Finishing School

Discussion Item 'C' on the Kissimmee City Commission meeting agenda for tonight is a waste of time that we agree should happen. Per the request of the commission they are sneaking a discussion item back on the agenda while not trying to raise any 'Red Flags' to the public on how back-ass-wards city policies have become. The item titled 'Robert Rules of Order and Commission Decorum' not only a discussion on the proper way for commissioners to do their jobs, but it is also a discussion on cellphone, texting, and twittering use during commission meetings. We will again repeat the phrase 'DURING commission meetings'. Their arguments much like pimple faced teenagers working the front lines at a Jack-in-the-Box is that if there were an emergency they could be reached. As employers of the commission our suggestion follows the Employee Handbook at Jack-in-the-Box; Cellphone use is not permitted during your shift except at an employees designated break time. Quite simply, if the commission decides to use their cellphones during the meetings then the WayneWho staff believes that any information on those phones becomes a matter of public record and we will duly request all such information. If there is even a remote possibility of sunshine laws being broken during a commission meeting using new technologies, then it is critical for the commission to address the problem and adhere to higher ethical standards.

The second part of the discussion, is whether or not the commission should have a training class on 'Robert's Rules of Order' and professional conduct standards. We believe this is important. Image, etiquette, and communication skills are all critical social components in the job of a commissioner. We believe that adding some social graces to our slate of commissioners would help raise the level of the perception of competence in the minds of the public. We recommend this 'Finishing School' training be acted on and taken seriously. Maybe the etiquette classes could be put on Access Osceola as a way to justify the expense of the city's TV channel and help educate the public on this critical government work. Remember 'Pinkies in the Air'.

Double Digits

If anyone happened to catch the news over the weekend, they would have noticed that Osceola County has broken the 10% unemployment barrier. Even with all of the promises by candidates and elected officials to 'bring jobs' into our area, it seems that the mistakes and mismanagement of the past have forced a new reality. An unemployment level in Osceola county of 10.7%, which, by all accounts, is still rising.

While the WayneWho staff is very aware that the economic crisis we are now in is unfolding on a national stage, we still believe that using smart government strategies could have made this time in Osceola more bearable. We know that the promises of candidates and elected officials to 'create jobs' were convenient election and re-election white lies, but we have to question if the past and current actions are even remotely helping to create or save jobs? If we look back to the beginning of this new commission's reign, we see more housing related projects approved than we do job creation projects. While the commission offers distraction issues on building green and raising gas taxes, that hide the fact that they are continuing down the same course of reckless development, more and more jobs vanish.

The WayneWho staff understands that in difficult times such as these, jobs are going to be lost. Our problem is that the county, and other local governments, have lost any sensibility when it comes to what they should be doing. There is no plan except to spend money on anything that some consultant says is smart, and to let developers have their way with us. This must end.

Today there is an item on the Board of County Commissioners agenda under the 'Department of Economic Development' that is an approval to renew a contract and increase the level of search engine optimization services which will cost the taxpayers an additional $285,600. While even us old folks realize that times are changing and that new advertising arenas must be used, is it smart to spend $585,600 in the face of county staffing cuts and an expanding local homeless population, to be seen on the Internet? Especially at the direction of a 'Department' who owns the current economic disaster in Osceola County? We guess it is also just adding insult to injury that the firm, POP Multimedia Incorporated based out of Seattle Washington does not fit the 'Buy Local' banner elected officials have wrapped themselves in like a child's security blanket. 'Buy Local' hell, we cannot even keep the taxpayers' money in the State of Florida. And what kind of questions will the County Commissioners ask? Will they ask for any documentation that shows the taxpayers who are covering the tab for this Internet adventure have received some benefit of the money spent? How many companies that have decided to relocated to Osceola County because they found us while playing on the Internet? What is the return on the taxpayers investment? How many jobs have been created? What words can we type into a search engine to find the economic development website? Will any of these questions be asked, or will it be the usual, 'Move to Approve'?
Of course the Osceola County Economic Development Department is not alone in their shameful spending. We can always count on the Osceola County School Board to waste money while preparing to lay off teachers. Last week the School Board heard a presentation out of Texas (not located in Osceola County) called Energy Educators who will 'guaranty energy savings at a certain percentage through behavior modification and take 35% of the savings as payment' according to a un-official press release from our good friend School Board Member Jay Wheeler. We missed the meeting, so we are not sure about how much taxpayer money were are talking about giving this company, but we believe this should not be approved in any fashion. Paying any company, especially one that does not fit the new campaign pledge of 'Buy Local', to tell us to make sure we turn the lights off when we are not in a room, is just pure stupidity. Is their pay based on the type of behavior modification techniques they employ? Is the Osceola County School Board sanctioning water-boarding for those who forget to turn their computers off at night? Nonsense.

All of this loony legislating is what we have witnessed while the unemployment rates have surged to 10.7%. We see more money being spent on wasteful items now than we did during the bubble boom over the past several years while the unemployment rate has continued to accelerate. At a time when failure is not an option, it seems the only thing our local governments, and their departments, can do is create a strategy leading us directly into failure. Let's just hope that we don't have to pay to have people find us on the Internet for the term '14.5% unemployment'. That would be tragic.

Banished

The WayneWho staff has been kicking around Osceola County's plan to spend its take of the millions in federal funding to alleviate the foreclosure crisis in the state of Florida and we are a little bit confused on one of the ideas. We were glad to the see the County Commissioners correct the stances on museums and health clinics and focus on foreclosures like the American Taxpayers have trusted us to do, but their is still one element that seems odd. Why would you build low-income housing in the middle of nowhere?

Before the folks down in Poinciana get upset at us, we are not suggesting that Poinciana is nowhere, but rather we are saying that Poinciana is a suburb of the Metro Orlando area where people strive to live the quiet life and commute to jobs that are a good distance away. Like in any other suburb type environment government services, shopping, clinics, and real jobs are at some distance away. So, we have to ask if it is smart to push your low-income residents away from the central hub of services and access to transportation? Would it be more convenient for families that cannot afford a vehicle to live in an outlying area like Poinciana that does not seem to be equipped, as a real city would be, to handle the needs of our low-income citizens? We do not believe the plan makes sense unless a new location that is more central and reduces transportation problems is looked at. Since the City of Kissimmee needs some help getting their Redevelopment project off the ground on Vine Street, maybe the County should discuss building the type of building that city wants, multi-story, parking garage, funky CRA colors with rope lighting, on that corridor instead of banishing low income families to the edge of the county. If the whole idea is to create an environment where people can live, work, and play, then maybe this would be a better plan.

Of course, no city wants more low-income families in its midst and forcing the Poinciana area into taking on the responsibility before it has the chance to become a city is just perfect timing. Poinciana is the forgotten town that Avatar built for years that the county has easily overlooked and it appears nothing has changed with the district's new commissioner Brandon "Valentine" Arrington dutifully nodding his head to whatever the rest of the commission has to say. Maybe "Valentine" should actually crack open the plan and give it a quick read to see if it makes sense. Maybe he should go down and ask some of the community leaders in Poinciana if they are ready to handle the needs of low-income families or at least spend a few minutes explaining why he thinks this is a good idea. It is not like the community leaders down there aren't already scrambling trying to handle one of the worst foreclosure rates in all of Florida, let's throw a little bit more on them. Is this more of the County's "Clean Slate" agenda at work trying to cleanse the area of those it perceives hinder its ability to attract high-tech and bio-medical firms?

The WayneWho staff thinks that spending some of the federal money on low-income housing is a smart idea, but we have to argue against its planned location. Banishing low-income American families will not help them get back on their feet, it just hides them from our line of site. Forgetting about a problem does not make the problem go away.

Bubble Talk

Our article yesterday touched on the idea that many in our area are working diligently to rebuild the development bubble that for a few good years, consumed our entire community. Today, in a good article in the Osceola News Gazette titled "Vine St. worries - Is redevelopment too slow?", we see even more evidence of this growing problem. In the article, the progress of making the zoning changes and an overlay district for the redevelopment of the Vine Street area through Kissimmee is described as moving slow, even though the vision for what the area has become well established. The frustration by some commissioners is that not enough commercial developers have been advertised to in order to get things moving along with the grand Utopian view. The idea of course is to redevelop in an area that has been allowed to fall apart in hopes that the sting of projects will some how gel as the economic epicenter of the City of Kissimmee. There is no real evidence that this will work, but the suggestion by a few of the commissioners was that we need to start building now.

While this all sounds good, we have to wonder if the creation of another construction boom is what we need right now. While we agree that the city needs to move forward with the plans for the redevelopment of the area, we think rushing the process is foolish at best. The belief that by building something you have done a good thing for a community is the exact thought process that has lead this area into the economic collapse we are feeling right now. In a Wall Street Journal article out today titled "Commercial Property Faces Crisis", the delinquency rates of commercial loans are described as going sour at an 'accelerating pace' which is threatening to cause tens of billion dollars in losses. According to the article "The delinquency rate on about $700 billion in securitized loans backed by office buildings, hotels, stores and other investment property has more than doubled since September." So the plan of the City Commission is to jump head first into commercial redevelopment in the middle of one of the worst commercial downturns on record. We can only assume that the plan is to rename 'Vine Street' to 'Toxic Asset Street' in order to get more dollars from the Federal Government.

This debate of course gave the Mayor an opportunity to light the campfire and start telling stories about the good old days of tricking businesses into taxing themselves for the the good of all in the West 192 area of the county. The bard's tale of getting the property owners to 'buy-in' to setting up a special taxing district so government could use the dollars to make the area the center piece for Osceola County tourism echoed through the chambers. The only thoughts we could grasp from another round of story time was that the Mayor's goal is to turn the failed Vine Street Corridor into the failed West 192 Tourism Corridor, and he wants to have the Vine Street property owners pay for it. Just for the heck of it, the WayneWho staff decided to take a quick ride through the 'redeveloped' West 192 ghost town that has had the advantage large amounts of tax dollars being thrown into it, and we were left wondering if this area was the best example of government at work?

The problem that we see with the discussion on all levels of government is that there is no clear acceptance that we are in a new economic era. Economic development actually means something different than it did two years ago. While we hear many whines and gripes about budget deficits, we do not see true efforts to put us on the right path to a community that is not built on the erroneous concept of some taxes being 'special' which magically makes them 'good' and 'good' for those paying them. This, of course, leads government to think that every thing they spend the 'good' taxes on is also 'good'.

Pop goes the bubble.

Rebuilding The Bubble

Usually the WayneWho staff tries not to get involved with the crosstalk of comments that come in from our readers, but sometimes comments, and/or e-mails, deserve some open discussion. We receive many e-mails that point to problems and shenanigans going on in our community which we try to incorporate into our un-news articles in creative and interesting ways. While we work very hard to keep our articles entertaining, we pride ourselves on defending sound public policy. In the end our arguments on these policies are our opinions on issues that we believe affect our entire community. And so our article begins...

Over the weekend we received an e-mail from Tom Long from the Osceola County Landlords Association in reference to a comment that one of our readers left on our "We Were Wrong" un-news article. The comment was making a reference to another comment about the Senior Apartment Complex the county wants to build in BVL. It read as follows: "... Where is the Landlords association on this one. They were hell-bent to stop developer Jonathan Wolf and the Preserve or Signature Crossing short term apartments, so where are they on this issue. I have not seen a letter or an e-mail from Tom Long on it yet, so I have to wonder if they are sitting this one out?" Mr. Long decided to respond via e-mail to us instead of to the person who actually posed the question.
It reads as follows:
"Subject: regarding Steve's comments

I was not sitting this one out. I was the first and last person to speak at the BOCC workshop. In fact, I pointed out that $5 million could help with down payment and repair assistance on more than 100 bank owned homes. It's on the county website.

Now that $8 million will be used in that direction and they are looking at 250 homes. Since I have little luck stopping big money on Signature Crossing, I tried the back door approach for the remainder of the Federal money, with some success.

I have never opposed federal money to help house those of extreme low, very low, or low income levels. That means the rents must be restricted also.

As to Signature Crossing, Where is the outrage from WayneWho? Wolf was not cut from the $5 million funding, while other more worthwhile projects got rejected. Wolf has been allowed to lie to the state and county, while the wayne who blog has went silent. "

We guess that by 'silent' you mean that we have offered more coverage on the topic than any mainstream media outlet, or that we wrote articles against the project and worked to expose the crumbling levels of trust with the 'Education Foundation.' If that is what you mean by 'silent' then we would have to agree that we have been 'silent.' What we have tried to do is point to a larger problem in our community that we believe even the benevolent Landlords Association is complicit in. That is the idea that we should begin the reconstruction of the economic bubble that existed in our county just a few short years ago which burst in a big way. This bubble was built on the premise that growth would never end and that the interests of special interest groups devoted to growth are all that matter.

First let us state that we are not attacking Mr. Long or the Landlords Association. Mr. Long has done more due diligence on this issue of the Preserve/Signature Crossing than any elected official or our local media. He has offered honest facts about the deception of the project that little Jonny Wolf and the Education Foundation has held our community hostage with for more than two years. His problem is now that he has been marginalized by the elected officials he has become friendly with. (Remember our article about the frog and the scorpion...? They can't help themselves... It is their nature to stab you in the back for political gain.)

The mindset of our local and state level elected officials is that we must find ways to restart housing. In essence they want to recreate the housing bubble because it was inside this bubble that we were all so happy and nobody was yelling at them. Politicians loved this time because campaign contributions were plentiful and they could delegate the decision making process to Quasi-Governmental Agencies/Authorities. Hence if things went wrong, they could blame the agencies instead of taking the blame themselves. This is obvious when we look at the Expressway Authority, Orlando's Airport Authority, or even the different Visitors Bureaus in the area and their recent histories of shady dealings and wasteful spending. But it is not so obvious when we look at much larger State Legislator created organizations like the Florida Housing Finance Corporation which is nothing more than a Quasi-Governmental program that helped to create that housing bubble in Florida. If we had good elected officials, they would look at the frameworks that have created the ability for developers like Jonny Wolf to circumvent the will and needs of Osceola County when it comes to common sense growth, and demand an audit of the Florida Housing Finance Corporation to find out who was behind these loopholes. These types of agencies are controlled by the elected and unelected power barons of our state for the purpose of their own financial prosperity. Andrew Jackson once wrote "It is to be regretted when the rich and powerful, to often, bend the purpose of government to their narrow ends." And that is all that the Preserve/Signature Crossing project represents. It is a symbol of government waste and the concentration of privilege by those who can spread the most capital. And we were mad about AIG?

We will close this article with the trimmed down transcript of a letter from Jonny Wolf to the FHFC which we believe shows the true merits, feelings, and purpose behind the Preserve/Signature Crossing project and our community. You can read the complete letter here: http://www.floridahousing.org/FH-ImageWebDocs/Developers/SenateBill2A/PublicComments/Comment_-_2009-02-24_-_Jonathan_Wolf_-_St._Cloud_Preserve.pdf

The letter reads basically as follows:

"St Cloud Preserve, LLC
1275 Lake Heathrow Lane, Suite 115
Heathrow, Florida 32746

Tel: (407) 333-3233
Fax: (407) 353-3919

February 24, 2009

Stephen Auger, Executive Director
Florida Housing Finance Corporation
227 West Bronough Street, Suite 5000
Tallahassee, Florida 32301

Re: The Preserve - CWHIP06-28

Dear Steve:

[Skipped first two paragraphs because of excessive ego stroking.]

The Preserve is a 120 unit rental community in Osceola County, one of the few counties in Florida that continues to see growth in School enrollments. With targeting to essential services personnel, including teachers, we know this community will fulfill a need for affordable housing for these service providers close to where they work.

The public/private partnerships we have set up provides for the Osceola County School District to own the land and the not-for-profit Foundation for Osceola Education to own the buildings. This structure not only provides safe affordable housing but also provides The Foundation with cash flow from the community to fund scholarship programs for Osceola County Students.

Osceola County has proven to be a difficult area in terms of getting the support of the local government in a effort to provide affordable communities. This is a county that has found a way to block any effort by developers to submit a viable application to FHFC for many years. As you may recall, FHFC took the unprecedented move to allow us to change the location of our site for this housing due to NINBY issues and city officials who were not prepared to override the opposition. We then came up against a like situation with the Board of county Commissioners, but were able to create a work-around with the approval of FHFC, whereby their contribution was made up from other sources, allowing the community to remain viable.

Our project is ready to move forward and can comply with the requirements for completing the credit underwriting within the time frame as specified with a view to commencing construction this summer.

Sincerely,

Jonathan L. Wolf
Managing Member"

Did you know?

The WayneWho staff received an interesting e-mail from our good friend Osceola County School Board Member Jay Wheeler, we assume, about yesterday's post. The e-mail titled 'What our children need education to prepare them for/watch' contained no explanation as to its importance or relevance to the current discussion matter, just a link to a YouTube Video. Many of our readers know that the WayneWho staff are all great fans of YouTube, but we also know the information that is posted on it may or may not be credible. But we were thankful for the link and watched it anyway. You will not need to watch it for the rest of the article to make sense, but we suggest you take a moment when you get a chance to see the guiding principals of our Osceola County School Board Members. The link to the video is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cL9Wu2kWwSY.

The 'Did You Know?' video is basically a list of trivia style questions that are strung in rapid succession to make the viewer go 'hmm....' The video starts of with the factoid that 'If you are one in a million in China' which then flips to a picture that says '...there are 1,300 people just like you.' The second factoid shows a large Chinese flag with the statement that 'China will soon become the NUMBER ONE English speaking country in the world.' Of course by this point in the video the WayneWho staff collectively sighed 'hmmm...' with the intrigue of what the word 'soon' might mean, but we continued on in hopes that this video sharing exercise might mean something. The next question states that 'The 25% of India's population with the highest IQ's is greater than the total population of the United States.' So now we can see the scare tactics beginning to take shape. The next succession of slides basically describe the future job market starting with the factoid that 'The top 10 in-demand jobs in 2010 did not exist in 2004.' And then the factoid bomb is dropped on the viewer that is supposed to shake them to their core, 'We are currently preparing students for jobs that don't yet exist using technologies that haven't been invented in order to solve problems we don't even know are problems yet.' (Wow... that is deep.) The rest of the video trails on in more useless factoids that may or may not have any basis in reality, but we at least understand the motives behind the School Boards and teachers around the state. We want money that you have not made yet to pay for educating your children to survive in fantasy land. This explains the problem.

First let us state that everyone on the WayneWho staff believes that education is critical to the future of our country, and that continuing to educate oneself should be a top priority for every person. In the early years of development, teachers and parents play critical parts in giving us the tools we need to be able to learn. If we know how to learn, then we can adapt to new technologies and ideas. Teachers are critical to developing this ability.

Our problem is that learning a test, the FCAT, does not teach you to adapt to new technologies. It teaches you to vomit practiced answers in the hopes of more school funding and raises for teachers. Having students watch movies, play computer games, or playing trivia games in the classroom are not building the educational bridge to our nation's future, these practices are only building a bridge to our wallets and one of the contributing factors to why India has more smart people than we do. The fundamentals of education have been lost in a sea of never-ending Tomorrow Land visions that have produced the reverse Wal-Mart effect; Less For More.

While we believe that the majority of teachers and school administrators are great at what they do, we return to our premise from yesterday. We need honesty in the system. We need independent Time-and-Motion studies that audit every aspect of our school system. As taxpayers we must ask the question "Are we getting what we are paying for or are we getting sent links to videos that explain abstract concepts to justify abstract spending?" We would also like to state that teachers alone cannot be singled out for the problems in our schools. Administrators, and even many parents have contributed to the decline, not countries like China or India.

We would like to thank our good friend, School Board Member Jay Wheeler for the link and for contributing to the debate on why Florida Schools continue to slip in results while they continue to need more money. These are the types of questions we feel should be discussed before any type of tax increase is decided upon. Maybe someone can dig up some other factoids that will explain where all the money is going and what happens to our socks when the they go into the dryer.

Save Our Schools

Populist and emotional arguments are always the greatest at throwing elected officials into a hissy-fit. When large groups of people are mad, elected officials scramble around to prove they are 'one of the people' by parroting the calls from the crowd whether honest or not. This can easily be seen in two places on your television screens right now. One is the hyped elected official anger at the failed corporation of AIG, and the other, a little bit closer to home, is the statewide public school system budget crisis. Both issues seem to require taxpayer funded bailouts on agencies that are supposedly too big to fail, while at the same time demand taxpayer outrage at ridiculous levels of mismanagement that have gone unchecked for years. While the WayneWho staff usually tries to avoid writing un-news articles of issues outside of our county, the Osceola News-Gazette's backing of a sales tax hike for schools demands some discussion.

In Osceola County, we have been down this road before. We know where a discussion on raising the sales tax to support our schools will lead. The discussion will lead to someone finally digging through the budgets of the different schools systems and discovering the wasteful spending that has gone on for far to long. If raising the sales tax in the State of Florida is going to require a vote by all of our residents, then the WayneWho staff is onboard with putting it on the ballot and letting the voters decide because then the truth will finally come out. Give the school systems their chance to make their arguments for not only why they need this money, but for how they are going to spend it wisely. Let them make their case for what kind of accountability they have had with the money they have already spent, and what type of accountability they are going to have with the money they are going to spend in the future. To us, this is a fair and honest way to address the situation before us. This is what happened in 2004 when the Osceola County voters shot down a "half penny" sales tax increase because they saw that the school system could not account for the money it was spending and that wasteful spending was rampant.

Of course this is not what is about to happen. What is about to happen is that the school systems are going to use children as human shields to protect their funding. They are going to scream and cry that we have to protect teachers while they refuse to layoff administration staff to help balance their budgets. They are going to whine about the quality of education while they waste millions of dollars on technology items that may or may not actually benefit the education of our State's children. Like AIG, it will look like we are facing impending doom if we do not throw more money at the problem. But amazingly, just like AIG, you will see the well paid actors representing the company doing things that do not match the urgency of the crisis. Yesterday, while the news that Orange County's budget deficit was going to double, Superintendent Ron Blocker enjoyed some time off and then was finally tracked down by reporters at an awards ceremony. Things must be bad right?

Here is our issue. Before we allow an angry mob of good hearted people scare the state into making a decision on increasing all of our taxes without proper intelligence, lets get some facts. We know this is a foreign idea to media outlets like our local newspapers, but we believe that we will only make the situation worse if decisions are made without all of the facts on school budgets being taken into account. We call for independent audits of all public school systems in the State of Florida to determine if proper and wise spending patterns have been practiced. Once we can all see that the schools are, for the most part, spending our money wisely, we can then begin to figure out what revenue solution would be best. To blindly support a sales tax increase is not the best solution. Adjusting the revenue stream to give a more balanced and steady income should be the solution that is demanded by all Florida residents. Slapping an additional tax would only lead to the public school systems being able to 'double dip' when property taxes come back in line as home values stabilize and begin to rise again. We would also argue that if the State is going to raise the sales tax for schools, then all local counties who are already using sales tax money for schools be forced to bring their local option taxes back to the voters. Basically what we are saying is that this is a complex issue that requires more than a knee-jerk reaction to solve. Maybe the best way to 'Save our Schools' is to stop and think.

Topical Solution

Tonight, at the City of Kissimmee Commission Meeting, the city's own propaganda network is on the chopping block. The ratings are in and the numbers are not looking good for the city owned station. Viewership is down even though the Public Information Office and the Access Osceola team have doubled their list of info-tainment products available for viewing. So what is the answer?

The WayneWho staff has developed a plan that we think is a good compromise between the needs of the public and government alike. Cut the staff of Access Osceola in half and remove Kissimmee's Public Information Officer from any real roll with the station. Get rid of the nonsensical FEC programming that runs now and go back to informational slides and video shorts to keep the public informed on what is going on in the community. Stop outsourcing Access Osceola as a video production company for free, but allow outside companies to produce videos that run on the channel. When the Chamber has a debate let them contract a private firm to shoot and edit the video instead of paying Access Osceola staff to do the work. The same goes for the work that Access Osceola has done for other organizations, let the organizations contract out the work and then Access Osceola staff can add the content to the channel. Removing this workload should allow the amount of staff to be reduced but keep the station running.

We know many of our readers who never read 'those damn blogs' are coughing up donut chunks right now because we said save the station, so let us explain.

In many respects Access Osceola is a luxury item. It is not required by law and while it serves a critical purpose, it not necessary to the daily functioning of our county. On the other side of the argument, government needs to do everything possible to keep its electorate engaged. There is also a public safety component that should be factored into the decision. With the city expanding its range of listeners by adding a radio station component to the mix, the station has the possibility of not only informing the public, but disseminating emergency information as well. This we believe is the key reason to keep the station open.

The station was originally started to broadcast public meetings to help keep the public informed on what government was doing in an effort to make the operation of government more transparent. In the beginning that idea seemed to work fine as the viewership grew because people wanted see what commissioners really did. Once the viewers realized the ignorance of commissioners during commission meetings and their frustration level grew because they had to watch as mistake after mistake was made from the bench, they tuned out just as quickly as they had tuned in. Why would the public tune in to watch government increase taxes and fees when there is no way to stop it anyway? The citizens, either in the room, or in the home viewing audience, cannot change the wrong track mentality of government, so why tune in only to go to bed upset? Basically what we are saying is that it is the governmental bodies broadcasting their lunacy that have killed the ratings more than it is the channel change from 9 to 199. Our argument is that while the full meetings should continue to be broadcast, there is more that can be done to fill the time between meetings that would attract viewers that do not require full production sets and crews to accomplish. Our suggestion is to simply go back to the power-pointless slides. Focus on community calendars and information that is relevant to the average citizen. Lists of places to help feed Osceola families are more important than the FEC programming now currently running.

As we have already stated, it is the mission of the station that should lead to keeping it on life-support right now. That mission can be found in the fact that the station has the ability to act as an emergency beacon for our community. Silver and Amber Alerts, emergency Police and Fire information, and of course disaster information after an event. This should be the the mission of the station instead of shows like 'Tea Time with the PIO.'

To end we would like to stress that we are not attacking the individuals who are employed by Access Osceola. We just believe that Access Osceola should not hold the positions that many of these employees now have. We also believe that the Public Information Office needs to be refocused away from television production duties. The city should have a public face that is able to speak on the issues and stances the city has. We can see a perfect example of this with the PIO at the Osceola County Sheriff's Department who does an excellent job of providing straightforward information to the public. It probably helps that the PIO at the Sheriff's office can be seen out in the public, going to meetings and participating in local public events, but in the end performance should be the real measuring stick and this we leave to the commission to determine.

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Celebrate Sober / Arrive Alive!

We would also like to congratulate the Osceola County Commission for doing the patriotic thing and voting to spend American taxpayers' money on what it was intended for, help for our neighborhoods.

We were wrong

It is difficult to get an un-news story wrong, but the WayneWho staff must admit that our story on Friday of last week was incorrect. The county still plans on misspending American taxpayers money on something other than helping to stabilize local neighborhoods, but it is what they are spending the money on we got wrong. From sources close to someone who once managed inter-office waste collection and receptacle deployment, we have learned that the cover story of a 'clinic' is possibly false. The information only WayneWho has been able to uncover points to something much more wasteful.

The plan, it seems, is to use the 4 million dollars from the Neighborhood Stabilization Program to build a commission retreat that will be know as 'Camp Trigger'. Much like the facilities used by our country's Presidents such as Camp David, 'Camp Trigger' will be the country retreat for our County Commissioners. The retreat, which will be operated at taxpayers expense and be operated more like a commercial day spa, will offer County Commissioners an opportunity for solitude and tranquility, as well as an ideal place to host DRI focused development leaders. The goal is to create a place where commissioners can go to clear their heads and enjoy a hearty meal at the facilities built in 'Sizzler' dinning facility. County Commissioners, obedient staff such as the County Manager, and development dignitaries will be able to regain their mental footing after well deserved massages, steam baths, and colonics. The goal behind the pampering is to help commissioners get their thoughts together to help fix the problems commissioners have created in our local community, and to help them determine the information that local newspapers should print to inveigle local residents.

WayneWho has received exclusive reports from a guy named Eddie that show that this type of pampering may already be working. In anticipation of the new facility being built, it seems that the Commissioners have brought many of the services into their current office facilities to help get their creative juices flowing. We have learned that during one of these 'sessions', a concept for an idea was formed that might actually be used by Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner as a model to save the banking industry. The plan which is being called the "Toxic Asset Resolution Bank And Borrower Yeildance" program, which is more commonly known as the 'TARBABY' program by concerned taxpayers, has been heralded as the best possible solution by bank executives determined to hold on to their bonus packages. The plan which is being reworked on a federal level by a Mr. Brer R. Abbit is to be finalized in the coming weeks and is a plan that all of Osceola can be proud of.

The WayneWho staff would like to apologize for our mistaken report last week and we will continue to strive to provide our readers the most accurate un-news information possible. Our goal is to not get you stuck with bad information.

Thank you for your continued readership.

Osceola Vs. the Feds, Again

The bailouts are in full swing. Whether you believe in taxpayer money being used for bailing out companies, industries, financial institutions, or local governments, or not, the fact is that the bailouts are happening. This should lead to the idea that, as citizens, we should all demand accountability from those receiving our money. Leave it to the Osceola County Commission to, once again, screw up something that is decidedly simply when it comes to tax money, the Neighborhood Stabilization Program authorized under Title III of the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008.

Based on the description of the Neighborhood Stabilization Program on HUD's (U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development) website, the program "will provide emergency assistance to state and local governments to acquire and redevelop foreclosed properties that might otherwise become sources of abandonment and blight within their communities. The Neighborhood Stabilization Program (NSP) provides grants to every state and certain local communities to purchase foreclosed or abandoned homes and to rehabilitate, resell, or redevelop these homes in order to stabilize neighborhoods and stem the decline of house values of neighboring homes." Pretty simple, right?

Osceola County's response: we are going to take 4 million of the Neighborhood Stabilization Program and build a clinic with it.

(The WayneWho staff knows that no elected officials or media cheerleaders read this blog, but in case you are, we recommend you re-read the two paragraphs above that describes again what the intention of the U.S. taxpayers is with their money.)

In a news story done by WFTV it has been reported that the County may split the money intended for starting to rebuild our neighborhoods by buying foreclosed properties and fixing them up, and instead build a two-story clinic on land where a small portable clinic already exists. A clinic that, as far as the WayneWho staff can tell, is not in foreclosure. The plan would include (wait for it) increasing the residential inventory of apartments by building 30 apartments in an area plagued with foreclosures. So not only does Osceola County Government plan to snub its nose at the American taxpayers, they plan to make the foreclosure problem worse. The WayneWho staff just wants to know what the Commissioners are allowed to smoke once they get elected?

First the idea of losing another battle to the Federal Government and losing more tax money, and possibly $14 million in NSP money because Osceola county thinks it is the Burger King county of our country and can 'have it their way' is appalling. Osceola County commissioners have tried to rewrite voting rules, and lost, so we guess that expecting they can tell the Federal Government and the taxpayers of the entire U.S. that they are not going to take the money being offered and spend it on what it is intended for, should not surprise any of us. Osceola County Commission Chairman John Quinones' response when questioned on if spending the money somewhere else when Osceola County's foreclosure numbers are so high was "We have tried to enhance and stabilize neighborhoods." If Osceola county had its own stock market, it would have crashed right then and there. Commissioner Quinones' response does not even make sense in the scope of deceit Osceola County Government is attempting to portray. At least he could have been more honest in his statement and said something to the effect of "We believe to stabilize our local neighborhoods we must get people working again and by using some of the NSP to build a building we don't need, we can put some local contractors to work because our 'Buy Local' policy will force us to do so. Basically we are using found money to help keep some of our contributors... uh, I mean, contractors in business." At least then we could nod our heads in collective disgust and say, "Hay, you have to give the guy points for being honest." Instead of course, we get drivel that makes no sense.

The second idea that we believe that we should address is that the NSP money that Osceola County might receive is not because we won some Powerball Taxpayer Lotto. It is not an award for having been studious in our community planning efforts. We are eligible for receiving this money because local governments practiced bad planning and allowed developers to control the growth in our community. One in 69 homes in Osceola County is in foreclosure which is the worst record in Central Florida, and it is because of bad, and very possibly corrupt, planning. For the past commissions, and their henchmen, who helped guide us into this mess, this is your legacy.

While many will point the finger at the individual home owners for this mess and scream personal responsibility, we say simply, you are right. If actions like the intended misuse of NSP money, and the actions of a development minded government have taught us anything it is that, as residents, we are on our own and we need to be responsible for ourselves. Government and the quasi-governmental groups protecting them do not have our backs. They do not want what is best for the residents they represent. They are more than willing to leave a man down in the field to build the next project their buddies dream up. The problem is that the boundaries of personal responsibility get very blurry in the absence of honest information from the experts that surround us.

We hope that the commission will reconsider making the mistake of spending the NSP money improperly. We hope that they will focus on stabilizing the foreclosure nightmare in our county. This is your chance to chart a new legacy that means more than having your names etched on a plaque of a building. It is our chance to get our local contractors working again by creating sustainable plans. Band-Aide measures and lax regulation have proven to be the wrong direction, so maybe it is time we try something else.

Shakedown

There was an excellent article in today's Orlando Sentinel on the Orlando-Orange County Expressway Authority which highlighted the many problems we find with quasi-governmental agencies. As noted in their article, the authority suffers from a culture of corruption at most levels, and has been using its influential powers to swing elections and create ways to take more money from residents. The sad news is that this type of environment is found in governments around the state, including Osceola County.

Here at home, the shakedowns are more blatant but our media is not usually all that aggressive in following up on claims of harassment and cronyism. For years, contractors and developers have been 'urged' to give donations to local pet project organizations used by politicians to leverage re-election bids. It has been so commonplace that many of these companies just consider these 'donations' as a cost of doing business in Osceola County. While we believe that it is important that companies doing business in our county are aware of the non-profit agencies we have in place to help our residents, we do not believe that the pay-to-play model belongs in our community. Organizations such as the Education Foundation, the Boys and Girls Club, and H.O.M.E have, in the past, reaped huge benefits from commissioners who had taken a shine to them. Many of the comments directing developers, who were going through the zoning process, to seek out specific charities have been caught on commission meeting tapes that no one ever questions. Of course now that the money is tight and times are hard the shakedowns have subsided, but the mentality still exists. Political favors here, adjusting an ordinance there, or helping to use taxpayer dollars to finance expanded strip mall developments are just new evolutions of the same game that not one elected official has taken any steps to stop.

Strong ethics reforms must be put in place. Many of the comments and e-mails we have received over the past few weeks have centered around the same arguments. There is no trust and very little confidence in our local elected officials. From insiders and outsiders alike, the sentiment is the same, "We do not trust government to do the right thing." We find this very sad during such difficult times.

Not one of the local governments has made any moves toward ethics reforms even being discussed this year. And in the meantime, the new 'Buy Local' policy already appears to have been hijacked to keep certain affiliated 'mud dropping' members in check. While the WayneWho staff has been excited to hear about the surge in local companies going after local contracts, we have been disheartened in the feedback we have received in how the selection process seems to be working. While we have no evidence of shady dealings with the new process, and only rumors at this point, we are concerned that more has not been done to eliminate the negative perceptions in our local processes. Reforms are needed to rebuild trust in our local process by stopping the possibility of shady dealings. The time for local governments to move on honest ethics reforms is now. The days of the 'shakedown' must come to an end.

Fun And Games

Tonight the City of Kissimmee Commission will vote on and probably pass another tax increase under the label of an 'impact fee' for its parks and recreation division. While we believe that our parks and recreation division is second-to-none as far as the service they provide, we are really questioning why staff would bring a fee increase forward in times of such economic uncertainty? We also really have to question whether the commission has any clue about the difficulties and strains those they represent are dealing with right now? Maybe instead of watching Access Osceola propaganda all day long, commissioners should turn on some other news stations to get some grasp of the unemployment and economic issues in our community. Passing another fee right now is unconscionable.

Our real problem with this increase is what it is being dedicated to. While we firmly believe that the parks department of any municipality is critical to the health and welfare of those living in the community, jobs and a steady income are probably more important. Passing another fee that will cost more jobs and put home ownership that much farther out of reach for many makes no sense during this economic crisis. We also have to question the credibility of the consultant, Tindale Oliver, that is presenting the study and the proposed fee increases because their numbers do not line up with current market trends. Their numbers also make many growth assumptions that are flaky at best. The numbers they show for possible revenue generation are not based on current building trends or even a best guess at what speed construction will return to our area. The numbers are much higher than the reality on the ground. Since an oversupply of a housing inventory is what our 'region' is faced with, how can we expect to generate the funding being promised. Again we hope commissioners will not 'glaze over' during the discussion on revenue generation and will ask some tough questions. The first of which should be, will this fee increase create more jobs than it destroys?

The other thought we had was based on our un-news article from yesterday. The constant struggle for power between all of the governments is hurting our community. All tax and fee increases should be temporarily tabled. All projects should be set aside for two weeks. From this point all government entities should come together and discuss from a 'regional' concept, how our community is going to move forward. Governments passing piecemeal tax increases and creating random building projects will not help this community become sustainable in the future. It will only create an ever declining environment that will cost more and more to manage. Right now local governments need to be aware of what each other is doing and how that is going to effect the members of our community on a broad scope. This concept was really the point of yesterdays article. The WayneWho staff thinks that local governments must stop just having knee-jerk reactions to budget shortfalls and start planning the best coarse of action to make sure revenues are spent smartly.

We know this is a scary concept, but this type of top down thinking can only come from our elected officials. Staff members of the different entities do not normally look at an issue or problem from the perspective of the entire community. They address the problem from their own job title's perspective. This is not bad, but it is part of the problem we are seeing in government right now. Too many chiefs with no concise plan of attack except to get revenues up. Not a smart plan at all.

Again, the WayneWho staff suggests a plan that all local government entities in Osceola County put these tax increases on hold temporarily, call a joint summit that is open to the public and televised to address all of the current issues facing each entity and the citizens they represent, and then discuss the issues and develop a blueprint to work the problem. We know that this is an unpopular and conservative approach to governing, but we firmly believe to preserve our community, we must conserve our community.

We Picked One

We were glad to see the new direction of the Osceola News-Gazette Editorial from Saturday's edition and wish we had a person to point at to say good job. We will at least give credit to the faceless "Editor" for making the needed corrections to the Lakefront article they had done the week before, and explained the path the public was able to choose for the project. The WayneWho staff is glad to see that they have chosen not to rewrite history, but embrace the true course that was taken. We hope that the public will remember that they can control the fate of their community if they choose to get involved and hold government accountable.

It is in this spirit of compromise that the WayneWho staff offers the rest of this article. We have been very critical of the tax and fee increases proposed by local governments, quasi-governmental groups, and non-profits wanting to suck more from governmental sources. While the first reaction of the WayneWho staff is almost always a resounding 'NO' when governments come asking for more money, we would have to agree that these are not normal times. We believe that our local news media, governments, and agencies should also be willing to comprise in their visions of grand convention centers, cradle to grave social programs, and government's intruding roll into our local private markets, and learn when enough is enough. Its is time that local governments admit their part in the worsening local situation to help restore a sense of trust and stability to our local economy. The WayneWho staff has noticed the beginning of this trend of owning up to the mistakes of the past. In this past weekend's Gazette article, the county finally admits they do not have the money to finish Neptune Road, even though the money to complete the road has already been collected. We feel that admitting to these problems is a critical first step and we should not lay the blame on the new commissioners who inherited them. Our fear is that this new found attempt at honesty and transparency will be short lived.

In the end Government is about compromise so our staff decided to hold an emergency meeting this weekend to discuss what ideas could be brought forward by government officials to help our local community. We asked ourselves where we would be willing to compromise and worked from there. We did the numbers on all of the proposed tax and fee increases to find out which ones might have any hope of pulling our community out of the economic quagmire it now finds itself in. While we feel our plan does increase some risk factors for some residents and businesses who are teetering on the brink of collapse, we believe that it is the only compromise that will have a positive effect for government and residents.

We believe the county should raise the gas tax the proposed five cents for the next three years only. We believe that since government programs and tax increases never go away once they are approved, this tax increase should be set to sunset automatically. Our plan, like ideas brought up on another blog this morning, would select very specific transportation projects that would benefit the existing community directly. No money should be spent to finance road projects that only help developers build more homes. Projects like overpasses on John Young Parkway and Osceola Parkway that would help to speed people, goods, and services from destination to destination should get the highest priority. Improving our transportation infrastructure to promote economic development is the key. Our numbers show that while forcing the sunset of the gas tax in three years will not generate the necessary funding for the entire amount of unfunded road projects that should have already been taken care of, we believe this will force government to more wisely choose which projects should get done. If the average resident of Osceola county is having to make tough decisions on where to spend money they have actually worked for, government should do the same for money it has not worked for. The residents should not be punished for government's inability to manage its money. Part of our compromise is that this tax increase should be the only tax increase for the next three years. No raising of impact fees, no increasing millage rates, no increases of government staff, and the suspension of all automatic fee increases for the next three years. Read our lips - No NEW Taxes! If the residents of this community are going to agree to invest even more money into projects they have already paid for, then they need some sort of sign of stability in what their monthly expenses are going to be. This goes for all local governments. No more increases. Increases in revenue need to be based on performance and not on the fact that local governments can shake down citizens anytime they want to. It is time local governments restore trust in the system, because right now, the citizens do not trust government with their money.

Our compromise would also include a heightened level of transparency. A chart of accounts for every project that gas tax money is going towards needs to be posted in full online. We believe that this should be done for all government spending, but for now the people should be able to track their new investment to see how wisely it is being used. And when the WayneWho staff says in full, we mean line by line with no hidden expenditures wrapped under bogus titles. If a dollar is spent on a few pencils, then it should be written on the online account that way. The public has a right to know.

We hope that our readers take these ideas and do with them what they will. Maybe our ideas can at least start a discussion of how to move forward instead of the discussion that has gone on so far. Taxing everything in sight is not the answer, but cutting off all government revenue (even if it would make us happy) is not the answer either. This plan is our compromise.

Editorial Shadows

We think that it is time for the 'Editorial' writers in local mainstream newspapers to attach their names to the 'Editorials' they write. While everyone at WayneWho understands the importance of anonymity, we believe that those who ghost write public policy arguments under the banner of 'Editor', a title which adds an element of presumed knowledge and credibility, lose their right to hide in the shadows. The mainstream use and public nature of journalism dictates that all facts be presented on any given argument and part of those facts should include the background and education of the 'editor' presenting a particular argument so the credibility of the argument could be studied for its merits. Or to put it more simply, in true WayneWho fashion, who is the smart person at the Gazette who is in favor of every tax and fee increase that rears its ugly head even when every economist says that raising taxes right now is the wrong thing to do? We would be scared to release our names to the public as well if we were running around screaming "raise their taxes, raise their taxes." That is like screaming "Harley Davidson Sucks" at the Cabbage Patch during bike week. Not smart, is the nicest way to label the action.

To recap, the 'Editor' was for the Fire Tax, the Security Alarm Tax, the original sales tax increase for schools that was soundly defeated by the public, government subsidized housing (the 'Editor' was for it before he/she was against it), and now he/she/they are promoting another sales tax increase. The pattern of the redistribution mentality of the 'Editor' has become painfully apparent which leads us to question the wisdom of the writer(s). Does a journalism degree qualify one to set public policy on the economics and taxing principles guiding local governments? If it does and the 'Editor' has all the answers, why not step up and run for office to help us fix our problems? This would give us an idea of whether, or not, editorial wisdom should override the democratic nature of our form of government in lieu of more socialistic principles. In the debates we could find out at what level would the 'Editor' like to tax our community? 40, 50, or maybe 60 percent? And if raising taxes is the solution, where is the study showing the positive improvement that we can expect for more tax increases? For all the public knows, Bernie Madoff is scribbling whimsical editorial thoughts to create some positive cash flow for his prison account while hiding under the banner of 'Editor' and having a good laugh as we tax ourselves into bankruptcy. This might also explain the less than sound fiscal policies our local mainstream periodicals have practiced themselves. The now defunct Osceola department of the failing Orlando Sentinel and the downsized and un-circulating press release machine known as the Osceola News-Gazette do not seem to be the guiding lights when it comes to financial success. We are not sure if their fiscal sense should be taken to heart when it comes to building a strong economy in our community. We are also not sure if the 'editorial' advice should be heeded from an organization that seems to be lashing out at a public that it can no longer count as readership.

We have questioned the legitimacy of 'Editorials' before and the WayneWho staff believes they are becoming more suspect in every edition. Supporting every tax and fee increase just does not make good sense. If the 'editorial staff' at the News-Gazette wants a tax increase so bad, at least just pick one and fight for it. We would love to see a real public policy debate from those who hide under the veil of 'Editor,' but we guess taking cheap shots at the public from the shadows is an easier business model to follow.

History Re-Written

Some call it political spin, others call it rewriting history. The WayneWho staff calls it a nagging reminder, a conscious if you will, of the mistakes governments make and then try to cover up as time passes on. Such is the case with the some of the projects that government has tried to pass no matter what objections surfaced only to later reverse themselves as public outrage swelled. Then a year or so later, the same elected officials try to act like they were the ones who were behind the stopping of the project in the first place. Such is the case with the Kissimmee Lakefront Park.

In this past week's Osceola News-Gazette the press release from the City of Kissimmee for the ground breaking ceremony was reprinted to help usher in a revised history on the historical path of the Kissimme Lakefront Park project. Missing from their article "Polishing a community jewel," was any reference to the public outcry that went on for several weeks as the City Commissioners, CRA 'Commissioners' and local self-interested developers tried to work back room deals to build a short term-rental high-rise condo unit on what is now a children's park and picnic area. Gone was the truth that public lakefront land was going to be 'given' to a developer to construct the high-rise that would be off limits to the average citizens of the City of Kissimmee. Gone was any discussion of the public's fight that ended in a packed commission chambers where attempts to pass the project were shouted down by the audience. Now the history of the "People's Park" is written as “Initially, there was no public input into the planning of the park We went to the commission and once folks got involved, things started to improve.” Wow, but that is not how Eyewitness News, Channel 13, Channel 2, or Fox News covered the political battle over public land from what we remember. We remember lakefront rallies and a political cartoon on fliers being passed out in the restaurants in the downtown area that helped to rally public support for stopping the project, the commission of that time was trying to pass, that put us on a path to the project we have today.

In a quote to the Osceola News-Gazette Mayor Swan said, “There are times that public officials make decisions to enhance the quality of life of its citizens – this is one of them.” While the WayneWho staff offers it congratulations to the Mayor and the Commissioners who have kept the project on the correct path, we would note that only one of the currently seated commissioners, Commissioner Gemskie, was on the commission at the time of the vote and he was not the one who made the motion to stop the project. A quick review of the tape shows Citizen Swan urging the public to be nice to the then seated commission who was trying to build condos on a children's park. Luckily for everyone in our community, the public did not listen because we would have ended up with a half-built bankrupt shell of a building and no place for our community's children to play.

We are deeply disappointed once again by the lack of research and reporting abilities of the staff at the Osceola News-Gazette. While we do not believe that their article needed to contain point by point attacks on the process at that time, a simple reminder that it was the public who made this project what it is today, not government, could actually go a long way in helping to get more people involved with the process. Increases in fees, taxes and tolls, that strike at the heart of the working class Americans that live in our community have left people feeling, once again, the they have no control over their government, or their destiny. An article that accurately stated history could go a long way in reminding people that the government is theirs and that elected officials, no matter how much that want to believe it, are not great wizards that can conjure up anything they wish. They are just people we choose to represent our needs and ideas. In a democracy, the people are the leaders because of the representatives they choose. When those representatives have their status falsely elevated we end up with leaders that no longer reflect the will of the public, which is exactly what almost happened during the original lakefront battle, which we remember as a great story of this community coming together and government stopping to listen. It is amazing how sometimes the truth can be a better story than the fiction some like to spread.

As we were reading the Gazette's article we could not help but to remember a famous quote from the boss character on a Dilbert cartoon. "A leader first makes himself believe the lie, thus turning deception into an inspiring form of optimism." Nothing could be more true.

Twitter Fight

Tomorrow night at the Kissimmee City Commission meeting, one of the most serious items our commission has discussed in many years is on the agenda. Not since the great 'Swine Reclassification' debate that raged a few years ago has an issue bubbled to the surface quite like the issue Commissioner Gemskie has brought up for tomorrow night's meeting. The social and economic balance of our community hangs on the discussion of 'Item 8 C' or the "Commission Cellphone Usage Policy" which is an item intended to discuss, "the Commission policy on its usage of cell phones and personal data devices during commission meetings." While the WayneWho staff has had many reports of select commissioners who seem to excuse themselves from meetings to seemingly get input from California based consultants on issues being discussed via their mobile personal computing devices, we have learned from sources close to someone who once deployed linear parking guidelines at city hall that this is not the reason for the discussion.

To explain how this discussion item has been able to leapfrog the other pressing issues in our community such 9.6% unemployment, the CRA trailer park built with tax dollars in downtown that is still sitting vacant, and the appearance of style hazardous rope-lighting, we must look at unconfirmed incidents that could have happened a couple of weeks ago during a lengthy 'discussion' by Mayor Swan. During one of the 'discussions' where Mayor Swan lays out how he would like the rest of the commission to vote, a 'Twitter' post appeared on one of the other commissioners 'Twitter' page at exactly 6:27 pm that said simply the word 'Boring...' Another post a few minutes later by the same Commissioner stated 'just finished reading the waynewho blog and it sucked today. need more puppet videos that hit g.' This seems to be the post that started of a flurry of angry 'Twitter' posts that made many references that blogging rules do not allow un-news sources, such as WayneWho, to republish. Needless to say the on screen banality of that commission meeting created by the writers at Access Osceola, did not reflect the on-line 'Twitter' fight that was taking shape. The WayneWho staff didn't understand any of this 'Twitter' talk either, so we decided to do some digging.

By the definition posted on Twitter.com, "Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?" This basically means that people post exactly what they are doing at every point during their day. People who use 'Twitter' are known as 'Tweets' by their fellow 'Tweeters' while those of us on the outside normally refer to them as 'Twits.' Basically it is an entire site that has the same 'exciting' and narcissistic consistency as the School Board Updates e-mailed out by our good friend Osceola County School Board Member Jay Wheeler. While most of our readers are probably still trying to understand the value of 'Twitter' let us assure you that it is a site that is worth spending taxpayers money and staff time on trying to figure out how to legislate it's correct usage by elected officials. The WayneWho staff recommends that the Commission appoint a 'Twitter' Czar to help tame tarnishing timely 'Tweets.'

Till tomorrow, 'Tweet' typing.