Showing posts with label Judy Stern. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Judy Stern. Show all posts

Friday, September 13, 2013

In Broward County, CRA numbers just don't add up - Broward Bulldog has latest news re Broward County Inspector General's office opening a broad line of inquiry into misuse of property tax dollars by CRAs, including Hallandale Beach's, "with millions at stake"; #audit, #stonecoldfacts, @MayorCooper

Above and below, northbound U.S.-1/Federal Highway as City of Aventura and Miami-Dade County becomes City of Hallandale Beach and Broward County, alongside Gulfstream Park Race Track & Casino and Village at Gulfstream Park retail complex. August 28, 2013 photos by South Beach Hoosier. © 2012 Hallandale Beach Blog, All Rights Reserved.
In Broward County, CRA numbers just don't add up - Broward Bulldog has latest news re Broward County Inspector General's office opening a broad line of inquiry into misuse of property tax dollars by CRAs, including Hallandale Beach's, "with millions at stake"; #audit, #stonecoldfacts, @MayorCooper
Sent out this email this morning to all Friends of the Blog and "all the ships at sea" in Hallandale Beach, Broward County, and in Tallahassee, Florida Governor Rick Scott and FL CFO Jeff Atwater, certain select Florida state Senators and members of the Florida Joint Legislative Auditing Committee...

CRA numbers that just don't add up -FYI re Broward Bulldog: Broward opens broad inquiry into misuse of property tax dollars by CRAs; millions at stake

 Yes, it seems like only yesterday that I'd been up half the night penning one in a series of emails to Governor Scott about what's been going on for YEARS at Hallandale Beach City Hall with the CRA Board and its very highly-paid, tone-deaf staffers repeatedly taking advantage of this city's taxpayers and small business owners to further crony capitalism and pure political patronage as best they could, using the cover of fighting social ills like "blight," the word that you never ever hear uttered at HB City Hall.

 Yes, the very same characters at HB City Hall who have an annual Visioning meeting to discuss their individual and collective thoughts and strategies towards the spending of taxes and CRA funds, not that facts matter a great deal.

 They call it a public meeting, but they prefer a public that is seen and not heard, since in this city, the public can't ask questions or ask for clarification or even make suggestions at it, forcing citizens to just sit and observe for hours on end while reality takes a long holiday.
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2013/03/visioning-and-public-participation.html

 But in this case I'm thinking of, my email to Gov. Scott wasn't from yesterday, it was March, six months ago:
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2013/03/my-open-letter-to-florida-governor-rick.html

 The next time you hear someone in Broward County, like one of the usual "experts" or pundits or maybe a self-interested lobbyist like Mayor Joy Cooper's supercilious pal, Broward lobbyist Judy Stern repeat the Conventional Wisdom in this county that nobody really cares about ethical behavior, transparency and accountability in Broward cities, except a handful of people, just keep this in mind.

 As of Friday September 13th at 2:55 a.m., in the 48 weeks since I first wrote my October 15th 2012 post titled, "Ethics? Not for us! Follow-up to my post re Hallandale Beach's unethical "business as usual" attitude, with "special rules for special people" if they are named Joy Cooper, Bill Julian and  Anthony A. Sanders; What ethics? What rules? @MayorCooper, @SandersHB" it's been seen 51,134 times at  
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/10/ethics-not-for-us-follow-up-to-my-post.html

 Yes, that's more than a thousand page views a week and more than the total population of this city, even during "the season."
Imagine that! 

 That total doesn't even include the number of people who saw it the day it was first posted, when it was the default post of the blog. 
That's a lot of people who now know a lot more facts about the truth regarding the corruption, unethical conduct and plain old incompetency that have been commonplace in Hallandale Beach all these years while Broward State's Attorney Mike Satz and his staff did NOTHING to help us.
Just saying...

 And now on to today's featured attraction...
-----


Broward Bulldog
Broward opens broad inquiry into misuse of property tax dollars by CRAs; millions at stake
By William Gjebre and Dan Christensen, BrowardBulldog.org
September 12, 2013 AT 6:29 AM

---------- Forwarded message ----------

Date: Tue, Sep 10, 2013 at 1:33 AM
Subject: FYI re Latest news re prospective audit of Hallandale Beach CRA by JLAC
Cc: "Scott, John W." <InspectorGeneral@broward.org>

Well, after making a phone call this afternoon to JLAC's office up in
Tallahassee,
I received the response below.

Now we at least have some documentation proving who this community's real friends in Tallahassee are -and aren't- these days, and who's just been feeding us lip service about rallying to the cause of giving Hallandale Beach citizens their long overdue accounting of where the HB CRA millions were really going for years, while nobody at HB City Hall was performing
anything close to the level of genuine oversight and scrutiny that was demanded -or which HB taxpayers, residents and business owners had a reasonable right to expect.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: JLAC <jlac@leg.state.fl.us>
Date: Mon, Sep 9, 2013 at 4:04 PM
Subject: RE: re prospective audit of Hallandale Beach CRA by JLAC
Mr. Smith:

To date, the Joint Legislative Auditing Committee has not received a request for an audit of the Hallandale Beach CRA from any member of the Legislature.

I apologize for the slow response. After your call today, Debbie mentioned your email on August 19th, but neither of us recalls seeing it before.

Kathy

Kathy DuBose, Coordinator
Joint Legislative Auditing Committee 
___ 
Sent: Monday, August 19, 2013 12:34 PM
To: JLAC

Subject: re prospective audit of Hallandale Beach CRA by JLAC

Monday August 19th, 2013
12:30 p.m.
To Whom It May Concern:
As of this morning, has the Florida Joint Legislative Auditing Commission received any correspondence from the following state legislators formally requesting that JLAC perform an audit of the Hallandale Beach CRA: Sen. Eleanor Sobel, Rep. Joe Gibbons and Rep. Shevrin Jones?
Living here, and being very involved in the effort to get your Committee to do one so that
citizens of this community can finally get the financial answers that we have long been
denied, I can tell you that there are no media reports of any of the three of them doing so,
thus far, so I just want to get confirmation of that fact.
Thank you for your assistance! 
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Thursday, August 1, 2013

More troubling news re the Hallandale Beach CRA scandal and the curious conduct of Mayor Joy Cooper re FL's Sunshine Laws and public records, which further makes the case for why we need the Florida Joint Legislative Auditing Committee (JLAC) to get involved and perform a thorough audit of the HB CRA ASAP

Above and below, looking north on south-bound U.S.-1/South Federal Highway towards Hallandale Beach City Hall, July 10, 2013 photo by South Beach Hoosier. © 2013 Hallandale Beach Blog, All Rights Reserved.


 Taken within the context of a sweltering South Florida summer -above via a heat map photo- that's often robbed us of our desire to live in South Florida full-time, or at least get into our car any time after its been sitting in a parking lot under a brutal and unforgiving sun for hours on end, for fear of our skin melting, and literally having the life sucked out of us after opening the door, today is a real red letter day at the blog.

 The reason for that is that we have some genuine positive news to share with you all courtesy of Tom Lauder that actually advances the narrative that is the continuing drip-drip-drip scandal of the Hallandale Beach CRA, and what has gone on in this city the past ten years.

 Not just the public policy scandal of all the wasted time and squandered opportunities to actually do the right thing in this city to actually eliminate blight and improve the area economically in a way that's actually tangible, which is a scandal of sorts, of course, but the larger financial one that directly led to millions of dollars going out the door with near-zero scrutiny and oversight by the very people at Hallandale Beach City Hall who were supposed to provide it on behalf of the citizens, taxpayers and small business owners of this city.
But who didn't.
Year-after-year.

I sent the following out as an email this afternoon because it helps to tie together more information about those mysterious text messages between Hallandale Beach Mayor Joy Cooper, HB City Manager Renee C. Miller and the mayor's pal and Broward lobbyist, Judy Stern, and their attempts to prevent an audit of the HB CRA from taking place via County Auditor Evan Lukic's office.
It also helps connects-the-dots more on how the city's elected officials and administrators handle public record requests that get a little too close for comfort.

 Rather than name every official I sent it to like I have sometimes in the past, let's just say that this time I've sent it to a wider variety of people than usual here and up in Tallahassee -and points-in-between- as well as some of the leaders of the Florida State Senate and members of the Florida Joint Legislative Auditing Committee, the latter of whom many of us in this city are counting on to get us the truth we've long been denied.
-----

 My comments are after this very timely article by Tom Lauder.

 Media Trackers Florida
Hallandale Beach Mayor Fails to Report Texts to Lobbyist During Meeting
By Tom Lauder
July 31, 2013
Hallandale Beach Mayor Joy Cooper exchanged multiple text messages with controversial lobbyist Judy Stern during a June 4 government meeting but did not log the messages on a lobbyist contact report as required by state law.
Earlier this spring, Hallandale Beach residents asked the Broward County Commission for assistance after a Broward County Office of the Inspector General (OIG) investigation “identified numerous instances of gross mismanagement that stemmed from institutional deficiencies in the establishment, organization and function of the CRA [Community Redevelopment Agency].” Some of the residents raising concerns included Hallandale Beach Commissioner Michele Lazarow and former Hallandale Beach Commissioner Keith London.
Read the rest of the post at:
http://mediatrackers.org/florida/2013/07/31/hallandale-beach-mayor-fails-to-report-texts-to-lobbyist-during-meeting

-----
August 1, 2013

 I wanted to let you all know today that since I sent a formal request to the City of Hallandale Beach six weeks ago, it is refusing to fulfill my Public Records Request and comply with Florida's Sunshine Laws in providing me with all the text messages between Broward lobbyist Judy Stern and HB Mayor Joy Cooper and HB City Manager Renee C. Miller in their lengthy efforts to prevent Hallandale Beach residents from getting the true facts.

 This, even as the three of them lobbied Broward County Commissioners and staff, including County Administrator Bertha Henry on this matter, to prevent a thorough audit of the Hallandale Beach CRA via the Office of Broward Auditor Evan Lukic.
A thorough audit that HB residents desperately want so they will finally know precisely what really happened to millions of dollars.

 I was told Wednesday in-person by HB City Clerk Sheena James, prior to the city's CRA Budget Workshop, that the city would be unable to comply with my request because, rather conveniently, they say their phone carrier -that is, AT&T, the carrier who is paid tens of thousands of dollars every year by Hallandale Beach taxpayers for telephone services used by Hallandale Beach elected officials and staffers-DON'T have to provide requested public records without a court order, even if the parties 'owning' the phones request them.

 Personally, I think HB City Hall is laughing at the idea of their being able to successfully thwart my honest efforts to get to the truth on this matter, and get my hands on public records that I have strong reason to believe contain some very incriminating comments by the three of them, possibly, even about me.

 When I brought this up during my three minutes to speak prior to the actual meeting, I specifically mentioned that HB citizens would be very interested in hearing from CRA Attorney Stephen Zelkowitz in the future on why the city doesn't simply log those messages in a timely fashion, since it seems clear to me that the city is using the carrier as a buffer to not comply with legitimate Public Records Requests, and that in any event, there will be requests by
someone at some future point for text messages, since they are public records, so the city better figure out what they were going to do to comply with the law.

 After I returned to my seat, Mayor Cooper then responded in a semi-sarcastic manner that she only wishes she could get access to all those messages (Of hers!)

 I was not amused, chiefly because I know the truth is that she does NOT want those messages being made public.
In any case, Mayor Cooper then went on to say, rather tellingly, that those text messages between herself, lobbyist Stern and HB City Manager Miller, regarding their efforts to thwart an audit, were "private."

 No, those text messages about the City of Hallandale Beach and its CRA were and are public records that I'm legally entitled to see under Florida's Sunshine Laws.
But that callous and condescending response of hers shows you the caliber of the individual that the beleaguered citizens of this town are dealing with, in that Mayor Cooper is someone who has repeatedly shown in the past that she will use any means necessary to thwart both the spirit and the letter of  Florida's Sunshine Laws -even to the point of suing a HB citizen-
and she continues to do so today.

 You may also be interested in knowing that Wednesday night at the HB CRA Budget Workshop, where city management employees out-numbered actual residents in the room by a factor of 12:1, I told the assembled CRA Board of Directors and the CRA Executive Director (City Manager), along with the city's various Dept. heads a fact I had already shared with some
Broward County Commissioners and well over a hundred other interested parties before and after that June 4th meeting mentioned in the article above.

 To wit, despite the fact that the Broward Inspector General's final report was issued months ago, the city has refused to place a link to the report or the city's  own response to it on the city's website for residents, taxpayers and small business owners to read for themselves.

 But because HB City Manager Renee C. Miller and CRA Attorney Stephen Zelkowitz were going to be speaking at that June 4th County Commission meeting against the request by HB Commissioner Michele Lazarow and former HB Comm. Keith London, and thought that it was important for the County Commission to be able to see and review them, they transmitted
both, so Broward County actually had links to both on their agenda for the meeting.

 So, Broward County was given the information that the city has refused to provide its own citizens on the city's website, even though the city's taxpayers and the CRA paid the legal fees in the official city response, as well as for Zelkowitz to appear at the Broward County Commission.
So we can pay for all of that but we can't see it on the website that we're also paying for.
That's how things are done here, and it's not by accident.

 Yes, the Broward OIG report that characterized as "gross mismanagement" the performance of the City of Hallandale Beach officials to describe what they found when funds are given to people and groups in this city without anyone actually EVER following-up and checking to see what actually happened to the CRA funds, or even whether they were actually used for the purpose they'd been proposed for in the original application.
Yes, HB City Hall operated on the honor system with all that money.

 People and groups that claimed to be non-profits but who weren't according to the IRS, and who didn't file required documents, and yet who were quite content to not properly disclose all sorts of relevant basic information, even while they strongly resisted almost all attempts at basic transparency to the  citizens of this community, or to the public at large.

 Now you know why the concerned residents of this city so desperately want the Florida JLAC to perform a thorough audit that will tell us the truth, since the very people at HB City Hall who are supposed to be providing responsible oversight of the HB CRA are also the people almost entirely responsible for the mess it's in, and the great loss of confidence the community has in City Hall's ability to perform even simple tasks honestly, ethically and competently.

 Yet these people, like Mayor Cooper, are also the one who are trying their best to keep the public in the dark about the facts as long as possible thru intentional obfuscation, needless finger-pointing and serial misrepresentation.
And the community saw another perfect example of that very thing last night, as if we needed another reminder.

 Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions, and please DO let me know when a decision is made regarding JLAC's future intentions on this important public policy matter to Hallandale Beach's VERY frustrated citizens.
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Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Per tonight's crucial Hallandale Beach CRA meeting at 6 p.m., here's an HB CRA primer to bring FL legislators and the press corps up-to-speed, as well as the South Florida Editorial Boards that have been ignoring it at their peril -News Flash: the FL Legislature is NOT going to TOLERATE the sort of self-evident waste of MILLION$ via crony capitalism that HB's CRA Board has been doing for years under the direction of Mayor Cooper

Above, Hallandale Beach City Hall Complex on S. Federal Highway/U.S.-1, where attention to details and appearances has NEVER been their strong suit in the nine years I've lived here, after returning to South Florida after 15 years in D.C. area. Thanks to the city's incompetent, myopic and poorly-managed DPW, the spotlights seen above in 2011 on the city's monument sign, at the corner of U.S.-1 & S.E. 5th St., have NOT worked since June of 2012. Which is to say that they have NEVER worked in the year that  Renee C. Miller has been City Manager. But guess what, attention to details and appearances really DO matter when you are a government, and the situation with the lights is but the tip of the iceberg when it comes to a consistently unsatisfactory performance for HB taxpayers and businesses in exchange for their taxes. August 7, 2011 photo by South Beach Hoosier. (c) 2013 Hallandale Beach Blog, All Rights Reserved
Per tonight's crucial Hallandale Beach CRA meeting at 6 p.m., here's an HB CRA & absence-of-ethics primer to bring FL legislators up-to-speed, as well as the South Florida press corps and Editorial Boards that have been ignoring it at their peril - News Flash: the FL Legislature is NOT going to TOLERATE the sort of self-evident waste of MILLION$ via crony capitalism that HB's CRA Board has been doing for years under the direction of Mayor Cooper
My friend and fellow Hallandale Beach and Broward County civic activist Csaba Kulin writes with his customary conviction and precision:
Hallandale Beach adopted the “rope-a-dope” tactics a long time ago. Mayor Cooper and her friends on the commission will take a lot of punches but will not change their ways on less the Governor, the State or Broward County comes down on them like a ton of bricks.
Maybe this time someone will not only listen but will help us to bring an end to this gross mismanagement of our City and CRA. Promises and cover-up will no longer do. A few people benefit at the expense of the rest of the City/CRA.
We need to know the truth, we are entitled to the truth.
We will see tonight who is going to vote for transparency and open government and who is NOT.

And will Broward State's Attorney Mike Satz and Broward Inspector General John W. Scott -or one of their representatives- be present tonight to bear witness to what happens here?

 What about anyone from Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi's regional office in Fort Lauderdale, which has also been completely asleep-at-the-switch for years on this and so many other matters in Hallandale Beach involving Florida's Sunshine Laws and very curious civic administration, doing absolutely nothing about things like months and months of legally-required lobbyist disclosure documents missing from HB City Hall and the city's own website?

If you attend tonight's meeting at City Hall, please be sure to bring along your cameras and video recorders so that you can capture the moment and perhaps capture something going on in the Commission Chambers that I don't see, and I will even give you an incentive.

I will buy a delicious coffee and pastry at the Panera Bread here in town for the non-reporter who sends me the best photo of themselves standing with Mayor Joy Cooper's bosom pal/Broward lobbyist Judy Stern,

 Stern was partners with the mayor and City Manager Renee C. Miller in vigorously fighting against the request of HB Commissioner Michele Lazarow and former HB Comm. Keith London to the Broward County Commission on June 4th to have a thorough audit of the HB CRA done by the Office of Broward County Auditor Evan Lukic,

 In that way, HB residents, taxpayers and small business owners could FINALLY find out where ALL the millions went, since Mayor Cooper has NEVER wanted a thorough audit of the entire CRA performed by an independent third-party.
That's the last thing she wants!

 For the record, as of 1:50 p.m. today, I have still NOT been provided copies by the city of the text messages sent between Judy Stern, Mayor Cooper and City Manager Miller regarding their efforts to thwart an audit of the CRA by the county, weeks after my simple Public Records Request was made.

If you are reading this far from the heat and humidity that is Hallandale Beach in the summer, especially those of you reading this up in Tallahassee, here's what you need to know: It's been Mayor Joy Cooper's great fortune to be an elected official in South Florida at a time when the vast majority of the local public is both apathetic and intensely cynical, and the local press corps, with just a few exceptions, has been both incurious and unwilling to report on what is in plain sight .
And that combination has been my community's great collective misfortune.

By the way, my October 15, 2012 post below, "Ethics? Not for us!" has now been seen over 35,052 times as of Noon.

And without further ado, here's the past 18 months worth of the Greatests Hits of the Hallandale Beach CRA waste, ethics and corruption scandal.

JULY 9, 2013
"High Noon" in Hallandale Beach on Wednesday night? After so many months of HB City Hall intentionally stonewalling the public, the city's long-running CRA scandal and the Broward IG's damning report of the HB CRA Board, alleging "gross mismanagement" of millions of dollars, will FINALLY get a public airing on Wednesday at 6 p.m. at HB City Hall; Is the Florida Joint Legislative Auditing Comm. poised to come to the rescue of long-suffering HB residents who've longed for a complete audit of the entire CRA for many years, and want to see some punishment after years of ZERO accountability and little tangible to show for the MILLIONS that went out the door?
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2013/07/high-noon-in-hallandale-beach-on.html

 JUNE 28, 2013
More intentional Hallandale Beach City Hall misdirection & deception re HB CRA - Media Trackers Florida has more proof of the unseemly behavior at City Hall that HB citizens recognize on sight from past experience: "Hallandale Beach Officials Failed to Document Contacts with Florida Lobbyist"
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2013/06/more-intentional-hallandale-beach-city.html

JUNE 10, 2013
Don't say it with flowers, say it with subpoenas! Subpoenas finally drop on the heads of Hallandale Beach officials, including Mayor Joy Cooper, and now the Joint Legislative Auditing Comm. is showing genuine interest in getting the WHOLE TRUTH from the HB CRA about what happened to all that money. Yes, the scandal in Broward County involving MILLION$ that the South Florida Sun-Sentinel and their Dana Banker & Rosemary Goudreau have been ignoring for months. Future owners of the Sun-Sentinel, please take note!

JUNE 5, 2013
When it comes to Public Integrity, it's "Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell" at the Broward State Attorney’s Office: What are all you people in Hallandale Beach who want good, clean government looking at me for, anyway? Why are you expecting me to actually do something about the longstanding corruption, incompetency and malfeasance at Hallandale Beach City Hall, to say nothing of what the Broward Inspector General's office just called the city's "gross mismanagement" for years of the HB CRA? After all, I'm only the Broward State's Attorney

JUNE 3, 2013
Questions, questions and more questions about Tuesday's important Broward County Commission meeting re possible audit of controversial Hallandale Beach CRA; Meeting now has an added feature: City Manager Miller and CRA Attorney Zelkowitz who publicly argued that the Broward IG didn't have legal authority over the HB CRA, will now be speaking and playing the role of Wiley E. Coyote before the boulder falls on them. Must-see TV! HB citizens want the truth, not more stonewalling, finger-pointing and spin from city's elected officials and city employees

MAY 31, 2013
Given the longstanding mismanagement and corruption involving MILLIONS of dollars at Hallandale Beach CRA, why has Broward's independent Office of Inspector General refused to hold a single outreach mtg. with citizens in Hallandale Beach, while OIG has met with other Broward civic groups? It's very perplexing and counterintuitive to getting cold hard facts out into the sunshine and the public realm

MAY 22, 2013
Mark your calendar for June 4th! Latest news re controversial Hallandale Beach CRA: Keith London set to appear at Broward County Commission and urge them to heed the recommendations of the Broward IG's damning report on HB CRA, urge Broward County Auditor to perform audit and get a full-accounting for HB taxpayers of where the $70 million has gone; Need to get FL Joint Legislative Auditing Comm. more involved, per my previous emails to Sen. Jeremy Ring

MAY 3, 2013
Csaba Kulin asks Hallandale Beach City Attorney Whitfield THE question HB citizens have long wondered, esp. as the Broward IG's Office has been busy investigating the city and turning-up mountains of incriminating and jaw-dropping evidence: Who at HB City Hall is supposed to make sure that applicable laws, ordinances and rules, especially those regarding ethics and conflicts of interest, are followed and enforced fairly? Teaser Alert: You won't like her answer

APRIL 24, 2013
The Broward IG returns serve on Hallandale Beach's embarrassing and mis-behaving tinhorn pols & officials re HB CRA. They get a dose of cold hard reality poured on them, the first of so many to come in their well-deserved comeuppance in the court of public opinion. Their karma is going to be a bitch!; @MayorCooper, @SandersHB, @AlexLewy

APRIL 19, 2013
Wither Florida's Sunshine Laws? Part II: Investigating the continuing dysfunction, lack of appropriate disclosure of public information and the generally imperious anti-citizen attitude at Hallandale Beach City Hall under Mayor Joy Cooper; Yet MORE on the City of Hallandale Beach's failure to comply with legally-required public disclosure/lobbying laws, as well as the accuracy and timeliness of public records on HB's own website; Lobbying records that are supposed to be timely and accurate are TWO MONTHS old, making any pretense of genuine lobbying disclosure a joke; @MayorCooper

APRIL 18, 2013
Breaking News: Broward Inspector General's Final Report on Hallandale Beach City Hall's longstanding corruption & incompetency with CRA released today - FINAL REPORT RE: GROSS MISMANAGEMENT OF PUBLIC FUNDS BY THE CITY OF HALLANDALE BEACH AND THE HALLANDALE BEACH COMMUNITY REDEVELOPMENT AGENCY

APRIL 4, 2013
Follow-up email to FL Gov. Rick Scott about MILLION$ more down the drain at Hallandale Beach City Hall. MORE of what we already knew and always suspected and now it's Q.E.D. yet again -Bill Gjebre in Broward Bulldog: "Hallandale city managers erased millions in code violation fines with little oversight"; @MayorCooper, @SandersHB, @AlexLewy

MARCH 19, 2013
Part I: Investigating the continuing dysfunction, lack of appropriate disclosure of public information and the generally imperious anti-citizen attitude at Hallandale Beach City Hall under Mayor Joy Cooper; Matters that anyone could see if they just looked -I looked and here's what I found in late February 2013

MARCH 14, 2013
Is Hallandale Beach Comm. Alexander Lewy -Lewy the Liar- running for FL House 100 in 2014? Yes, but opponents/voters have a treasure trove of evidence to show why he's a poor choice to represent anyone anywhere, given his uncontrollable know-it-all personality and pro-govt. mindset, and penchant for always thinking he knows best, even when self-evident facts show why he's wrong; Friends Helping Friends Dept.: Last Tuesday Lewy was honored by group at the same address he voted to give $200k CRA loan to (that still owed taxpayers money for previous loan) and voted $50k to just weeks ago. Plus, another deal for Rabbi Tennenhaus; @AlexLewy
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2013/03/is-hallandale-beach-comm-alexander-lewy.html

FEBRUARY 20, 2013
No end in sight for Hallandale Beach's ethical problems with CRA funds: The Palms Community Action Coalition's lack of public transparency -and Murvin Wright's fingers in so many pies- are THE logical result of years of unethical dealings in Hallandale Beach, wherein taxpayer & CRA dollars routinely go out to pals of City Hall, and compliance with laws, common sense and real-world notions of oversight and conflict-of-interest take second place to personal/political gain
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2013/02/no-end-in-sight-for-hallandale-beachs.html

DECEMBER 18, 2012
Good news for Hallandale Beach taxpayers! Rare victory for common sense and financial accountability at City Hall courtesy of Comm. Michele Lazarow
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/12/good-news-for-hallandale-beach.html

DECEMBER 16, 2012
Public corruption & incompetency hiding in plain sight - The Hallandale Beach CRA and its Exec. Director, Alvin Jackson, along with CRA "Directors" like Alexander Lewy, show their true colors -yet again! One thinks he's above the law and the other one wants to ignore the law on how CRAs operate; Broward Bulldog: Broward IG says Hallandale made “immense” gaffe in overseeing $12.7 million in city bonds; @AlexLewy, @SandersHB
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/12/public-corruption-incompetency-hiding.html

NOVEMBER 9, 2012
Hallandale Beach's Midnight Vigilante is no Paul Revere! Caught in the act: Hallandale Beach Mayor Joy Cooper's son's Midnight Ride of campaign sign-stealing -on Election Day!; Anything goes now in HB -even political intimidation- as Broward IG & Broward SAO sleepwalk while laws & ethics are repeatedly laughed at by pols in power; @MayorCooper, #FDLE, @myfloridalegal, @fbi.gov

 OCTOBER 24, 2012
The City of Hallandale Beach's rules are clear -NO political activity on city property. But Josh Brown, Jr. doesn't care about our rules. He wants what HE wants, and our rules don't scare him...; @SandersHB
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-city-of-hallandale-beachs-rules-are.html

 OCTOBER 15, 2012
Ethics? Not for us! Follow-up to my post re Hallandale Beach's unethical "business as usual" attitude, with "special rules for special people" if they are named Joy Cooper, Bill Julian and Anthony A. Sanders; What ethics? What rules? @MayorCooper, @SandersHB
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/10/ethics-not-for-us-follow-up-to-my-post.html

 SEPTEMBER 19, 2012
More tough questions for Hallandale Beach taxpayers to ponder as voting draws near on 2013 budget for controversial CRA; Why can't the city provide real oversight and criticize Jessica Sanders' continued inability to properly manage the Palms Community Action Coalition, which gets CRA funds? Because her husband is a commissioner, the same man who hides from savvy taxpayers rather than answer their questions about his land sale to the city in 2009 -for MORE than property was worth!; @MayorCooper, @SandersHB, @AlexLewy 
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/09/more-questions-as-hallandale-beach-gets.html

 JUNE 28, 2012
Hallandale Beach's political corruption is hiding in plain sight -"Your Tax Dollars at Work" Hallandale Beach CRA (City Commission) Says Hands Off to Broward Inspector General; Mayor Joy Cooper's stonewalling initiative begins in earnest, since the true facts are NOT her friend
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/06/hallandale-beachs-political-corruption.html

 JUNE 26, 2012
Cornered! Pious Comm. Anthony A. Sanders consistently ignored Hallandale Beach's most-concerned taxpayers, and now, as they see their suspicions about him proving to be entirely justified by an IG investigation, because of his own words, deeds and votes, they're urging him to quit and come clean. Words, deeds and votes that the South Florida press corps has almost completely ignored for four long years.

 http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/06/cornered-pious-comm-anthony-sanders.html

 JUNE 23, 2012
As we get closer-and-closer to the real targets in Hallandale Beach of Broward IG John W. Scott's inquiry, longstanding questions begin to get the overdue attention they always deserved, while many of the 'Usual Suspects' have good reason to be VERY concerned; @MayorCooper, @SandersHB, @AlexLewy

 JUNE 22, 2012
The more you know about the culture of corruption and incompetency in Hallandale Beach, the less this news surprises you: A week later, Hallandale Beach's elected officials and employees are still REFUSING to cooperate with the Broward Inspector General's Office in their probe of HB City Hall

 http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/06/more-you-know-about-culture-of.html

 JUNE 3, 2012
From the blog's cold storage vault, circa 2010: Another Hallandale Beach story the South Florida news media originally ignored for YEARS: faux journalism & crony capitalism with taxpayer dollars for allies of HB City Hall
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/06/from-blogs-cold-storage-vault-circa.html

 MAY 31, 2012
In light of more news stories re bad Hallandale Beach CRA loans, Csaba Kulin and I thwart yet another of City Hall sycophant Andrew Markoff's desperate attempts at revisionist history of City Hall's trail of crony capitalism under Mayor Joy Cooper and her Rubber Stamp Crew; @MayorCooper, @SandersHB, @AlexLewy
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/05/more-news-stories-about-curious.html

 APRIL 12, 2012
An IG investigation! Finally! Plus, more curious CRA matters to ponder - William Gjebre in BrowardBulldog: Broward Inspector General's office zeroing-in on Hallandale Beach after numerous reports re city's curious CRA loans and land purchases with no written plan in place for the latter
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/04/ig-investigation-finally-plus-more.html

 MARCH 9, 2012
Wednesday night's HB City Comm. mtg. re the gory details of Marcum LLP's audit of the City of Hallandale Beach and its entrenched anti-Sunshine, anti-taxpayer culture
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/03/wednesday-nights-hb-city-comm-mtg-re.html

 MARCH 7, 2012
Csaba Kulin continues connecting-the-dots on Marcum LLP's devastating audit of Hallandale Beach, revealing how city's own rules were routinely broken and leaving taxpayers on the hook
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/03/csaba-kulin-continues-connecting-dots.html

 MARCH 6, 2012
More on the $20 Million of Hallandale Beach city contracts that went unchecked -Csaba Kulin re Marcum LLP's limited audit of "Exceptional" Hallandale Beach City Hall and its longstanding dysfunctional practices that insult HB taxpayers
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/03/more-on-20-million-of-hallandale-beach.html

 FEBRUARY 16, 2012
Miami Herald's Fred Grimm weighs in -again- on the faux newspaper in Hallandale Beach and its sweetheart CRA deal from HB City Hall to be a propaganda arm
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/02/miami-heralds-fred-grimm-weighs-in.html

 FEBRUARY 14, 2012
Csaba Kulin on Hallandale Beach's crony capitalism deal with a fake newspaper that stands ethics on its head and takes CRA money in exchange for being a City Hall propaganda machine
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/02/above-september-12-2010-issue-of.html
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FINAL REPORT RE: GROSS MISMANAGEMENT OF PUBLIC FUNDS BY THE CITY OF HALLANDALE BEACH AND THE HALLANDALE BEACH COMMUNITY REDEVELOPMENT AGENCY

Now we need to see some logical follow-up and real prosecution of the people directly in charge and pushing these illegal and incompetent policies, not the minions.

Please be advised that the report can take up to a minute to open due to the many exhibits. 
It took 55 seconds for me.
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Friday, June 28, 2013

More intentional Hallandale Beach City Hall misdirection & deception re HB CRA - Media Trackers Florida has more proof of the unseemly behavior at City Hall that HB citizens recognize on sight from past experience: "Hallandale Beach Officials Failed to Document Contacts with Florida Lobbyist"

The chickens are finally coming home to roost in Hallandale Beach and they want an honest audit done on the city's scandal-plagued Community Redevelopment Agency, (CRA), so citizens can finally find out where all the millions of dollars really went. Above, a scene from North Beach, Hallandale Beach, FL. February 14, 2008 photo by South Beach Hoosier. © 2013 Hallandale Beach Blog, All Rights Reserved.
For reasons that I hardly even need explain to most of you regular readers of the blog at this point in the continuing controversy that is the scandalous Hallandale Beach CRA, and the efforts of the city's elected officials and top administrators to suppress any effort by Hallandale Beach citizens to get an honest audit of the CRA, this email of mine was sent this morning to lots of interested parties throughout Florida with an interest in making sure that South Florida taxpayers are not intentionally made monkeys of forever. 

 Besides the trustworthy and hardworking elements of the local press corps -a diminishing number to be sure- lots of Broward's most well-informed citizens, civic activists, bloggers and a few selected elected officials, were Florida Governor Rick Scott, Attorney General Pam Bondi, Florida CFO Jeff Atwater and Florida state Senators Jack Latvala, Jeremy Ring and Joseph Abruzzo, as well as Broward Inspector General John W. Scott.

 Most of you reading this already know perfectly well why the state legislators who are supposed to represent the best interests of Hallandale Beach's citizens in Tallahassee, state Senator Eleanor Sobel and state Rep. Joe Gibbons, are NOT part of the list.

 Certainly things would be easier if they were anything but the colossal failures they've proven themselves to be over so many years on so many issues of interest to this community.
Not just unhelpful, but actual obstacles.

No, our small community's collective misfortune is that Gibbons and Sobel's perfectly dreadful track records in office, individually and collectively, over SO many years, consistently shows that they DON'T put our community's best-interests first, but rather their own, especially their own political futures.
That dismal track record makes them completely untrustworthy in every important respect that counts, especially when it comes to getting the truth for HB's beleaguered citizens out of a City Hall led by their imperious pal, Joy Cooper.

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Hallandale Beach Officials Failed to Document Contacts with Florida Lobbyist
By: Tom Lauder 
June 27, 2013

Just to confirm the validity of this post above, not that any is needed, since the facts are crystal clear, as of 5 p.m. Thursday, I'd still NOT received the copies of the text messages sent between lobbyist Judy Stern and Hallandale Beach Mayor Joy Cooper and HB City Manager Renee Miller that I requested in writing on June 12th.

Text messages that had one central goal in mind: preventing an honest and accurate audit of the Hallandale Beach CRA so that HB residents, taxpayers and small business owners could FINALLY find out where the millions of CRA dollars really flowed all these years with no genuine oversight or follow-up by officials.
Officials who were, in theory, supposed to do that as part of their official responsibilities -but didn't.

But as we have all learned the hard way, oversight and follow-up were simply words that did NOT exist in their lexicon for YEARS, with important files missing left-and-right and many documents missing or inaccurate in the files that actually were present.

In this most-recent case, Cooper, Miller and Stern were aghast about a June 4th public request to the entire Broward County Commission requesting an audit of the CRA performed via Broward County Auditor Evan Lukic's office.

Well, you already know what transpired, who said what and who did nothing at all to help HB residents get that long-overdue public accounting that's been denied us all these years by the same powers-that-be at HB City Hall who didn't want any more public scrutiny.

But then this isn't even the first time all year that public disclosure of public information has been a quaint and abstract idea in Hallandale Beach.

Yes, as previously mentioned, the same poorly-run city that DIDN'T publicly disclose its legally-required official Contacts list for well OVER two months, even while city officials, elected and administrators -inc.  the Mayor, City Manager and CRA Director- were meeting with real estate developers, at least one of whom, Stephen Riemer publicly admitted at a March 18th CRA meeting that he wanted the city to (illegally) use its power of eminent domain to buy-out small businesses near properties he  already owns near the FEC tracks, in order that he can build a large development there.

Presumably, after he and the city have chased-out all other existing businesses, however they can to help him personally, no doubt using CRA funds.
That's illegal in this state, of course, as the FL Legislature has made clear, but then lots of federal, state and local laws are routinely ignored in Hallandale Beach with the current crew in charge the past few years, with my blog an accurate chronicle of their years of mendacity and anti-democratic fervor.

As you might well imagine, those small businesses owners resent NOT knowing what's going on and NOT being able to get honest and forthright answers from the very people who are supposed to be working for them, not against them.

But here's what they see with their own eyes, right in front of their businesses: promised, overdue road improvements by the city delayed several times without any sort of public explanation, and after hearing Riemer declare war on them at a public meeting, they can't help but wonder if it's being done intentionally by the city to drive the businesses out, just as Riemer wants, using CRA funds.

Lots and lots of curious coincidences that always turn out the same way, eventually add-up to an interesting fact pattern that's hard to ignore.

There was deception everywhere when Riemer spoke at that March 18th HB CRA meeting against the city's long-promised funding of that CRA-funded road improvement program, which took place without the public knowing anything at all about those private meetings he'd held with city officials because the city didn't post them.

Though they had the opportunity to do the right thing, albeit, after-the-fact, and publicly disclose to the public that they'd met privately with Riemer, the city officials who met with Riemer never disclosed it. 

They acted like this was the first time they were hearing anything at all about Riemer's plans or concerns.

Yes, disingenuous is the word that comes to mind. 
But that's how things continue to roll routinely in a city where the spirit and letter of Florida's  Sunshine Laws are routinely ignored by the very people in charge of following the laws and enforcing them.

In case the link within the story above proves hard to pull up, it's at

 -----
Not in email:

 Among the many recent predicates for the email above that help explain it, especially the situation on the city's Fashion Row area -N.E. First Avenue- that has, unfortunately, pitted small business owners against the City of Hallandale Beach, whose employees and elected officials have been arrogant, deceptive, and intentionally duplicitous to them, while blaming others for their own actions, are the following:

TUESDAY, MARCH 12, 2013
Future of Hallandale Beach's Fashion Row Arts District on N.E. First Avenue to be discussed at an important 5:30 p.m. meeting on Wednesday at Dekka; What, if any, are insurance executive and developer Stephen L. Riemer's strategic plans for the future of the N.E. First Avenue area, alongside the F.E.C. tracks?; More cases of déjà vu on Hallandale Beach's woeful website


FRIDAY, MARCH 15, 2013
Entrepreneur Luciana Preguerman and other Fashion Row shop owners in Hallandale Beach draw a line in the sand over the City Commission/CRA threatening to sabotage an already-approved and budgeted plan for street improvements they've been desperately waiting for, and are livid over the new CRA Director's inability to logically articulate why they're considering such a move. They want answers before Monday night's important CRA meeting at 5 p.m.

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