Should the City of Port Orange be the "Employer of last resort"? What do you think?
The 130 acres we are retaining for in house mowing (but not to save money) ….
From: Dianne Gardner
Cc: Greg Kisela
Sent: Wednesday, June 25, 2014 8:46 AM
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Dear Mayor and Council,.
As a former business owner and taxpayer, I found the decision last night at the City Council meeting June 24th, 2014 to keep the remaining 130 acres as an in house mowing job, so we do not have to lay people off, shocking. I know other reasons were stated as a rationale on why we needed to maintain this mowing force, i.e. potential crisis …but council has emergency powers in times like those…you could forego the bidding process and take action as necessary if we had a “mowing crisis” of some kind. We have been coming to enough CC meetings to know that can and does occur.
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And this would be your legitimate decision to make if this were a private sector operation and you as owners decided to keep various folks around and provide them with jobs because they were loyal and devoted employees or they were family or they were something. When Mike and I were in business without taxpayer subsidy for 26 years, we did not have that luxury. We laid off as necessary. We did that or we would have gone broke.
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Please reconsider on this Mayor and council. This is the public’s purse and you gentlemen have a fiduciary responsibility to the taxpayer. After Mary Anderson crunched the numbers last night on what our costs are relative to private sector costs, I felt ill. And those numbers I am sure were not even reflecting what our real costs are on this particular 130 acres. They apparently are the most expensive for us as a city to maintain.
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With a little logistical planning you can always have a private sector contractor in the pipeline. Correct our request for bidding process and maybe this can straighten out. Our VP of operations where I worked for 20 years used to have a great phrase: ” Keep your hiring ahead of your attrition”. We were always interviewing. Will work with mowing. Might work in Finance too.
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Sincerely,
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Dianne Templeton Gardner
618 Ruth Street
Port Orange, Florida 32127
I believe I understood the additional cost of the government cutting these 130 acres to be as follows:
Cost Differential per acre $ 62.43 times 130 acres times say 28 mows per year totaling $ 227,245 in additional costs to taxpayers.
The cost differential was hotly disputed as being understated by a knowledgeable businessman in lawn maintenance.
If that is the case and if that differential was understated by 100 % the actual cost to taxpayers would be north of $ 400,000
The Manager recommends continued in house mowing “to maintain the highest standards ” WHERE EXACTLY ARE THESE 130 ACRES LOCATED ???
When I was with the city tuff turf did our mowing at utilities. The cost came out the budget that I managed I have to say that they did a great job. I don’t know what problems they had with public works but they did good work for utilities. Mr. Cheney from tuff turf really knows his business. I get the feeling that someone has a personal problem with him.
Woody: Our residents know that our medians were in great shape up until the past few years. And they know the vendor Tuff Turf did a good job under their landscape maintenance contracts for many years before the carpetbaggers showed up.
The Mayor tried to re-write history at last Tuesday council meeting – during some of his outburst he tried to sell the idea the the vendor quit while looking for more money. We are not all stupid, we clearly recall the reason was they were being harassed by the Public Work director.
During some of the Mayor’s abrasive outburst against the vendor it now appears the DPW director may have got her orders from the Mayor to harass that vendor into quitting.
I also agree with others that the obnoxious treatment the Mayor bestowed on councilman Bastian was disgusting and uncalled for. The Mayor owes him an apology at the next council meeting.
The mayor piercingly stares down employees that attend council meetings that stand up for transparency and what is right. It is as though he is sending them a subliminal message that I will sooner or later get to you. He is getting old and senile and his reality testing is failing him. He still has the delusions that he can railroad anyone that opposes him in any way.
His current city manager’s job is to obfuscate transparency and attempt to perpetuate the old myth in 2014 that Allen Green is Teflon and anyone that opposes his personal plan is fighting against city hall.
I predict Mr. Kisela’s days are numbered and Allen Green is not far away from a pair of depends and permanent residency in an assisted living facility.
Maybe the mayors depends were soiled at the council meeting and Greg didn’t have the time to change them because of those citizens asking stupid questions. You could see that both of them were really put out ” let’s get this over with so I can get changed”. So sorry to see Greg leave! Ya right! But what will the mayor do now? Let’s hope and pray that we will get a real CM that will be for the employees and citizens. Next should be Saunders and a few butt kissers that work for the city!
You can bet Green’s soiled bottom that he already new on Tuesday night that he would soon be looking for another city manager. Maybe this time the council will be able to select one that was not imported from the FCCMA and the Florida League of Cities. Hopefully they will select a professional manager from the private sector who will have a professional resolution to the challenges within the city. Green may have to join Eharmony.com to find another special someone he can have closed door meetings with.