing much of for many years, as you have voted nearly 100% for whatever City Manager Mike Good or mayor Joy Cooper have proposed, by hook or by crook, no matter how petty, no matter how undemocratic, and no matter how short-sighted it was for HB's citizen taxpayers.
So tell us, Comm. Ross, why DO you vote on agenda items that are intentionally kept away from the public, and NOT printed on paper or placed on the city's third-rate website, and held up in a second-floor room at City Hall where your words, actions and votes are intentionally NOT televised or videotaped?
Why have YOU done this dozens and dozens of times for years, including voting to give yourself a huge raise?
And why have YOU shown zero remorse for anything that you have done, even when it's later proven to be thoroughly wrong for its citizens?
YOU need to be recalled from office as soon as possible, and people in this city will work hard to make that happen.
They are working on it right now.
Your time has come and gone and yet you remain on the stage as a myopic, mean-spirited hindrance to this city ever getting out of the black hole you drove us into.
In April, YOU even have the unmitigated gall to publicly chastise Hallandale Beach citizens at HB City Commission meetings, as they were walking from their seats to the microphone to speak under public comments, before they could say anything, and then YOU pathetically called my friend and community activist Csaba Kulin, one of the most honest persons in the entire city, a "shill"?
Do you have no shame, Dotty Ross?
No, Comm. Ross, Csaba Kulin is just one of the many, many HB citizens who can see exactly what's right in front of them: a poorly-run and largely unaccountable City Hall, and in you, a VERY sad and angry 80-something year old misanthrope who is completely blind to the continuing harm she does.
You were mysteriously "nominated" for Florida League of Cities elected public official of the year in 2008, just months before you stood for re-election.
Hmm-m-m...
Not because of anything positive that YOU had actually done that year for this city's citizens, residents or business owners, and YOU were NOT selected by a blue-ribbon committee that sought to reward excellence and hard work, but rather "nominated" by your Rubber Stamp cronies on the city commission, something that the Miami Herald and Sun-Sentinel articles NEVER mentioned in their puff piece.
But the honest citizens of this community who have paid attention to your behavior and votes knew the score, and knew a self-dealing con job from Joy Cooper and Mike Good when they saw it thrown in their faces.
Not that this troubled YOU at all in the least.
Many people, even people who once voted for you and once gave you the benefit of the doubt, have confided to me over the past six years how very disappointed they are in you.
In fact, they have even gone so far as to volunteer the notion that if you weren't a city commissioner, they really have no idea what you would do with your time.
As if that was a reason to keep someone in power like YOU who has clearly outworn their welcome with little tangible good to show for their time there, compared to the myriad problems you and your cronies have neglected and exacerbated thru your chronic inattention to detail and lack of support for genuine transparency and accountability.
YOU are just foolish enough to imagine that YOU are still fooling everyone, and that HB's citizens can't see that YOU are someone who has continually been making excuses for the unsatisfactory results at HB City Hall for YEARS and YEARS, long ago erasing whatever good you may've once done.
Frankly, I'm not entirely sure what you would do with all that time if you weren't a HB city commissioner, but it's not my problem.
I don't care what you do in the future, all I know is that I and many other informed and concerned citizens want to push that hypothesis forward ASAP, so we can all find out for ourselves.
I do know one thing for sure, though, and that is that you, Comm. Dotty Ross, are the case study in this small town of the principle of addition-by-subtraction.
This city's chances to improve and crawl out of its longstanding black hole, to no longer be the butt of news media jokes and a regional laughingstock, and for its citizen taxpayers to finally breathe the air of normalcy at Hallandale Beach City Hall, WILL improve dramatically if YOU no longer have a vote on the Hallandale Beach City Commission.
That's precisely our goal.
Mikel Jones, an attorney in Hastings' office, said single-member-district voting is the remedy. Under single-member districts, voters would elect commissioners who live in their respective districts. The County Commission, the School Board and various municipalities have recently changed to single-member districts.
The suit was filed Tuesday in Broward County Circuit Court, on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s 73rd birthday.
"The city of Hallandale has used, and continues to use, voting procedures . . . to create, enhance and promote the opportunity for and existence of discrimination against minorities,'' the lawsuit reads.
Jones pointed to the city's October special election when the Rev. Josh Brown Jr., the only one of nine candidates living in the primarily black northwest section, received an overwhelming number of votes from his region but finished third overall.
More than 70 percent of Hallandale Beach voters are white. Many live in high-rise condominiums in the city's east side.
Mayor Dorothy Ross, however, feels Hallandale Beach - a rectangular city of 4.5 square miles - is too small to cut up into five districts. She scoffed at the idea that commissioners are not attune to concerns in all areas.
"Most people, when they have district voting - it's a big area that they're talking about,'' Ross said. "It's just inconceivable to me that there's one area in this city that I don't know about.''
Jones said Anthony Musto, the winner of October's election, gained much of his support from white voters.
"A good number of white folks voted for him because he's white,'' Jones said. "I'm not saying he doesn't have credentials . . . but color really does matter apparently.''
Musto said he had not read the lawsuit.
Assistant City Attorney David Jove referred all inquires to City Attorney Mark Goldstein, who did not attend Tuesday's commission meeting because of a bout with the flu.
----
Oh, really?
It doesn't seem that way to us.
In fact, it doesn't seem that way to anyone in this small ocean-side city who's paying attention.
Paying attention, something that you've NOT been doing much of for many years, as you have voted nearly 100% for whatever City Manager Mike Good or mayor Joy Cooper have proposed, by hook or by crook, no matter how petty, no matter how undemocratic, and no matter how short-sighted it was for HB's citizen taxpayers.
So tell us, Comm. Ross, why DO you vote on agenda items that are intentionally kept away from the public, and NOT printed on paper or placed on the city's third-rate website, and held up in a second-floor room at City Hall where your words, actions and votes are intentionally NOT televised or videotaped?
Why have YOU done this dozens and dozens of times for years, including voting to give yourself a huge raise?
And why have YOU shown zero remorse for anything that you have done, even when it's later proven to be thoroughly wrong for its citizens?
YOU need to be recalled from office as soon as possible, and people in this city will work hard to make that happen.
They are working on it right now.
Your time has come and gone and yet you remain on the stage as a myopic, mean-spirited hindrance to this city ever getting out of the black hole you drove us into.
In April, YOU even have the unmitigated gall to publicly chastise Hallandale Beach citizens at HB City Commission meetings, as they were walking from their seats to the microphone to speak under public comments, before they could say anything, and then YOU pathetically called my friend and community activist Csaba Kulin, one of the most honest persons in the entire city, a "shill"?
Do you have no shame, Dotty Ross?
No, Comm. Ross, Csaba Kulin is just one of the many, many HB citizens who can see exactly what's right in front of them: a poorly-run and largely unaccountable City Hall, and in you, a VERY sad and angry 80-something year old misanthrope who is completely blind to the continuing harm she does.
You were mysteriously "nominated" for Florida League of Cities elected public official of the year in 2008, just months before you stood for re-election.
Hmm-m-m...
Not because of anything positive that YOU had actually done that year for this city's citizens, residents or business owners, and YOU were NOT selected by a blue-ribbon committee that sought to reward excellence and hard work, but rather "nominated" by your Rubber Stamp cronies on the city commission, something that the Miami Herald and Sun-Sentinel articles NEVER mentioned in their puff piece.
But the honest citizens of this community who have paid attention to your behavior and votes knew the score, and knew a self-dealing con job from Joy Cooper and Mike Good when they saw it thrown in their faces.
Not that this troubled YOU at all in the least.
Many people, even people who once voted for you and once gave you the benefit of the doubt, have confided to me over the past six years how very disappointed they are in you.
In fact, they have even gone so far as to volunteer the notion that if you weren't a city commissioner, they really have no idea what you would do with your time.
As if that was a reason to keep someone in power like YOU who has clearly outworn their welcome with little tangible good to show for their time there, compared to the myriad problems you and your cronies have neglected and exacerbated thru your chronic inattention to detail and lack of support for genuine transparency and accountability.
YOU are just foolish enough to imagine that YOU are still fooling everyone, and that HB's citizens can't see that YOU are someone who has continually been making excuses for the unsatisfactory results at HB City Hall for YEARS and YEARS, long ago erasing whatever good you may've once done.
Frankly, I'm not entirely sure what you would do with all that time if you weren't a HB city commissioner, but it's not my problem.
I don't care what you do in the future, all I know is that I and many other informed and concerned citizens want to push that hypothesis forward ASAP, so we can all find out for ourselves.
I do know one thing for sure, though, and that is that you, Comm. Dotty Ross, are the case study in this small town of the principle of addition-by-subtraction.
This city's chances to improve and crawl out of its longstanding black hole, to no longer be the butt of news media jokes and a regional laughingstock, and for its citizen taxpayers to finally breathe the air of normalcy at Hallandale Beach City Hall, WILL improve dramatically if YOU no longer have a vote on the Hallandale Beach City Commission.
That's precisely our goal.
