GUEST COMMENTARY

BEA GARDNER

It is no secret that I have endorsed the OK’S for Vero Beach City Council. The OK’S are none other than O for Old, K for Kramer and S for Shupe.

And, it is no secret that the beach rag, out of seven candidates, only endorsed one candidate – Pilar Turner. I find it hard to believe that they could not find two more good candidates to support, even if all they could come up with were Heady and Wilson.

Word on the street has Kramer and Old being the two top vote getters, and it’s beginning to look like there might be a battle for the third seat between. So, in typical Bea-isms style, I am going to spell out the reasons why you should choose Shupe over Turner.

There is a difference between Jack Shupe and Pilar Turner. One thing that comes to mind Is the fact that Shupe seems to be incapable of rolling his eyes as good as Turner does.

Did you know that Shupe is running for a seat on the Vero Council and, unlike Turner, he has no intention of supporting the Shores and the County in law suits that have potential to damage the City in which he is hoping to serve?

Now, if Jack Shupe is running because he wants to serve the Citizens of the Vero Beach, then why is Turner running when she seems to be more interested in helping her friends outside the city limits with their plans to sue the city? I could probably come up with a few guesses but, for the sake of argument I think I will just give you my laundry list of why you should NOT vote for Turner.

Here are my reasons NOT to vote for Turner as was stated on Bea-isms in my Sept. 11 article.

Taking a closer look at her past votes and past positions during her tenure on City Council, I think you just might agree with me that she does not deserve another term.

Actually, as you look over her record it is hard to imagine her wanting anything good to happen to Vero Beach – the very city she says she wants to serve.

• Pilar Turner voted NO to go to court on the Tracy Carroll short term rental issue
• Pilar Turner voted YES to sell the Cemetery
• Pilar Turner voted YES to sell the Water and Sewer System to the County, knowing that the W&S is a profitable enterprise fund for the City.
• Pilar Turner did indeed want and expect the residents of the City to choke up an additional $26 million to FPL during the final stages of trying to make a sale of the Electric Utility happen.
• Pilar Turner voted NO to the dog park. In fact she wanted to sell the land and get rid of the Animal Officer.
• Pilar Turner was chosen to Represent the City on the FMPA board and near as I can tell she has done a poor job, especially in the PR department with that entity. In fact, I heard she missed attending over five of the board meetings that she was supposed to be attending.
• Pilar Turner voted NO on the Enterprise Zone.
• Pilar Turner constantly interrupts citizens when they are addressing the council, especially when she disagrees with them.
• Pilar Turner is constantly quoting unrelated and somewhat goofy “benchmark” numbers in her effort to govern by benchmarking.
• Pilar Turner has been part of the group, better known as the Troika, that has cost the City close to $2M  to make a sale of the utility happen while not understanding that this could never happen due to existing contracts and obligations that the City is entangled in.
• Pilar Turner, and the rest of the troika, jubilantly signed a sales agreement with FPL before all the details were worked out.
• Pilar Turner objected to the gathering of Public Records request that the special attorney for the City had requested so that he could dig in to the records and properly defend the City of Vero Beach regarding the law suits from the Shores and the County.

Vote for the OK’S and the City will be OK. Make all three of your votes count.

Editor’s note: Bea Gardner is the creator of Bea-isms.com.