Thugshots in Broward County. By Geniusofdespair

I liked this website of Broward Sheriff's photos because they separated the thugs' mugshots into categories. They have "Nice Hair" and a "Tattoo Gallery" among others. I will let you go to the link to see "OMG...LOL", and my favorites "Jail Babes" (some are attractive) and "Rough Night."

From "Nice Hair":

From the "Tattoo Gallery" (A word to the wise: When you tattoo your cheek with the word 'death' you might be limiting your marketability):

As The Stomach Turns in Miami Dade County: Alvarez Filed Suit to Stop His Recall. By Geniusofdespair

The Miami Herald reported a suit was filed by Mayor Carlos Alvarez:

Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Alvarez filed suit in Circuit Court Friday seeking to block his March 15 recall election, alleging numerous petitions gathered to seek his ouster should be tossed out because of various technical flaws.

The suit asks the court to declare that not enough valid petitions were filed to warrant a recall election. It asks the judge to order the mayor's name be stricken from March 15 ballot.

One of the allegations: "Among other things, the latest suit alleges 104,280 petitions are invalid because of a failure to print, type or stamp notaries' names below their signatures." Give me a break, talk about grasping for straws. Is this about the notary or about the voter's wishes? I think requiring notarized petitions in the first place is an outrage. Where is that conspicuously absent ACLU when you need them? Are they off helping skin heads instead of us regular folks whose right to petition our government is made an impossibility.

Breaking News: Judge Rules Natacha Seijas is Compelled to be Deposed. By Geniusofdespair

With good news, comes annoying news.

In a hearing today, the judge ruled that Vile Natacha Seijas must attend and testify at a deposition requested by Miami Voice in the recall lawsuit. "In her ruling, (Judge) Donner admonished Cody for walking out of the deposition without seeking a ruling from her right then and there, adding that if she was called, 'I pick up my phone.'"

The annoying news...I was subpoenaed today. Why is it annoying? I won't be able to watch the proceedings. (No, I did not doctor this photo it was taken the exact moment that Michael Pizzi's name was mentioned).

Natacha Seijas: IF LOOKS COULD KILL! By Geniusofdespair

This is such a pisser. I could not believe the daggers coming out of Natacha's eyes during this deposition Thursday. You have got to watch it, watch her eyes when she hears Michael Pizzi's name. I never saw this kind of venom out of anyone. After she gets up we get to look at Stephen Cody's belly for a while. There is one County Attorney present, Gerald Sanchez, representing VNS in her official capacity and there is another County Attorney Orin Rosenthal representing the County. Natacha's PAC is suing the county for certifying the petitions. That seems like a conflict to me. It is my opinion, you can't have two lawyers from the same entity taking different sides.
Link to YouTube for this video.

The video takes time to load but it is well worth it. See Miami Voice's attorney's statement on the aborted depo in post 2 below.

Natacha Seijas (VNS): running away from voters, full of bile and contempt ... by gimleteye

It is an incredible video: Natacha Seijas standing before history, staring bleakly at the camera in a recorded deposition related to her lawsuit contesting the upcoming recall election; "suspended but not completed". Who knows what is the heart and mind of the vindictive county commissioner but bile and contempt for those who would hold her accountable? Seijas has owned Hialeah's county commission seat through massive campaign cash from land speculators and the brotherhood that controls Miami Dade County. During this time, voters in Hialeah have been clueless about the way Seijas has failed them. With support of unions that lack courage and insight and leadership, Seijas has dominated any opponents. In the last recall, her bile billowed against "people who aren't Hispanic" from the Redland; the last rural enclave in South Florida that Natacha was determined to open up to the bulldozers and platted subdivisions of her campaign financiers. This time, Seijas can't use ethnic and racial divisions: her well-worn trump card. Seijas can't outrun the pace of the economic collapse that turned the edges of the county into sprawling ghost suburbs, higher taxes, a degraded quality of life, and joblessness. Seijas scorns the view that she is personally responsible. But she is and in more than a symbolic way. Her role as de facto chair of the county commission-- a role enforcing the political order of land speculators, lobbyists, rock miners and fraudsters-- is directly implicated in the sprawling land use that destroyed Miami's natural attributes, put our drinking water at risk, and shifted enormous infrastructure costs-- mandates costing taxpayer billions-- onto the backs of voters to the benefit of the Growth Machine. Just one example from 2010: Seijas intervened to stop any county planning for climate change from including specific maps using science and studies that had already been completed, that would demonstrate low lying areas most vulnerable to flooding from sea level rise. Her recall, the second in five years, is an indictment by voters who don't know anything about the way she meddles and terrorizes county staff. In the same way the Spanish language TV reporter who surprised Seijas, forcing her to turn against the wall rather than face the camera: even Seijas must be kept awake by the message. You can run, Natacha, but you can't hide.

Vile Natacha Seijas (VNS) Bolts Deposition and Attorney Kuehne was Pissed. By Geniusofdespair

Natacha went for her deposition Thursday in the recall lawsuit but left because Miami Herald reporter Matt Haggman was there. Above is a video of Ben Kuehne's response regarding Natacha Seijas refusing to be deposed. Yes, it is a worse quality video than any of mine (hard to believe) but it is worth watching! If it were better quality you could see the veins in his neck bulging, just above his signature bow tie.

Stephen Cody, Natacha's best bud and lawyer, wanted Matt Haggman removed from the depo even though the depo is a public record. Ben Kuehne, Miami Voice's Lawyer, refused Cody's demands so Natacha left without giving her much anticipated deposition.

I wish I were a fly on that wall. You can see how she responds to reporters in the photos below from a previous encounter.

For FPL Bigwig Jeff Bartel, corporate responsibility is whatever he wants ... by gimleteye

There is nothing more appalling in public life than the way electric utilities force ratepayers to pay for megaprojects costing billions, like new nuclear power at Turkey Point, that put the hammer on local government in ways that distort democracy beyond recognition. Care about wetlands protection, water quality, water supply in South Florida? FPL makes it up, on the spot.

Here is a specific demonstration how FPL executives act like royalty. Last week, FPL Vice President for Compliance and Corporate Responsibility Jeff Bartel strong-armed local city commissioners in Coral Gables to approve, on appeal, a variance for his home in Hammock Lakes. The affluent area has site-specific zoning, but Mr. Compliance got his variance from compliance and approval to double square footage. Most people never have a chance at any variance in the Gables. For me, I'd just like to walk my dog off leash once and a while.

So how did Bartel demonstrate his "responsibility"? He did it by putting five well-known attorneys/lobbyists in the front row at the city commission, facing two city commissioners who are up for re-election, including Greenberg Traurig's black hat land use lobbyist, Lucia Dougherty. Compliance is not in the eye of the beholder: it is in the eye of owner of the beholder. The oligarchy is alive and well in Florida.

Commissioner Lynda Bell's Final Campaign Report Is In - I Have More Questions Than Answers. By Geniusofdespair

There is a lot missing from the expenses on Miami Dade's District 8 County Commissioner Lynda Bell's report. She didn't really get additional money in the last reporting period she only registered $495 in donations although she amended her earlier report to add $3,500. No one that interesting is on it. In the last report she spent $11,178. Not very much considering all the TV commercials. It makes me believe she had Political Action Committees helping her just like Flinn did but I would like to know the PAC names so I can see who donated. Did she have Republican PAC's helping her? What about Right-to -Life groups? I looked at Gene's PAC and I know who donated there. So with these reports, it is what is missing that intrigues me. Where is the Get-out-the-Vote GOTV? That is the absentee umbrella -- she won the election on absentee ballots. Is that expense folded into another expense? She didn't pay her campaign advisers very much. Who supplemented their fees? Did they donate their time? No because you would see it as IN-KIND. They got paid by someone.

See for yourself what she spent money on...there are 3 more pages if you hit read more. I went from last backwards. (hit the graphic to enlarge it)

Miami Herald: You Suck at Full Disclosure. By Geniusofdespair

I take issue with the Miami Herald today on a PRO letter to the editor about Vile Natacha Seijas. The Miami Herald doesn't identify who the letter's author FRED FROST is, namely he was/is still? president of the South Florida AFl-CIO, one of the Unions funding her anti-recall PAC. I addition, a PAC controlled by Fred Frost gave VNS's PAC $25,000.

See a previous post on Frost when he spoke in support of Marlin Stadium - with photo of him.

Have You Contributed to the Vile Natacha Seijas Recall Yet? By Geniusofdespair

Come on people fork over some dollars for good government. This video is from the LAST recall effort of Seijas. It is a Jim DeFede classic, if you don't see video, this is the link.

Let Us Now Praise Famous Parking Lots ... by gimleteye

News arrives in the Herald of the latest but not last blow to the $190 million deal-- struck by Greenberg Traurig and its Herald executive pals-- at the height of the building boom to convert 10 acres of Herald real estate to condos/retail/parking. The busted deal to create a Times Square, squarely in the middle of nothing, stands for the hubris of the boom in more ways than one, but the one we have focused on at Eyeonmiami is how the parking lot deal distorted the editorial view from One Herald Square-- stripping from the city's only daily newspaper critical analysis of the housing asset bubble that might have tempered the boundless enthusiasms related to the boom that took root first, then rotted.

Credit the Herald for reporting its own embarrassing embrace, if not detailing who got paid how much and how many millions in compensation were distributed long ago to Herald executives based, in part, on benefits to shareholders of the imagined deal. That would make a far more interesting story than a collapsed promise. But the parking lot is also emblematic of a city that can't plan its infrastructure to save its life, and, a newspaper that can't report it because of internal conflicts.

Herald founders were right to place the newspaper's view and operations at the intersection of the main route from Miami to Miami Beach. At the time, Miami was a small city. Despite its ambitions, Miami in the mid 20th century was small minded and mean, with its share of bigots and racism. All that traffic flowed past the Herald, across the causeway to island homes; from which one could hop on a boat at lunchtime and return with a locker full of fish for dinner a few hours later. That Miami-- the Miami of John and James Knight and the rod and reel club-- is gone and vanished. All that remains are a few fish docks with cleaning tables whose purpose is all but forgotten.

The way the city filled in leaves another kind of view; a city cut off from itself. The tragedy of privatizing waterfront in downtown Miami cannot be rectified without tearing down Bayside Marketplace and refocusing the attention back to the bay. In the meantime, civic structures, a private arena, and condos have filled in; from the Miami Heat to the Performing Arsht Center and the empty Herald parking lot. Nothing on this stretch of Biscayne Boulevard makes sense. It is an unworkable landscape created with glad-handing, and former bubbly and coke in the VIP rooms of condo openings. The Herald sits, resolute, in the midst of this history and this disconnected landscape.

On evenings when the Performing Arsht Center is scheduled at the same time as the Miami Heat and the circus, the pathetic single lane Biscayne Boulevard exit from 395 causes traffic to backfill all the way to 95. I know it is easier to get downtown, if you live downtown or mid-town or uptown; but what the city fathers allowed to be built (and now we will have a science museum and art museum, in the same traffic vector) is an infrastructure mess no tout or public relations megaphone can explain away.

I know: Miami is a fantastic place to live and the winter weather makes the rest of the nation yearn to be in our shoes. This is the finest city in the world. It is the best place on earth. The water is clean and the Everglades are saved. And the Miami Herald also has a parking lot to sell you.

Natacha Seijas Ambushed By Spanish Language TV. By Geniusofdespair

This was one angry lady...She was at a ribbon cutting event with Hialeah Julio and then they started asking her about the recall. GenTV reporter was persistent. When Natacha wouldn't talk to her about the recall at the ribbon-cutting event, she went to her office and then to her house. It is all here!



Miami New Times has a translation.

The Florida Legislature: An Assembly of Polluters ... by gimleteye

If you are a member of the majority party of the Florida legislature these days, you are a Republican and you probably believe that creating jobs means polluting more. There is no other way to interpret the ignorance emanating through proposed legislation: the Pollute Florida More Act. Here's the short version: because the State of Florida failed to protect outstanding Florida waters from storm water runoff from urban areas and big agricultural operations (after more than a decade of dithering), the U.S. EPA has stepped in to impose pollution standards. This action by EPA is required by federal law. It is also a major advancement for a federal environmental agency that was hobbled during the Clinton and Bush terms by political pressures. Tea Party'ers and ordinary Republicans may not understand that the state-based legislative efforts is complemented in Congress, where GOP members and the Chamber of Commerce are plotting to finish off federal environmental laws with new riders and legislation. One long-time environmentalist called the current legislative climate "the worst in his forty year career". This is the direct result-- not of the economic crisis-- but the liberation of federal agencies from the iron grip of lobbyists representing polluters. President Obama said, in early 2009, that he was going to let science guide environmental policy: he didn't just say it, he acted. The polluters know 2012 is around the corner and they are making the most of their opportunities where they have political majorities, like the Florida legislature. The stinking GOP message from Tallahassee: we are too filthy to clean up our own mess.

Mayor Juan Carlos Bermudez is Running for Miami Dade County Mayor. By Geniusofdespair

The field is getting crowded. Don't know much about this guy but he has to be better than Hialeah Julio Robaina.

Meanwhile photogenic, former State Representative Marcelo Llorente is raking in the dough. He has $301,504. In December he took money from the Wren Group, Carlos Salman Realty, Manuel Alfonso-Poch, Ramon Rasco and CCS Strategies among others. A Chris Korge in Gainesville gave him $25? What is that about? And, why is he giving himself a $7,500 loan when he has all that dough?

Manny Luis, the guy I found holding up a fish on facebook, has withdrawn from the race. So now we have Bermudez, Llorente, Darrin Ellis (not a serious candidate), County Commissioner Carlos Gimenez, Lazaro R. Gonzalez (led the first recall against Carlos Alvarez, doesn't speak English well, can't win and he hung up on me when I asked him to support charter change), Joshua Larose (the nutty guy with a penchant for Political Action Committees) and Hialeah Julio. Speaking of Robaina, he is in the news again, see Miami New Times.

Cell Phone Overload. By Geniusofdespair

I don't know about you guys, but my meals lately are looking a lot like this comic strip. Either we are texting or doing searches about whatever we can't remember, i.e. words, movies, songs etc. It seems we can't just put those damn things away and communicate. My New Year's resolution? Love the one you're with.

The Miami Herald, Collapse and the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission: too little, too late ... by gimleteye

A principal theme of this blog is to highlight and to expose connections between the Miami economic elite and the housing boom that took flight in the late 1990's and ended with an historic crash. Although this, the worst economic crash since the Depression, had many fathers and mothers across the nation (ie. Texas, Nevada, Arizona, California), the epicenter of the crisis was here, in Miami. Yes. We finger point on this blog: BankUnited, City National, and others thrived through the financing of "what the market wants"; a euphemism for a nightmare landscaped with crappy subdivisions, gated "communities", and soul-less places. Most mainstream media accounts neglect the key point of Eyeonmiami: that the crisis could not have happened without the active support of enablers far from the villains on Wall Street.

In particular, the land use policies and politics of the late, great boom originated in South Florida, where an earlier generation of entrepreneurs had figured out the components of scalable housing developments that characterize the built landscape: condominiums on the ocean front and platted subdivisions in the ring suburbs. Although the conclusions of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, issued last week, are unsurprising-- namely that the crisis was avoidable-- the mainstream media continues to avoid the closer analysis of what I describe as the Growth Machine: the network of local real estate speculators, lobbyists, mortgage and title companies, engineers, and politicians who facilitated first the massive overdevelopment of South Florida and then its inevitable collapse.

A good place to start would be a critical analysis of the county commissioner now fighting for her political life: Natacha Seijas (VNS). Seijas, the bulwark of the developer lobby in Miami-Dade, was the key county commissioner who helped order contracts at Miami International Airport in the 1990's. There, minority contract requirements were used to feather the nests of speculators who were also housing developers and ran political campaigns. Seijas also controlled the zoning decisions of the board of county commissioners: the key to minting millionaires from land speculators and developers in platted subdivisions outside her Hialeah district. To find the local cogs in the wheel that spun the Growth Machine, look no further than Seijas and the organization of business interests; from small bit players, feeding into trade associations, their lobbyists (like Greenberg Traurig) and the results benefiting major corporations. Organizing public works and infrastructure to benefit shareholders of private corporations: it is no different at Miami International Airport than in the suburbs. (Take Parkland, the new massive mega-development idling its time on some bank's balance sheet.)

In the weekend edition of the Financial Times, the Burmese independence hero Aung San Suu Kyi was quoted, "Sometimes I think that a parody of democracy could be more dangerous than a blatant dictatorship." Her words deeply resonate through this Miami era. Civic activists have witnessed that parody of democracy time and again from the dais of the county commission where the manipulation of zoning (like the efforts to move the Urban Development Boundary) focused the energy of speculators and insiders and turn due process into a charade. Some of those activists in Miami-Dade, who attempted a recall of Seijas just a few years ago, were treated to exactly the tenor of a blatant dictatorship; obstructed from collecting recall signature petitions, spied upon, and harassed by Hialeah police (including false arrest) with no consequences from law enforcement. None.

To know the principal, local actors of the housing boom and crash, explore the contributor list to Natacha Seijas' defense today. It is the same cast of characters who promoted the political order that reef wrecked the economy -- the patriarchal cartel that promoted "The Ownership Society". Yes, the financial crisis was preventable. The question might have been asked in the winters when then Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan and his wife looked for the best parties in Miami with local developers and speculators: they convinced each other that there was nothing wrong at the time. Nothing wrong with the fruits of speculation, lost wetlands, and a rapidly diminished quality of life that now makes it difficult to attract jobs to Miami. Nothing wrong with the lobbying culture or any aspect of the Growth Machine. On these connections, the Miami Herald was silent. And while the Herald agrees today on its oped page with the conclusions of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, the city's only daily newspaper continues to shield its eyes-- and the complicity of former publishers-- from the inquisitive, critical role it could have played for readers and voters but didn't, when it counted.

Update on a Development of Regional Impact: Parkland. By Geniusofdespair

This article was written May 20, 2010 in the Daily Business Review but I missed it so I think many of you might have too. I last reported on Parkland in February when the loan was in default. Lynda Bell got a lot of money from Ed Easton for her campaign. It is pretty important to keep up with developments looming on the wrong side of the Urban Development Boundary. This Parkland development of regional impact (DRI) was particularly awful...Hold the Line!!

Developer sues partners after loan to keep project afloat

Developer Ed Easton is suing two partners to recover money he claims he put up to help rescue a controversial Miami-Dade project from a potential foreclosure.

Easton sued developers Michael Latterner and Wayne Rosen in Miami-Dade Circuit Court early this week over the Parkland project proposed for outside the county’s urban boundary.

Easton is seeking $1.18 million he said he paid to help cover his partners’ share of mortgage payments. The money was used to pay down loans that at the time totaled $47 million tied to the 961-acre Parkland site, bounded by Southwest 162nd and 177th avenues and 136th and 152nd streets.

Latterner and Rosen did not immediately return calls for comment.

In 2004, Easton, Latterner and Rosen created a partnership called Krome Grove Investors. The partnership is one of several entities behind Krome Groves Land Trust, which is seeking state and county permits to develop the 6,941-home community in western Miami-Dade.

Each of the three partners in Krome Grove Investors was responsible for capital contributions to help the trust cover expenses and keep loans current. If one of the partners could not make a capital payment, the others were to make the payment, according to the lawsuit. The payment was to be in the form of a loan.

In September, the partners were required to contribute close to $3.9 million to help the trust reduce a $44.6 million mortgage with City National Bank to $40 million, according to Miami-Dade County records.(hit read more)

The payment also helped cut two second mortgages totaling nearly $2 million to $414,150 last year, county records showed.


When Latterner and Rosen couldn’t pay their combined $1.18 million share of the $3.9 million payment, Easton paid the entire amount.

Easton has been trying to get paid for nearly eight months, said Miami attorney Bill McCaughan, who represents Easton.

“They don’t question that they owe that money,” said McCaughan, a partner with K&L Gates. “Their concern is that there is going to be future capital calls and they want to structure things in a way that Mr. Easton would cover future ones so they would have all the benefits but none of the obligations.”

Easton, managing partner of Krome Grove Investors, is also the trustee of the Krome Groves Land Trust. Other investors in the trust include Miami-based Lennar Homes, Miami developer Sergio Pino, members of the Herran and Guerra families — who own Sedano’s Supermarkets — and lobbyists Rodney Barreto and Ramon Rasco.

McCaughan said the future of Parkland is safe since Easton helped pay down the trust’s debt and obtain a City National Bank loan extension until April 2011.

In addition to thousands of homes, the proposed community would include 200,000 square feet of retail space, 100,000 square feet of medical offices, a 200-bed hospital and 550,000 square feet of light industrial space.

The trust applied for a county permit to build the massive project outside the county’s urban development boundary in 2007, as the housing market began to rapidly deteriorate. But in December 2008, the trust put its application on hold.

Paola Iuspa-Abbott can be reached at (305) 347-6657.

A Reader sent me this photo. By Geniusofdespair

It appears that Miami Attorney Ben Kuehne is not the only one to wear a bow tie. Natacha Seijas's recall attorney's assistant attorney, relegated to carrying the briefcase for Coffey, was seen wearing a bow tie recently while out and about.

Chinese Engineering! By Geniusofdespair

Toxic drywall isn't their only problem.

The Barnacle in Coconut Grove on the Florida State Park closure list. By Geniusofdespair

Rick Scott's is going to haunt us for years. If the budget is cut, as threatened, the Barnacle in the Grove is one of 53 parks slated for closure by the DEP Department of Environmental Protection and other agencies. The list was sent to the legislature January 26. Hit read more to see entire list:

The 53 Florida State Parks
1 Allen David Broussard Catfish Creek Preserve State Park, Haines City
2 Atlantic Ridge Preserve State Park, Stuart
3 Big Shoals State Park, White Springs
4 Bulow Plantation Ruins Historic State Park, Flagler Beach
5 Camp Helen State Park, Panama City Beach
6 Cedar Key State Museum State Park, Cedar Key
7 Colt Creek State Park, Lakeland
8 Constitution Convention Museum State Park, Port St. Joe
9 Crystal River Archaeological State Park, Crystal River
10 Dade Battlefield Historic State Park, Bushnell
11 Dagny Johsnon Key Largo Hammock Botanical State Park, Key Largo
12 Deer Lake State Park, Santa Rosa Beach
# Devil’s Millhopper Geological State Park, Gainesville
# Don Pedro Island State Park, Boca Granda
# Dudley Farm Historic State Park, Newberry
# Dunn’s Creek State Park, Pomona
# Estero Bay Preserve State Park, Estero
# Fort Cooper State Park, Inverness
# Fort George Island Cultural State Park, Jacksonville
# Fort Mose Historic State Park, St. Augustine
# John Gorrie Museum State Park, Apalachicola
# Judah P. Benjamin Confederate Memorial at Gamble Plantation Historic State Park, Ellenton
# Lake Jackson Mounds Archaeological State Park, Tallahassee
# Lake June-in-Winter Scrub State Park, Sebring
# Lake Talquin State Park, Tallahassee
# Letchworth-Love Mounds Archaeological State Park, Tallahassee
# Lignumvitae Key Botanical State Park, Islamorada
# Madison Blue Spring State Park, Lee
# Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings Historic State Park, Cross Creek
# Natural Bridge Battlefield Historic State Park, Woodville
# Olustee Battlefield Historic State Park, Olustee
# Orman House Historic State Park, Apalachicola
# Paynes Creek Historic State Park, Bowling Green
# Peacock Springs State Park, Luraville
# Perdido Key State Park, Pensacola
# Ponce de Leon Springs State Park, Ponce de Leon
# Pumpkin Hill Creek Preserve State Park, Jacksonville
# Rock Springs Run State Reserve, Sorrento
# San Felasco Hammock Preserve State Park, Alachua
# San Marcos de Apalache Historic State Park, St. Marks
# Savannas Preserve State Park, Jensen Beach
# St. Lucie Inlet Preserve State Park, Stuart
# St. Sebastian River Preserve State Park, Fellsmere
# Suwannee River Wilderness Trail/Nature and Heritage Tourism Center, White Springs
# Terra Ceia Preserve State Park, Palmetto
# The Barnacle Historic State Park, Coconut Grove
# Troy Spring State Park, Branford
# Wacasassa Bay Preserve State Park, Cedar Key
# Washington Oaks Gardens State Park, Palm Coast
# Werner-Boyce Salt Springs State Park, Port Richey
# Windley Key Fossil Reef Geological State Park, Islamorada
# Ybor City Museum State Park, Tampa
# Yellow River Marsh Preserve State Park, Holt

Promises, promises: GOP can save jobs, the economy, by reforming sugar policy ... by gimleteye

The Washington Post had an excellent editorial yesterday. The Miami Herald should reprint this one. Readers should click on our archive, 'Big Sugar', to see what is behind US sugar policy, that reinforces political order in Tallahassee and county commissions around the state and in Congress, too.

A sugar policy that's costing America jobs and money
Saturday, January 29, 2011; 6:30 PM

CONGRESS AND the Obama administration are in the market for fresh ideas to create jobs. Or so we are told. So far, however, we haven't seen too many specifics - but that may be about to change. Two senators, one from each party, have introduced legislation that would phase out the costly, job-destroying federal sugar program. Democrat Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire and Republican Mark Kirk of Illinois call their bill the Stop Unfair Giveaways and Restrictions (SUGAR) Act. Despite the cutesy title, it's a seriously necessary proposal.

Current law is a pastiche of protectionist measures that drives up prices for consumers in two ways. First, 4,700 U.S. sugar cane and sugar beet farmers share a government-guaranteed 85 percent of the U.S. market; the remaining 15 percent gets divided among some 40 lucky sugar-exporting countries, plus Mexico, which recently started exporting here under the North American Free Trade Agreement. Second, the government guarantees minimum prices for both raw cane sugar and refined beet sugar. The combined effect of these measures has been to keep the U.S. price well above the world price. According to Ms. Shaheen, consumers pay an extra $4 billion for their food because of these policies.

When food costs more, consumers buy less of it, and processors must cut production. Therefore, U.S. sugar policy costs jobs among bakers, candy makers and other food processors. Estimates vary; Promar International, an agriculture consulting firm, produced a figure of 112,000 jobs lost between 1997 and 2009. In 2006, the Commerce Department estimated that the sugar program cost three manufacturing jobs for each job it saved in sugar growing and harvesting. And, by the way, job preservation in U.S. sugar growing and harvesting came at the expense of agricultural employment in poorer sugar-producing countries.

Ms. Shaheen and Mr. Kirk have offered President Obama and the Republican leadership in the House a common-sense way to keep their promises to get rid of unnecessary government regulation and liberate the job-creating energy of the market. As such, it's also a good early test of the sincerity of those promises.