As much as I hate most of the County Commissioners, there is no excuse to lie to them...Ever.Last week there were a couple of transit articles. Anyone see them, they weren't on the front page? They outlined how George Burgess lied about the freeze of Federal Grant funds coming to Miami Dade Transit.
In one article printed Dec. 6th (that I can't find online) it said:
Burgess sent a misleading memo to Commissioners on Thanksgiving eve telling them that media reports on the suspension were wrong "because the manual withdrawal process remained active." In response, El Nuevo Herald asked an FTA official, Brian Farber, if that information was accurate, he said no..."since these improprieties involve serious accounting deficiencies involving federal funds and fare box collections, the FTA will not be considering any such request until extensive corrective actions are taken."
Burgess issued an UPDATED memo to commissioners (me: without the lies) acknowledging that all fund request "Will not be processed at this time...(in other words found in the article) "After first minimizing the suspension, and then denying it, county officials said that indeed all FTA grant funds have been suspended until further notice."
December 8th the Miami Herald reported that fraud wasn't involved by the county:
"Miami-Dade's county manager assures commissioners that the transit agency's federal funding suspension resulted from mistakes." (HUH?? Like what the hell does that mean? Burgess you are assuring the Commission it is not fraud only MISTAKES?) "Burgess said he expects the internal investigation and ``corrective'' procedure to be wrapped up by early March. Llort said it was still unclear when the federal government would lift the suspension because she doesn't know when precisely the Federal Transit Administration will return to Miami-Dade to conduct a new audit." (March? It is going to take until March to clear this up??)
Finally, this you won't believe (straight out of the Miami Herald article):
"County officials disclosed that a Sept. 20 letter from the Federal Transit Administration advised Miami-Dade Transit that its withdrawals of federal fundings through the ECHO system were being restricted. Nevertheless, about two hours after the letter arrived, a transit official withdrew nearly $15 million from ECHO. Assistant County Manager Llort attributed the withdrawal to a 'miscommunication'within transit. However, Harpal Kapoor, the transit director, said after the meeting that he did order financial officials to stop making ECHO withdrawals, 'but they didn't listen.'"
They didn't listen? What the hell is going on over there? Mayor Alvarez, why didn't you fire Burgess over this? Off with their heads! This gets both my "believe it or not" and my "boondoggle" category.
11 comments:
Sorry, early on I had a lot of typo's hope they are fixed now....
You would think that Burgess with a stolen Herald reporter as his close aide would be able to produce a straight and consistent message, if for no other reason the guy would be able to write a story.
Someone needs to be standing in the counting room with a shot gun.
improprieties involve serious accounting deficiencies involving federal funds and fare box collections
Don't we shoot looters?
"Don't we shoot looters?"
No. We re-elect them.
You do not understand Burgess. He is incapable of admitting the truth about any county problem. It is the Stierheim method: admit nothing; deny culpability; blame others; mislead whoever's asking; survive to fight another day.
In other words, as Katy Sorenson used to say, be a professional staffer.
Wow 15 Million? Maybe it was added to this weeks lkottery payout?....Yeah thats where its is
George Burgess for Mayor of Miami-Dade County! Cut out the middleman.
This is his normal MO.. CITT funds, Marlins Stadium, Budget, Union Contracts.... All this man does is lie. Well, I guess we are going to have to wait until Alvarez is gone to see Mr. Burgess gone too. Sickens me that he is going to make almost $400 K a year for his pension.. I am feeling sick now just thinking about it!
OMG! Woof now wants to shoot government looters? I'm afraid, we might lose everyone in local and state government! LOL What a violent dog this one seems to be. Must be one of "those" Republican dogs; they don't only bite, they obviously shoot too! LOL
It is hilarious that Burgess, Llort, and Kapoor suggest that no serious problem exists because the issue was not fraud but rather mismanagement and incompetence. Also, Burgess has this way of pretending that he only just arrived on the scene to fix a scandal and didn't have full responsibility over the problem area the whole time (e.g., the housing agency, JMH, labor negotiations, airport expansion, etc.).
If you notice, Burgess is always surprised and never on top of day-to-day management operations. Every scandal the county has had, he has known nothing. Finding out where the fare money went is easy. We know it did not go to transit, so just follow the money and we will know everything. I think the public has a right to know where the money went.
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