It’s a given — or it sure in hell should be — that this area’s image, attractiveness and future will take a major hit if we remain in a state of mess transit. “Keeping up with Detroit” is not exactly mantra material.
However, there’s another reputation stalker afoot: the Hillsborough County Commission. The concerns being voiced — from business leaders to City Hall insiders — have become increasingly visceral and not so sotto voce.
For too long we’ve become inured to a commission that is an exercise in generic dysfunction and a provincial rural-vs.-urban disconnect. But the current three-ring-circus incarnation has been more than frustrating and, well, embarrassing. It’s been a message to those who matter that this just might not be a particularly sophisticated, progressive place to do business.
Welcome to Bumfolk, Fla., where you can truly make a difference — and not get fired — if you’re merely incompetent. But, yes, you could be suspended — as we’ve just seen — but seemingly only after damage control and face-saving has morphed into a running joke, public outrage and a local low-lights media staple. Have to draw the line somewhere.
Put it this way, when decision-makers are in town — whether for an event or a transaction — they often take advantage of the cameo to get a feel for what’s going on locally. They will look at a newspaper other than USA Today. They will flip on a local newscast. No, this is not market research. More like drive-by impressions and frame-of-reference material. But they matter.
It hardly helps that they have been seeing or reading about Hillsborough County Administrator Pat Bean, who might be unprincipled as well as Peter Principled. Something about ill-advised pay raises as well as e-mail snooping that may or may not have included “inhaling.” Prior to that, the issue had been pretty much restricted to her priorities, judgment, vision, initiative, leadership and innovation instincts during the worst recession in memory.
In lieu of a pink slip, which would come with a pricey, six-figure severance send-off, she was admonished and given a term paper to write about her goals. She turned it in late and sans meaningful details. Which were caustically — and condescendingly — noted.
The county attorney, Renee Lee, was unable to help out on the e-mail debacle because she was in the dock herself over electronic snooping into what may or may not have been privileged. The Florida Department of Law Enforcement will make a determination. So the commission had to seek the counsel of an outside lawyer. Lee, of course, had her own mouthpiece, as did Bean.
For additional spice, it’s been abundantly evident that both Bean and Lee, now suspended (with pay) for 90 days pending an FDLE investigation, didn’t just dislike the rhetorical flogging by the commission; they also dislike each other. And for another subplot, there was Commissioner Kevin White, avatar for the ethically challenged, intimating the other day that the scrutiny of Lee might be racially charged. Thanks, Kevin, we had almost forgotten about what you had been bringing to the propriety table before the Bean-Lee farce began dominating print and electronic news outlets.
Interested outsiders could also have seen a recent County Center crowd primed for a sideshow masquerading as public officials at work. There were some belittling signs and at least one visitor brought popcorn to “Government in the Sunshine Meets Its Match” or “A Dysfunctional, Posturing Commission Tries to Figure Out Exactly What to Do About Those Who Aren’t Good Enough to Keep Their Jobs.” Squirming Room Only.
But here’s hoping that those sampling local government also were privy to the fact that some serious business did get done. After months of wrangling and parsing, commissioners finally approved ballot language for that critically important, transit sales-tax referendum in November. But, no, it wasn’t unanimous.
Dissenters in the 5-2 vote were Jim Norman and Al Higginbotham. Perhaps they’re just not on board with the correlation of modern transit, including light rail, with economic viability and quality-of-life scenarios. Or maybe they just can’t justify any tax — even one to avoid a path to the past and counterproductive sprawl. Or maybe they just don’t like run-on sentences.
That other bit of serious business wasn’t on the agenda. It simply eclipsed it. That would be the rationale that was reinforced that there’s an overriding need for a county mayor. Not just someone who is not Pat Bean. Someone who, by virtue of an election, can actually be in charge. A real leader who isn’t vision-challenged and can bring innovative, regional thinking to bear during the most challenging of economic times.
Now that would be worth watching.