re George LeMieux and his assertions about "commuter rail line linking Miami and Palm Beach County"

Just discovered this very interesting November 10th post on the Daily Business Review's Inside Track blog this morning.
http://dailybusinessreview.typepad.com/insidetrack/2008/11/tallahassee-insider-says-state-will-have-to-do-more-with-less.html


Wish I'd seen it before I went to last Wednesday's SFRTA Broward Countyworkshop in Dania Beach, because I certainly would've asked out loud whothought this assertion by George LeMieux was more true now than it was a year ago.

I want it to be true, I just want to know -and see- what the actual evidence of it is.

I realize that to some of you it may seem like a small thing, strictly window dressing perhaps, but I've been very troubled for quite some time at the lack of any recent information on the SFECC (South Florida East Coast Corridor Transit Analysis) website telling taxpayers just what exactly was going on with the project. http://www.sfeccstudy.com/index.html

I understand that there is a specific timeframe for each aspect of the project, but when you have a situation as we do in South Florida, which I've chronicled on my blogs, where FDOT Secretary Stephanie Kopelousos can't ever be bothered to personally interact with actual taxpayers and citizens in the most urban part of the state, and only seems to frequent industry and or politico-filled events, appearances actually DO count for something, especially when she can find time to visit airports in West Florida that aren't even open.
The days of my giving her the benefit of the doubt are long past.

Back in February I wrote some of you the following:
Another concern I have is that it's now been exactly a year since something was added to the News section of the SFECC website:http://www.sfeccstudy.com/news.html
FEC tracks hold key to commuter train linking S. Florida's downtowns
02/19/07

Frankly, I'm more than a little troubled by the fact that they've chosen to keep such a low-profile over these past 12 months, since as anyone who's lived here for any length of time can tell you, no place in the country hasa short-term attention span smaller than South Florida's.
Honestly, the evidence is all around us!

I could be wrong but I really don't think my friends working at think tanks in Washington, along K Street, Connecticut and Massachusetts Avenue, would consider that the shrewdest public strategy to go with.

Especially when the public policy you are actively involved in also requires that you be in the public persuasion business, even if you don't like to think about it that way.

I realize from having gone to so many of their public meetings and reading their docs that the project had a certain process that needed to be followed, but having nothing said about their efforts for a year can't be good.
For anyone!

Well, a few weeks ago, after I first got word of the three SFRTA county meetings planned, I went back to the SFECC website -I'm also on their so-called mailing list but don't ask when the last time I received something was- and right below Project Description it reads:
WEBSITE LAST UPDATED 11/01/07

Thirteen months!!!

Wow, I'm no web genius, and I know that SFECC Director Scott Seeburger can't be expected to do everything himself, but I do know that most websites that have information on them that old posing as their new info, are nothing but busted-up dot.com sites that have 'given up the ghost.'

I don't know who the genius is behind the SFECC's recent PR efforts(!) but the clear preponderance of the evidence suggests there needs to be a change there, toute-de-suite, before more supporters like me become openly critical of their efforts.

And trust me, based on the past year and the wholly un-necessary secretivenessof FDOT, that day is a whole lot closer than you think.

Just something to think about.

Read the post below and let me know what you think.
__________________
Daily Business Review
Inside Track
November 10, 2008

Tallahassee insider says state will have to do 'more with less'
Gunster Yoakley & Stewart chairman George LeMieux dropped some tantalizing teasers about developments on the state budget and transportation in a speech at the Palm Beach County Bar Association's annual Bench Bar Conference.
To read the rest of this, go to:
http://dailybusinessreview.typepad.com/insidetrack/2008/11/tallahassee-insider-says-state-will-have-to-do-more-with-less.html

Mini-bio info on Mr. LeMieux at Gunster Yoakley & Stewart's website.
http://www.gunster.com/attorneys/lemieux_g.asp

I'll have some comments and thoughts on that SFRTA workshop I attended in Dania Beach after Thanksgiving.
Would've been nice to actually see some media coverage of the event, but then that ended up becoming one of the topics I and others spoke about at the end, along with some suggestions for changing that.

Calif. Variation of a Bad Hallandale Beach & Miami Shores Policy

Per one of my last posts here at Hallandale Beach Blog, due to technical problems, I'm currently running a day or two behind in placing before you here my vast armada of photos that highlight the preposterous stance the City of Hallandale Beach has taken the past 18 months regarding the so-called North Beach "Community Center" on State Road A1A, located below the HB Water Tower, adjacent to Fire Rescue Station #60 and the city's border with the City of Hollywood.


That facility has been in the legal possession of HB since last August 3rd, yet as I noted previously, in the intervening eleven-and-a-half months, there has NOT been a single city-wide public forum devoted exclusively to the future use and policies of that facility.


Paradoxically, there were also NO forums held in the city in the months before the facility was to come under their cover, and yet certain groups have already had use of the facility, which has not a single sign on it informing the public that it's their's.


The Hallandale Beach Realty sign on the front/A1A side door remains all these months later.


When the city of Hallandale Beach convenes its next City Commission meeting on Tuesday August 5th, it'll have been exactly one year and two days since the city took possession of the property, and we're no closer to having either a clear and understandable policy, or, a working and enjoyable facility that the PUBLIC can actually use, in accordance to those rules and regulations.


That my friends is what passes for life and city governance in Hallandale Beach, Florida in the year 2008.


So, in complete contrast with the apathy to which Hallandale Beach City Manager Mike Good and his staff, Mayor Joy Cooper and the rest of the Hallandale Beach City Commission has dealt with this issue of community interest, as an editorial in today's Los Angeles Times informs us, there in Cali's Southland, the problem may very well be that voters are too interested in a public policy issue. (We should have such problems here!)


Actually it's not a problem for the voters, it's a problem for the federal government.

They want to back out of any meeting regarding the controversial Foothill South toll road.


Should I mention here that the Miami-Dade public forums on the I-95 Express fiasco were held at the Miami Shores Golf Course, the duchy that doesn't want to have a FEC commuter train station within their tiny boundaries, meaning no stops between 79th Street and North Miami?

I still have the tombstone ads FDOT placed in the Herald advertising the meetings.


Yeah, Miami Shores exhibits the typical South Florida mentality down here among municipalities that make this area such a laughingstock, despite all the smoke they blow for public consumption about valuing inter-governmental cooperation.


I've long wondered why South Florida's local media, print and electronic, has slept on that angle for more than a year and a half, since the geniuses in Miami Shores have made no secret of their feelings.


Yet I don't recall there ever being a public opinion poll in The Shores asking residents their feelings, much less, a public referendum on the ballot there where they could make their voices known.

South Beach Hoosier would remember that and so would you.
We don't remember it because it NEVER happened!


I know this in particular because I was standing directly right behind Tom Benton, the Shores Village Manager, i.e. city official donkey, at the SFECC forum held in Aventura when he said 'nyet!' on behalf of their duchy, grand or otherwise.


The Herald's excellent North Dade reporter Carli Teproff was all over the story at the time, but somehow, the larger public policy issue of communities opting out of the FEC commuter rail plan, without their citizens getting a say in the matter, just vanished into thin air.


Despite my alerting them to the matter and how it was just a snapshot of the self-evident iceberg awaiting South Florida's dysfunctional transportation policies, none of the Herald columnists or veteran reporters I wrote to about it ever wrote about it.
Or responded to my email.
Surprise!


Below, my email to Scott Seeburger of FDOT, the man in charge of SFECC's efforts. In that SBH post, I compared Miami Shores foolishness to not be a part of the FEC commuter rail plan to the worse decision made in DC's Georgetown area to not have a DC Metro station located there, owing to the locals' supposed fear of riff-raff.
Result, constant traffic everyday on M Street heading in all directions, choking on traffic on weekends, esp. nice days during spring and summer.
___________________________
Saturday September 8th, 2007

Dear Mr. Seeburger:

Thank you for your prompt attention to the manner I wrote you about last week pertaining to the SFECC website.
Mr. Ramchandani was able to send me a much better version of the pdf file than what was legible on the SFECC website, therefore I was able to finally read Mr. Benton's ridiculous comments on behalf of the Village of Miami Shores for myself.

I wanted to let you know that in the very near future, I will be making a post on my blog, South Beach Hoosier, regarding Mr. Benton and the Village of Miami Shores' efforts to intentionally isolate themself from the South Florida transportation debate, by disenfranchising tens of thousands of South Floridians who would use that train on the FEC tracks to travel to points from downtown Miami to Palm Beach County.


It's actually an excerpt of a letter to various local elected officials and reporters that I wrote upon returning home from an SFECC public meeting in Aventura, where I was exasperated and vexed at Benton's reiteration of the Village's position that they would fight any attempt to have a station located near US-1 and the FEC tracks anywhere between 79th Street & 125th Street, the sites mentioned most prominently in your plans.


Like many letters written in a fit of anger, I held off sending it because I wanted to calm down and reflect over my central points after doing some more research.
Well, that supporting evidence I knew was out there was found exactly where I knew it was, and you will be able to read it for yourself.

In that future post, I will also give you a historical pespective on how poorly other communities were served by some within their community to play the veto card on regional transportation issues thru the adoption of myopic and selfish attitudes that have longlasting effects that negatively effect their area's transpotation, economy and quality of life.
___________________________________
Subject: Re: Comments of Tom Benton, Miami Shores manager re his objections to SFECC
CC: ramchandani
From: seeburger

Date: Fri, 7 Sep 2007

Mr. X:

I assume you received a readable version of the fileyou were looking for. If not, please let me know and we will do something else.


Thanks for your interest, and support.

Scott P. Seeburger
Planning and Environmental Mgmt Florida DOT - District 4
____________________________________
Subject: RE: Comments of Tom Benton, Miami Shores manager re his objections to SFECC
Date: Tue, 4 Sep 2007
From:"Ramchandani, Jitender"


Please see the attached.

Thank you,

Jitender Ramchandani
__________________________
Sent: Saturday, September 01, 2007 4:50 PM
To: Scott Seeburger
Cc: Cejas, Carlos M.
Subject: Comments of Tom Benton, Miami Shores manager re his objections to SFECC Saturday


September 1st, 2007


Dear Mr. Seeburger:


The pdf. file -below- I accessed on the internet doesn't allow for a complete reading of Mr. Benton's comments properly, as they remain off the margin and completely illegible.


I've tried just about every computer and printing trick I can think of, all to no avail.


Could you please arrange to have your staff email me those particular comments,which I personally find very troubling for the future of the plan, since it would disenfranchise South Floridians who live b/w 79th and 125th Street , affecting not just Miami Shores residents?

I've gone to both the Hollywood and Aventura public meetings, and am a vocal advocate of the plan, which ideally would've been in pace when I was growing up down here in the 70's.


FYI: I was directly behind Mr. Benton when he made some ridiculous anti-SFECC comments at the Aventura meeting last year.


Thank you in advance!
__________________________
Los Angeles Times
Editorial: Let the public speak
A hearing on the Foothill South toll road, expected to draw as many as 10,000, must go forward.
July 15, 2008


One of the worst possible reasons for not holding a public hearing is that too many people are passionately interested in the outcome. Yet that's precisely the illogic contained in a U.S. Department of Commerce letter indicating that the agency might cancel its hearing on the proposed Foothill South toll road after learning that perhaps 10,000 people want to attend.


The department is considering an appeal on the toll road, which the California Coastal Commission rejected as environmentally unacceptable. But after committing to a public hearing, it now faces a quandary: Far more people have expressed interest in attending -- probably to oppose the project -- than the venue at UC Irvine can hold. The department is weighing its options, the letter says, including canceling the July 25 hearing. And though it doesn't rule out a new date, it also complains that "the cost of a larger facility and increased security would exceed our current budget."


That has to be a joke. Since when is there a budget cap on providing public access?


To see the rest of the editorial:
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/opinionla/la-ed-tollroad15-2008jul15,0,7220627.story