There are a few drawbacks to having March elections. It is nearly impossible to get people off their arses and vote unless it is a general election. They came out for Obama in droves with lines 6 hours long. Perhaps they like all that free chit and wanted to keep it going. The national debt is growing like a weed and Obama has the lowest approval rating in a year and his popularity is tanking too. Local elections are another story. If it was about personally getting a free house or even a Grant from the CRA you can bet that we would have had a huge turnout in our city.
We had 14% show up at the polls in Lake Worth. On election morning, Helen and I were calling voters in our community to cast their ballot. It helped. We did not get a big turnout but we did have a big percentage of YES voters at our precinct. One 82 year old lady rode her bike down to vote. She was determined to keep our city looking "sweet and quaint, walkable and sunny," the reason why she moved here in the first place. "No greedy developers for me," she said. She is one of the voters who did NOT get confused by the NO message.
Boynton Beach Mayor Jerry Taylor said, "People are apathetic. You would think they would be more concerned, especially in local elections. That's what has the most impact on their daily lives." He is so right but you can see the apathy by those who don't even take the time to go to city commission meetings. Now that Lake Worth does have audio/video of the meetings, it helps but there is no replacement for going to the meetings and seeing the reactions and commissioner remarks, up close and personal. Body language speaks volumes. Everyone needs to meet the "players" and listen to them speak. Even then, some people are not open minded and will play along with the majority commission (their friends and their desire to be in "the in-crowd") that does have better attendance from their folks. It gives a false positive of confirmation of the majority's position and decisions.
Right now the mindset of this Commission is revenue at all and any costs even the sacrifice of our downtown or in the neighborhoods. The voters, in spite of the purposely confusing message by the NO folks who wanted to win by deceit, got it right. I believe that if the NO people had "played" with honesty and integrity, the vote would have been 84% YES. And that was my only disappointment.
Read the PBPost article, the guys that got the endorsement all wrong.
11 comments:
That's a perfect example of "low rise" we can expect much more of now that you have "saved" the city. Which commission district is that in anyway?
You see, it was never about heights. You can have "stunning" 65 ft high buildings according to you and you can have ugly 1 story buildings as you show above.
Now, how do we change the charter to disallow ugly buildings? How about a charter amendment that won't allow a three story building right next to a single story building? What? That's already in the LDR's? Ya, but three commissioners can change that, right?
I think we should all vote on each and every variance to come before the P&Z board.
What do you think?
How do we go about disallowing hateful ugly bloggers?
If you are referring to my "stunning" remark pertaining to the EcoCentre, I was talking about the interior--ONLY.
Next, your sarcasm is noted as well as the fact that P&Z has a lot of power as does the Commission to change zoning and LDR's.
@10:33--Ask Mary Lindsey
The turn our was horrible, its always much better during a general election (regardless of who is running) which is why I voted no to moving it back to March.
After I voted on Tuesday, people kept asking me about my sticker as most people didn't seem to know about the municipal elections. I told/encouraged several people to get out and vote, municipal elections really impact you more than the general election.
It is hard if you are a working professional to get to the commission meetings, its been ages since I've gone to one, but I am involved in that I attend my neighborhood meetings, I pay attention and I vote.
@10:50 Ask Dee McNamara
I take it my sarcasm stepped a little over the line. The W.C. Fields quote was definitely NOT meant for you Lynn. It was more aimed at the whole ugly "yes" side. It really seems like you all are still so angry. Why aren't you all celebrating your big win. You should be happy but the ugly is really showing now.
Granted the "no" people, I'm one of them, are not happy, but you all are really bitter. And you won!
You SAVED Lake Worth, just like you saved John G's and the Casino historic building (site).
So.... this morning, I'm sober.
I'm fine knowing that it'll be just that much harder for anyone to invest in Lake Worth in a way that could see a profit, so many of them will go elsewhere. And that's fine by you. You really don't want any development. Any.
Some visionary evil greedy developer almost 100 years ago, built a beautiful 100 foot tall hotel next to our intracoastal. It helped to draw people to our town, not because of its height but because it was significant. People took pictures, made post cards. We emulated Misner and Wright.
Now we can build non-descript boxes with flat roofs. I'd be proud too.
Now you must find another divisive issue for the election.
The answer is McVoy. He's the commissioner in that district where the quaint low rise garage was built. But it's not his fault either. It was the Department of Sustainability (FKA Building Department) which didn't follow their own rules. Didn't go in front of the P&Z or the Commission did it?
It must be quaint... it's so low to the ground.
We are NOT angry--you did piss us off when you changed the Comp Plan from 45 feet to 65 feet.
One more thing, we love the hotel--we just don't want anymore tall buildings. There is plenty of room to build 4 stories. A hotelier will make money in this city--we have way to much going for us not to be successful. With the right leadership, that can happen.
So amusing, another devisive Issue come and gone. One side licking their wounds the other rejoicing that they won. Amusing to a now outsider that some of the characters on both sides don't even really care that much what the issue meant, rather it was just another us against them. Something that has always played a part in small town politics, power struggles, personalities revealed, ugliness and more.
In my opinion this was such a non issue for Lake Worth as evident by the lame turn out. 45 or 65 ft.? It doesn't mean a thing to the overall character of the city. This town has been a town of speculators, riding the stock of lake worth up artificially and if smart bailing before it crashes once again. Doomsday? Nah. the City will survive. Lake Worth has location, amenities and quaintness whether buildings are 45 or 65 it just doesn't matter. What Lake Worth needs is leadership that takes the City beyond the next boom or bust. Beyond speculators, beyond short sided thinking, beyond just the next battle of perceived sides. That leadership hasn't happened in over 40 yrs and all of the citizens, the ones that actually work and invest their lives here, just keeping paying for lack of vision (45 vs 65 is not visionary on its own at all). Is Lake Worth ready for the next boom? Meaning real investment of all stakeholders, not speculators (they will always be ready) and not just the us against them crowd. I think this City will keep getting passed over and remain stagnant until somebody or some group actually leads with a vision for the next 20-50 yrs.
Unfortunately, there was nothing amusing about all of this. it was tragic, really...tragic that the people had to be put through all these hoops to be listened to...that they know best, not a handful of commissioners or planners who want to change the character of our city forever for their self-serving or false beliefs.
The city needs to END all this low cost affordable housing. Take back the CRA and take the downtown out of it. It needs to clean up the slum and the blight. It needs to get an administrator who will attract investment here and a hotelier. It desperately needs a different mentality than believing and projecting that we are all doom and gloom. When the mayor makes statements such as she did at her state of the city, it detracts and it sets a stigma that is very difficult to rise above. People read all her doom and gloom...not conducive for any investment.
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