COMMENTARY

MILT THOMAS

Editor’s Note: Last year InsideVero ran a three-part series giving background information about perennial candidate, Charlie Wilson. He is now running again for City Council, a position he won in 2009 but was removed from office after one month for not meeting residency requirements. His residency is also in question this election cycle, as well as complying with regulations regarding political signs. But flirting with legal boundaries while attempting to achieve personal gain has been a consistent theme in his political career. Following is a summary of stories over the years appearing in print and online and from people familiar with Wilson’s political activities.

Back in 1984 in his hometown of Fort Pierce, Charlie Wilson ran the first campaign for Bobby Knowles, who was subsequently elected sheriff of St. Lucie County. Knowles campaign headquarters were in Wilson’s advertising agency and after the election, Wilson became chairman of Knowles’ Citizens Advisory Council. More on this later.

In 1988 he ran for and lost a state house race.

In 1992 Wilson ran for St. Lucie County tax collector, losing that race to Dorothy Conrad.

The same year, Wilson came under scrutiny regarding his advertising company’s contract with the St. Lucie County’s Tourist Development Council. He had handled advertising for them from 1988-1991 and results of a county audit suggested he had overcharged or received money for services not rendered. However, the auditors could not prove he did it intentionally, so he settled with the county. Wilson claimed the charges against him were politically motivated.

After moving to Indian River County in 2001, Wilson provided advertising and public relations services for political and business clients through his company, Media Arts Group.

He worked a short time as news director of Treasure and Space Coast Broadcasting.

He also became active in Indian River County politics and in 2004 ran for a seat on the Hospital District Board of Trustees, losing to Dr. Hugh McCrystal. According to Larry Reisman’s TCPalm opinion column of October 16, 2009, “Charlie was the Brian Heady of the Indian River County Hospital District, complaining about the way things were done at the entity before running for a seat there.”

It would become a pattern for Wilson, acting as an outspoken critic of a government entity as he tried to gain an official voice, either through election or appointment. As a registered lobbyist in Indian River and St. Lucie Counties, he remained active in both communities.

In August of 2006 he applied for Indian River County’s emergency management position, but was not hired.

In 2007 during the Ft. Pierce mayoral election, in which he supported candidate Harold “Buzz” Smyth (his brother) against incumbent, Bob Benton, and candidate Rick Reed, Wilson’s involvement came into question. He wrote in the TCPalm comments section on December 17, 2007: “To answer the residency question which I have answered many times before, I was born in Ft. Pierce and lived in St. Lucie County for 30 years. I was hired by the St. Lucie Association to serve as spokesperson because I live out of town and immune from attack by City Hall.

A reader commented onmyhometownnews.net in December 2007: “Let’s get the facts right on the St. Lucie Association. It’s interesting that candidate Buzz Smith (sic) stepped down from the board of directors to run for mayor. It’s also interesting that the Board of Directors of the St. Lucie Association are his relatives. His mother is Jean Wilson, his uncle is Richard Wilson, his aunt is Linda Hudson, and the spokesperson is Smith’s Charlie Wilson, his brother. By the way, Charlie Wilson is a resident of Indian River County. I’d say this is a family affair that is misleading St. Lucie County residents.”

Charlie Wilson is listed elsewhere as executive director of the St. Lucie Association. It is also interesting that his brother, Harold “Buzz” Smyth, would later be hired as the city’s economic development liaison (see below).

Two years later, Wilson would win election to the Vero Beach City Council, only to be removed because he did not establish residency requirements.

As to Smyth’s stint in economic development, in a January 2011 opinion piece by Scripps columnist Anthony Westbury, he commented on Smyth’s appearance before the Ft. Pierce City Commission about his work as the city’s economic liaison consultant. “Smyth was summoned to account for his activities in the third quarter of the year. Unless he scores a passing grade, the city has the right to withhold payment for the previous quarter or even terminate the entire agreement.”

It is interesting to compare the comments about Wilson’s brother and the scrutiny Wilson came under when handling St. Lucie County’s tourism funds, with Wilson’s long-time criticism of the Indian River County Chamber of Commerce for its handling of economic development and tourism, which has been considered exemplary by local and state government officials.

In 2007 Wilson started an online blog, Indian River Report. Prime subjects that he wrote critically about were impact fees and the Chamber of Commerce, especially about its handling of tourism and economic development. Wilson authored several other short-lived blogs, The Charlie Wilson Report and Vero Beach Business Directory.

At the March 14, 2007, Tourist Development Council meeting, with Charlie Wilson in the audience, a motion was made to put out RFPs (request for proposals) for competitive bids to handle the county’s tourist development advertising. In the minutes, Council member Susan Adams said she had been approached by Charlie Wilson, who told her he had been offered a job to oversee the RFP process but he had not indicated who offered him that job. At that, Wilson then stood to deny the allegation. The RFP motion was defeated by the TDC.

However, two weeks earlier, on February 27, Wilson had submitted a draft report to Commissioner Gary Wheeler, suggesting how tourism advertising could be better handled by an agency other than the Chamber of Commerce, presumably his own.

Then at the April 3, 2007 County Commission meeting, Wilson asked the county to take tourism advertising in-house (to be handled by whom?) and was rejected.

In 2008, Wilson, a vocal proponent of charter schools, ran for Indian River County School Board but lost to Claudia Jimenez. Around that time (“In close proximity” according to a newspaper account) he was also acting as a consultant for Imagine Charter Schools, a private company. He is still on its board today.

At the April 21, 2009, County Commission meeting, Commissioner Wesley Davis submitted Charlie Wilson’s name for appointment to the Tourist Development Council, but he was not selected.

He was most successful in his criticism of Vero Electric and beginning in 2009, advocated the sale to FPL, promising the city would reap some $80 million in the deal. He ran for City Council on that platform and won decisively. His success was short-lived however, when Circuit Judge Paul Kanarek removed him from office for failing to meet the city residency requirements. Ultimately, if the sale had gone through, the city would be losing millions.

Back in his hometown of Fort Pierce, the Ft. Pierce Tribune published a story in November of 2009, under the headline, “Ex-sheriff’s favor may have cost the county $1 million,” The story alleged that Sheriff Bobby Knowles, as a favor to campaign supporter, Vernon Smith, opened a St. Lucie County Sheriff Department bank account at Riverside National Bank that cost St. Lucie County taxpayers $1 million over 16 years. This information was provided to the Tribune by none other than Charlie Wilson, who had firsthand knowledge as Sheriff Knowles’ campaign manager in 1984 and head of his transition team. The only question that remains is why he turned against Knowles.

Wilson ran for a seat on the Indian River County Commission in 2010. During his campaign, Wilson’s son and girlfriend were arrested for signing false petition forms on behalf of his father. The senior Wilson denied any knowledge of the wrongdoing. He lost in the primary to incumbent Joe Flescher. His son was sentenced to four years in prison.

In a June 17, 2010 article on TCPalm by Scripps editorial editor, Larry Reisman, entitled “Charlie Wilson: Human or Teflon?” Reisman commented that “…The Republican race for Indian River County Commission District 2 is ugly. The question will be whether incumbent Joe Flescher and challenger Dale Simchick can avoid the stink created by the campaign of Charlie Wilson.”

In a Vero Beach 32963 online article posted on September 26, 2012, journalist Eileen Kelley wrote, “No matter what one thinks of Wilson, one thing is clear; he can have an impact. That was very clear last week when a representative of Florida Power & Light summoned Wilson to City Hall to be – as one insider put it – the ‘voice of reason’ during a packed meeting when the City Council eventually voted to sign a $54 million memorandum of understanding to sell the city’s electric utility and then voted against a referendum to let voters and not the council decide the sale. ‘A referendum does nothing but delay, deflect and deny,’ said Wilson during the public comment period.”

On December 18, 2011 in TCPalm, Scripps’ Larry Reisman wrote, “Mr. Wilson, wanting more information before selling is NOT A RUSE. The real question a lot of folks in the community are asking is, What’s in it for Charlie Wilson? Because anytime someone wants to wait for facts and figures he calls them obstructionists…Nobody is trying to deflect delay or deny as Wilson says, just trying to take heed of what the city manager said the other day. O’Connor said it will be 18-24 months before we will know what it will cost the city to get out of the existing contracts and until that is done there can be no sale.”

In December 2010, Wilson and others started Asset Research and Recovery, to recover impact fees paid to the county but as yet, unspent. Wilson contended the fees should be returned to developers and landowners. It was a subject about which Wilson had often expressed passionate criticism in his blogs and through traditional media and in exorcised presentations at county commission meetings. It was also a potentially profitable business. Wilson charged clients a 30% commission for recovering impact fees.

Ten months later, in September 2011, after a falling out with Asset Research and Recovery investors, Wilson stepped down as president and formed two new companies in the same business, Open Permit Search Inc. and Impact Fee Consultants.

Commissioner Wesley Davis was listed as a partner/franchisee in Open Permit Search Corp., but later backed out, according to a story on TCPalm, September 13, 2011. “…Davis said he backed out of a private business venture that could have put him in conflict with his role as an elected official. But he didn’t back out before his name was printed on flyers and cards distributed to businesses across the Treasure Coast.”

In a related story, County Commissioner Tim Zorc, who was elected in November 2012, had done business with Wilson’s other new company, Impact Fee Consultants. Zorc’s name came up in a lawsuit between Wilson and the Vero Beach Museum of Art. The suit was over a $100,000 impact fee refund obtained by Wilson’s company for which he had not been paid his 30 percent commission.

Museum executive director, Lucinda Gedeon, said she dealt with Zorc who represented himself as senior vice president of Impact Fee Consultants.  Zorc said in an interview with InsideVero that his relationship with Wilson was as an independent contractor and it ended when Zorc declared his candidacy for county commissioner.

Wilson subsequently won the lawsuit against the Museum, but then an attorney and partner in Wilson’s former company, Asset Research and Recovery, claimed that Wilson had violated a non-compete clause in their agreement (VeroNews.com, October 8, 2012).

In the summer of 2012, Wilson started a new blog, Wheeler and Wilson, co-authored by retiring County Commissioner Gary Wheeler. It focused primarily on political races. The blog supported Tim Zorc against his opponents and ran during the 2012 election campaign. Wheeler’s and Wilson’s joint blogging effort ended just days after Zorc was elected.

Wilson also used the Wheeler and Wilson blog to continue his criticism of the Chamber of Commerce, often making unsubstantiated accusations about its activities and funding. In the August 10, 2012 issue, he wrote: “Several years ago I suggested we invite advertising agencies to bid on the advertising project.” (Please refer to above comments on the March 14, 2007 Tourist Development Council meeting.) The blog entry concluded with the following statement: “…maybe we can just start a new Chamber of Commerce that actually represents business interests.”

That last comment was apparently not an idle threat. In May 2013, The Florida State Chamber of Commerce received a request from Charlie Wilson asking how to go about opening a new Chamber of Commerce in Vero Beach. In January 2014, he announced the formation of the Vero Beach Chamber of Commerce, claiming his new chamber would focus on Vero Beach, whereas the Indian River County Chamber, known for almost 100 years as the Vero Beach Chamber of Commerce, was not as focused. He would promise not to seek any government funding for marketing as he had done previously in both St. Lucie and Indian River Counties.

In the fall 2012 campaign for Vero Beach City Council, two groups advocating the sale of Vero Electric to FPL, Operation Clean Sweep and Citizens For Truth, were identified in news accounts as being founded by Wilson.

In January 2013, Charlie Wilson made a well-publicized effort to demand the firing of County Administrator, Joe Baird, presumably over his role in retaining impact fees. He demanded Commissioner Peter O’Bryan fire Baird or he would find three candidates to oppose him for reelection. Wilson then formed a political action committee, Committee to Replace Joe Baird. Baird was never fired and O’Bryan won re-election unopposed.

Wilson also criticized this publication regularly during his weekly monologue on the Vov Soos show, many of those attacks in a personal manner. He even announced on the Soos show last January that InsideVero had ceased publication, a story he probably wishes was true. He wrote to InsideVero advertisers warning them not to continue advertising and tried to get the Taxpayer’s Association to form committees to speak with civic groups about boycotting us. All these efforts were unsuccessful.

Whether it is his failed runs for elected office (or his successful run for Vero Beach City Council that lasted one month until he was removed by the courts), or his campaign against impact fees, his strident criticism of local government and its people and elected officials, or the candidate petitions forged by someone working on his behalf, or the short-lived blogs and newsletters selling Vero Electric at all costs to FPL, whatever the subject, Wilson sees a reason to denigrate it. Now he is running for City Council, using televised public meetings to rant about all the problems the city faces due to City personnel, elected officials and more.

But he apparently never learned the time-proven adage that you don’t grow taller by chopping off the heads of those around you.