FOR THE RECORD
By Lee Melsek
lmelsek@gmail.com

Again and again, Judah fails to deliver

It was a politicians dream. Our five councilman and County Commission Chairman Ray Judah pressing the flesh and getting their backs slapped by voters who came looking for a promise. The members of the Bay Oaks Recreation Center Seniors program came to our town council this summer for assurances there would be no cutting of their programs. Less money, they know, means less service. They wanted to hear that wouldn't happen.
Fear not, Judah and the council promised. We will take care of your center and your programs, they proclaimed. Minutes later the council announced it should put another $130,000 in the center's budget. Everyone was happy.

But in the days after the crowds left and the doors were locked, the council, crippled by a potential $900,000 deficit, returned to the hard, cold world of government realities. In the slaughter house of budget cutting workshops the council, and the rest of us, learned a chilling fact: Having to dance to Mr.Judah's tune on taking over Bay Oaks will cost our town almost half of all the property tax dollars it collects.

I say chilling because this town is faced with some huge and costly problems that don't even begin to address the deteriorating condition of that center. There's the millions of dollars needed to repair the decrepit water system. There's the big sums needed to fix our flooding problems. And there's the dwindling income from the grants and other legislative largess we used to take for granted to run the Mound House and Newton Park and could have helped with our road and water fixes.

Will Bay Oaks programs have to be cut? Will pool hours have to be reduced? Stay tuned. What's most disturbing about that is this: The town will take the blame if bad things happen to the those programs serving our seniors and kids.. But the blame will belong to the county.

And to Ray Judah specifically.

Despite all the happy-face spin our council tries to put on it, the ownership shouldn't be changing in the first place, at least not at a time like this. Lee County government is in a much better financial position to continue operating that center now in the middle of this this economic mess that is crippling our tiny town government.

But Ray Judah, the man who claims to represent our island in county government, didn't possess enough influence - or will - to stop the county from putting it onto the backs of our taxpayers, even after the departure of the man who most insisted on the transfer, former County Manager Don Stilwell.

Mr. Judah has a history of letting this island down when it to the really big dollar issues. Let's remember, all of us who were here back then, that in the early nineties it was Judah who chose to head for Tallahassee rather than attend a commission vote on a developer's request that the county give away a public right of way on the Gulf at Virginia Avenue.

He proclaimed his opposition to giving the property away, but on the eve of one of the most historically significant county decisions that's ever faced our island, he took a hike rather than stick around and make sure the commission understood what the island's representative wanted. The land was given away to the Diamondhead Hotel folks in a commission vote that triggered the battle cry for the incorporation that followed.

I am not the only long time resident of this island who has asked, and is asking still, what, exactly, Ray Judah has done for the general public of Fort Myers Beach in the two plus decades he has fed at the trough of county employment. His unwillingness to stop the dumping of Bay Oaks onto our taxpayers is simply the latest in a long line of things he's failed to deliver on
His utter lack of influence on the commission has failed to get Estero Boulevard fixed. Even his good buddy, Mayor Larry Kiker, was dumbfounded when he discovered the county has not set aside any long range money to fix that road.

Mr., Judah also has failed to get us bike paths or even the paltry $1.5 million the council has asked the county for next year to do some work along the boulevard. And there's at least a morsel of evidence Judah's influence with islanders is waning. He lacked the influence with many property owners here to persuade them to sign easements needed for the renourishment project.

He even failed to produce the job that is government promised on Estero Boulevard's recent partial resurfacing. The resurfacing was supposed to be much more inclusive than we ended up with and turned into a farce that angered even his friends at our town hall. He's also failed to guard the tourist tax dollars that come off this island in big numbers and earmarked for beach maintenance. He, in fact, lead the raid on those dollars to give to the wealthy owner of the Boston Red Sox.

With a record like this one perhaps it's time for island voters to begin rethinking Mr. Judah's importance to our county government.

Want to respond to this coulumn? E-mail Lee Melsek with your own opinions. lmelsek@gmail.com



<<< BACK

If you'd like Tidelines mailed to your home or business each month call Lee at 470-3407 and let him know. It's free.