IRNA PRESS RELEASE
The Indian River Neighborhood Association has endorsed Dick Winger and Amelia Graves in the 2013 City of Vero Beach elections. The election will be held on November 5, and is set to be a very critical one. In the next session of City Council many important issues will be discussed, from restoring our lagoon to keeping Vero, Vero. We encourage everyone to vote.
Dick Winger’s campaign slogan is “Keep Our Vero, Vero.” He has an established record of working for this community and its people. He has worked hard to keep our water and sewer system in the city’s hands. He’s protected the interests of the police, 911, animal control and lifeguards, as well as keeping our parks clean and beautiful. Dick Winger will work to keep our zoning laws sane, our parks and roads well maintained, to maintain our restrictions on short term rentals.
Amelia Graves is a new candidate. She’s worked very hard so far during this election and this bodes well for her future on City Council. Amelia has five generations of family living here, and she grew up here. Amelia has traveled all over the world, teaching English and helping locals in impoverished places. She knows firsthand how special Vero Beach is and she will work to protect it. The IRNA feels she will bring many fresh ideas to City Council.
Both of these candidates know the Lagoon is important. They both pledged to protect it with stronger fertilizer ordinances as well as presenting creative plans on how to deal with septic tanks near the water.
Both candidates support slowing down the Twin Pairs, not just to help the Downtown, but for safety reasons. Both feel that this would be done less expensively in a few years when the state does some work on the road.
Both of these candidates believe civility in government is important. Both encapsulate the spirit of the Indian River Neighborhood Association and we encourage you to vote for them.
Join us for a luncheon with these candidates on October 15, 2013 at CJ Canons. Please RSVP to Dan Lamson at dan.lamson@indianriverna.com.
The Indian River Neighborhood Association is a non-partisan, county-wide organization with the single objective of preserving Indian River County’s quality of life and natural resources. We are a group of individuals who have organized to provide the sole, strong, unified voice to counterbalance the access, influence and special interests of the development industry. We recognize that we cannot match the developers and their allies in financial strength or influence from paid lobbyists, but as organized citizens with intense and diverse talents and experience, we have been and will continue to be a potent political force in controlling unbridled, low quality development.
Indian River Guardian 
Fine and fine, but are they fine? As a resident of Indian River Shores, no one from our city council asked for my opinion, nor to my knowledge for any of my neighbor’s opinions as well. Indian River County needs to focus on its constituent’s electric bills from the City of Vero Beach, presently they are more than 30% over FP&L rates and have been a financial drain on all residents for many years now. What are the platforms of both candidates being endorsed by the Island Community concerning electric rates and how will they address this on going “railroading” of the Indian River Shores residents? What is their solution, and how would they work with the other City council members to achieve this?
SORRY, JUST REALIZED THAT THIS IS THE INDIAN RIVER NEIGHBORHOOD ASSOCIATION AND NOT THE IR SHORES CITY COUNCIL. SO IRNA, PLEASE TELL ME YOUR REASONS FOR ENDORSING THESE CANDIDATES AND HOW THEY WILL DEAL WITH THE HIGH ELECTRIC BILL PROBLEMS THAT WE HAVE.
What is so hard to understand? The deal with FPL is a done deal as far as the city is concerned. We have signed on the dotted line and there is no way to get out of this deal. Now we are just waiting for other kinks to be worked out that we do not have any control over. So drop this issue and let’s talk about issues that the Council can do something about like the lagoon and our local taxes and our city jobs. We can do something about those issues. The other is out of the councils hands.
DEAR SUSAN SEIDLER, AS FOR MYSELF, I MIGHT BE A LITTLE THICKER THAN MOST. WOULD YOU PLEASE EXPLAIN HOW AND WHY THIS IS REALLY A DONE DEAL ESPECIALLY IF PRESENTLY THREE OUT OF FIVE COUNCIL MEMBERS ARE FOR THE SALE AND THE NEXT ELECTION COULD CHANGE THIS! I THINK BRIAN HEADY’S BOOK IS AN INTERESTING READ. IT RELATES TO THE VERO ELECTRIC CO. AND PUTS EVERYTHING IN THE OPEN INCLUDING THE ATTEMPTS AND COVER-UPS OF FORMER COUNCIL MEMBERS. IT OPENS ONES EYES TO DISTRUST AND WARNS US THAT ADDITIONAL SOLUTIONS STILL EXIST! I DON’T KNOW HOW MANY READ HIS BOOK, BUT I WOULD HOPE IT MAKES A DIFFERENCE FOR THE VOTERS AND HELPS THEM ELECT THE RIGHT CANDIDATES. WITH KINDEST REGARDS, LARRY
Larry, The following two stories address your questions.
Even a council composed of as many as five ardent opponents of the sale would be contractually committed to make every effort to conclude the sale. Despite what the Professor of Political Baloney may be telling the listeners of WTTB, the Council would be failing to act in good faith if it refused to provide for the legal counsel necessary to represent the City is concluding the sale. To replace the current transactional attorney with a different firm would be one think – possibly a good idea, but at this point probably not. To simply fail to employ a transactional attorney would be an act of bad faith.
The contract gives either party the right to require specific performance. As long as FPL is willing to pay any additional costs and changes to the existing contract do no negatively impact the City financially, the Council simply does not have the right to refuse to approve those changes.
http://insidevero.com/2013/09/22/talk-of-defunding-transactional-attorneys-is-a-red-heran/
http://insidevero.com/2013/09/19/there-is-no-opt-out-provision-in-citys-agreement-with-fpl/
The fine folks at FPL would prefer to see Carroll re-elected because they want, no 95 percent certainly of closing, but 100 percent certainty. In order to have that additional assurance of Council support, they are willing to see the City of Vero Beach subjected to another two years of Tracy Carroll’s Ft. Lauderdale-style politics. FPL’s offices are in Juno Beach. Amy Brunjes and their other executives live well south of here, and will not have to suffer the consequences of Carroll’s actions, which seem set to turn Vero Beach into another Ft. Lauderdale.
Finally, ALL CAPS IS HARD TO READ.
Also Larry, keep this in mind. The current Council has dragged this out so long that customers of Vero Beach’s electric are paying attorney’s fees that are built into their bill. Would you consider that “Working in the best interest of the community”? I certainly understand your concern with your electric bill being 30% higher than your neighbors in the county, but your current Vice Mayor isn’t doing you any favors. We need a quick resolution that will permanently lower rates. That’s what Amelia stands for and that’s why she’s getting endorsements from organizations such as the IRNA.
Hi Larry,
I too am upset about the high electric bills here in Vero Beach. If the troika had not been so singleminded in their determination to sell our electric plant to and only to FPL, things may have gone differently. If the troika had listened when people who understood what they were getting us into, warned them of the problems that the sale to FPL would be faced with, if only! We would have not now be paying extra on our electric bill to cover the cost of our outrageously expensive and apparently not very skilled transitional attorneys. We have to accept the mess they created and elect Amelia Graves who is determined to have this matter finally settled in the most financially friendly way for our city and our electric customers. What’s been done to us already cannot be undone.. The financially harmful deal has been signed.
Now with the loss of City income that the power plant provided, you don’t have to be a genius to understand that I order to make ends meet we have to either raise taxes to meet the shortfall and maintain our standards or cut services and city jobs or a combination of both, but loosing that city income will have a profound effect on our lives here in Vero and I believe that we will all regret how this plant was sold out from under us for many years to come.
Leicalarry,
Have you considered the reason for these high utility bills? The three council members signed a contract in advance of finalizing contracts already enforced by other cities and OUC, FMPA, and have agreed on a sale price of $111,000.00 on an appraisal of more than &185,000.00. They have agreed to advance the $500.00 an hour transactional attorneys twice…attorneys who have botched the sale from day one! The Troika are hell bent on selling what they call an “eyesore” to the waterfront. They do not and have not considered the extent of time that it would take to finalize this sale, nor did they care about that from day one. All of the utility customers are paying high bills because of their lack of concern, not just IR Shores. We have all been subjected to rate hikes because of this and not just once, and it will happen again. Will this sale lower our bills? I am not so sure, and guess what, I believe that the city residents will be paying for this sale alot longer than the three signing council members want to admit. There isn’t much money left from this sale ( if any ) by the time all fines are payed and we remove our lines from IR Shores. Will we ( city taxpayers) be held captive for years to come with continual tax hikes, will we have lower services that no one in the county seem to care about? My guess, until the actual closing of this deal, there will be more rate hikes and no one will ever know the true damage until it is over with. Damage to this city is yet to be seen.
I would like to thank all of you for responding to my comments on this “horrific” subject. I would feel a lot better if all of you did not have the same electric bills as I do, and I feel even worse for those who are City residents and will have to burden the impending financial storm that now appears imminent. Perhaps the wisdom learned by us is greater than the money we have all spent, and it is times like these that we realize we are all connected and must work together! Not having a vote, I pray that the concerned voters will understand the problems at hand and stand together to save this great city, to end the bigotry, to respect every neighbors privacy, and to deliver electricity that is affordable for all!