Life is good! So says the emails

Happy Tuesday! I know what you’re thinking…gee, Mike, we haven’t seen any County Commission emails lately.

I’m right there with you.

Here’s what happened. I usually request these in advance for several weeks at a time. That way I’m scheduled for a month’s worth of emails without having to make a formal request each week.

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Well, we’ve been having some odd technological glitches lately, and one of them wouldn’t allow me to open the commissioner’s email. This was back in March, and I sorta forgot about it as politics heated up.

The problem with going several weeks without commissioner emails is that’s really the only way for me to stay in touch with the county government. I'm in a fog without them.

My usual practice is to ask for a random commissioner batch each week. I’ve mixed that up some to include Chairman Holly Davis every week because she is so engaging with constituents.

Since I hadn’t requested any emails for two months, I decided Monday to ease out of the gate with only Chairman Davis’ emails. Here’s a few:

— Davis continues to get questions and criticisms from Inverness Villages 4 residents. It’s no closer to a resolution today than yesterday. No solutions in the emails, just continued finger pointing that goes both ways.

Davis insists residents blew it by continuing to oppose her efforts.

She wrote: “I have spent three years learning the ins and outs of every aspect of IV4, with far greater resources at my disposal than the residents talking with each other and bringing up the same things over and over. It’s a shame that the effort and knowledge was not listened to.”

You know how I feel about this. A total failure. Neither the government nor the citizens can say they’ve done all they can to find an answer. Just bickering. No leadership. None.

— Davis and all commissioners regularly receive complaints from residents about speeding in their neighborhood. Commissioners routinely slide those folks off to the sheriff’s office, since that’s a law enforcement job. Residents routinely bring their complaints back to commissioners after getting nowhere with the sheriff’s office.

Here’s an example. A Citrus Hills man sent Davis an email in March asking for help with speeders on his street.

Davis forwarded his email to the sheriff’s office, and a sergeant reached out to the man with promises of getting something done. That was two months ago.

Last week, the resident returned an email to Davis saying that, despite assurances from the sheriff’s sergeant that the matter would be handled, nothing happened.

Davis, in her reply to the constituent, mentioned an ongoing problem with the sheriff’s office and doubted she could help.

“We have not had much (if any) cooperation in our own dealings with the current sheriff, and we have no say in how he performs his duties… He’s made clear his disdain for us (BOCC, despite giving him the entire budget he asked for last year), so I don’t believe me weighing in will help even a little.”

Davis then suggested the neighborhood hire an off-duty officer to nail speeders, which is common in communities throughout the county. 

While my opinions of the sheriff are quite clear, it’s generally not a good idea for elected officials to drag down one another publicly. Sheriff Mike Prendergast does it all the time, but that’s no reason for others to follow suit. Just sayin’.

— Another resident believes a four-way stop sign will deter speeders through a difficult intersection in his neighborhood.

“In the two minutes I took to write this email to keep you all apprised of this situation, at least five cars drove past my house easily doing in excess of 50 miles per hour. It’s a 25 mile per hour zone.”

I see a lot of these. I always wonder…how do people estimate that speed? Fifty mph on a residential street seems rather excessive. 

That said, 25 mph is crawling. Seriously. The worst drive in Citrus County is Roosevelt Boulevard in Beverly Hills, where everyone goes 25 mph, and not 26 mph. (Just kidding, Beverly Hills. Love ya!)

Drug arrests and shootings might bring the Tampa Bay TV news crews up here, but what gets residents really riled are speeders and three-wheelers in their neighborhood. Hope the next sheriff knows that.

That’s it for this Tuesday. Have an exceptional day, friends.

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