Comments on: Century Hires Attorney For Task Force Members Charged With Sunshine Law Violation

By: Safebear

Safebear — Thu, 01 Sep 2016 15:19:25 +0000

Well obviously the attorney is not in favor of Pre-Trial Diversion – that would be too quick. If she fights it for complete dismissal that means she has to interview all 4 for at least an hour each so that’s $1200 then she’s got to go to court for at least 2 hours (anybody every been that it was less?) so that is another $600 and that don’t count the hours of time to type up all the legal documents.

It is a non-criminal violation, nobody is going to jail and if they go to PTD then as long as they know the rules and follow them it will all be expunged and nobody pays nothing to nobody.

By: molinoman

molinoman — Thu, 01 Sep 2016 14:52:49 +0000

Just do the math like most everyone here has already done. Century town counsel and all its officials must really be uneducated backwater morons. If not they sure do not do anything to prove themselves to be anything otherwise. Hee-haw! Saddle up the mules boi, slide me some grits, I gots to get me some education.

By: A Alex

A Alex — Thu, 01 Sep 2016 14:08:52 +0000

4 guilts X $500= $2,000.
Attorney X 4 guilts= PRICELESS

By: William

William — Thu, 01 Sep 2016 13:45:54 +0000

I do not. Here is the Town Charter and all their ordinances, if someone wishes to research:

https://www.municode.com/library/fl/century/codes/code_of_ordinances

By: M in Bratt

M in Bratt — Thu, 01 Sep 2016 13:43:17 +0000

William; Do you or any of your readers have any idea what the process would be for a group of citizens to get the Town of Century dissolved as a chartered town?

By: Gandma

Gandma — Thu, 01 Sep 2016 12:58:38 +0000

Let me see if I have this straight…They are fighting a $500 fine by hiring a $300/hr. attorney? If they accepted the state attorney’s offer, they could go to a Sunshine Law course for educating themselves, follow that training for a probation period and ” if nothing else comes up that (the charges) will be dropped”.
The Century Town Council will pay over $1,000, by the time it’s all done, to try to have the charges dropped. Is this how we best spend taxpayers’ money?

By: M in Bratt

M in Bratt — Thu, 01 Sep 2016 12:50:55 +0000

This vote proves that this City Council can not add and subtract. $300 an hour for a lawyer against a possible total fine of $2000 total for all four of them. If the members of this task force are not capable of agreeing to the terms of pre-trial diversion on their own, they all need to resign. The City Council members that voted for this should also consider resigning. Better yet, let’s circulate a petition to de-certify Century as a city. No police, no fire, no library, all Century City does is collect and spend revenue from taxes, water, gas, and sewer. Let the county take over the parks, sell the water, sewer and gas to pay off the town debt, and let the Town of Century die in peace, and the taxpayers would save some real money, and nobody would miss them, or see any deterioration of services.

By: DLo

DLo — Thu, 01 Sep 2016 12:35:07 +0000

Unbelievable, I suppose I should not be surprised. The council in all of it’s wisdom chooses to hire an attorney for $300 per hour to represent these task force members for a NON-CRIMINAL offense, that EVERYONE is aware that they actually committed, when the prosecutor is recommending pretrial diversion and for them to take a class that they obviously need. This is the biggest waste of money and resources I’ve seen from this incompetent group yet, and that is saying a lot. If someone is unable to process what NONCRIMINAL means I believe that person should not be sitting on a board making recommendations about how to spend tax dollars. DISSOLVE CENTURY TOWN GOVERNMENT NOW!

By: jeeperman

jeeperman — Thu, 01 Sep 2016 12:27:08 +0000

“She made a motion that the two consultants bear the cost of the attorney.”

Appears that council member Ann Brooks is the only one with any amount of common sense.
Those consultants are not going to walk away from more “consulting” work from the city. And if they do, good riddance as they appear to be incompetent.

By: c.w.

c.w. — Thu, 01 Sep 2016 12:14:29 +0000

Hiring an attorney for $300.00 per hour versus a fine that could be “up to” $500.00 per person. This is Century economics. Just how dumb are the officials in Century? You can bet the farm that the attorney will cost more than the fines if the fines are the maximum the judge can charge. lol