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| Text Messages like this one, above, have been turned over to commissioners late last week from our consultant DPZ CoDesign. They are not flattering.... |
Late Friday afternoon DPZ Co-Design Team leader Marina Khoury sent two drop box hyperlinks to the county. The links contain the emails and text messages I requested pertaining to the OLF-8 master planning project DPZ is working on for the county. I requested them after a contentious meeting and after learning about some other concerning issues as a result of some blogs and articles in Rick Outzen's InWeekly.
(DPZ is requesting the county, their client, pay them a large sum of money for providing this information requested public record information. from Khoury's email "The fee for this work is $5433.75 (28.75 hours x $189" . This seems to be very excessive, exorbitant --so this will be discussed Thursday at our Committee of the Whole Workshop.)
Last month the whole process was upended when emails were disclosed that showed our consultant, DPZ, was copied on emails where some vocal minority-opinion groups were setting out to undermine our economic development goals and objectives and publicly embarrass the commissioners. The county was never notified of this in real time, which to many observers constituted a serious breach of professional ethics on the part of DPZ. We are DPZ's sole client, and intentions potentially harmful to the client and the client's project related to DPZ via email copy should have been immediately reported back to the county. But they were not.
This was the genesis of some very negative press for DPZ and Navy Federal Credit Union.
So later this morning my aide will begin making copies of these latest emails and text messages so that I can more easily go through every one of them, page by page, centimeter by centimeter. Which I will do.
Meanwhile, a quick look at some of the text messages over the weekend is enough to get me started.
The recurring theme seems to be simple: DPZ have their ideas and plans, massive residential, minimal commerce, and anyone who disagrees with them is the enemy. Rick Outzen is the enemy for his blog posts and stories--simply for covering the machinations discovered in his publicly requested emails--and for telling the truth. Scott Luth apparently is not respected and not liked---in one text released DPZ team member Mike Weich says of Scott Luth "He really doesn't get it--I'm embarrassed for him." Why? Scott is sharp and works hard to bring jobs to our county. Why disparage him?? And of course--- I am the most hated of all. Referred to as an "Ass" by team leader Khoury in one text--run down and disparaged in several others. It's okay--doesn't hurt my feelings. At least I wasn't called an "ASSHOLE"-like Rick Outzen was. Rick is referred to as an "Asshole" twice in just the few texts I've managed to wade through thus far. (SEE TEXTS MESSAGE SCREEN SHOTS BELOW THIS POST)
The thing that is most disappointing---why the scheming and conniving, the backbiting and the bitterness from our supposed consultant? We are all supposed to be working collaboratively on this project to do something good for the community-not work against each others' interests. Disappointed in what I am reading is an understatement. I'm not here to make best friends with DPZ or anyone else, I'm here to make the best decisions I can for the citizens I serve. I've been in politics long enough now that none of this surprises me and because I have alligator thick skin--none of it bothers me. I just wonder why DPZ didn't just pick up the phone and call me if they had something to say? Why the backbiting and scheming?
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| DPZ team discussing and quoting from a February 10th blog post by Rick Outzen |
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| DPZ team discussing and quoting from a February 15th blog post by me |
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4 comments:
Rick is an AH.
Did the BOCC vote to accept any of these plans from DPZ or not? Have you voted?
Just vote no, thank you, and let Navy Federal pay them, if that is a possibility.
I would think you could handle a school through the school district and a new employer through the economic developer aspect of the county and PEDC,FLWEST -- that is what they are there for, is it not?
Reinstate concurrency in the entire CP for growth management and charge impact fees to all developers. I read a pretty good article on that. Simple search. Glad to see you write about that. You are reasonable. I don't think Commissioner Barry is making all the best decisions in D5 in that manner actually.
Maybe Rick's ok.. He just posts some comments and not others if they don't go along with his opinion sometimes. I guess one who runs a blog has that choice.
He just seems like a democrat and they have not been for the USA lately, maybe he is busy and not paying attention.. or blinded by the COVID data. No body's perfect.
Rick Outzen and I do not agree on a lot of things, and he has gone after me in the past in his paper and also on his blog. This said, he will cover important stories and he does this. During the Newpoint schools fiasco a few years back, he jumped all over that story while other media outlets ignored it. Here, with respect to DPZ and their actions on this project--to his credit Rick is the one who made the records request and uncovered the machinations. He also called out the PNJ for their vicious, unfair attack piece unleashed on the BCC a while back. He saw it for what it was, dug deeper, and found the embarrassing connection between NFCU, DPZ, and the PNJ. Really revealing, really embarrassing. So Kudos to him for this. His actions may have led to the BCC being able to maintain an additional 200 acres for jobs--which is a great thing!
Yes Rick want to bring up Jan 6 then not take comments. I heard he did the same with the murders in Beulah. He picks winners and losers like he thinks he is something. I pick loser for not being able to think outside his own box. https://100percentfedup.com/retired-30-yr-navy-chaplain-volunteered-to-speak-with-fbi-about-protest-at-capitol-on-jan-6thwhat-happened-next-is-terrifying-video/
But yes kudos for getting the public record on DPZ. Looks like you all reached a compromise at the COW.
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