Outsourcing isn't the real problem with beach safety in Hallandale Beach, but rather the actions -and in-action- of David Jove, Mike Good and Mark Antonio at HB City Hall; #HallandaleBeach

North Beach, Hallandale Beach, FL. May 30, 2012 photo by South Beach Hoosier. 
© 2012 Hallandale Beach Blog, All Rights Reserved

Outsourcing isn't the real problems with beach safety in Hallandale Beach, but rather the actions -and in-action- of David Jove, Mike Good and Mark Antonio at HB City Hall; #HallandaleBeach

Based on the eight-plus years I have of seeing how often Hallandale Beach has been mismanaged, the issue of outsourcing beach safety on the city's public beaches to third-party contractors has never been the main problem, though it seems to have become one now in the eyes of a lot of people who don't know all the facts, including some local and out-of-state reporters, who are latching onto that as a convenient straw man they can attack, often for political reasons.
While it's understandable to a certain extent for people who don't know the true extent of how badly run things are here to think that must be the problem, it isn't.


People, esp. residents of this city, feel a need to explain away the justifiable anger and upset they have over what has happened here recently that's gotten the name Hallandale Beach into headlines and stories all over the world for all the wrong reasons.
But they'd be better off looking closer to home at people whose names they already know.

The real problems lay at the desks -and feet- of a handful of highly-paid people who formerly toiled at Hallandale Beach City Hall.
People who'll be making more then $3 Million in pensions in the future for time they were given credit for that was actually done PRIOR to the current pension plan.
Yes, millions of dollars.


In my opinion, based on all I know and have observed from the center of the storm, the real problems with beach safety in Hallandale Beach are in the actions and non-actions of former City Attorney David Jove and former City Managers Mike Good and Mark A. Antonio.


Yes, the buck stops with them, and what's left over for sloppy seconds rests entirely with the ineffective and tone-deaf fivem-member Hallandale Beach City Commission, that with the exception of Keith London, never actually wanted to look under-the-hood to see what was really going on, even though oversight, rather than policy-making, is actually what most local officials are better at than policy-making.
Here, unfortunately, they are bad at both, since taking some pride in being diligent about mastering the pertinent policy information is not a trait the majority of the commission necessarily values.


Now, though, with Jove, Good and Antonio out of the picture, this city's residents have inherited all manner of bad public policies and unsound decision-making that we'll be paying for and dealing with for many, many years, to say nothing of the huge pensions their assistants will be receiving for the very same reason -credit given for prior years under a different plan, not actually work done under the pension plan in question.


A pension plan pushed on the HB City Commission by yet another former City Manager, R.J. Intindola, who the city's own figures show pockets an EXTRA $96k a year because of this plan that was approved one year before he retired.

A pension plan that ran counter to what the majority of local governments were then migrating to.

Trust me, here on this blog in the coming weeks and months, you will be getting the genuine jaw-dropping pension numbers on these characters -and others- that will animate at least some of the coming political campaign conversation in this town the next 16 weeks until Election Day.

Teaser Alert -NOT: Bill Julian's fingerprints will be on it.

Bur that's in the future, so for now, let's turn our attention back to the topic du jour, beach safety and the incident that brought it to worldwide attention.

My comments after the article. 

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South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Fired Hallandale Beach lifeguard to receive key to city; contract with company may sink

By Ihosvani Rodriguez, Sun Sentinel

5:42 p.m. EDT, July 6, 2012

HALLANDALE BEACH—

City leaders plan to give the lifeguard who was fired earlier this week the key to the city while considering showing the door to the private company that canned him.

Mayor Joy Cooper said Friday she remains horrified by the way Tomas Lopez, 21, of Davie was fired for leaving his post on the beach to help rescue a drowning man outside the company's legal boundaries. Lopez worked for Jeff Ellis Management, an Orlando-based firm that has been providing lifeguard services for the city since 2003.

"I know people across the country are as outraged as I am," Cooper said. "This doesn't reflect our culture. We are a small, caring community."

The city plans to issue Lopez the symbolic key during a ceremony on Monday. The unidentified man who needed rescuing is also expect to attend the event, the mayor said.

Company officials have since apologized to Lopez over the firing and offered him his job back. Lopez has turned them down. The company also announced it would be looking at its emergency protocol policy and possibly retooling it.

But those revisions may come too late, given that Lopez's firing seems to be an international public relations nightmare for both the city and the private firm.

The incident and the company's contract could become an election issue for most city commission members who are seeking re-election in November. Some of the political opponents, including former Vice Mayor Bill Julian, have already made it a campaign issue by pushing for the services to be provided in-house. When it comes to beach safety, Julian said "the real issue is that I think we can do better. We need to bring back our own guys."

Commission members, including Cooper and her bitter political nemesis Commissioner Keith London, have each said they want to revisit the idea of contracting out lifeguard services.

London, who is facing Cooper for the mayor seat, told residents and supporters in an e-mail sent Friday that the incident has provided the opportunity for a second look at beach safety.

"During a time when Hallandale Beach is attempting to attract more visitors with families and young children, I believe this is an opportunity, in light of a near tragedy, to review and potentially enhance the services provided by our first responders," London wrote.

The city began outsourcing the lifeguard responsibilities nine years ago as a cost-cutting measure. In 2009, the city renewed a three-year contract with Jeff Ellis Management worth roughly $1 million.

The contract is set to expire in September.

In firing Lopez, company supervisors said he ran past the boundaries the firm is contracted to protect. Company officials initially said Lopez put swimmers in his area in jeopardy and the firm could've been sued. A review of the contract specifically indicates that the boundary must be protected at all times.

The company is required to reimburse the city $100 for each day a lifeguard is not present.

In 2007, the firm reimbursed the city $500 after it pulled its lifeguards off the beach because of rough conditions. A woman nearly drowned while the stands were left empty and had to be rescued by beach guards from adjacent Hollywood.

Hallandale Beach is the only city in Florida the company provides ocean lifeguards. It does provide guards at community pools for numerous municipalities around the county, including in Hallandale Beach, Dania Beachand North Lauderdale. The lifeguards have said they get paid $8.25.

Dania Beach considered hiring the firm in 2005, but residents and employees vehemently opposed the move saying they were worried about the quality of the company's ocean-rescue training.

Gerry Falconer, president of the lifeguards group United States Lifesaving Association's southeast region, said the company has never sought certification through his association. He said there are several companies that provide similar services around the country, but most are designed to provide lifeguards at public pools.

"It's apples and oranges. At a wave pool, if things go bad, you can just hit a switch and turn the waves off," he said. "You can't do that on the ocean."

Company officials have long stood by its own certification training called the International Lifeguard Training Program, which they say includes ocean training and recognized by insurance companies.

Lopez said Friday he underwent the company's lifeguard training at a pool, which consisted of rigorous swimming and physical exercises. He then had training on the beach after he was hired.

Company president Jeff Ellis could not be reached for comments on Friday. He did say earlier this week he plans to provide city officials with results of an investigation about this week's incident.

Mayor Cooper said she plans to address the issue at the commission's first meeting in August.

There's also a video at URL http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/broward/hallandale/fl-hallandale-beach-lifeguard-more-20120706,0,1727797.story

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To me, outsourcing lifeguard duties on the city's public beaches were never the main problem here, but rather former City Attorney David Jove NOT doing a satisfactory job of completely spelling-out the city's reasonable expectations and requirements in the contract at the time, and subsequently, the City Managers and City Commission's complete failure to provide adequate oversight and suggest timely contract changes when appropriate.
Our old friend, lack of oversight, is the central problem, like dozens of other issues that we all could name that have long plagued this community.

Everything else devolved from that, including HB City Hall's failure to ever talk to the lifeguards themselves, just like the city NEVER spoke to the city's Mini-Bus drivers before they came out with their Transportation Master Plan. 
Really!

Why wouldn't you speak with your own employees and contractors first to see what suggestions they had before you spend so much money, so you can be sure to get the input of people who deal with a situation on a daily basis and incorporate their valid concerns or suggestions?

It's completely counter-intuitive and an example how often common sense has been ignored in this city over the years because that was NOT the way City Manager Good and Antonio wanted things done.

With them, it all started with themselves -top-down, despite the fact they they are not the ones who set policy.

The HB Parks & Recreation may nominally oversee the lifeguard contract, but again, that's in name only, since nobody in that  dept. had or has the power to do anything once the contract was signed. 

No, it all lay with the City Manager's office, and there, Good and Antonio both failed.

For many years, when their supervisors weren't around, the lifeguards have specifically told me exactly what they were missing in the way of resources and tools to do their job to the best of their ability, or what problems they were having with the city NOT doing what they said they were going to do, and taking forever even IF they did it.

Like the state of the lifeguard stands themselves, which are physically sub-par compared to other communities in South Florida.

South Beach, Hallandale Beach, FL. May 30, 2012 photo by South Beach Hoosier. 
© 2012 Hallandale Beach Blog, All Rights Reserved

And as I've been saying and writing, and as the city already has known for a long time, the lifeguard stations are NOT currently grounded for lightning strikes.

What happens if one is struck overnight during a storm and destroyed, what's the city's back-up plan to have one in place the next morning?

What's the plan?

The truth is that we all already know based on years of experience that there is no back-up plan.

There never is.

Looking south towards North Beach, Hallandale Beach, FL from the Hollywood cityline. Though you really can't see the South Beach station from North Beach, HB City Hall thought they could share one jet ski, when it actually worked! 
What more can you say? May 30, 2012 photo by South Beach Hoosier. 
© 2012 Hallandale Beach Blog, All Rights Reserved

Whether it was NOT having message boards on the side of the lifeguard stands that they could actually write on anymore because of excessive physical wear-and-tear from the sun and graffiti -and the city being a year behind in getting replacements- or NOT having a single  working jet ski to reach swimmers in peril in strong winds/undertow conditions because the last one was broken, and the city had no back-up plan, and refused to rent one until the previous one was fixed, the problems lay with the city, not the contractor,


Think about the fact that even when it was working, the city expected the two lifeguard stands to share one jet ski among them, separated by hundreds of yards.

When seconds really count!

It's absolutely ridiculous!

But this was how the city "managed" things on the beach on a daily basis for years.
That's NOT Jeff Ellis & Associates' doing, that's the city's!

As I wrote the other day, for quite a long time during the past 2-3 years, the lifeguards had nothing to cope with those sorts of wether/physical conditions, so this whole debate, upsetting as it is, could well have come a whole lot sooner, under much more tragic and deadly circumstances, with genuine drowning victims and lawsuits against the city that they could never possibly prevail in, leaving all of us on the hook.

That they didn't come sooner isn't because of anything the city has actually done, but rather in spite of everything the city HASN'T DONE.

Hope you can attend Monday morning's ceremony at HB City Hall at 10:30 a.m., because my sense of things is that given the amount of lingering concern and anger that remains, it could well prove to be a whole lot more interesting than anything Mayor Cooper is currently counting on.


And don't even go thru the pretense of having a meeting on beach safety in August if you aren't going to require David Jove to answer questions honestly, under oath.

Stop thief, stop! So guess whose campaign website contains 3 of my original blog photos -all taken without permission or paying for them? Bill Julian. Yes, just like Hallandale Beach City Manager Mark Antonio's serial copyright theft of many of my original photos. Antonio will soon learn that stealing just doesn't pay!

Stop thief, stop! So guess whose campaign website contains 3 of my original blog photos -all taken without permission or paying for them? Bill Julian. Yes, just like Hallandale Beach City Manager Mark Antonio's serial copyright theft of many of my original photos. Antonio will soon learn that stealing just doesn't pay!

Yes, it was exactly who you thought would be that incredibly clumsy just 20 weeks before a pivotal city election where voters will have yet another chance to thoroughly reject him, and keep him far away from any important decision-making about this city's future - former Hallandale Beach City Commissioner William "Bill" Julian. 


The very person whom I personally hold most responsible -along with Mayor Joy Cooper- for the sorry state of this city with so much potential, because of their consistent bad judgment, embarrassing decision-making, inattention to detail and complete unwillingness to ever learn from their many mistakes.
In that respect, they are both forever re-inventing the wheel of exasperation.

Circled in orange on this screen capture I made are the three original photos of mine that illegally appeared on Julian's campaign website as of 8 p.m. June 19, 2012.

So, let's take a close look at what Julian and his dim-witted campaign decided to use on their temporary campaign website, things which better completely disappear from there very soon -or else!
And really, Julian's lived here for multiple decades and he doesn't have any good photos of his own that he can use for his own campaign website, even temporarily?
Wow, that's pathetic!

Here are the captions that I've had on these photos since I first took them and uploaded them to my blog, with the occasional updates: 

Hallandale Beach Water Tower on A1A/South Ocean Drive. Located below the Hallandale Beach Water Tower on A1A/South Ocean Drive, on the south side (right) is the "Community Center" that HB City Hall, thru their gross incompetency, had made impossible for HB citizen taxpayers to use now for 41 MONTHS as of January 2011. (And where's the American flag on the Fourth of July weekend? Missing in action as it had been for months!) July 3, 2009 photo by South Beach Hoosier

Hmm-m... where have I seen this photo before...

My July 3rd, 2009 photo of the HB Water Tower as seen on the City of Hallandale Beachs website, via their computer next to the public notice board at HB City Hall. The city's website has contained numerous of my photos for well over a year without ever asking for my permission and without ever paying for them. That's how they do things under the current crew running the city. February 10, 2012 photo by South Beach Hoosier.

A FISH ROTS FROM THE HEAD DOWN, AND SO DOES LOCAL GOVERNMENT IN BROWARD COUNTY, FL

City of Hallandale Beach Municipal Complex: A fish rots from the head down, and so does local government in Broward County, FL. This monument sign on U.S.-1 and S.E. 5th Street, across from Gulfstream Park Racing & Casino and the Village at Gulfstream Park retail complex, alerts you to your proximity to way from the HB City Hall and Police Department. 

It's a government that by their words and actions has given taxpayers every impression of holding itself apart and above from the citizens it's supposed to serve, often acting like they don't have to follow the laws that govern everyone else in the state of Florida and the U.S., whether of logic and reason, contracts, or, more to the point for this blog, the Florida Statutes on Sunshine Laws and Public Records. 

City employees in Hallandale Beach routinely refuse to answer reasonable questions posed to them by resident taxpayers, and as I have found out myself, often berated you for even having the nerve to ask! Comm. Dotty Ross has a solid record for her put-downs of the public even before they speak. 

As it happens, it's also not a very safe area, despite who's supposed to be there, and in the past few years, the public parking lots have been pitch black for 6-9 months at a time, even next to the Police Dept. HQ. The then-Police Chief just shrugged his shoulders, even at City Comm. meetings. As if they couldn't make a worse first impression, at one point, even the lights on this sign didn't work at night for over FOUR YEARS, either. March 3, 2009 photo by South Beach Hoosier.

HALLANDALE BEACH. ACTUALLY, IT'S A CITY OF GROSS INCOMPETENCY, RED-TAPE & MYOPIA

Hallandale Beach, City of Choice. The sign that greets northbound drivers on U.S.-1/South Federal Hwy. as they leave the City of Aventura and Miami-Dade County in the rear window; one of the three main streets into Hallandale Beach. Unfortunately, it's the perfect metaphor for the City of Hallandale Beach and its elected officials and employees: short-sighted and lacking in common sense. This sign was originally placed so far west on the median strip -and practically BEHIND a palm tree- that drivers can't actually read it even if they wanted to. In any case, because of the longtime gross incompetency and negligence of the city, the spotlights that are supposed to illuminate the sign at night HAVEN'T worked since about mid-January of 2004. 

Which is to say, yes, LONGER than the U.S.'s involvement in WW II. 

Welcome to the City of Hallandale Beach! Begin heavy traffic, chronic red tape and mis-adventures in government! Hallandale Beach, FL; Original photo here was taken January 2007; this one taken May 8, 2008; photo by South Beach Hoosier. 

The three palm trees that had been in front of it on the median are gone, so now you can REALLY notice that it DOESN'T work! 

February 2009 update: In order to make room for a left-turning lane at S.E. 5th Street into The Village of Gulfstream retail complex, the 'invisible' sign was removed and placed farther north. As of June 19th, 2012, the lights on this sign STILL don't work! In fact, the light fixtures have been gone for months. Yet another sign of the ruinous reign of Mayor Joy Cooper and City Manager's Mike Good & Mark A. Antonio. No attention to detail!

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Well, as people are always saying, you only get one chance to make a good first impression.

Not to worry, though, within the next week, I'll get to the self-evident and serial copyright thievery of City Manager Mark A. Antonio at Hallandale Beach City Hall, which goes back more than a year.

Hallandale Beach Mayor Joy Cooper's old threats & lawsuits re-emerge as Hollywood's Beach One Resort sues over its access to the beach, the latest shoe to drop in The Related Group's Beachwalk project that'd make HB's North Beach a de facto private beach for The Related Group's properties, NOT a public beach for HB residents

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Hallandale Beach Mayor Joy Cooper's old threats & lawsuits re-emerge as Hollywood's Beach One Resort sues over its access to the beach, the latest shoe to drop in The Related Group's Beachwalk project that'd make HB's North Beach a de facto private beach for The Related Group's properties, NOT a public beach for HB residents

We all knew that it was only a matter of time before we got more facts about this heretofore mysterious lawsuit regarding access to the beach that was obliquely referred to last week around town and at the City Commission meeting on The Related Group's Beachwalk proposal, didn't we? 

And now the South Florida's Sun-Sentinel's Tonya Alanez has assembled some of the latest relevant facts to better connect-the-dots that should cause quite a ripple when you look at the big picture...

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/broward/fl-hallandale-beach-access-lawsuit-20120613,0,4101185.story

South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Beach One Resort's newest buyer sues Hallandale over beach access

By Tonya Alanez, Sun Sentinel

7:34 p.m. EDT, June 13, 2012

HALLANDALE BEACH—

The city has never embraced Hollywood's proposed Beach One Resort on Hallandale's northern border and has twice sued over congestion the project would bring to a high-rise heavy section of A1A.

Now, it's Hallandale's turn to be sued over the 41-story hotel/condo.

The dispute, this time, revolves around beach access.

Although the plot of land for the proposed Beach One Resort at 4111 S. Ocean Drive is in Hollywood, the beach directly in front of it is part of Hallandale's North Beach Park.

Because a Hallandale park-improvement plan would eliminate an existing 20-foot right of way dedicated to beach access, developer — Mazal Tov 11, LLC — which is buying the resort property for $15 million is suing Hallandale and the former developer.

Beach access for the 477-room hotel/condo is "an essential term of the contract" and the spat is hanging up a planned June 15 closing on the property, according to a lawsuit filed May 30 in Broward Circuit Court.

"The seller [Beach One Resort, LLLP] possessed actual knowledge, or should have known, that the city of Hallandale Beachintended to close beach access to the property, but misrepresented and concealed this fact to the seller," the lawsuit says." The buyer would not have entered into the contract or made [$2.2 million in] payments if it knew that the property did not have beach access."

A Mazal Tov spokesman, Marc Schmulian, indicated that a resolution may be in the works.

"We're working very hard to get this thing resolved as quickly and amicably as possible," Schmulian said Wednesday.

The Hallandale City Commission met in executive session June 7 to discuss the lawsuit.

Hallandale officials, through city spokesman Peter Dobens, declined to comment on the pending litigation.

Olga De Los Santos, corporate counsel for Beach One Resort, didn't have much more to say: "We are under strict orders not to comment on pending litigation. Regretfully, we can't comment."

Beach One Resort, slated for a 1.6-acre lot at the northeast corner of South Ocean Drive and Hallandale Beach Boulevard, has long been a source of tension between Hallandale and Hollywood.

Hallandale Mayor Joy Cooper attended an October 2008 Hollywood commission meeting to complain that the project would bring problematic congestion to an area already dense with high-rise condos and luxury hotels, especially in front of an adjacent Hallandale fire station.

At that meeting, Hollywood city commissioners unanimously approved zoning changes to allow the developer to move forward with the project, which is expected to generate $1.2 million a year for the city.

Hallandale officials hurriedly filed two lawsuits against Hollywood and the developer, objecting to the project, the effects its traffic would have on the fire station and claiming some Hollywood commissioners were biased against Hallandale Beach.

One of the lawsuits was dismissed by a judge and the other was settled when Hallandale and the original developer agreed on a valet-parking plan.

Mazal Tov is also suing over that valet agreement, saying the seller "actively concealed" it. Had it been disclosed, Mazal Tov would not have entered into the contract because it "burdened the property in perpetuity," the lawsuit says.

That agreement calls for Beach One Resort to provide mandatory valet parking when its holds special events drawing 400 or more guests; its purpose was to ensure that event traffic would not spill onto A1A or impact the neighboring fire station.

Construction has yet to begin on the project which is designed to include a restaurant and lounge, fitness facility and meeting space.

"The concerns raised by Hallandale, we have sought to address and the developer has sought to address, and, we believe, has been resolved," Hollywood spokeswoman Raelin Storey said Wednesday.

"I think we're past that issue now, and we hope that the developer and Hallandale could work out any other issues that remain."

My previous posts on the Beach One Resort project from 2008 are below.

Yes, back in the days when Mayor Joy Cooper was making her wild threats against the City of Hollywood and was threatening to charge an entrance fee to access the public beach -North Beach- near the Beach One Resort property, something she has neither the legal power or authority to do, of course under the Florida Constitution.

Is there nothing Mayor Cooper won't say or do or threaten in order to get her way?

For the record, since facts really do matter, esp. in this case, at the 2008 Hollywood City Commission meeting where the plan was unanimously approved, the public meeting where 

a.) Mayor Cooper, then-City Manager Mike Good, then-City Attorney David Jove & Company arrived having completely failed to do their basic homework, and actually know the relevant rules that applied next door in Hollywood. Yes, Jove being Jove!

Foolishly, this crew thought they'd just show-up and be given preferential treatment and be given special rights at the meeting that actual Hollywood citizens didn't enjoy -to speak for fifteen minutes instead of the three minutes allowed during public comments- until Mayor Bober set them straight on the rules, and

b.) the meeting where I publicly spoke in favor of the Beach One Resort project, having attended most of the previous public meetings on the issue, where both the developers and the city staff were friendly, forthcoming and professional, something that can't really be said here in HB the past few years, where the city has attempted to keep public information from the public about development issues until the last possible moment.

It was at this 2008 meeting that a very interesting and telling fact emerged that was NEVER publicly mentioned again at Hallandale Beach City Hall.

And a most delicious and telling fact it is, too.

When the clueless HB crew were clearly losing their cool and their argument, they complained that Fire Chief Sullivan never received some pertinent documents from Hollywood to look over, but without missing a beat, it was quickly pointed out that the docs in question had in fact been sent to Good, who had, in fact, received them.

You see, it really wasn't the City of Hollywood's problem that then-City Manager Mike Good, the person in charge, never gave those particular docs to Chief Sullivan.

He had them, but for whatever reason, he chose not to share them with Sullivan.

Yes, incredibly, the Cooper Crew actually wanted to complain about something that the City of Hollywood had absolutely no control over, and then fumed about it.

Really.

Tell me truthfully, is that not THE perfect fact to explain to people who don't live here how things are routinely done at Hallandale Beach City Hall?

Not just poorly and unprofessionally, but incompetently and sometimes, as we've previously, discussed, perhaps even illegally as well.

Naming Names Herald-style -Beach One Resort Hotel in Hollywood Passes Round One

Oct. 3, 2008: http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2008/10/naming-names-herald-style-beach-one.html

Beach One Resort's Approval in Hollywood Provokes Wrath and Harsh Words at Hallandale Beach City Commission

Oct. 18, 2008: http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2008/10/beach-one-resorts-approval-in-hollywood.html

Cleavage Grows Larger b/w City of Hallandale Beach and Hollywood After Beach One Resort Approved

Oct. 21, 2008 http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2008/10/cleavage-grows-larger-bw-city-of.html

If Mayor Cooper, former City Manager Mike Good, Fire Chief Sullivan -and then Asst. City Manager Antonio- were genuinely so concerned and serious about the public safety of HB residents and visitors when saying that the Beach One Resort shouldn't have been approved by the City of Hollywood for that site next-door to the iconic HB Water Tower and the HB Fire/Rescue station below it, then how come they, the so-called leaders of the City of Hallandale Beach, NEVER made arrangements to erect even a single Fire Truck warning sign, like the one above -commonplace in all parts of this country!- placed ANYWHERE on State Road A1A/Ocean Drive and east-bound Hallandale Beach Blvd./State Road 858 as you approach the Fire/Rescue Station in question, to warn drivers and pedestrians?

You know, as is done everywhere else in this country routinely?

So much for their genuine concern about public safety and attention to detail! 

Then and now!

Folks, they never erected one prior to that 2008 Hollywood City Commission meeting and four years later, nothing has changed at that intersection and immediate area -there's still NO WARNING SIGNS there of any kind!

Yes, actions really DO speak louder than words, and by that measure, it's yet another example of the City of Hallandale Beach saying one thing and doing quite another.

Above, another classic 2008 photo of mine highlighting the city's inability to do something right and their lack of attention to detail -this is the city's first "warning" sign that you see about surveillance cameras at the beach. 

It's on the back of a a west-bound Stop sign that's on the opposite side of the street as you are driving east. And as you can see is frequently obstructed by palm fronds.

But of course, courts have already ruled that if the public can't see a posted warning or road signs, they're really NOT posted. 

Yes, that so-called "warning" is still there, and the city has never posted any other more-visible warning signs at the entrance.

It's one of dozens of facts and problems about the beach and this city that I told HB Assistant City Managers Jennifer Frastai and Franklin Heileman about four year ago, over the course of nearly an hour, in the conference room of the City Manager's office at City Hall.

Frastai has NEVER done anything about any of the dozens of matters I brought to her attention that day, including the ones related to public safety, most of which are still all around us today. 


Frastai also NEVER followed-up with me as she said she would, despite my giving her multiple email addresses and phone numbers she could reach me at. 

As almost everyone in this city who is paying attention knows, I'm one of the easiest persons to reach in this city, but somehow, she couldn't be bothered.

Which is why Jennifer Frastai simply can't be trusted -there's no logical follow-up.

Above, in this July 2008 photo of mine, you can see one of two kids playing on top of the OLD dirt mound on the Beach One Resort property. 

Given how often it rains here, I guess it's a good thing he didn't get swallowed up by any sand that wanted to channel quicksand, huh?

But what about the dirt mound that's there NOW?

The present dirt pile on The Beach One Resort property at at 4101 S. Ocean Drive in Hollywood. May 11, 2012 photo by South Beach Hoosier.

The present dirt pile on The Beach One Resort property at at 4101 S. Ocean Drive in Hollywood. May 30, 2012 photo by South Beach Hoosier.

Above, a June 2008 photo of mine from near the Hollywood-HB border on the beach, looking south. What do you know, there's one of the filthy and rusty pipes that the HB Dept. of Public Works has left in the middle of the public beach for years!

Yes, Mayor Cooper, her Rubber Stamp Crew and City Manager Antonio sure have a very strange and unusual way of showing HB taxpayers and visitors to the area how much they really care about the public's beach, don't they?

Yes, four years later, they're still there: both the rusty pipes and the very people responsible for being so careless and callous about an invaluable resource -the public's beach.

Above and below, both from June 2, 2012: At top, my friend and fellow Hallandale Beach civic activist, Csaba Kulin, at a place that ought to be one of the city's crown jewels and a natural meeting place for the whole community -but isn't: the City of Hallandale Beach's very poorly-maintained North Beach park, with the iconic HB Water Tower and The Beach Club condo towers to his right. 

Below, with The Apogee development in Hollywood right behind him, currently under construction.

Above and below, proving the maxim that rust never sleeps. 

But at the City of Hallandale Beach's poorly-maintained and dirty North Beach, it also never moves. May 30, 2012 photo by South Beach Hoosier.

The public beach, especially in a city that is as small as ours, is an invaluable natural resource to this city's present and future residents.

Unfortunately, it's a resource that Mayor Cooper has already clearly indicated thru both her words and deeds that she's perfectly willing to cede de facto control over to a developer for mere peanuts, in order to get The Beachwalk project approved next Wednesday night.

FYI: On Saturday I'll finally be posting "Part 2 of 2 re The Beachwalk project in Hallandale Beach -Initial comments & ruminations on Wednesday night's HB City Comm. meeting; calling out Carole Pumpian, crony capitalism mercenary"

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

Above, the never-ending embarrassment for us as Hallandale Beach taxpayers and the world of journalism. October 8, 2010 photo by South Beach Hoosier.

What follows is a Draft of a March 2010 blog entry that while it contains certain elements regular readers may recognize from previous posts here, was never itself posted online this way. And was, of course, 100% true when I wrote it, too.

Looking at it now, I can't help but wonder if Broward Inspector General John W. Scott and his crew of investigators, who are already busy investigating the city, have spoken yet to former Hallandale Beach CRA Manager Bobby Robinson or former HB Director of Development Services Richard Cannone, now of Calvin, Giordano & Associates.


(At HB City Hall Cannone is now considered a registered lobbyist and has visited HB City Hall numerous times on behalf of The Related Group's Beachwalk proposal on the Intercoastal that was unanimously rejected in January by the HB Planning & Zoning Board, but which, this being HB, comes back anyway to the entire City Commission this coming Wednesday night. More on that in a separate blog post on Mo0nday.)
If not, Mr. Scott & Company should definitely be making a VERY STRONG effort to do so -now.

I can personally think of about a hundred or so concerned Hallandale Beach citizens who, given enough of a head's up, would be happy to bring a cup of coffee with them from Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts and then plop down $10 a piece to sit down and observe an interview held in the middle of the auditorium of the HB Cultural Center, so we could finally hear their own accounts of what was REALLY going on that had/has so many HB taxpayers rightly upset.


How public information about development proposals was kept from the public, or so we can all find out which squeaky wheels in town were asking to be greased via CRA funds, with an almost guaranteed lack of appropriate accountability or follow-up.


Reminding you again, the following is from March 2010...


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The City of Hallandale Beach subsidizes one-sided propaganda thru $50k grant to FAUX newspaper.

Above, the document that memorializes the fact that the City of Hallandale Beach subsidizes one-sided propaganda thru a grant and loan to FAUX newspaper.
And yes, that is the same FREE fake newspaper that gives Mayor Joy Cooper a "column" to extol her particular brand of ill-informed nonsense and half-truths without fear that a Letter to the Editor will EVER appear that directly refutes and corrects her serial mis-statements.

The Sun-Times not only DOESN'T run them, they DON'T print ANYTHING the slightest bit critical of Hallandale Beach City Hall, Mayor Cooper or City Manager Mike Good and his high-paid staff.
Just so you know, as of just a few months ago, HB's city manager and staff made more in salaries than the Hollywood City Manager's Office, despite the City of Hollywood being well over THREE TIMES larger in both size and population.
Guess who'd never ever mention that salient fact? 


Yes, Craig Farquhar's faux newspaper that serves as propaganda arm to Hallandale Beach City Hall.

November 8, 2009 photo by South Beach Hoosier

The faux newspaper that serves as the propaganda arm to Hallandale Beach City Hall and the Joy Cooper & Mike Good Regime, the South Florida Sun-Times.
This particular vending machine is located but two feet away from one of the emergency fire exits of The Flashback Diner on U.S.-1/South Federal Highway, across from Gulfstream Park.
In a normal, well-run city, they'd be removed to another place on the property.

But in Hallandale Beach, a trio of vending machines can be placed right next to an emergency exit in a building one block from HB City Hall, and nobody there EVER notices the self-evident violation!
They are deaf, dumb and blind to everything around them. .

Twenty years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall, Hallandale Beach, Florida still needs glasnost!

November 5th, 2009 Update re South Florida Sun-Times, above.At yesterday morning's Hallandale Beach City Commission meeting, I heard the new official Hallandale Beach City Hall stalling tactic regarding the actual citizens and taxpayers of this city being able to see the documents regarding City Manager Mike Good's decision to give $50,000 in city CRA money as a grant to the faux newspaper called the South Florida Sun-Times, above.

Mayor Joy Cooper was practically gloating Wednesday when she foolishly said that she thinks that the particular documents are "proprietary" and can't be shared with public!
Can she really be that arrogant and anti-democratic in public, he said rhetorically.

Can she really think that she can trump the State of Florida Constitution and the protected rights that Florida citizens enjoy under our Sunshine Laws, forever, and that there won't be legal and political consequences for her personally and the city?

To answer my own question, yes, Joy Cooper is indeed that arrogant, that anti-democratic and that egotistical. Proprietary?

Sure, because in the current economy of the year 2009, actual for-profit companies want to model their own behavior on an inferior product like the faux newspaper, the Sun-Times, that doesn't actually generate a profit, has a very poor reputation and that rather than accurately reflect the news of the community in its pages, good and bad, exists as a propaganda arm of Hallandale Beach City Hall and the mayor and city manager who give it money, just like the Hallandale Beach Chamber of Commerce.

Twenty years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall, Hallandale Beach, Florida still needs glasnost!

Below, the phony "story" the city placed in the faux newspaper the week before the 2008 election:

This is the phony, one-sided story Hallandale Beach City Hall had placed in the faux newspaper the week before the November 2008 election, in order to try to ensure that Anthony A. Sanders got elected.


It was dis-honestly titled Setting the Record Straight: On the Purchase of Eagles Development Center, and carried no byline or identifying author information.
Most well-informed people in the city have long-believed that it was actually written by someone in the HB City Manager's Office, likely one of the Asst. City Managers.


Which is to say that some highly-paid city employee, whose salary and pension are paid for with taxpayer funds, was instructed to concoct a lie masquerading as a news story, in order to placate at least one elected city official, in order to ensure that facts about an interim City Commissioner were covered-up and that said interim City Commissioner was elected.

That's how absurd life in Hallandale Beach is, and where was the South Florida news media when this originally happened, even after they were repeatedly told what was going on?
Completely Missing in Action, as usual!