The above Facebook post was made a few days ago regarding the letter below sent by Waste Management as to why the company failed to respond to the City of Palm Bay’s RFP for trash removal services.
Here’s the letter:
We’ve seen other posts supporting Waste Management’s position on this and calling for the RFP to be re-issued allowing more companies to bid because of the limited number of companies responding.
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It’s been a few days since we wrote about Palm Bay Mayor Capote’s letter to City Manager Morrell asking for her resignation.
We have been trying to figure out the reason and timing for this illogical and divisive action from Capote.
We know that the Mayor was upset with Morrell’s legally required compliance and assistance with the JLAC audit. We know that he was upset that Morrell wouldn’t cover for him on the issue of the improperly supplied car he was driving around. We suspect that he is not thrilled with Waste Management not submitting a proposal for trash removal in the City as it appears Capote wanted Waste Management to get the contract no matter with and that includes not having to compete for it. (After all, if and when he loses his race for the County Commission, we believe he’ll need a job.)
As the days have passed our anger over this has not subsided, and so here is our graphical response to Capote’s call for Morrell’s resignation:
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Unbelievable.
That is all that can be said.
In a letter dated March 23, 2020, Palm Bay Mayor William Capote has called for the resignation of City Manager Morrell:
This may seem a bit untimely given the “panic” surrounding the coronavirus, but issues facing residents will continue, especially those issues that were around before the start of the panic.
One such issue is that of Waste Management and trash removal contracts.
Way back in February, 2019, the City of Palm Bay decided to notify Waste Management that the City would not be renewing its waste pickup contract with the company and would instead seek to go through a competitive bidding process. At the time, Mayor Capote pushed strongly for allowing the City Manager to “negotiate” with Waste Management instead of ending the contract and going forward with the bidding process. We wrote about the Council meeting where the issue of renegotiation or a bidding process was discussed here and here. It made no sense to us then and even less sense now to give Waste Management exclusive negotiation rights with the City as opposed to having other companies bid on the contract.
The reason we say it makes even less sense now is based on what happened with unincorporated Brevard County, whose residents are looking at a 39% increase in waste pickup fees because the County decided to negotiate only with Waste Management.
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“Do ya think they’ll notice we aren’t listening?”
Oh what a night it was in the City of Palm Bay Council Chambers last night.
At 6:30 PM Mayor Capote gave his annual “State of the City” speech. As usual, these types of speeches – particularly from Capote – are more “rah rah” than substance.
However, usually these types of speeches not only highlight the good things that are happening, but the challenges that lay ahead. That’s simply not Capote’s style. Despite the fact that the City was dragged before the Joint Legislative Auditing Committee after the Committee found 31 violations of policies and the law within a 16 month span, no mention of that was made. It would have been the proper thing to mention the JLAC Report and how far along the City was in correcting the violations, but that was not to be.
The Mayor did not mention the FBI reports concerning violations of the law by current and former City Council members.
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There has been an ongoing conflict between the City of Palm Bay and Brevard County concerning the “exchange to nowhere” and the connecting roads.
During the last City Council meeting on February 6, Palm Bay Councilmen ripped into the County on a variety of issues.
However, a week before that, on January 29, Brevard County Assistant Manager and head of the Development and Environmental Services Group, had sent an email to the City of Palm Bay and specifically to Deputy City Manager Suzanne Sherman as to the state of the negotiations between the City and the County.
The email was referenced at last Tuesday’s County Commission meeting in a discussion concerning the negotiations with Palm Bay on the proposed inter-local agreement. (ILA)
What caught our ear was the fact that the email implies the negotiations were a “sham” when viewed from the point of view of the County.
We decided to ask for the email which is found below.
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Janice Crisp is running for Palm Bay City Council Seat 2.
We have run across Crisp before who has some strange ideas when it comes to the press and bloggers. For example, she claims that the press must be licensed by the state.
That’s obviously not true, and so we try and stay away from people with ideas like that. To think that they are seeking public office where they can write and and vote on laws without basic understanding of legal principles is frightening to us.
On Tuesday, Crisp spoke in front of the Brevard County Commission. Normally we wouldn’t say anything, but her comments are bizarre.
We took the time to transcribe them.
I’m from Palm Bay and I’m running for City Council. What I would like to speak with you guys about is the process in which people are able to request public records. I know that there’s been an increase in what you have to pay but what I’m here to talk about is how the process and how people are identified – are we letting real people or just people who make internet requests.
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Call an ambulance as we are having a heart attack.
The Palm Bay Planning and Zoning Board voted last night to end time restrictions on signs.
We honestly thought they would rubber stamp the City Staff recommendation to keep the time limits in place.
The removal of the section now heads to the City Council where hopefully this thing can die the death it deserved years ago.
The Planning and Zoning Board of Palm Bay is holding a meeting tonight starting at 7:00 PM. The agenda can be found here.
At issue for us is the staff recommendation that the Planning and Zoning Board approve an unConstitional ban on speech on private property and the attack the ban signifies on property rights as well.
We have talked about this to the City Council before.
This ordinance which was passed in 2017, was addressed in the City Council on December 19, 2019 and January 2 of 2020 for what was later called a “renumbering” or “reorganization” of the ordinance. Yet the fact of the matter is that the Council could have addressed the content of the ordinance without any issues and chose to pass on it, sending it back to the Planning and Zoning Board for reconsideration.
We will fight and see this to the bitter end.
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Seldom in life are there true coincidences, and we believe that is especially true when it comes to governments and government actions.
A few weeks ago the City of Palm Bay closed off four sets of play equipment after it was determined the sets were dangerous. According to the FloridaToday:
Palm Bay recreation workers have closed four aging park playgrounds, and they want opinions on installing new slides, step climbers, swings and other equipment.
The affected playgrounds:
• Liberty Park, 895 Carlyle Ave. SE
• Oakwood Park, 490 Koutnik Road SE
• Riviera Park, 550 Riviera Drive NE
• Veterans Memorial Park, 2201 Port Malabar Blvd. NE
“In November, city of Palm Bay parks and recreation staff determined that the playgrounds at these four parks were beyond their useful lifespan, and recommended the removal of these playgrounds to avoid potentially unsafe conditions for users,” said Christina Born, city spokeswoman.
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