Whistle-blowers Sue
U.S. District Judge Susan Bucklew has unsealed a lawsuit filed by five former and current Hillsborough County government employees who claim their bosses in a redevelopment agency have misused federal and state grant money.
According to the complaint, top officials of the county Community Improvement Department filed false paperwork with federal and state authorities in order to cover up their misappropriation of funds and failure to monitor grant recipients.
The lawsuit focuses on the county department's troubled former director, Kevin McConnell, who transferred to a less stressful job in the water department last year after he was treated for alcohol abuse.
The allegations of favoritism in county redevelopment funding vaguely resemble the claims made against former Tampa redevelopment czar Steve LaBrake, who was forced out of his job in 2001 amid a federal grand jury investigation.
McConnell's former agency showered a nonprofit called the Alliance for Affordable Housing with about $15-million in grant money, according to the lawsuit. The court complaint states that McConnell's wife worked for the alliance "at a generous salary" and his brother did real estate appraisals for the group.
McConnell and his superiors have denied that he did anything improper to benefit the alliance while he was in his old job.
The millions of dollars in grant money kept coming to the alliance even though the nonprofit wasn't audited from 1995 to 2000. Grant makers require the county to make sure the ultimate recipient of their money is audited yearly.
One of the plaintiff-employees, Kay Jones, complained to her supervisors about another county program. In 2000, Jones told her bosses that the county was providing rental assistance to some who might be able to pay their own rent. She blamed the county's lax monitoring of the so-called Section 8 program.
According to the lawsuit, her supervisors responded by eventually firing Jones, an 18-year county employee, for "wasting time investigating fraud and abuse."
The lawsuit was originally filed under seal in August 2001. Most of the court file remains out of public view.
The employees are suing under the federal False Claims Act, which allows whistleblowers to share in any monetary recovery from parties who are found to have defrauded the government.
Assistant County Attorney Stephen M. Todd told Weekly Planet that his office's preliminary review indicates "there is a strong basis for a complete dismissal of the suit" and the county will be responding accordingly within the next few weeks.
—Francis X. Gilpin
Sandy Bottom Line
Call it democracy in action. Call it the push-and-pull of politics. Or just call it raising one hell of a stink.
Whatever it is, it worked.
Pinellas County commissioners voted 4-to-3 against allowing the St. Petersburg/ Clearwater Area Convention and Visitors Bureau (CVB) to defer $2.5-million from a beach restoration fund after the area's chambers of commerce protested (see "Sand Dollars," http://www.weeklyplanet.com/2002-08-14/news_feature.html).
"The outcry from their constituents all said the same message," said Deborah Stambaugh, president and chief executive of the Tampa Bay Beaches Chamber of Commerce. "It's hard to ignore that."
CVB Executive Director Carole Ketterhagen said her bureau needed the money to create an additional marketing position and cover a $2.5-million budget shortfall that resulted from reduced bed taxes. But Stambaugh and other chamber representatives believed taking the money from the beach fund would send a negative message to the federal government, which subsidizes beach enhancement programs.
To manage its shortfall, the CVB will be allowed to borrow leftover money from the county and pay it back with interest in the same fiscal year.
Stambaugh hopes the budget dispute will bring the area business leaders and the CVB closer together. "I would hope that there would always be the intent to work through the chambers and not around the chambers," she said.
—Trevor Aaronson
Shaq Attacked
I, for one, was delighted to see Shaquille O'Neal get roasted in the media for not showing up at his celebrity basketball weekend a while back. As a card-carrying Orlando Magic fan, I still hold a grudge for him signing with the Lakers.
Shaq's no-show left a bunch of kids disappointed and parents out some pretty big bucks. I was at the game. The whole thing was a sham.
In the aftermath, it came to light that he was sick. But he didn't call. Then local dailies reported that Darryl Madison, promoter of the charity event, may have never had a firm contract with O'Neal. He said he paid Shaq's representatives $50,000. Shaq's people said they never got the money. The dailies started to ease up on O'Neal and focus their attention on Madison's nefarious dealings and questionable past.
They're missing a major point: Why in hell was the NBA superstar asking $50,000 to show up at a charity event?
O'Neal's 2001-02 NBA salary was $22.4-million, escalating to $25.2-million this coming season. Using last season's numbers, O'Neal makes $61,370 every day of the year, whether he scores 40 against Sacramento or plays video games all day. And that doesn't count endorsements or other income. Yet the big man wants $50K to be in Tampa for a few days. That's disgusting.
Shaq should've either done the charity event or not, but yo, man, don't take the dough.
—Eric Snider
This article appears in Aug 28 – Sep 3, 2002.