One Cop At A Time

I posted yesterday that the amount the commission spent in 35 minutes was $167,500. Of that number, $86,000 is hard cash that we are now obligated to spend. The remainder will come due if our police chief is let go for anything other than criminal convictions.

North Bay Village could have economized by posting our legally required notices in the Miami Daily Business Review and instead spent $26,000 more to post them in the Miami Herald.

North Bay Village has a code enforcement officer who is currently restrained from doing his job. Rather than comply with a simple hiring freeze, the city is now hiring a new code enforcement officer at $59,000.

$86,000 could have kept one cop employed. Which is worth more to the citizens - a subsidy to the Herald and unrestricted hiring ability for the interim city manager or keeping a cop on the streets?

Three members of our commission voted in lock step with no serious public discussion of the consequences. None. When you see three people quietly agreeing on something controversial, you know the fix is in.

Do you really trust Rey Trujillo, author of the North Bay Village Trujillo Tax who loves to spend public money for his whims, George Kane who was found by the Miami-Dade Commission on Ethics to have negotiated his own compensation by sponsoring an unnecessary move to the Lexi, and Paul Vogel who is constantly surrounded by activist union members?

So one cop loses his job in 35 minutes because these three have some hidden agenda. They didn't even have the respect to share their reasoning with the city. We are heading down the track to bankruptcy and these three are driving the train.


Kevin Vericker
August 25, 2010