Although we're not a lawyer (and don't pretend to play one on the Internet), a few legal minds in the Bay area have told CL recently that if John Dingfelder (and Linda Saul-Sena for that matter) challenged the law that the Tampa City Council approved last fall banning people like him for running again for council, he would have a good chance of winning that legal argument.
But there will be no challenge, as Dingfelder posted a message on his Facebook page Wednesday afternoon stating that instead of challenging the system (and asking for the voters support, just months after ending a tough campaign for County Commission), he will go all in building up his own law practice. His Facebook post reads in part:
DingfelderLaw – A name you can trust" Many of you have recently asked me: "What are your plans?" Well, I have decided to continue to serve our community by practicing law-full time. So please tell your friends, family members and local small business owners, that I am available for free consultations.
Breathing a sigh of relief after Dingfelder's announcement are all the other candidates running in the race that Dingfelder presumably was looking at, the city-wide District 1 race. Though Curtis Stokes has some name recognition after being selected to replace Saul-Sena last summer by the council, it's certainly not as good as Dingfelder's. Also running in that contest are Guido Maniscalco, Chris Cano, Tom Slaughter and Rigatoni's owner Rick Barcena.
The council voted last fall 4-2 (Mary Mulhern and Yolie Capin dissented) to ban members who stepped down to run for another office to then come back and run for the council race in the next election – a law clearly aimed at punishing Dingfelder and Saul-Sena, who both had announced early a year ago that they would in fact run for County Commission races in the fall of 2010.
Thomas Scott, Charlie Miranda, Stokes and Joseph Caetano all voted for the law. All will be on the ballot in March in Tampa – Scott for mayor, and the other three running for re-election.
Both Dingfelder and Saul-Sena already spent more time than they ever imagined with lawyers last year, after a failure to submit paperwork to the Supervisor of Elections office regarding their plan to leave the council early to run for high office became known. They both ended quitting the council literally overnight upon recognizing their sin of omission last summer, though through court action they were able to withstand legal challenges to their candidacies for County Commission.
Dingfelder and Saul-Sena were unsuccessful for their bids for county commission last November, caught up in the tsunami that saw very few Democrats elected anywhere in Florida.
For years, Dingfelder has worked with attorney Tom Scarritt with the Scarritt Law Group.
This article appears in Jan 6-12, 2011.