Michael Lewis’ editorial in Miami Today was on target on the Charter Review: Democracy, Miami-Dade style: Don't let the people vote Miami-Dade. He said:"Commissioners set the charter review rules, picked the players, set the time limit — and now ignore everything as they prevent a public vote to protect their own interests."
Look what the Commissioners said at their first meeting to review the 21 Member Committee’s recommendations:
"We should empower them to freely discuss any item that should be brought in front of the commission," said Commissioner Rebeca Sosa, but not allow a public vote unless the commission concurs. "I don't think it's healthy for this community to allow a group to place items directly for the electors."
Sending review recommendations directly to the ballot, said Commissioner Sally Heyman, could affect the commission, causing "some unintended consequences that may be adverse to how we operate or what our future objectives are."
If measures were to go directly to voters, Mr. Moss said, his appointee "is going to mirror my views as opposed to someone who approaches it from a purely objective perspective."
"The only concern I would have," Barbara Jordan said, "is I pick someone and give them their marching orders and then they recognize the power that they have and switch out on me."
Michael Lewis said of the process:
Instead, commissioners want us to vote on their own pet changes, ideas the review team explicitly rejected. And, they're throwing their blatantly self-serving ballot questions at us at the same time. What a slap in the face to the charter review team — and to all of us!
One commission-generated proposal would amend the charter so that the mayor and manager would no longer oversee the police department. Another commission-generated proposal would do the same with the elections department. A conflicting commission-generated proposal would have voters elect the sheriff. Others would do the same with the supervisor of elections and the tax collector.
Commissioner Jordan even pulled from her pocket a 24th charter proposal — unwind the strong mayor government that voters just created, a change that vastly reduced the commission's powers.
Further, the taskforce debated six months after expert testimony, but the commission is pulling these proposed ballot questions out of the air.
4 comments:
In spite of Miguel DeGrandy trying to subvert the process, I thought the task force did a great job. Too bad our Commissioners are so small minded. They just want to protect their powerbase. They want people to fawn over them forever (they don't realize that people laugh at them behind their backs).
If the media had been as vigilant in naming names, of those who influence the county commission, we might not be in this situation of looking backwards all the time because the vested interests stop us from looking forwards.
People, did you really believed our commissioners were going to relinquish a bit of their super powers and listen to the people? They never do, and they never will. Let's call the Feds and have them thoroughly investigated -how is it possible that a small group can control all the citizens of this county, with a population of over 1,000,000 people?
Can't we just have them arrested?
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