By Thomas Perrin, JMI Public Affairs Director
Return to Civility? It’s always at this time during election season when everyone just wants the first Tuesday in November to hurry up and get here so they don’t have to listen to any more campaign ads…which they have inadvertently memorized.
And it never fails, someone always says, “I can’t believe it–these ads get more and more negative every year! Will candidates ever return to civility?”Well, the Reason Foundation has put together a short video transcribing the text of old campaign flyers from 1800 when John Adams was running against Thomas Jefferson and recreated what their campaign ads would look like if produced today.Maybe those Sink/Scott ads aren’t so harsh after all.Amendment 4 I’ve been very surprised that the media haven’t picked up on the story of St. Pete Beach.You may recall that St. Pete Beach is the town that passed a local version of Amendment 4 a few years ago, and you may have even heard about some of the problems they’ve run into with all the litigation surrounding their land use changes. However, you probably haven’t heard about Resolution 2010-27 which was passed by their city commission in October.Let’s just say it didn’t have very many good things to say about Amendment 4:
NOW, THEREFORE the City Commission of the City of St. Pete Beach, Pinellas County, Florida DOES RESOLVE:
Section 1. Having dedicated its own policies to advancing smart growth, recommends defeat of Amendment 4.
Section 2. Having incurred the time and expense of nearly 2-1/2 years of litigation over comprehensive plan amendment litigation and experienced the undue burden on its tax payers and City government, recommends defeat of Amendment 4.
Section 3. Having placed a substantial modification and repeal of its own version of Amendment 4 before its voters and its electorate having overwhelmingly rejected the broad scope and burden imposed on the electorate by Amendment 4, recommends defeat of Amendment 4.
Section 4. Urges citizens of St. Pete Beach and across Florida to vote “No” on Amendment 4 in the November 2010 election.
INTRODUCED AND PASSED by the City Commission of St. Pete Beach, Pinellas County, Florida on this 12th day of October 2010.
“The ballot is stronger than bullets.” – Joseph A. Schumpeter
2010
