NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- When it came to selling out to the developers, only City Commissioner Lynne Plaskett said "no" at Tuesday night's meeting at city hall.
What went down at the Tuesday city commission meeting was just another example of the total disregard and disrespect of the citizens of New Smyrna Beach by its "supposed" elected officials, four of whom -- Mayor Adam Barringer, Vice Mayor Judy Reiker, Jack Grasty and Jim Hathaway -- voted to put their developer-friend's interests before the interest of the citizens.
The mayor, vice mayor and other two commissioners did this by giving $500,000 from our reserves to fund the placement of utilities for their development buddies, who refused to pay for their own utilities (which were readily available by the way) out of their own pockets.
To then compound the insult to the citizens, Hathaway who is running for a county council, (yeah right) then states that he would only vote in support of the matter if the commission lowered the amount of interest to be paid on the borrowing of our money down from 8% to 6% over the next 10 years.
Grasty even had the gall to say that was a great idea because with the lower interest rate the developers would be enticed to pay back their debt even faster. Reiker corrected him saying the incentive would only be there if the interest were higher -- not lower.
Grasty, who can't do basic math, Reiker, Hathaway, and our mayor -- who said nothing, of course -- all voted in favor of revenue being used from the city's general fund -- our taxes -- to support the developers.
And who is to blame for this insult? All of you who don't attend city commission meetings. I'm the blame, too, because I didn't attend Tuesday's meeting after being disgusted when I challenged them at the previous meetings for which my expressed disgust fell on deaf ears.
But we can't give up and let them do what they want, even when they are disrespectful. I was told there were only a few citizens at the meeting. More of us need to show up and let these "supposed elected officials" know that we are tired of them pushing through their personal agendas in order to advance the "corruption, collusion and cronyism" in New Smyrna Beach.
Until the next time!
Editor's Note: New Smyrna Beach resident and citizen government watchdog Bob Tolley writes his blog exclusively for NSBNews.net. The opinion he expresses is his own.