A Decisive Win And A Recount? And Then There's The Carpetbagger...

Andre Pierre had no trouble beating Frank Wolland for the mayor's seat but Councilman Michael Blynn (striped tie and shades in the photo)and challenger Bonnie Schwartzbaum ended up only 14 votes apart triggering a hand recount Tuesday, June 9th to determine the winner. Bonnie, a political newcomer, had a very well thought out and executed campaign. On the other hand Mike was running on a "Look what a good job I did this past term!" platform. That included numerous cross country junkets at taxpayer expense, and voting for a new generous retirement and healthcare package plus a tenfold increase in salary and an expense account for the mayor and council. No money to bring our parks back up to standard and the water plants are in total disrepair!

And that guy in the yellow Marcellus T-shirt? Well Marcellus was in court this morning. It's very likely that he hasn't actually lived in North Miami long enough to qualify for this election and a lot of his yellow shirted suppporters live in the next county, including the one who beat the shit out of me for taking pictures of them. That race won't be decided until the judge rules on the residency issue.

Update on the Bonnie Schwartzbaum/Michael Blynn race. The recount confirmed Michael Blynn's 14 vote lead and he was sworn in for another term on the council. Still, it's hardly a mandate when an attorney who is the incumbant councilman only wins by 14 votes against a challenger with no experience at all in city politics. We still luv ya Mike, but work a little harder this time around!

Chatting About Water Plants And Politics

As usual I was having my late night cup of coffee and managed to start up a conversation with a good looking young lady. As usual I wrote her name on a piece of paper. Par for the course I not only misplaced the piece of paper but forgot what her name was!

What I do remember though, is that she worked for the North Miami Beach water department and before that she managed North Miami's West Side plant. Between that information and my campaign button we were quickly into a discussion about the sad state of North Miami's water plants, and that they're in good condition compared to the sorry state of the water mains under the streets. The mayor and council think that the road to re-election is by keeping the water bill low.

Of course we're payng to treat lots of water that simply leaks out of the pipes into the ground while the pumping equipment itself is in such a state of disrepair that it's held together with spit and prayers. Meanwhile the cost of repair keeps climbing and the cost of patchwork repairs keeps adding up. At some point you've gotta pay the piper.

Recently we missed the opportunity to save a fortune. The county was ripping up a number of arterial streets in the city and repaving them at county expense. A great opportunity to bury some new pipes! Instead now we have to pay to tear up newly paved streets, and the patchwork repaving makes some of those streets bumpier than they were before.

She told me that she was much happier and a lot less frustrated working where they take these things into consideration