re The Miami Herald: What's black & white, increasingly unread and continually resented? Why is McClatchy Corp. doing nothing as the Herald slides further into irrelevancy, and further alienating its readers by the clear lack of a tangible strategic plan -or even effort- to change? They're running multiple stories on front of website that are weeks old!

re The Miami Herald: What's black & white, increasingly unread and continually resented? Why is McClatchy Corp. doing nothing as their Miami Herald slides further into irrelevancy, and further alienating its own readers by clear lack of a tangible strategic plan -or even effort- to change? They're running multiple stories on front of website that are weeks old!

Last Monday, I sent the email below to some high-ranking executives at McClatchy Corp HQ -in Sacramento- the parent company of The Miami Herald, along with bcc copies to some other interested parties throughout South Florida, the state and the country who wonder -like me- why this area continues to be so severely underserved by The Herald despite the advent of new and rather technology the past ten years that makes actually covering and reporting on everyday news events or even investigating more-complicated stories, easier and quicker than ever.

Why do we STILL see no tangible sign that there's an actual plausible and logical plan in place at One Herald Plaza to actually improve the overall news product and become much more responsive to South Florida's readers desire for better and more-thorough local news coverage? 
Why is there so much resistance to what is staring them right in the face and what what their remaining readers actually want?

It's very, very strange counter-intuitive behavior.

Which is not to say that the South Florida Sun-Sentinel or any of the news operations for the four Miami-area English language TV stations are doing their viewers any favors, either, or being any more responsive, as I mentioned the other in discussing how none of them have done a single campaign story this year on 36-year Broward States Attorney Michael Satz or the two men who plan to ease him out of his office with extreme prejudice.


(By the way, could we all just agree amongst ourselves that stories about diets, fashion, plastic surgery, celebrities-in-jail/celebrity-shoot-outs and phony corporate-sponsored events on South Beach shouldn't be run or mentioned on the 6 and 11 p.m. newscasts? That'd be a great start!)

And to point out just three of the many more-obvious things that I've previously mentioned here that are currently missing in the Herald, why in the year 2012 do we STILL not see a single Broward-centric columnist in their pages, a South Florida-based conservative columnist who is NOT a former pol or campaign adviser and who can write persuasive prose that respects both history and reality?
Or even an education blog that is more than simply a random collection of PR releases from publicists, School Boards and colleges?

In the past few months, because I spend so much time reading domestic and foreign news sites and blogs that give me more of what I actually want before I go to sleep, I've gotten in the habit of not actually looking at the physical copy of the Herald until sometime after 4 p.m.

And yet partially because of that new reading habit, just within the past month, I've voluntarily put the kibosh temporarily on 6-8 different blog posts that I've written that dealt with some aspect of problems that I detected in the Herald.


Whether it was dealing with the reporter's inaccurate use of facts, insufficient use of facts, misleading statements, continuing reliance on a source that is not objective, down to the brutal coverage of the Jonathan Vilma Saints bounty-gate story, where despite the fact that Vilma went to high school and college down here -Coral Gables High School & U-M- there was no original Herald reporting or analysis the next day, just wire service copy.
Pitiful.


This was 100% accurate when I wrote it on June 12th, and one of the two stories I refer to was still displayed on the Herald's website with a photo as of Noon Monday afternoon.

-----

What's black & white and continually read -but resented? 

It's a rhetorical question because there are currently two stories featured on the Miami Herald's

website that are one week old -or older. Why?

We all know it's because of the Herald's continued and pronounced geographical bias for news coverage.

One article is about Miami Beach and the other is about Coral Gables. In fact, the Coral Gables

story is 12 days old.

But The Herald loves both cities and considers them both simpatico and part of the Herald's natural coverage area, while I and my neighbors, 14.2 miles due north, are considered outliers.

If either piece I've highlighted below in red had happened in Broward County, and Hallandale Beach in particular, they'd have vanished from that webpage within about 30 hours, if that long.

But a week later, these two particular stories remain.

Why?

Even as there is nothing in the newspaper about any of about a dozen different stories regarding Broward County people, places and events that I can think of.

Like, for instance, a story about the 36-year incumbent States Attorney and his (perceived)

failed legacy against police, govt. and political corruption.

But the Herald has chosen not to write a single story this year about his campaign race,

so five months have come and gone and now, as of today, he is eight-weeks removed from a

primary election challenge and 21-weeks from a general election challenge if he survives the first.

But the Herald has written nothing about him, and, of course, because of that, they've also

written nothing about his opponents.

That's no way to run a newspaper.

And far, far too often, at almost any time of the day you check it, day or night, too often to be

mere coincidence, the Herald's Broward homepage 

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/broward/#navlink=navbar

consists of a majority of stories that have nothing to do with this county, the sixth-largest in the

fourth-largest state in the country.

Last week, checking at random, at different times of the day, on four separate occasions, only

two of the seven featured stories on the Herald's Broward homepage had stories that had anything to do with anyone, anything or any issue in Broward County

That's no way to run a newspaper.

WHEN are we finally going to see some some tangible, positive changes at the newspaper that reflect the genuine interests of the population of South Florida, particularly those of us that live north of the Miami-Dade countyline?

It's getting worse by the month, worse by the week, and worse by the day...

As I've told you previously, that iceberg on the horizon isn't going away, so if a course correction isn't made soon, the Herald will once and for all pass the point of no return for many readers like me who've held out hope that changes were afoot.

At some point, the survival of the newspaper is merely an academic exercise, not one that most of my friends and neighbors will care about after so many years of consistently sub-par performance that irked them instead of informing them.

re Beachwalk project in Hallandale Beach: Hallandale Beach Mom with common sense writes re the conditions at HB's North Beach. Yet City Hall STILL won't accept ownership of longstanding problems there, just like they've ignored city's education/White Flight problems for years

View Larger Map

Yes, it seems so nice from a distance, but ... 
North Beach, Hallandale Beach, FL

Earlier today I received an adroit comment regarding my post of last Friday titled, 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
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/06/hallandale-beach-mayor-joy-coopers-old.html


In just a few sentences, she managed to get to the heart of so many longstanding problems in this city: the unwillingness of elected officials and highly-paid city employees in charge to first acknowledge the problems and to solve them to the satisfaction of Hallandale Beach taxpayers residents, and business owners.
Instead, out of habit or personal preference, they either ignore, deny, or kick the can further down the road.


Or, as has often happened when I've publicly discussed these matters, found myself personally attacked for pointing out what everyone but them seems able to see right in front of our collective faces. 


Barboryte wrote:

I went to this beach once and never again. I would rather drive to Hollywood boardwalk and spend money there and have my kids play in the sand and enjoy plenty of showers and clean beach.Maybe it's time to get up and sell and move from this town. All I see is our town being sold piece by piece to developers with absolutely no regard to the residents. 

Her comments are not unlike many I received over the recent years during the battle against Peter Deutsch's Ben Gamla Hebrew Charter School trying to force itself down the throats
of a single-family residential Northeast HB neighborhood, on N.E. 8th Avenue, with the promise of far more kids and traffic coming from outside of HB and southeast Broward than the neighborhood either wanted or could stand.


But associated with that issue was the related one that is the abject failure over the eight-plus years that I've lived here of Mayor Cooper and the City Commission and City Managers Good and Antonio to be serious and convene a citywide forum at the HB Cultural Center, say on a Saturday morning, run by a moderator and with experts present, where the city's educational problems and future could be FINALLY be discussed, calmly but honestly.


Frankly, it's as if everyone at HB City Hall was so afraid that the truth would be uttered by so many dozens and dozens of HB parents that it would actually hurt someone else's feelings, so instead, we simply had to just pretend, year-after-year, that the problem didn't really exist.
But it did and it still does.


Specifically, that would mean publicly airing a problem that I've written about here on the blog a few times but which nobody at HB City Hall wants to publicly acknowledge, but which as everyone who has lived here for any amount of time knows, is one of the main reasons that families move away from Hallandale Beach: the popular perception that the nearest public high school, Hallandale High School, is unsatisfactory and a poor educational choice.


So instead we have either White Flight to the more western suburbs of this county, or high school age kids attending private or charter schools located outside of this city.
That's NOT how you build a community -or keep one intact.


But year-after-year this problem has been allowed to exist below the radar.
And equally so, the awful conditions of this city's public beaches, which clearly ought to be a jewel and natural meeting place for the community, but which isn't.


Which, of course, explains why you are much more likely to run into someone you know from HB at Hollywood Beach, near Johnson Street on the Broadwalk, than you are at HB's own beaches.
People have and are voting with their feet -and their cars.


I'm now going to quote myself.
Really.


From my January 19, 2009 blog post titled, Welcome to Hallandale Beach: where old cigarettes and condoms party at the beach that HB Cops ignore!
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2009/01/welcome-to-hallandale-beach-where-old.html

As we all know from our travels, in many if not most American communities fortunate enough to have a beach, especially those dependent on tourism, the beach is an invaluable resource that's esteemed, treasured and given extra care and concern.

It's a place where city officials and elected officials constantly visit and hover around to keep track of not only its physical and aesthetic condition, but also to gauge the mood of resident and visitor beach-goers to see if there's any problems or concerns there they need to be aware of.

They are pro-active, NOT reactive and slothful and full of excuses as they are in Hallandale Beach. 

That public sentiment is often an early indicator of the residents' collective feeling about the town itself, since when resident taxpayers feel that a place as high-profile as the beach is going downhill, and not being properly looked after, it's only natural that they suspect that other things in the city they can't see are falling apart, too.

It's only human nature, but it's something the City of Hallandale Beach has been in utter denial about for years, as one problem after another has been left to fester there.Yet when confronted with the reality, they've instead put their heads in the sand.The evidence is all around you.

So, I was at North Beach on Saturday for well over an hour, checking things out, and as usual, it was fine as long as you only saw it thru the prism of the palm trees along Surf Road.

Yes, from there, everything always looks fine!

 Above, July 26, 2008 photo by South Beach Hoosier.

But once you've parked in the garage (the one that the mayor seems perfectly willing to give away) and were actually standing on the beach, you could tell that it was as filthy and unappealing as ever, though to be fair, for once, I didn't find any condoms or liquor bottles over near the rusty pipes that have been on the beach for years...

Snapshot of a poorly-maintained public beach: Finding a used condom near one of the only two park benches at 4 p.m., on a Friday holiday afternoon on a beach full of families. January 2, 2009 photo by South Beach Hoosier

It could hardly be clearer that HB City Hall and their DPW leadership STILL won't accept ownership of the longstanding problems there.

They act like residents who pay taxes for that beach to be properly maintained CAN'T see what has been in front of us for years and we don't know who is responsible.

They're wrong -we do.

We know EXACTLY who is responsible!

The very problems I telephoned DPW about two weeks ago -FROM the beach- which they said they'd take care of.

Among other things, that included the city's Beach sponsorship signs that we've seen there for the past few years, were still lying on the ground, not properly erected.

And were far from where they were supposed to be.

Like last time we were there.

And the week before that...

And the month before that...

According to the life guards, the sign on South Beach has been under the lifeguard stand -that STILL has graffiti on it- for easily 3 or 4 months, waiting for DPW to do the job they're paid to do -basic maintenance.

It's only further proof to me that, as I've been stating for years, the look and care of the public beaches has fallen so far below what is acceptable, that we should immediately take it away from a clearly-ineffective and dis-interested DPW, and privatize the function, just like the beach life guards are actually contractors for Jeff Ellis, not city employees.

A firm given the money that was previously appropriated to DPW for beach maintenance, and which has properly maintaining an attractive and safe beach as their only function, knowing that if they fail they'll be replaced.

I believe that almost anyone we choose would do a MUCH-SUPERIOR job by us as taxpayers then continuing to expect a dog that clearly won't hunt, like DPW, to suddenly learn to hunt.

Obviously if this happens, there also needs to be a commensurate cut in personnel numbers for DPW, since I'm certainly NOT going to reward DPW for doing a terrible job by letting them keep the same number of employees, since actions and consistent poor performance must have consequences, and that should include some for Hector Castro himself, the DPW Director.

http://www.hallandalebeachfl.gov/index.aspx?nid=19

So where exactly is Hector Castro on this matter, and WHY is it that he is never grilled about this longstanding failure at HB City Hall, when it's clearly a big enough and obvious enough problem that even Joy Cooper apologists were mentioning it at the June 6th City Commission meeting?

And why was his immediate predecessor or Antonio or Good never grilled, either?

Where is the personal and professional accountability at HB City Hall?

By the way, the life guards stands we have on the beach are NOT properly "grounded" for lightning strikes, which is both a liability issue and a maintenance issue.

Rather than have the city hand-over de facto control of the public beach called North Beach, so The Related Group can make it a boutique beach that caters largely to their residents and hotel clients for their three properties within four blocks of that location at the Hollywood-

Hallandale Beach city-line, and also maintain control of the public parking garage, too -both for thirty years- we should tell the City Commission to tell TRG, thanks but no thanks.

But do go ahead and build the hotel you can already build, because that is something that nearly everyone in the community agrees we need.

But build it WITHOUT the condo units, and WITHOUT tossing the North Beach parcel in as a sweetener -to a real estate corporation!

Then, we vote in November for a mayor and city commissioners who take their job as public representatives seriously, who actually DO their homework, read the background documents  fully and who actually show-up for HB City Commission meetings ready, willing and able  to ask tough, probing questions of city staff and applicants, for the benefit of this city's taxpayers, NOT for the benefit of developers or a certain group of people in town used to having their way.

And after those sort of people get elected in November -and they are NOT named Joy Cooper or members of her Rubber Stamp Crew named Anthony A. Sanders and William "Bill" Julian-  they can instruct our new City Manager, Renee Crichton, that owing to the longstanding neglect of the city's public beaches for years, fixing the public beaches is now deemed a HIGH PRIORITY, and she needs to come back to them within thirty days with some realistic proposals to make that a reality -ASAP!

One that also includes the possibility of the city privatizing the maintenance of the beach so that it properly reflects the fact that 13 years ago, the people of this community overwhelmingly voted to "put the beach back into Hallandale Beach."

Four Weeks of the Olympic Torch Relay thru Britain -London 2012 Olympics; Isabella Duder's video of Will.i.am carrying Olympic torch in Taunton

Olympic Torch Relay Week 1 Highlights - London 2012, May 26, 2012.
http://youtu.be/BSsi3vcaP_0



Olympic Torch Relay Week 2 Highlights - London 2012, June 2, 2012.
http://youtu.be/Kp3XUllY3qU



Olympic Torch Relay Week 3 Highlights - London 2012, June 9, 2012.
http://youtu.be/SHcs-qR9XLs



Olympic Torch Relay Week 4 Highlights - London 2012, June 16, 2012.
http://youtu.be/90Cu7PdxrNk



Olympic Torch Relay Day 29 Highlights - London 2012
Included Gateshead, Hadrian's Wall, Sunderland, Durham
http://youtu.be/nZUOEPZTPVI


1,019 communities in 70 days: Monday is Day 31, with the Torch Relay in North Yorkshire, and starting in Middlesbrough and winding its way to Hull. 
39 days untill the Olympic Games begin Friday July 27th.


Watch the Olympic Torch Relay LIVE at 
http://www.london2012.com/torch-relay/video/live.html


Don't miss blogger Isabella Duder's great photos of the Torch Relay on Day Three in Taunton featuring Will.i.am of The Black Eyed Peas carrying the torch there:
http://isabelladuder.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/olympic-torch-relay-day-3-taunton.html



Her May 22nd video is at: http://youtu.be/7-ZUvK2veiQ 
First are some photos, then the video starts at 0:19.


---------------
http://www.london2012.com/


http://www.london2012.com/torch-relay/


http://www.lloydstsblondon2012.co.uk/en/In-your-community/Olympic-Torch-Relay/

Official London 2012 Olympics YouTube Channel: 
http://www.youtube.com/user/london2012


http://www.olympic.org/ 

Today, on Father's Day, where are FL Rep. Joseph "Joe" Gibbons' children celebrating with him? Likely up in the Jacksonville area where they all live, NOT in Broward County where he pretends he lives full-time

View Larger Map
If it's true that "Home is where the heart is," and we know that this location in Jacksonville is the law office of Joe Gibbons' wife, Ava Parker, what are we left to surmise and conclude?

Today, on Father's Day, where are FL Rep. Joseph "Joe" Gibbons' children celebrating with him? Likely up in the Jacksonville area, where they all live, NOT in Broward County where he pretends he lives.

We know that they're all not over at North Beach, where we were yesterday, taking even more photographs to document how dirty the beach is and has been allowed to remian for years under the current powers-that-be at Hallandale Beach City Hall.

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 photos by South Beach Hoosier.

Joe Gibbons' gambit continues to make a complete mockery of the state's laws that require someone to be a full-time legal resident of the district they represent.

And the state legislators from Broward County all know about it, too.
And they just look the other way.

Along with the Broward States Attorney Mike Satz and the entire South Florida news media, save Bob Norman.

In Indiana, you actually have to live where you say you do, and be able to prove it, even if you're an elected official.

In Florida, not so much.

This article show the contrast between states that enforce their laws and those that don't:

Los Angeles Times

Indiana secretary of state convicted of voter fraud

By Ricardo Lopez

February 4, 2012  1:17 pm

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/nationnow/2012/02/indiana-secretary-of-state-convicted-of-6-voter-fraud-charges.html

See also:

THURSDAY, APRIL 21, 2011

Elaine de Valle's Political Cortadito blog channels Sherlock Holmes and catches the crook red-handed: FL Rep. Frank Artiles. Blogger 1, Lying Pol 0

http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/elaine-de-valles-political-cortadito.html

-----

Elaine de Valle's Political Cortadito blog: http://www.politicalcortadito.com/

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

The Second Reading re The Beachwalk is Wednesday June 20th at 6:30 p.m.

Having waited an entire week, it's now time to move on to some long overdue public discussion of what I'm calling the "meat-and-potatoes" portion of our discussion of The Beachwalk project at 2400 East Hallandale Beach Blvd., next to the Intracoastal Bridge in Hallandale Beach, along with some related matters which you surely WON'T be seeing raised or discussed elsewhere in this community, especially among the sleepwalking news media.
I call it "meat-and-potatoes" because like that sort of comfort food when it's done right, it should be thoroughly chewed-over and savored -with some time for reflection.

It was hard for me and many other well-informed Hallandale Beach residents attending last Wednesday night's City Commission meeting -or among those watching it online- not to take notice of the fact that corporate PR shill and Hallandale Beach Chamber of Commerce president Carole Pumpian kept her dubious record intact of supporting every single development project proposed in HB, despite what it's for, despite what it'll looks like, and most importantly, despite what HB neighborhood residents, homeowners and small business owners think or want.


Plain and simple, Carole Pumpian just doesn't care what they -YOU- think.


She's working her agenda, not the community's.

Above, in pink, Carole Pompian sitting in the second row of the three rows of lobbyists and hired hands working for Related to get this over-reaching bad idea passed. June 6, 2012 photo by South Beach Hoosier.

Pumpian's been very consistent about that if you hadn't noticed, but as you'll soon hear, there's a very good reason for her to be so unconcerned about the genuine public opinion of this ocean side city's 38,000 residents.

No, rather than be concerned with what Hallandale Beach citizens think, Pumpian's more of a fan of the sort of phony and insincere corporate "artificial turf" grass roots efforts that yours truly has seen up-close in many parts of this country over the years.


That includes the orchestrated one involving the controversial out-of-scale proposal from 2009-2010 by the union that owns the Westin Diplomat Resort & Spa, which wanted to place multiple giant condo towers of over 25-stories in and around the Diplomat Gold Course in NE Hallandale Beach, including one of the city's most affluent streets, which HB residents and homeowners overwhelmingly opposed, an effort my friend Csaba Kulin was among the leaders of throughout.


But Carole Pumpian and the HB Chamber of Commerce of Patricia Genetti and Joe Kessel didn't let the facts or the Hallandale Beach public's clear opposition to the Diplomat's plan get in the way of their vocally championing the proposal at public meeting after public meeting thru the long process, before the Broward County Commission eventually killed it 6-3 about 26 months ago.


http://weblogs.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/broward/blog/2010/04/diplomat_plans_fail_to_win_cou.html


For those of you who don't already know, and I'm sure that the vast majority of you, let me connect-the-dots a bit more on the Chamber and its Executive Director, Patricia Genetti, who runs it on a day-to-day basis.


Genetti had no qualms at all about supporting City Hall's deceptive handling of the issue, which included trying to keep public information about the developer's changes and modifications from the original plan from the public, and not placing it online until little more than 24 hours before the first actual vote that took place in the city, by the HB Planning & Zoning Advisory Board.
With yet another vote the following day by the City Commission.


More importantly to me and many other HB residents who care about transparency in public policy and use of taxpayer dollars, Genetti showed no moral or ethical qualms in vocally attacking HB taxpayers at public meetings who were against the project, even while she NEVER publicly disclosed when she spoke, that the City Commission paid the Chamber $50,000, much of which went for her own salary.


Which is to say that for a number of months, extending over two separate years, concerned HB taxpayers found themselves in the odd position of having their own tax dollars being used against them by someone like Genetti who was happy to bash them and other opponents of the Diplomat's plan like there was no tomorrow, but who lacked the basic integrity to come clean and admit that she was not an objective person. 


Genetti never admitted it in 2009 or 2010, and she's never admitted it in the two years since the Diplomat plan (and its cocky crew) were shot-down overwhelmingly by the Broward County Commission, and used as an example of what residents throughout the county did NOT want to see in the future near their neighborhood.


That ought to give you some sort of insight into the caliber and moral rectitude of some of the people we have in Hallandale Beach who always have their hands out for the taxpayer handout, and who have no qualms about attacking the citizens, taxpayers, homeowners and Mom & Pop shop owners of this community.
http://hallandalebeachchamber.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=48&Itemid=53

Earlier I conspicuously used the word "residents" and that wasn't by accident, because there's a good reason that Pumpian is so consistently deaf, dumb and blind to the the genuine feelings and desires of actual Hallandale Beach residents, and why Pumpian is NOT someone whom the most-concerned citizens of this very frustrated town trust.
Far from it.


It's not just because of Pumpian's general demeanor, though it's true that it's been said to me by more than a few female residents of HB over the years that Pumpian gives the appearance of a woman constantly trying to connive or worm her way into important matters, and have some sort of connection to every one of these sorts of large construction/development  projects.
Now whether that's because of some basic economic desire on her part to make some money as a PR shill for them or their friends, or, in part, to fill some sort of need to appear to be an important and influential person in this city, I can't say, but it is the perception of a lot more well-informed people than she thinks.


But she's NOT either, of course.
This post of mine today will discuss in some general terms why she and the HB Chamber of Commerce aren't taken seriously by the most well-informed and most-involved citizens of Hallandale Beach.
Do you know what those reasons are or might be?

I'll give you a small hint.

It's one of the same reasons that I so gleefully ripped into her -and her ilk, the Joe Kessels of the world- two years ago at multiple Broward Planning Council and Broward County Commission meetings on the far-too-large Diplomat project they championed against the interests of HB residents who already lived next-door to the Diplomat Golf Course.

Of course it was hard not to be gleeful in picking apart the Kessel Crew's transparent weaknesses in their arguments, which sounded so remarkably similar that you couldn't help but wonder if they'd been written by the same Chamber or Diplomat marketing geniuses we have seen accomplish nothing, even while they rounded-up union supporters who didn't actually live here.

One of those pro-Diplomat supporters on the Chamber was the owner of the faux newspaper that's supported by tax dollars thanks to Mayor Cooper, Craig Farquhar's South Florida Sun-Times, who publicly lied about not having an opinion, when I and others have actually seen a copy of his email to Broward County urging its passage.


Plus, here's the official record that Craig Farquhar, this recipient of HB taxpayer largess that the taxpayers are actually AGAINST, this so-called person with "no position" on this issue is a stone-faced liar: Page 13 of the Broward Planning Council's Minutes of February 25, 2010.
is that enough proff for you that he's a hypocrtite?
Right there under Speakers in support of PH 8, six spaces after Joe Kessel, five spaces before Patricia Genetti.


Yes, of course, Farquahar is a member of the Hallandale Beach Chamber of Commerce!
I told you it was the center for crony capitalism in this town -and he's the proof of that.
He received a $50k CRA loan, only has to repay $25k.
http://www.broward.org/PlanningCouncil/Documents/PlanningCouncilMonthlyMinutes/02252010Minutes.pdf


Newcomers to this blog take notice:

Broward Bulldog

Sweet deal for owners of Hallandale newspaper that features mayor as columnist

By William Gjebre, BrowardBulldog.org 

FEBRUARY 9, 2012 AT 6:11 AM

A weekly newspaper in Hallandale Beach got a $50,000 city “loan” under terms so favorable that half of it – $25,000 – amounted to a taxpayer giveaway because the city did not require it to be repaid...

Read the rest of the story at: 

http://www.browardbulldog.org/2012/02/sweet-deal-for-owners-of-hallandale-newspaper-that-features-mayor-as-columnist/

See for yourself:
http://web.me.com/mike.butler/Change_Hallandale/Updates/Entries/2010/2/26_CIty_Raises_Taxes_while_Wasting_Money_on_Private_Companies_files/SunTimes_PromissoryNote.pdf


Or, see my February 14, 2012 blog post titled, 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

Yes, the Hallandale Beach Chamber of Commerce is sort of the ground-zero for the professional crony capitalism crowd of HB, who want to act like insiders and profit off the public's teat, which is something that as we all know so well, Joe Kessel managed to do below-the-radar for years.

See: 

Realtor Being Paid by Hallandale May Have Had Role in Controversial Loan to Pornographer

By Thomas Francis

April 8, 2010 at 4:50 PM

http://blogs.browardpalmbeach.com/pulp/2010/04/hallandale_digital_outernet_joe_kessel_jenna_jameson.php

There's a good reason that the Chamber doesn't do the sorts of normal civic events that CoCs do in the rest of the country. 
The sorts of things that people in those towns from coast-to-coast take pretty much for granted as traditions, albeit perhaps hokey ones in the minds of some, like hosting debates for mayor, city commission and local state races,  esp. Breakfast Debates, with money going to charity.

Here, though, the folks who make up the Executive Board of the Chamber know that one way or another, HB City Hall pays the freight around here, so why should they anger Mayor Cooper and actually have a debate giving anyone challenging her and City Hall a chance, and force the mayor and her Rubber Stamp Crew to have to explain and defend the indefensible?

First, for reasons unknown, the folks at the Chamber have a very high opinion of themselves, which is very odd considering how little they have accomplished for the greater good of the community and how truly disconnected they are to the real community activists of this area.


This difference also explains in part why The Related Group chose to meet with them instead of the real activists of this community, and perhaps, even paid for a nice meal in the process while everyone brainstormed.

No doubt that's have been held somewhere at the Village of Gulfstream Park where PR shill and Chamber Director Suzanne Friedman is their paid mouthpiece, and because, of course, that's their hangout and unofficial clubhouse.

To me and many other HB citizens who pay close attention, the Chamber is not unlike a mid-1960's high school clique, right down to their having a couple of uncool kids they like to keep around from time-to-time to toy with, and play the role of court jesters, amusing them.


Here, former HB Commissioner Bill Julian plays that latter role, as he even writes about them and their spouses and their vacation adventures in the faux newspaper that is taxpayer-financed.

Here's the secret they haven't figured out: they're the only ones who think they're cool.

Everyone else who really knows what's really going on here just laughs at these phonies and their pretentious ways.

As for their current elected President, Carole Pumpian, who, supposedly, also redesigned the Chamber of Commerce's dopey website that said nothing before and says little of note now,
and which was often 5-6 months behind with information on their own activities, but which did have a link to her business in Hollywood.
At least they have their priorities, huh?


Did you happen to catch her mention her home address as required when she walked up to the microphone and spoke before the City Commission?


I mention it because she rarely actually goes to public meetings here, which is unusual given her position, but then it's not like the HB Chamber actually polls its own members what they think of something and whether or not they should support or oppose something at City Hall.


But then there's a reason for that.


Try to think of something within the past six years that the HB Chamber opposed that Mayor Cooper supported.
Just one.


Just name one public policy change, one proposed ordinance, one proposed resolution, one...
There isn't one.


No, as a regular attendee at public meetings throughout this city for many years, I can tell you that about the only time you can count on seeing Carole Pumpian around is every 18-24 months or so when there's something involving construction/development.


Then, like the photo above from last Wednesday, she sits with her bosom buddies up in the front rows of the commission chamber: the real estate developers and their hired guns.


Sometimes, that also includes the lemmings of the do-nothing Chamber of Commerce and their clique/cult of personality where "insider" Joe Kessel plays the role of guy who invented the wheel and who works all the angles.


Often, as we've seen over the years, speaking in favor of unpopular HB City Hall initiatives WITHOUT publicly disclosing who's paying him, like the secret deal he had with City hall itself.


So if you haven't already guessed it by now, folks, Carole Pumpian works in the same city that she lives in, and that city is NOT Hallandale Beach -she lives in Hollywood.

So, to recap, in short, Carole Pumpian doesn't really give a damn about anybody or anything in Hallandale Beach unless she, a client, or the Chamber can somehow make a dime off of it somehow.
She's a mercenary.

Yep, that's about the size of it.

More on Beachwalk in the coming days

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Broward Bulldog

Hallandale gives thumbs up to condo king Jorge Perez’s $100 million, high-rise Beachwalk project

By William Gjebre, BrowardBulldog.org

June 7, 2012 AT 12:39 AM,

http://www.browardbulldog.org/2012/06/hallandale-commissioners-like-condo-king-jorge-perezs-100-million-high-rise-beachwalk-project/

Miami Herald

Proposed hotel gets tentative approval in Hallandale Beach

Miami developer Jorge Pérez gained preliminary approval from the Hallandale Beach commission to build a more than $90 million project on the Intracoastal Waterway

By Carli Teproff

Posted June 7, 2012

http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/06/07/2838243/proposed-hotel-gets-tentative.html

South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Hallandale considers 31-story hotel/condo

By Tonya Alanez, Sun Sentinel

6:27 p.m. EDT, June 7, 2012

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/broward/fl-hallandale-beachwalk-project-20120607,0,6092598.story

The Second Reading is Wednesday June 20th at 6:30 p.m.

See plans at  http://www.hallandalebeachfl.gov/index.aspx?NID=805