Puppet and Puppeteer
Port Orange, Fla. At the February 26th 2013 council meeting Mayor Green floated the idea of purchasing the totally useless 50 ft strip of land north of the Fire Station on US 1 at 419 Ridgewood Ave. The unanimous instruction of Council as reported in the minutes for that meeting was “all Council members were in agreement to move forward to determine the value”
At the October 2nd 2013 Council meeting, neither Manager Kisela or Mayor Green could not offer a credible explanation as to how the February 26th 2013 instruction of Council to ‘determine the value” has advanced to full blown offer to purchase that property complete with an appraisal and the required advertising having already run in the News Journal.
The Mayor in true ‘Sgt Schultz’ fashion ‘knew nothing, ’ and the Manager stammered and stuttered about the appraisal being required, which is difficult to understand considering that City Ordinance # 2011-26 provides that Council may waive the appraisal requirement for property purchases under $ 100,000 and this property is being purchased for $ 40,000
So what are we to make of the fact that in the 7 months following the February 26th 2013 Council meeting and September 26th 2013 ( when the agenda came out for the October 2nd Council meeting) Council did not hear a word about what was going on with this property ??
Are we supposed to make any sense out of this inexplicable event, or are we to be contented with being left as stumped as the mayor and manager professed to be ??
If it is the former I have a hypothesis that doesn’t contain many assumptions The Mayor told the Manager to do it, and the Manager did as he was told.
Secret back room understandings were the signature trademark of the Mayor and the former Manager, and we all know how that ended.
I am very concerned that Green appears to have taken up with Kisela where he left off with Parker.
We won’t be fooled again !!!
Ted Noftall