marconews.com Accounts

Government grows like weeds if the Taxpayers allow it ! Officials do not spend their own funds like they spend our Tax Dollars. With the slowdown in the economy, what City staff members cut back on staff instead of asking for more help? When our Financial operations violated Florida State Law and Regulations, their staff was increased in stead of any one being fired.

NO FRAUD ??? When taxpayers are told their tax dollars are used for one thing but later find out that the funds were used for something else---that is not fraud ??? I did not expect the audit to find anyone stealing City funds but I did expect that there would be violations of state and local laws , and that was in fact found. Certain local staff withheld this information from the elected City Council members ! State and City Laws were violated, so what happens to those responsible ? From the comments above, some residents do not seem to mind that staff was not honest with our elected officials or the residents of the City of Marco Island. There also were a lack of proper check and balance systems. All City residents should expect complete honesty and compliance with state and local laws. Wake up Marco !!!

Issler.......When one capital project is properly approved according to law, you can not take funds from that project and use them for something else. Neither can you take funds from the approved project and use them for any other purpose. neither the City Manager or the Finance Director can violate this requirement established by law even if you are personally willing to overlook it. Why are you always willing to defend improper actions by our City Council? Because they were elected , does not give them the right to violate what all Florida Governments must comply with.

Montel........Why do you make personal attacks against concerned residents? If these serious problems do not concern you, fine. Other residents that I speak to are very concerned and are also interested in trying to improve current Marco City Operations. You seem to think everything that happens here is fine, perfect and no mistakes have been made. Open your eyes and ears. Please!

ISSLER.............You admit you have not read the emails that give direction, involve private meetings with staff, indicate contacts with certain consultants or businesses and pretty much has the staff responding on a regular basis to requests and directions.You always want to talk about " FACTS ", How about reviewing the proof before you open your mouth on this subject. These emails will open the eyes of any fair-minded resident of Marco Island, that Arceri has entirely too much control over Officials and staff without any record of the City Council Authorization at any Public meeting. Every Resident of Marco Island should Carefully and completely review all of the emails to see who is really running Marco Island.

Another excellant letter. BUT WILL THEY LISTEN?

To Howard Blankman..... EXCELLANT LETTER !....The Publication-----Update Cape Coral for JULY--AUGUST reports " City temporarily halts further Utility Expansion --The city council can,t decide whether to move forward on the utility expansion project titled Southwest 6/7. THEY ARE WORRIED ABOUT ADDING THE BURDEN OF EXPANSION COSTS TO ALREADY BELEAGUERED PROPERTY OWNERS. The costs for a typical --site are estimated to be $10800 for all properties plus $6750 in impact fees for properties with homes built on them. " The Marco Island City Council should also be concerned for their residents and not add new revenue sources to avoid holding the line or cutting back on spending.

Let us hope and pray they do not change their position before they adopt the budget.This has happened in the past when staff or other special interest indivuals put pressure on the council members that voted " NO ".

WALDACK......You were elected to hold down costs and see to responsible Financial Practices. How many times was our effort to create our own City Government VOTED DOWN ? It barely passed after a CAP was made part of the proposal. Your Thoughts at this time should be about the hard Times the residents of MARCO are facing now . Our Dollars can only be stretched so far and then we can not pay our bills. You should not start charging any new fees or assessments to MARCO RESIDENTS during these hard times. You should NOT EVEN BE THINKING OF THE POSSIBLE ELIMINATION OF THE BUDGET CAP !

Do the residents of Marco Island want to hire an ADDITIONAL 300 EMPLOYEES TO CATCH UP WITH NAPLES? How can the officials and staff of Marco Island seriously compare Marco to Naples to justify the proposed Marco Budget? Naples is about totally developed with a major highway running right through it. Their police, Fire and First Aid totals about 170 employees due to this. Marco has about 70 employees for these services without a major highway. Naples has another 67 employees assigned to: SOLID WASTE, CITY DOCK FUND, VEHICLE MAINTENANCE, BEACH PATROL and REDEVELOPMENT. MARCO HAS NONE of THESE SERVICES. Since the Marco Staff Had this information as part of their 1989 Proposed Budget Materials, how do they dare to compare Marco to Naples? They owe all Marco Residents an apology for MISREPRESENTATION IN THEIR BUDGET PROCESS presentment to the public.

It appears that no Marco City Council, Past or present knows how to have a " BUDGET CUTTING " Session. One of the most Dangerous things about government, is it,s constant growth. While I believe that government closest to the people is the best,it is not the best when it ignores it,s residents, the State Legislature and the Governor. When will our City Leaders understand the difficult time many of our residents are facing. Many of our residents are trying to survive on fixed limited pensions. Food prices,prescriptions, gasoline and many other costs [ including new assessments from the City ]have placed these residents in debt without new City charges being dreamed up and and billed to make the future more bleak. The last two years the City added 22 new employees and now they are adding 8 more. Residents should now realize where our local government is heading. How many more employees, cars, trucks,pieces of equipment will they add? Check our city cost for fuel, insurance, repairs and planned Capital Projects, just to name a few of our ever increasing costs. Check these out for yourself.

Leroy.....No, I am not Roger Hall. I am not offended though, because Mr. Hall seems to be a very intelligent person. Please find out if Tucker represented the sellor of the lot while he was still a Council member or did he become the lot owner,s Attorney right after he stepped down from the Council? Joel said the Council has put him under " pressure ", it is the other way around and always has been.

Monte Lazarus......Did it occur to you, that writing a letter to the editor to call individuals " idiots " places you in the same catagory as those you attack. If your letter was to speak up for those you support or admire, I can understand. Why not indicate that you respectfully disagree with those you attack. When will all the Venom cease about the last election. Apparently the people you supported won, why not be a " good " winner and end any attacks. While you only go after two indivuals in your letter, Your continued use of the phrase " Cave Dwellers " will continue hard feelings with all those that did not support your candidates. Why not stop insulting a wide range of Marco Residents today. Thank You

The first decision the council members should make is: Where can we reduce the budget. They will not get any recommendations from staff on this. Staff only wants to point out how you can " hit Marco residents with more assessments, fees, charges [ utility or other ] or any new revenue sources to maintain or increase departmental budgets. Regardless of the attempt by the Florida State Legislature to reduce Local Government Spending, the Marco City Staff has their own game plan. Spend, spend, spend so our 4 by 6 mile Island can have more construction projects, more employees,more vehicles and equipment and maybe more government buildings to house our City Staff.

Beowulf..... Thank you for your history lesson but I still will hold my hand over my heart during our National Anthem. When I was in the service we all saluted our flag during the Anthem. No one should ever be lectured for showing any form of love for our Country.

Issler.... How big do you want our government here on Marco to grow? The City of Marco Island only became in exhistance when the Charter contained a Budget Cap. When anyone attends the City Budget Hearings next week, it is easy to see all the specially funded sections of the Marco City operations not covered by the Budget Cap. See also how much Government has grown in employees,vehicles, equipment,Capital Projects, repairs,gasoline and oil expense, Insurance and employee benefits on this 4 by 6 mile Island. Why is it not time to look for ways to reduce costs instead of looking for more sources of revenues to continue our big time spending? While we can understand increased Gasoline and oil costs, it is time to stop trying to do too much too fast.

I can not understand people like ..barfieldfly above. With 3 or 4 postings above, barfieldfly is so negative and brings nothing to an intelligent discussion by Councilman Forcht and "blackwidow". Also 27 year resident,s contribution is "blast" former Council Member Discullo present Council Member Kiester and charge that the 4 losing candidates in the last election are "shameful names" as are Davies,Beaufort and Puttnam. First of all, T. Discullo and C. Kiester were the two Council Members that raised more questions on Council Agenda Items before voting. They did not " rubber Stamp " everything placed before them.

Excellant letter, Barb. Let me add that if more residents studied and made their feelings known about all the major decisios to be made by our City Council during the current budget sessions that involve many, many Millions of dollaes, I could smile a lot more.

God Bless Paul Pailsen and his Comrades for their dedication to the United States and all Americans. When you hear about these Heros willing to give their lives for our Country, we should all appreciate all those in the service of our Country. I can not understand how so many of our citizens keep bad mouthing our country while enjoying all of the benefits made possible by the many, many thousands that have served or are serving our beautiful U.S.A.

happyonmarco and OldMarcoMan----- Do you approve of Roney Joels handling of this without City Council approval or not? Should the City be required to have adequate parking for the number of seats in the meeting hall or not? Do you expect our City Government to function in a business like manner or not? Please answer these questions so we can tell if you are concerned citizens of Marco Island or just people who will whitewash any wrong doing by our City staff and people who like to just smear those you do not like.

MarcoFacts---The real question is nothing about the recent election! The real question is why did the City not Provide Sufficient Parking for Residents when constructing this new building with the Council,s Public Meeting Center. Why do we allow city staff to negotiate verbal agreements without Council Approval? Why did Mr. Joel construct new street lights on private property withoutCity Council approving an appropriate contract covering all aspects of such an agreement. For the City to attack this man that donated a very valuable property[ worth about $500,000.00 ] and then expect to use his parking lot day or night, whenever they please without a properly approved contract, is not a just method of treating any private property owner. Have the attorneys prepare a fair agreement that does not deny parking to all patients of the various docters in that building during regular business hours. Also do not deny access to old Bald Eagle drive for these patients to use when leaving the private parking lot. The City gave continued access to all other buildings on old Bald Eagle, so why should this property be denied access? Finally, the City Council should make it clear to staff, that they should never make " verbal agreements " with anyone without prior Council approval.

Stop looking at this problem in terms of personalities. The City sought and received a donation of a large property to enable the construction of the new police building with the City Council public meeting room. This donation was of a very valuable property. The City has constructed this new building and public meeting center WITHOUT ADEQUATE PARKING. Why has the City not provided the adequate parking required of any one else on Marco Island? Why did Mr. Joel construct new lights on private property without the City Council approving a contract covering all aspects of the use of private property at the appropriate times? For the City Officials to now condem the man who donated this property [ worth at least $500,000.00 ] for wanting to use the parking spaces in his own parking lot for the patients of all the Docters offices in his building during office hours does not seem fair. Dr. Guidry should not have to bear any extra cost for allowing public parking in his lot for the benefit of the City and it,s residents during Public Meetings. Stop attacking this fine man and have the attorneys put a fair contract together for the City Council to approve. The fact that Dr, Guidry ran for public office has nothing to do with not having the proper agreement in place in the beginning. Whenever staff members do things without Council approval, we are going to have problems.

Why is it that those that supported the new Council refuse to hold them to the sunshine law that requires public discussions on important matters like buying an Electric Utility. If they want to use Arceri, then appoint him to a study committee like the rental committee people were....in the open ...at a public meeting. It does not look good when at least two members of Council expressed public opinions on something not even authorized by the new Council in a public meeting. Where did the reporter get all the information on the $5 million extra the City could spend on expansion? Looks like Arceri is still running things behind the scene.

I know nothing of his work record where he came from but I would like to know his former benefit package compared to to one offered to him by the City Council representative in the negotiations. This total financial package offered by our Marco Island Council would bring many hundreds of well qualified and experienced Managers and Administrators from various Government locations to our Island Paradise with their applications for the position.

The new council has worked hard to arrive at this decision but they should look over all the powers given to the City Manager without oversight by our elected Council Members under current Marco Law. For one example, He [ the City Manager ]can authorize award of contracts up to $100,000.00 without Council approval and then authorize payment of said contracts, again without approval of our elected officials. Where is the check and balance needed in handling our taxdollars. Having studied the Marco Laws in this area, there are many other changes that should be discussed and considered for revision by residents familiar with Local Government Operations to insure improvements that benefit the Elected Council Members and the residents as well.