Sung to the tune of "Help Me Rhonda":
She rode in on her high horse and we never even knew what hit,
Swiped at blacks and gays and porn and she wouldn't even budge a bit,
Well, Ronda you've done it this time (done it this time)
And we're getting tired of all your whines,
So voters, help get Ronda,
Help get her off the commish …
Let's boot Ronda,
Please, let's boot Ronda,
Let's boot Ronda,
Please, let's boot Ronda …
Let's boot Ronda, Yes!
Get her off the commish …
Ronda, Ronda, Ronda. The material she gives us!
Right now, Commissioner Ronda Storms is after the porn-meisters of public-access cable, crusading to vanquish the whole station (which has ridiculed her in the past) because she didn't like the nudity aired on one late night show.
In just four years, Storms has insulted almost every person in Hillsborough County who is not like her.
On whether a law school devoted to graduating minority lawyers could do its job: "We can get them through law school, but we can't get them to seem to pass the Bar."
On why Florida is creating such a law school: "It's guilt money. This is so white people can pat themselves on the back." On whether Keystone residents should be allowed to build their barns before constructing their spacious new homes: "Y'all aren't getting little sheds out there, you know, with toothless people."
Explaining why she opposes waiting periods and background checks for buyers at gun shows: "We as law-abiding citizens are bartering away our civil liberties. What we are doing is expanding the powers of the police state."
Oh, Ronda.
She is the queen of the one-liner — a reporter's dream. Remember when she voiced concerns that taxpayers could get stuck with the $5-million tax bill for Raymond James Stadium?
"Sometimes you are the windshield and sometimes you are the bug. This time we are the bug. But at some point, we will be the windshield, and at some point the Glazers will need this board."
Beautiful! And the time she pondered how the county would pay the tax bill for the stadium? Unforgettable!
"We don't know what pig we are going to squeeze and we want to know what pig will squeal the least."
Do not call this woman stupid. She is not stupid. She is a shrewd operator who plays to the right wing better than any local politician I have ever seen. She's full of outrageous sound bites that I'd find very comical, if not for the fact that she's assailing values that truly matter. Things like equality and free expression. This is America, and Storms can think and say whatever she wants. But the way she does it tends to paint people who don't think like her as, somehow, dirty.
Her latest flap concerns Charles Perkins' sexually explicit public access program, The Happy Show. Once Storms learned the show featured shots of a woman's genitals on a cable network funded by taxpayers, she saw a huge opportunity.
"This to me is a cosmic, universal issue — a life purpose issue," she was quoted saying in the St. Petersburg Times. "I believe that people are called into office to do things. I believe I am here for just such a time as this."
Oh, Ronda! That one's great. It's a calling, a mission—not an opportunity to get attention before you march forward on your re-election effort in a race that could do you in.
Before you assume I'm a great defender of that sexually explicit show or its "right" to be aired on my cable station, I should tell you that I am not. But, government should not be the community censor. Storms is creating a fundamentalist feeding frenzy over something that we could and should decide for ourselves. Skip the grandstanding and put together a citizen's panel to consider the issues and the implications. Let's learn from this. I don't want her to tell me what to view on the Internet as she did with the library, and I don't want her deciding what's aired on television. Imagine the prime-time lineup with Storms in charge: Little House on the Prairie, Father Knows Best, The Lawrence Welk Show and, for some knee-slapping variety, Hee Haw — all in a single night.
I don't want her staining the reputation of the commission with racist, intolerant and ignorant remarks. However, Commissioner Storms possesses qualities that I admire in others. She's forceful, determined and resolute. She fights for her beliefs. She stands firm, even when people condemn or ridicule her.
The problem is, she always seems to take a side that belittles or denigrates those who think or live differently from her. As Weekly Planet reader Charles Jackson wrote me: "If this women had her way, we would all be lily-white, ultra right-wing Christian conservatives watching the 700 Club everyday."
I wanted to know more about her. But she hasn't called back, like her aide promised. All I want to know is what drives her, who influenced her and what it's like being Ronda Storms.
There has been a grandstanding conservative on every governing board I've ever covered as a journalist, but few have so consistently raised my blood pressure like Storms. And, that's the problem.
She's good at what she does.
And she's fighting on the other side.
Contact columnist Fawn Germer at fawn.germer@weeklyplanet.com or 813-248-8888, ext. 134.
This article appears in Apr 10-16, 2002.