A round-up of Sunday editorials from Florida’s leading newspapers

A round-up of Sunday editorials from Florida’s leading newspapers:

Tampa Bay Times — Times recommends: Gerdes, Garrett, Wheeler-Brown for St. Petersburg City Council

A new pier on the waterfront is on the way, a building boom continues downtown and universal curbside recycling is here. St. Petersburg is on a roll, but there remain challenges — from creating more jobs to revitalizing Midtown. The biggest issue is breaking the baseball stadium stalemate. Three City Council races are on the Nov. 3 ballot, and voters citywide will have an opportunity to add more thoughtful voices to the discussion.

Charlie Gerdes: District 1

After four productive years representing west St. Petersburg, Charlie Gerdes has demonstrated a consistent ability to dissect important issues with common sense, a solid grasp of the facts and a long-term vision for the city. The lawyer’s practical approach serves as a bridge between the most conservative and progressive council members, and he deserves a second term.

Philip Garrett: District 5

Philip Garrett, 50, is a senior property appraiser for Hillsborough County and has been a member of the executive committee of the St. Petersburg chapter of the NAACP. Like Kornell, he is a passionate advocate for education and for creating more jobs in this southern district. Garrett would have made the Skyway Marina District larger and seeks ways to expand the city’s black middle class.

Lisa Wheeler-Brown: District 7

Lisa Wheeler-Brown’s deep commitment to public safety from the ground up has strengthened relations between St. Petersburg’s police department and its residents. After her son was murdered in 2008, she ran down tips and helped authorities find the killer, who is now serving a life sentence in prison. She continues to work with police to battle an “anti-snitch” ethic that undermines criminal investigations. Her energy and ties to her local neighborhoods make her the best candidate in District 7, which includes much of Midtown and some of the city’s poorest areas.

The Bradenton Herald — State College Board of Trustees pursuing irresponsible faculty policies

The State College Board of Trustees got an earful this week from SCF’s president, a former president, faculty members and the director of a lobbying organization representing more than 20,000 union college instructors.

The stout opposition to the board’s foolish elimination of tenure a month ago pointed out an undeniable fact: The school’s ability to attract and retain quality instructors will be damaged. SCF now holds the ignominious position as the only school out of 28 state colleges to quit offering continuing contracts to new faculty. Tenure must be earned through achievements.

But there’s another policy proposal in the offing that degrades and devalues the teaching profession. If approved, future college job applicants would be forced to win positions via a low-bid process. This pits people against people to see who will accept the lowest pay, and most certainly will not appeal to top-notch professionals who command top dollar.

This bid process mirrors the one contractors endure to win government contracts.

Trustees appear bent on punishing instructors by adopting another new policy, one that eliminate spring break and part of the winter holidays break for full-time staff hired after Nov. 1.

Apparently, trustees embraced the idea that an educational institution should operate like private industry.

The Daytona Beach News-Journal — Tightening controls on ad authority

In Volusia County’s family of tourism promotion agencies, the Southeast Volusia Advertising Authority consistently has been the problem child in recent years.

So it’s good to see officials implementing some stricter rules and discipline.

Since 2012, the SVAA has dealt with scandal or controversy every year. It began when the county fired Executive Director Nicole Carni after it launched an investigation into $47,000 in missing funds, including her pay and credit card expenditures for personal expenses. In February of this year, Carni pleaded no contest to a felony fraud charge stemming from allegations she used ad authority funds to overpay for services and pocketed the refunded amount. She was given three years’ probation and ordered to pay a $5,055 fine.

In 2013, the County Council ousted Palmer Wilson as chairman of the ad authority twice in a two-month period in a flap stemming from his involvement in the approval of a $10,000 marketing agreement with a news website. In 2014, the State Attorney’s Office ordered the SVAA board to attend a class on state open-meetings law after then-Executive Director Carl Watson and three board members violated the Sunshine Law through a string of emails in December 2013. In the emails, the board members complained about media reports that Watson and another staff member reimbursed the tourism group after an audit showed they put $135.73 on authority-issued credit cards for lunches.

Which brings us to this year’s spin of the SVAA wheel of misfortune. In August, SVAA Interim Executive Director Renee Tallevast fired two staff members, operations manager Sherry Hendershot and marketing specialist Myriah Chandler, after an audit found that they were scheduled to receive substantial pay raises. County Manager Jim Dinneen had characterized the salary increases as “abnormally high” and had recommended the County Council delay approving the ad authority’s budget. The fired employees argued that the raises had been approved by Watson, and that they had received similar raises in the past.

The Florida Times-Union —City must end the corrupt Police and Fire Pension Fund

We can’t say we’re surprised by the forensic audit of the Police and Fire Pension Fund.

The blatant self-entitlement of administrator John Keane, the shocking lack of oversight by the board, the uncooperative attitude toward records requests and the sheer incompetence of the entire operation has been well documented in The Florida Times-Union.

There is one word for this:

Corruption.

Edward Siedle, the president and investigator of Benchmark Financial Services, was hired by the Jacksonville City Council to conduct a forensic audit of the fund. He gave the fund a generous D-minus for performance when he presented his audit Wednesday.

What? It wasn’t an F?

Don’t worry. That grade is sure to come soon as more information is uncovered.

The auditor was unable to obtain much of the information he needed because — no surprise — the fund stonewalled his requests for public records.

It literally takes a subpoena to pull information from these people.

Florida Today – NPA popular among Florida voters

Something interesting is happening with Florida voters.

More and more people are becoming unwilling to identify with either of the two major political parties and are choosing instead to register as No Party Affiliate (NPA).

One possible reason could be that the two parties are becoming increasingly extreme, rigid and fractured. Factions form within the parties and intolerance of other views become the norm.

Voters who belonged to a party for many years stayed in it out of habit or loyalty — even when they no longer felt welcome or comfortable.

That may have reached a tipping point.

Most people join a political party because they agree with the vast majority of the party’s platform or ideology. Some join because their parents or spouse belong to that party. Older voters are dying off and younger voters are more independent, leading to shifts in party loyalty and registration.

According to the Florida Division of Elections website, at the end of August 2015, the voter registration rolls show those choosing to register with no party affiliation have reached 2.9 million. Compare that with 20 years ago. In 1995, there were 519,890 registered NPAs representing about 8 percent of the electorate.

While NPAs account for 24 percent of the state’s registered voters, Democrats claim 38 percent, Republicans hold 35 percent, and 3 percent belong to numerous minor parties.

The Gainesville Sun – Cheers and jeers

Florida lawmakers have wasted more than $11 million due to their failure to follow the state Constitution when drawing legislative districts the first time around.

After that trick for taxpayers, one would have hoped the Senate’s passage of new borders for its districts this week would provide a rare treat from Tallahassee. Yet this Halloween we’re left to ponder another scary display from Republicans in the Legislature.

Jeer: The Florida Senate, for passing new Senate districts that split Alachua County in two.

Voters approved the Fair Districts amendments in 2010 to ban gerrymandering. The measures require compact districts that use existing political boundaries when possible and aren’t drawn to favor a particular political party or incumbent.

The Senate admitted it violated the law when initially drawing its districts, meeting in a special session for a do-over. Senators had five maps from which to choose that kept Alachua County in one district, yet voted 22-18 to approve the one map that split the county. The map now goes to the House for consideration.

The map would keep Sen. Rob Bradley, R-Fleming Island, representing part of the county and spare him from being in a district where he would have to run against incumbent Sen. Travis Hutson, R-Elkton. Bradley has done a good job representing Alachua County, but the decision shouldn’t be about him.

Cheer: Idylwild Elementary School math teacher Leonard Marshall, for starting a monthly lunch-period mentoring group called the Idylwild Boys of Purpose.

The Lakeland Ledger — Bringing The Landings in for a landing

The Winter Haven City Commission made an easy and correct call the other day in brokering a deal with developer Taylor Pursell to end the legal dispute over The Landings. Extricating themselves came at no small cost to taxpayers — about $2 million, which includes legal fees partially covered by insurance — but the alternative, theoretically, could have been 10 times that.

Thus, when handed lemons, make lemonade.

But while city commissioners may grit their teeth a bit in writing out that $1.2 million check to developer Taylor Pursell, they can take solace in the fact that the payment won’t cover Pursell’s legal costs — estimated at $1.5 million, according to a recent Ledger report — for igniting the legal battle to begin with. To some small degree, however, Pursell is probably grateful for how it ended. Despite having racked up $1.5 million in lawyers’ fees, his odds of prevailing were dicey at best, had the matter gone to court, as it was slated to next year.

Now, after 28 months of legal wrangling, both sides are free of each other, and the city can now focus on what comes next for the Chain of Lakes complex.

We give Pursell some credit for stoking the imagination about the potential of the 48-acre lakefront site that he sought to convert into Winter Haven’s version of Lakeland’s Lakeside Village — only a little bit better because it would actually have been on a lake.

The original $150 million proposal would bring restaurants, retail outlets, apartments, an IMAX theater and 200 hotel rooms. True, it would have meant the demise of a good, ideally situated multipurpose sports and community complex, including relocating the popular Theatre Winter Haven and the eventual destruction of the beloved Orange Dome. And, predictably and understandably, that was upsetting to many city residents.

The Miami Herald —Venezuelan prosecutor exposes phony trial

Even in Venezuela, where government abuse is an everyday thing, it came as a bombshell: The state attorney who recently prosecuted opposition leader Leopoldo López fled into exile, denouncing the “false evidence” that was used to win a conviction in the high-profile case that drew worldwide condemnation.

There had never been any doubt that Mr. López was railroaded. It was all a put-up job orchestrated by the administration of President Nicolás Maduro, but the prosecutor’s revelations leave the government without a fig leaf to hide behind.

The prosecution of Mr. López has been denounced by human rights groups for lack of the most elementary guarantees of due process and fundamental protections for the accused. But even jaded Venezuelans, who are all too familiar with the sinister nature of the government, were shocked by the public declaration of Franklin Nieves, whose disclosures exposed the utterly corrupt nature of he rogue bunch posing as Venezuela’s government.

In a video posted online a few days ago, Mr. Nieves said he decided to leave the country because he could no longer play his assigned role in the judicial charade against Mr. López. He said he fled with his family “because of the pressure I was under from the executive branch and my superiors to continue to defend the false evidence that was used to convict Leopoldo López.”

Mr. Nieves appears slightly nervous but sincere in the video as he confesses that he could not follow orders to defend the case on appeal. “I couldn’t sleep because of the pain and pressure that I felt continuing with the farce, continuing with this case that unjustly violated the rights of this person.”

The Orlando Sentinel —ACLU chief: We defend rights for all: The Interview

It’s been 50 years since local chapters of the American Civil Liberties Union in Miami, Gainesville and Tampa merged to become the ACLU of Florida. In the years since, the organization has been in the thick of legal battles in Florida surrounding the freedom of speech, the right to privacy, the right to vote, gay rights and other hot-button issues. We asked Howard Simon, Florida ACLU executive director for 18 years, to reflect on his organization’s history. An excerpt follows. The full transcript is online at OrlandoSentinel.com/opinion, along with other recent interviews, including last week’s with the president of the conservative Tax Foundation.

Q: What were the conditions that led the three local ACLU chapters to form the statewide organization in 1965?

A: We understood that threats to basic freedoms were the result of bad policies enacted by our state Legislature, not just city and county commissions. We needed to become a truly statewide organization. Today, we have a staff of almost 30, located in Miami, Tampa, Pensacola and Jacksonville, and a volunteer presence in local communities throughout the state.

Q: How would you describe the mission of the ACLU of Florida?

A: The ACLU is America’s nonpartisan defender of constitutional rights — defending rights for all, regardless of race, religion or political point of view. For 50 years, the ACLU of Florida has worked to ensure that everyone has the rights guaranteed by our constitutions and civil rights laws, and we have fought back against efforts by state and local politicians to restrict those rights.

This means working in the courts to challenge policies that erode our freedoms, and working with the state and local governments for policies that protect and expand those rights. We also educate the public about their rights in a variety of contexts so individuals can advocate for themselves. …

The Ocala StarBanner —Where is the accountability?

Standardized testing was supposed to bring greater accountability and transparency to schools, but has instead caused confusion and dissension.

Testing should help identify low-performing students and schools in order to help them improve. But in Florida as in other states, flawed results are being used to punish teachers and schools while failing to assist educators and parents in helping struggling students.

On Tuesday, Marion County parents received preliminary information about their children’s performance on the 2015 Florida Standards Assessment. The information shows how students’ FSA results compared to others in the state, but not whether they actually passed.

The problem is that the Florida Board of Education won’t determine the scores indicating whether a student passed until at least January. Under a preliminary recommendation, just more than half of Florida students would pass the math and English exams in most grades — and some board members are pushing for even tougher scoring.

The state is moving forward with grading schools, teachers and students based on the FSA, despite a third-party review that found problems in “just about every aspect of the administration” of the tests. In addition to widespread technical problems, the review found only about two-thirds of test questions were aligned with state standards in some subjects. We are not making this up.

The Pensacola News-Journal —State wrong to cover up bear permits

Florida’s first big bear hunt in 21 years did more than “harvest” almost 300 of the state’s bears. It wounded the state’s tradition of open government and public records.

The Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission called off the hunt Sunday, after just two days, with the score 295-0 in favor of the hunters.

One man was attacked by a bear near Eastpoint, on the eve of the hunt, but no injuries were reported among the 3,778 hunters who bought bear permits.

We wish we could say the same for the public record.

The FWC decided, unilaterally, that information on more than 100 licensees was exempt from public disclosure because the applicants are law-enforcement officers, court officials or members of families involved in the criminal-justice system.

Florida’s public-records laws provide that certain citizens can have their home addresses and other personal information redacted in driver licensing records of the Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles. That’s to prevent criminal suspects, or their gang members, from tracking down a cop or prosecutor and trying to intimidate witnesses. And the FWC agency used DHSMV record to verify residency of more than 3,200 permit holders for the big bear hunt.

The Palm Beach Post —Legislators would be wise to bury their hatchets in 2016

One political party, the GOP, had total control of the executive and legislative branches of state government this year, and look what happened. Gridlock on so many important items: The budget. Health care access for the poor. Congressional districts.

Republican leaders’ inability to find compromise meant taxpayers paid for not one special session. Not two. But three, all to carry out the budget-setting and redistricting work that should have been completed properly the first time, but wasn’t. The third session, to deal with redistricting state Senate seats, is set to begin on Monday.

Worse, anger over the handling of do-or-die issues like Medicaid and support for safety-net hospitals spilled over so that ego-bruised members of both houses torpedoed each others’ priorities, and the House declared an early end to the regular session. It was an unstatesmanlike response that left Floridians coping with mental illness, disabilities and lack of health care access as the casualties of war. It was ugly and unacceptable.

After the governing train wreck that has been 2015, House Speaker Steve Crisafulli and Senate President Andy Gardiner have set expectations for the early January 2016 legislative session fairly low. Speaking at the annual Associated Press Legislative Preview Day in Tallahassee last week, there was none of the chummy repartee and camaraderie seen a year earlier, only a sort of weary acknowledgment of limitations, and encouragingly, a peace offering.

More peace and less posturing is precisely what’s needed.

The Panama City News-Herald — Humans created the ‘need’ for a bear hunt

A lactating mother bear was killed near Lake City on Saturday (the opening day of Florida’s first statewide bear hunt under new guidelines).

Have you ever heard the wailing of a baby bear cub when it’s hungry? Think of your own children when a baby is crying as it is time to be fed! These cubs, which could be from one to three in number, will eventually dehydrate and starve to death unless someone finds them … then what?

The state no longer believes in rehabilitation and release of bears, but either they die in the woods or they go to a zoo! The person who killed her should have been aware that there were cubs around. She would have been unaware of a hunt for her life unless she sensed something was up by the smell of a human near her cubs, which could be more than 300 yards away. She would have made sure they were safe and very quiet.

She may also have been trying to lead them to safety, as I have observed a mother do with her two cubs on Tyndall Air Force Base. She knew I was present at 300-400 yards away and immediately took action to get her cubs away from me and into the density of the forest — and I was in a vehicle!

I stopped and watched as she led them into the woods from an open field where the two cubs had climbed a tree. As they moved, she rose every 50 feet to look back at my vehicle at least three times before she hit the edge of the woods.

The black bear hunt was done for one reason and one reason only. We humans and our activities have led up to this hunt! We are encroaching upon forested lands that are inhabited by insects, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals, which the Florida black bear is one of.

A local Panama City TV reporter interviewed a man who had killed one of the bears, and besides saying he was going to feed his family with the meat — which is a good thing — also commented that bears are coming into neighborhoods. Well, duh! Did this young man ever ask why? Did the reporter ever ask why do you think they are coming into neighborhoods so much more frequently than before?

The South Florida Sun Sentinel – You’ll pay more, despite what officials say

This is the season for tax bills, which means it’s also the season for political double-talk.

When bills start arriving in two weeks, property owners in Broward County will see increases on nearly every line, from nearly every government agency that charges property taxes.

Despite what local politicians claim, almost all Broward cities are raising taxes, as are the county and School Board. A notable exception are the hospital districts for north and south Broward.

The story is pretty much the same in Palm Beach County, where only seven of 38 cities have lowered the property tax rate — the key to how this all works.

The math is simple. Property values increased 7.1 percent in Broward this past year, and 7.59 percent in Palm Beach. So with most local governments keeping the same tax rate, you’ll pay more because your property is worth more.

In fact, as Sun Sentinel reporters Brittany Wallman and Andy Reid recently reported, property owners in Broward County will pay an additional $108 million in city and county taxes, while those in Palm Beach County will pay another $52 million.

But that’s not the message being sent by local politicians.

With rare exception, people are being told that local governments “held the line” on property taxes.

The Tallahassee Democrat – Reaching youth through chess

Having spent many of his adult years in uniform, from the military to corrections to security, Learnon Leon figures he’s learned something about keeping others on the right path.

And even though life has provided the Tallahassee native with an ample number of experiences and lessons to school others, now he wants to reach back to something he learned in 1978 and continues to perfect today:

Playing chess.

Leon, 61, wants to reach out to Tallahassee’s youth and engage them in the skill, discipline and patience it takes to first, understand the board game, second, enjoy its qualities and challenges and finally, relate to the pieces on the chess board to life.

Do you always want to be a pawn? What does it take to move across the board? What does it take to get there?

I first learned of Leon’s interest when a co-worker shared a Facebook entry he had posted:

“Chess save lives in our Community” I am offering Chess lessons in the black Community in the Tallahassee Area. If we can keep one child or adult out the jail/funeral home it’s worth it. Please post this quest to families who can benefit from this opportunity. Get your kid involved in my beginner “Chess Lessons”. 

The Tampa Tribune — Seeking justice on Amendment 1