re Hallandale Beach's three-day 2013 Budget debacle last week: More thoughts & questions about what you didn't read about it in the Miami Herald and the Sun-Sentinel, as Carli Teproff and Susannah Bryan continue NOT seeing the forest for the trees, or mentioning very important facts and context; If one reporter who perpetually ignores what she sees and doesn't try to find out what's really going on in this city is bad enough, why do we need another? What we need even less than incurious reporters are thin-skinned autocrats on the dais who are afraid to tell the truth and unwilling to admit when they're wrong; @MayorCooper

re Hallandale Beach's three-day 2013 Budget debacle last week: More thoughts & questions about what you didn't read about it in the Miami Herald and the Sun-Sentinel, as Carli Teproff and Susannah Bryan continue NOT seeing the forest for the trees, or mentioning very important facts and context; If one reporter who perpetually ignores what she sees and doesn't try to find out what's really going on in this city is bad enough, why do we need another? What we need even less than incurious reporters are thin-skinned autocrats on the dais who are afraid to tell the truth and unwilling to admit when they're wrong; @MayorCooper

Not that you asked, but the worst of all possible combinations in South Florida is now found in Hallandale Beach: continual government lies & misrepresentation and lazy journalism that doesn't tell the truth or share important context. 

Meanwhile Concerned HB residents like Maggie Ivanovski, Csaba Kulin and Rob Raymond continue to play very important roles in this city even while others in this city who could shirk their civic responsibilities

Despite lots of patience from Hallandale Beach residents waiting for them to actually go out into the community and find out what's really going on, reporters Carli Teproff and Susannah Bryan have shown over time that they aren't interested in asking good-but-pointed questions of powerful people in this city, based on actually knowing something factually that City Hall didn't hand them.

That being so, here are the first few simple questions of more that'll come that you ought to be pondering over the next few weeks as those September city budget meetings approach that Mayor Joy Cooper wants to be a formality, where she has HB citizens playing the role of punching bags.

a.) How much money from the city's Reserve fund has the HB City Commission taken out each year over the past six years, i.e. since 2008, all while Joy Cooper has been mayor?

b.) What's the grand total of that amount from those 6 years? 

c.) How much is in the Reserve now?

d.) Why does the city under Mayor Cooper continue to use Reserve funds every year to pay operational expenses instead of making more strategic cuts in personnel or policies to better reflect the fact that the economy in this city is NOT booming?
The Village at Gulfstream Park is NOT booming, it's actually knocking over already-built buildings -Cadillac Ranch- that probably never should have been put up in the first place.

e.) Why did City Manager Renee C. Miller and CRA Attorney Steven Zelkowitz both say publicly that some CRA docs had already been dealt with promptly and appropriately according to state laws and requirements when the truth may well be that they STILL haven't been? (More on this soon.)

If you really want to get a financial fright, ask HB civic activist Maggie Ivanovski to tell you how much money in salaries and benefits the HB City Manager's office consumes in her proposed budget, while continuing to do such a poor job of actual oversight, yet remaining oblivious to longstanding problems in this city that are right under their nose and which they and Dept. heads have ALREADY been told about many, many times.

Ask HB civic activist Csaba Kulin if it's true that he figured out after going thru the City Manager's proposed budget that the person who will be in charge of the yet-to-be-built
City of HB pool at B.F. James Park will be making a salary of $120,000 a year once it opens next year.
It is true.

Ask Hallandale Beach businessman Rob Raymond if the so-called "improvements" in front of his very successful medical equipment business and all along N.E. First Avenue/Fashion Row seems like it's worth it, given how much unsafer that road is now, especially at night, and the large number of drivers who have hit the new curbs jutting out towards the now one-lane road since the city opened that area -even before the curbs were painted yellow.

The "improvements" that were supposed to be finished by last year's holiday season of Chanukah and Christmas but which were stopped twice for reasons that were never properly explained to the businesses there. 

Now the curbs jutting out towards the road are various shades of black over yellow from all the drivers who continue to hit them since ALL the street  lighting is on the west side of the street  -away from the curbs and the parking spaces.
(If there aren't photos of this as you read this now, come back within 24 hours and they'll be here.)

The older man who recently banged on Rob's business's front door after driving and hitting a curb, who was slightly injured physically -but apparently, quite shaken-up emotionally, and angry- whom Rob let in and spoke to -and wisely, also photos of the curb- is someone whom Mayor Cooper wants to wish away, because that man's unhappy reality in this city now doesn't fit into her fantasy, where she is admired and respected, not loathed and resented, as is the true state of things in this city among people who pay close attention, which, admittedly, is never a majority in this city.

Given the way that the businesses along N.E. First Avenue/Fashion Row have been repeatedly taken advantage of by both the city and the CRA, very likely, on purpose, a situation made worse by the blatant disrespect that new CRA Director Daniel Rosemond has shown the business community at a meeting I've mentioned previously that the HB Chamber of Commerce and other so-called "business leaders" were no-shows at.

Tell me, why should someone as successful as Rob, someone whose business is so very successful that unlike any other business in this city, people actually fly from around the world to South Florida just to do business with him, keep his business in Hallandale Beach, and not just relocate it up to Hollywood or somewhere else where he won't get the perpetual double-talk and flat-out lies from city and CRA employees like he continually does here?
Good question!

Mayor Cooper and her pro-crony capitalism pals around town and on the City Commission
-Anthony A. Sanders and Alexander Lewy, who want almost all CRA money spent only in Northwest HB, instead of thr entire CRA district- better start thinking about it, too, before Rob and others finally decide they've had enough of the city and CRA's broken promises, red tape and intentional headaches, to say nothing of the years and years of uneven enforcement of laws and rules in this city by City Hall towards both individuals and small businesses.
Just saying...

Read the two very incomplete and superficial accounts of what happened last week at Hallandale Beach City Hall and see if you can notice what important context is missing from the articles that's both very important in a well-run city and that both of these articles fail to mention at all?
Something noteworthy that both Carli Teproff and Susannah Bryan FAIL to disclose to their readers that they really ought to know but don't because... well, that's a good question.
Answer is after the articles.

Miami Herald
Hallandale Beach homeowners will pay a little more in property tax
By Carli Teproff
August 2, 2013

After commissioners made a few cuts to special projects and dipped into the city’s reserves, Hallandale Beach residents will likely see the same tax rate as last year, officials decided this week.

While the commission proposed to keep the tax rate at $5.6833 per $1,000 of assessed property value, taxpayers can still expect to pay slightly more because of rising property values. 

Over a two-day workshop, commissioners agreed they did not want to raise taxes, but with rising costs, needed to draw on their rainy-day fund. The reserve account is now about $22 million, from which the city plans on pulling $3.9 million. 

Read the rest of the article at:

http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/08/02/3539845/hallandale-beach-homeowners-will.html


South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Hallandale using $4 million in reserves to balance next year's budget
By Susannah Bryan, Sun Sentinel 
5:28 p.m. EDT, August 4, 2013

HALLANDALE BEACH—

Residents won't see a hike in their city tax rate or fire fee next year, city leaders vow.

Instead, City Hall plans to use $4 million in reserves to balance a $56.7 million budget for the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1. That would still leave taxpayers with $17.5 million in emergency reserves.

During a recent budget workshop, Commissioner Michele Lazarow suggested the city might want to stop relying so heavily on its "rainy day" fund. Last year, the city used $6.5 million in reserves to balance the budget.

Read the rest of the article at:
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-budget-hallandale-forecast-20130801,0,2150121.story

What was conspicuous for NOT being mentioned in either article is

a.) that last Wednesday night, the HB CRA Board cast preliminary vote at their Budget 
meeting requiring that all members, other than "professionals," must live within the

HB CRA district, i.e. west of N.E. 14th Avenue.

Commissioner Alexander Lewy made the motion, seconded by Mayor Joy Cooper, and the third vote was by Commissioner Anthony A. Sanders.

Lewy cast this out-of-the-blue decision as a "philosophical move" with some truly laughable self-justifying comments by Mayor Cooper, already made VERY, VERY ANGRY by some "inconvenient facts" cited at meeting by former HB Commissioner  Keith London, myself and some uncomfortable questions posed by Commissioners Michele Lazarow and Bill Julian, including questions about the transferal of millions of dollars without the CRA Board's knowledge.

It became truly pathetic after the City Clerk explained that the reason the CRA Advisory Board is done the way it is is now is because -wait for it- there was NOT ENOUGH INTEREST by residents living only within CRA district, so volunteers from all parts of city were welcome.

Another vote on this matter is coming in September.

If finalized, this would mean CRA Advisory Board Comm. Chair Leo Grachow, Chad Lincoln and Robert "Bob" Selz would all be kicked-off and replaced.

To me, it was just another transparent attempt by Lewy the Liar to try to curry favor with African-Americans in HB and turn the CRA Advisory Board into yet another rubber stamp group.

Basically, a variation of same reason he wanted the vote for the Parks Bond issue next August when much of city is gone for the summer instead of in November.

Lewy wants to create another reason for as many HB residents as possible to turn out at the polls, so some of them can vote for him in the FL House District 100 race.

b.) the residents of Hallandale Beach were NOT allowed to speak during two of the three meetings that took place last week, and comment after the myriad presentations by the various Dept. heads and city officials, many of whom said things that were simply not true and used numbers that neither add up or make sense given the size of this city.

So why didn't Teproff and Bryan mention that, since the tenor of the conversation of the room would've been quite different if the city's officials and employees knew that they could be corrected and have mistakes pointed-out, and have residents at home watching on TV or via the Internet to know when they were being served up a fresh slice of B.S.?

But then HB citizens weren't allowed to speak at the city's Visioning meeting earlier this year either, and that glaring and galling fact has somehow NEVER been mentioned in the Herald or Sun-Sentinel, though mentioned here on the blog at least twice, below.

MARCH 2, 2013

'Visioning' and Public Participation: Comparing and contrasting Ft. Lauderdale and Hallandale Beach's approach to planning for the future -one is open to constructive criticism & suggestions from its populace, and the other is stealthy and closed-minded. Guess which one I live in?; @MayorCooper]

http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2013/03/visioning-and-public-participation.html

MARCH 5, 2013

To Hallandale Beach's frustrated and beleaguered taxpayers who've reached their limit after SO MANY YEARS of unsatisfactory performance by city's DPW -esp. re proper maintenance/appearance of public beach and city parks- outsourcing some DPW tasks ought to be on the table for active consideration. So why is City Manager Renee Miller not even going to consider the idea during the next year given DPW's dismal track record?

http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2013/03/to-hallandale-beachs-frustrated-and.html

Before I give you Teproff and Bryan's office email addresses so that you can ask them those questions yourself if you so choose, here's an email that I sent out last week that gets to the very heart of the matter that both of these reporters completely ignored, to the dismay of anyone paying attention to what happens in this city.

Last Monday, the first day of the city's Budget workshop, the public could only speak before the meeting started, not after anything was actually revealed or described in depth.
Which led to the following email of mine on Tuesday July 30th at 1:09 p.m.

Subject: FYI: Csaba Kulin on Hallandale Beach Mayor Cooper's welcome and ideas on open government

Though I already knew about it from being there in person for the beginning of the first day of Hallandale Beach's Budget Workshop before heading home and then watching the rest of it at home on my computer, and then talking to him about it late last night, the following is an interesting email that my friend and fellow HB civic activist Csaba Kulin sent to a few people within the past hour.

It's very revealing, but not so about him, so much, though it is revealing of his dedication to this community, despite how much it takes him for granted, but also about the toxic civic discourse that takes place daily in the city with Joy Cooper as mayor.

Not that her frightful behavior and contempt towards citizens is Breaking News, per se, but it's good to be reminded from time-to-time of what we are actually up against.

Not just a woman possessed of truly bad judgment, and illogical and almost frightening thinking on public policy, but someone genuinely anti-democratic in every way that really matters to citizens and genuinely mean-spirited  to boot.

That's who we have as mayor of this town.

it's time for some of you who've been sitting on the sidelines to open your eyes and stop pretending otherwise.

-----

Dear Friends,

I traveled 1200 miles, paid for my own airplane ticket, read a 900 page budget book, created charts, spread sheets and notes to be in Hallandale Beach and to be prepared for the budget workshop. I intended to attend all three days of the workshop as I have done previous years. I dare to say that it is a lot more than 99.9% of our other residents are willing to do. So what do I get in return? Insults and some more insults from Mayor Cooper.

When I walked in the Commission Chambers I walked over to the dais to say “good afternoon” to VM Lewy and Commissioner Sanders. As soon as I got to the dais VM Lewy asked me about a letter I sent to JLAC recently. We had a civilized discussion about the reason behind my action. In the middle of that discussion Mayor Cooper arrived at the dais. She immediately started in a loud and agitated voice to berate me. She asked me “why do you bring up this matter again?” she told me that I am “sore loser”, referring to the fact that I lost in the last election, and other unkind, insulting comments.

I responded to her that I did not bring up anything, VM Lewy asked me a question. To VM Lewy credit, he backed me up by saying to the Mayor that “I asked Mr. Kulin a question, he did not bring it up”. I was taken aback by her angry and disrespectful manner but I did not respond in kind.

The situation did not better after the Mayor stated that “I will not allow any more public comments tonight. The public will have a chance to speak again at the time of voting on the completed budget” I assume in September. That was a direct insult to the two or three residents in the Chambers. What are the residents? Potted flowers or someone to be seen but not heard. So I left the meeting. I see NO reason to expose myself to such insults even if I lost an election.

Many times an informed resident sitting in the room can point out certain facts commissioner may have overlooked in the “heat of the battle”. How could that not help to come up with a better solution? Besides that, the Commission is talking about our money.

I am writing to you because I want to memorialize for the future this incident. I hope you see the wrong in Mayor Cooper’s behavior and if you do, you may consider urging your Commissioners to change the rules so each resident may comment on every item on the Agenda. There is not room full of people willing to speak on every item. Most of the time you can count the residents in the Chamber on one hand.   

In light of this kind of treatment I will need to reconsider how much time and effort I should spend in the future to have a better and more efficient city government. 

Sincerely,

Csaba Kulin

-----
Later that day I sent the following update at 6:45 p.m. 

Update: Adamant about not allowing the public of this city to speak for even a few minutes at Hallandale Beach's Budget Workshop that will already likely run 6-7 hours today -and still ongoing as I write this- except before the meetings start and any info is mentioned by the Dept. heads, Mayor Joy Cooper was defeated 4-1 on a motion to overrule her by the other HB Commissioners.

Csaba, Maggie and myself have already raised some legitimate questions and concerns about the City Manager's proposed city budget, and we know you have questions, too.

Come on down and watch a taste of some real participatory democracy in action, albeit small steps, but all very much against the mayor's wishes.

One small step at a time...

But the next day, it was gone.

Look at all you would not have known if you depended solely on the Miami Herald and the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

cteproff@MiamiHerald.com
sbryan@tribune.com or 954-356-4554

It could hardly be more clear that the current beat reporters assigned to this city, who are very infrequent as it is since their papers also have them cover Hollywood, which has its meetings on the same days, do NOT have what it takes to give residents of this city the information they want in a timely and informative fashion. 

The newspapers need to find someone else who does.

Just saying...

Bad journalism is STILL happening in plain sight in South Florida: Why are Herald and Sun-Sentinel beat reporters ignoring campaign finance disclosure violations story re Broward County PBA in Hollywood? Violations that appear quite deliberate. On this, as with so many other dozens of stories that the public wants to know MORE about, these reporters and their editors are sleepwalking

Bad journalism is STILL happening in plain sight in South Florida: Why are the Herald and Sun-Sentinel beat reporters ignoring campaign finance disclosure violations story re Broward County PBA in Hollywood? Violations that appear quite deliberate. On this, as with so many other dozens of stories that the public wants to know MORE about, these reporters and their editors are sleepwalking

Once again, for about the millionth time since they've had the Hollywood and Hallandale Beach reporting beats for their newspapers, the Miami Herald's Carli Teproff and the South Florida Sun-Sentinel's Tonya Alanez are NOT reporting news they know about.

Why in the world is there a time-delay in reporting news to readers that happened WEEKS ago?

In most large cities not located in Florida, especially Northeastern and Midwestern cities that still have pretensions to being 'newspaper towns,' the information would've been in the newspaper the very next day, and the local TV stations, as per usual, would've suddenly gotten interested in the story, too, and gone to work that day in either ferreting out some real answers, or at least making their viewers know what the basic facts were and who the parties involved were. 
But here, it's weeks later and there's still nothing about it.

What are they, reporters, publicists or spin doctors?

It's a very familiar refrain to news-hungry residents of this part of Broward County.

My fact-filled blog post on this matter is coming this week, and I'll very likely take aim at some of the most egregious apologists for both the union and the reporters.
And I'll have some of the questions that we should've already seen posed weeks ago to the people involved at the PBA.

Csaba Kulin gets the Miami Herald's whitewash treatment: McClatchy's Co.'s Herald practices the opposite of giving credit where credit is due, editing out the name of the one person in South Florida most-responsible for finding out why and how 3 former Hallandale Beach City Managers will soon be multi-millionaires with taxpayer dollars; a story that Miami Herald reporters, editors and management have completely ignored for years!

Where did all the taxpayer money go? Good question! Csaba Kulin knows some of the answers. Imagine if we had City Commissioners here like him and Michele Lazarow who'd actually take their oversight  responsibilities for taxpayers seriously, and ask probing questions instead of just sitting on the dais and playing the role of rubber stamps for the mayor. Hmmm... October 24, 2012 photo by South Beach Hoosier. © 2012 Hallandale Beach Blog, All Rights Reserved.

Csaba Kulin gets the Miami Herald's whitewash treatment: McClatchy's Co.'s Herald practices the opposite of giving credit where credit is due, editing out the name of the one person in South Florida most-responsible for finding out why and how 3 former Hallandale Beach City Managers will soon be multi-millionaires with taxpayer dollars; a story that Miami Herald reporters, editors and management have completely ignored for years!

It's a damn shame that the Miami Herald's editors have once again shown their infamous tin ear for Broward County news, their terra incognita,.

In this case, by editing-out the name from their version of this past week's latest embarrassing story about Hallandale Beach in the Broward Bulldog, written by Bill Gjebre, of the one person in South Florida most-responsible for finding out why and how 3 former Hallandale Beach City Managers and other highly-paid officials will soon be multi-millionaires with taxpayer dollars.

In doing so, they do a serious dis-service to someone whose diligent unpaid hard work for two years first turned-up evidence of financial self-service by Hallandale Beach's three most-recent City Managers, ripping-off Hallandale Beach taxpayers while producing sub-standard results that we can all see around us in this small ocean-side city, HB civic activist and City Commission candidate, Csaba Kulin.

Pension plan pays off big for ex-Hallandale Beach city managers  

Hallandale Beach’s former top managers collect fat pensions from a retirement plan they pushed a decade ago

http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/10/23/v-fullstory/3063859/pension-plan-pays-off-big-for.html  

(FYI: The above story will disappear from Herald website in a few days, unlike Broward Bulldog's website.)

Seriously, folks, whom exactly did you think gave the reams and reams of information with copious notes to the Bulldog's Bill Gjebre in the first place, to get him fully-acquainted with all the pertinent facts and figures, Joy Cooper, the notoriously thin-skinned and ethically-challenged longtime autocrat of a mayor, under whose "leadership" the city's budget has nearly doubled the past 6-8 years, with hardly anything tangible for put-upon citizen taxpayers to point to except a Wastewater Treatment facility? 

Hardly!

And it's certainly not former HB City Manager R.J. Intindola, one of the central parties under-the microscope in the article.

As I've mentioned here previously, Intindola is the smug and poison pen online blogger who lives in Georgia, far from what's actually going on here, but who acts like he's a real player in what happens here. 

He not only isn't, of course, but his name now provokes laughs in people who know that he's been spinning a spiffy PR story about himself for many, many years that is now finally getting the genuine scrutiny it deserved many years ago, and best of all, using the city's own documents.

As we say in France, touché monsieur!

Hallandale’s ex-top managers collect fat pensions from retirement plan they pushed a decade ago

By William Gjebre, BrowardBulldog.org

October 22, 2012 at 6:23 AM

http://www.browardbulldog.org/2012/10/hallandales-top-managers-collect-fat-pensions-from-retirement-plan-they-pushed-a-decade-ago/

Some of you regular readers of the blog may recall this story from five months ago, in my blog post of May 19th:

Csaba Kulin exposes the multi-million dollar bill to be borne by Hallandale Beach taxpayers for having a disconnected City Commission that was -and is- NOT interested in paying close attention to detail or in asking tough questions. That's how and why former City Managers Intindola and Good have made out like bank robbers

http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/05/csaba-kulin-exposes-multi-million.html

Which was followed-up by a large email and subsequent blog post here on Tuesday:

Thanks to Csaba Kulin's many months of diligently digging thru city records to find the truth -only some of which city had- we now know what the real cost to Hallandale Beach taxpayers has been for having an inattentive City Commission for so many years: Millions and millions of dollars for Intindola, Good & Antonio's pensions!

http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/10/as-predicted-here-months-ago-thanks-to.html

And here's the real kicker -Csaba Kulin already has the proof of the city's embarrassing "smoking gun" that kicks this story up several notches from what's written here. 

The sort that, IF Broward County had a solid and dependable local prosecutor, leads to real investigations, real grand juries and real legal consequences.

A fact that the Miami Herald seems determined to find out about -after-the-fact.

And I happen to know it, too, thanks to months of listening to Csaba connect-the-dots.

Not that the Herald's beat reporter for Hallandale Beach, Carli Teproff, ever thought to look into any of this, even though I've sent her some of the information that positively connects-the-dots, months ago, just as I sent it to the Sun-Sentinel's Tonya Alanez.

Nope, they just couldn't be bothered.

And neither could anyone else in South Florida's deservedly-maligned press corps -except Bill Gjebre of the online Broward Bulldog.

Why?

You'd have to ask Teproff and Alanez for that answer, but I have my own suspicions.

No, seriously, why don't you ask them why they weren't interested in a news story involving a city they covered that involved millions of dollars?

If I was their editor, you can be damn sure I'd be asking, but then I wouldn't work for either news paper, now would I?

Nope.

One, the Sun-Sentinel, with a pay-wall that is suffocating the newspaper and making it even more irrelevant, and the other, the Herald that plans on erecting one soon that will only hasten its likely demise. 
Not that their reflexive geographical myopia helps them any! 

(But lure existing and new customers and eyeballs to pay for what new and original content? Ah, there's the rub! What do they have to offer people dis-satisfied with the current product, more of what they dislike?)

Csaba has done what the smartest prosecutors presenting a case before a jury do -letting people hang themselves with their own words.

In this case, Csaba not only has used their own words to help paint a story, but has also used the documents these folks created, the city's own documents, to show what has been going on for years below-the-surface of Mayor Joy Cooper's economic facade on S. Federal Highway.

A city which, if you didn't already know, has a rapidly declining Reserve fund because of its continual use to balance the city's books on everyday expenses, as well as Cooper's craven crony capitalism, an economic theory that treats the city's CRA funds like an ATM for her friends and supporters.

Especially for her loyal supporters in Northwest Hallandale Beach, where do-nothing Comm. Anthony A. Sanders happily plays the role of bank teller with citizen's tax dollars or CRA funds that are supposed to end blight.

Except Sanders acts like it's his money, not ours, and he wants to be thanked for it at the ballot box in ten days. 
No, I won't be thanking you for squandering money and refusing to face HB concerned citizens in person for over three years.
Sanders & Co. needs to get the heave-ho but quick come Election Day...

Csaba penned some words on Thursday that I have included below that spell it out pretty well for all to see and chew-on, especially the very bitter supporters of Cooper, as well as longtime Commissioners Bill Julian, Dotty Ross and Sanders.

This claque of aggressively loud-mouthed and high-strung supporters, whom, as you might imagine, don't much want to let the real facts and bad judgment of their heroes interfere with their preferred alternative-version of reality, where Cooper, Julian, Ross and Sanders are just super, just like the state of the city, and it's people like myself, Csaba, Mike Butler, Keith London and others interested in reform and transparency who are keeping the city down.

Yes, the Cooper Rubber Stamp Crew's collection of sycophants, oddballs and ne'er do-wells, with their grand sense of entitlement, who, in order to prove their worth to their heroes, almost routinely engage in the most juvenile and almost laughable stunts imaginable, of which stealing others' campaign signs is but, I suppose, the most basic of initiations.

For a few of them who are just barely tethered to reality, though, that also includes making phony phone calls to the Police Dept. in order to try to embarrass and frame people they hate.

(I'll get to that in a few days.)

That so many elected officials who have so very much to be publicly held accountable for, as well as their flunkies, drive around town and act above the law, would be laughable if it weren't so damn objectionable and obvious.

I described it here in detail as recently as Wednesday, and I suggest you go back to that post if you don't get the full picture of what things are like.

And now, finally, here's Csaba Kulin with the latest news on this pension matter: 

I have researched Management Pension Plan for two years. I have all the documents made available to me by the city. I did not find anywhere the City Commission-approved the prior year of service before the pension plan actually started.

The plan started in 2001 and R J Intindola should be receiving 13 months plus 4 years of time purchased. That is a bit over 5 years, not almost 25 years. R J Intindola should receive his 401K retirement, which is a lot less generous, prior to 2001 years of service.

I have been looking for two years for the authorization to give credit for “back service” years.
I was not able to find it for one reason. There is none.

The City Commission approved the plan but NOT the “prior service years”. I have no proof YET but I suspect it was approved, without City Commission’s OK, by the then City Manager R J Intindola. As far as know, R J Intindola was the first beneficiary of his decision.

This is not the end of the story. Will Hallandale Beach try to “claw back” and stop paying out ill-gotten pension payments? Will the Broward Inspector General look at the issue? Will the Hallandale Beach City Commission just say “let us forget about the past and concentrate on the mistakes we will make in the future” or we are going to get to the bottom of this. I will tell you after November 6, 2012
Here is the “smoking gun” from the current City Manager.

Hello Mr. Kulin,

I apologize for the delayed response but I wanted to be 100% sure that this information as correct. The city does not have an item that speaks directly to the credit of back time. I have attached for you all the documentation associated with formal actions adopting the management pension plan for your review.

Renee C. Crichton
City Manager
City of Hallandale Beach

-----

So I ask you, in a City Manager-style form of government like Hallandale Beach has had, who do you suppose made that crucial and expensive decision years ago regarding back time?

Teaser Alert -it wasn't the cute blonde beach lifeguard from Ft. Wayne.

Think much, much higher on the food chain.

Yes, just more reasons to vote for Keith London for mayor and Csaba Kulin and Michele Lazarow for city commission instead of the faces of unethical behavior and inadequate oversight and financial accountability, who desperately want to be on the dais a month from now -Cooper, Sanders and Julian.

http://kulin2012.com/

http://michelelazarow.com/

http://keithlondon.com/

Long-term financials at Hollywood and Hallandale Beach City Halls are likely shakier than they appear; 'Mayor Joy Cooper: "I don’t want to adversely affect our services.” 'Since when has she concerned herself with quality of services? Quite the opposite!

“We would like [the tax rate] to be lower, but we have a lot of expenses this year,” said Mayor Joy Cooper after the commission tentatively approved the tax rate this week. “I don’t want to adversely affect our services.”

As quoted in the Miami Herald over the weekend.

To which I can only say, since when has she concerned herself with quality of services? 

Quite the opposite!

The evidence is all around you that you are NOT getting what you've paid for.

Miami Herald

Hallandale Beach residents likely will pay more in taxes  

Hallandale Beach leaders approve a tentative tax rate, which will help pay for additional city services.

By Carli Teproff

Posted June 23, 2012

With two new parks facilities and a push to increase code enforcement and maintenance, Hallandale Beach will have a lot of expenses in the coming year.

And most residents can expect to pay a little bit more in taxes to pay for it all.

So far, the City Commission is leaning toward keeping the tax rate the same as it was this year — $5.90 per $1,000 of assessed property — but with property values going up, that amounts to homeowners paying more.

For a home valued at $200,000, taking the standard $50,000 homestead exemption, the tax bill would be $885, not including school and other taxes.

The city expects to generate about $21.5 million in the 2012-2013 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1. That’s up $700,000, or 3.37 percent, from this year.

“We would like [the tax rate] to be lower, but we have a lot of expenses this year,” said Mayor Joy Cooper after the commission tentatively approved the tax rate this week. “I don’t want to adversely affect our services.”

Costs are up because two new facilities, a city marina and Foster Park will come online this year, said City Manager Renee Crichton. Running the park will up costs for staff and maintenance, she said.

“The city is an excellent position financially, but we still have some challenges we are going to face long-term,” said Crichton.

Commissioner Keith London, who is running against Cooper for mayor, said he thinks the city needs to rein in its spending.

“I think the budget is too high,” said London. “I don’t think we get the value for our dollar.”

City staff has been working on a proposed budget for months now, and the work will continue through the summer. There will be two public hearings in September before the commission votes on a final tax rate.

In the meantime, commissioners said, the staff should look for ways to save money.

Also at the meeting, the commission agreed to raise fire fees by $20 to $145. By raising the fees, the city would see an additional $900,000.

-----

Earlier today, the Balance Sheet Blog in next-door Hollywood, run by Sara Case and Laurie Schecter, posted a thoughtful and important new entry that has an interesting take on the not-so-rosy long-term financial situation in Hollywood, in that despite the positive changes that were made in response to Hollywood voters overwhelmingly passing last September's referendum on city pensions, Larry Legg, an experienced and savvy CPA who's looked at all the docs you can think of, still states that the "city is still at a moderate to high level of risk of bankruptcy and/or austerity measures." 

It's well worth reading!

PENSION REFORM

July 2, 2012, 12:52 PM 

http://balancesheetblog.wordpress.com/2012/07/02/pension-reform/

Did you notice that line about Unfunded Pension costs?

That particular number here in Hallandale Beach is one that you never hear mentioned or discussed, much, esp. with respect to how to dig out of that hole, but I know someone who does know exactly what those numbers are, esp. with respect to the largest share of that problem, the Police and Fire/Rescue pensions.

If you've been reading this blog regularly, you know who that person is, too: Csaba Kulin.

Trust me, I've seen the numbers myself and it will make your head explode when you see them laid bare here on the blog very soon.

In a somewhat similar vein, based on the Teproff article at the top from the Herald and the everyday experiences of Hallandale Beach taxpayers and business owners, year-after-year, here's a reasonable question for Hallandale Beach Mayor Joy Cooper that Teproff and Tonya Alanez of the Sun-Sentinel might want to ask and actually follow-up on with some examples: How many years in a row has HB used the city's reserve fund simply to balance the city's budget?

Not for legitimate unexpected emergencies, but just to balance the budget, crammed with goodies for some, esp. the professional crony capitalism class here in our small city.

Cooper and her apologists at City Hall and all over town do not want to answer that question for a very good reason.

Because the truth is NOT her friend, and neither is spreading the truth.

Later today I'm heading over to North Beach for my final photo recon for my post on a matter that I had wanted to post Friday morning, Mark A. Antonio's last day as City Manager, but which will now probably run later in the week, now that I've blown past my own deadline.

It concerns the REAL reason that the City of Hallandale Beach's Parks Master Plan meeting on South Beach wasn't held at the North Beach Community Bldg. on May 31st, despite the fact that in a normal city, one where common sense and logic do intersect once in a while, that's where it would have been held for all sorts of patently obvious reasons.

If you guess that the reason probably has something to do with the city's infamous and cumbersome bureaucracy that has consistently shown no idea what's it's actually doing, its trademark inefficiency under Good and Antonio, you'd be right.

Not so much the right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing as much as the right hand NOT knowing that it actually has a left hand.

Trust me, it's yet another embarrassing, only-in-Hallandale Beach screw-up, with its usual complete disregard for the taxpayers and citizens of the community.

Yes, just like Antonio's continual disregard for us by insisting that he'd do things his way -the wrong way- even after it was made clear over-and-over in regard to all manner of policy and financial matters that the community felt 100% differently than him.

His complete inability to adapt and evolve was always his most obvious weakness since I've been living here for over eight years.

I had been planned on toasting Antonio's departure on Friday, but absent someone to capture the moment, decided that the best thing I could do was to continue to document how genuinely feckless, ineffective and disconnected to our reality he was 'til the very end.

Incompetency for which he will be rewarded with a pension the size and scope of which will shock people here when they finally see the true figures, though I have a very good idea of it now.

By the way, there's a new Public Records policy in the city.

Guess where it's NOT mentioned? 

Yes, the city's own website.

http://www.hallandalebeachfl.gov/index.aspx?NID=87

So, remind me again how come the city's IT Dept. head Ted Lamott still has a job after so many years of ineffectiveness?

Without giving too much away here, the next four months are going to be VERY BUMPY for individual City of HB Dept. heads, so very used to flying below-the-radar publicly, as I and others publicly discuss and analyze what they have done and mostly haven't done with the funds and resources they've been given, with so little oversight by our feckless Commissioners and the departing City Manager, who has been counting the hours he could leave since January 1st.

All with little tangible results to show HB taxpayers for the city's budget having nearly doubled the past six years under Mayor Cooper, the woman with so very little genuine concern about the actual quality of services delivered to taxpayers and business owners.

Yes, on miserably hot days like today, Cooper must surely be thinking a lot about her Colorado

home-away-from-home. 

I aim to do all I can the next few months to help make THAT her primary residence after November, but the real question is whether or not all the pro-reform candidates running for HB City Commission will do the same.

And if they do, will the voters here actually reject the Cooper Rubber Stamp Crew's eye-rolling antics, odd disconnect from reality and financial bumbling, and actually vote with their heads?
Actually give pro-reform candidates the opportunity they need to properly reform this city thru meaningful financial accountability, greater transparency and an injection of plain old common sense to get it out of its current funk?

We'll all know the answer 18 weeks from tomorrow.