Thank you for sharing your thoughts and giving me an opportunity to respond. Our state attorneys and public defenders -- and their support staffs -- do tremendous work for very little money. I understand your frustration.
I made a decision – more than a year ago – to adjust the salaries of a select few members of my senior staff to ensure pay equity with other government employees with comparable responsibilities. As a longtime county employee who worked his way up through the ranks, I can tell you that there are rare occasions where you find a particular salary is out of proportion. Such was the case with a very few members of my staff who took on additional responsibilities as we transitioned to a new form of government. The salary adjustments were personnel decisions, not personal ones, and I have nothing to gain. The decisions also came way before I was forced to propose a budget with unprecedented service cuts and workforce reductions. I took no joy in making budget recommendations that are universally unpopular, and none of my budget proposals is final. The Board of County Commissioners will adopt a final budget on September 17, 2009.
More important, the total budget and number of employees in the County Executive Office has been decreasing. The proposed budget is nearly $2 million dollars and 20 employees leaner than it was five years ago when I first entered public office. There are fewer people doing more with less.
Again, thank you for giving me an opportunity to respond.
Sincerely,
Carlos Alvarez
Mayor
33 comments:
Carlos Alvarez can try all he wants to make his decision sound rational or fair... but the truth is that this was nothing but a political pay-back. He is a corrupt politician. And he is condescending too.
2 million and a few people leaner. yippie. anybody else read their proposed tax assessments. wish i couls sell my house for the value placed on it by the tax assessor.
still wondering why nobody cared what i thought o you thought about the new stadium//////
Carlos Alvarez is not corrupt. Go get a job in he private sector and make your own way.
I will say that when I read the mayors post, I thought it was silent charlie responding for a second..
Stop the nonsense about government workers making sacrifices to work in the public sector and doing it out of noble motives. As a former ASA, I can state with near certainty that ASA's fall into the following categories:
1. "3 and out." Get 3 years of experience and try to cash in. The motive is pure selfishness and that is fine as long as it is as advertised.
2. The nagging wife syndrome. This is the group that would like to be a number 3 below but has a wife that is just about fed up with seeing her neighbors driving around in a Lexus and looking in the mirror every morning and seeing her boobs start to sag and knowing that the Aventura plastic surgeon ain't going to solve her problems on a government salary. In other words " i don't give a flying #$&&**** how much you love your job, I am sick of eating dinner every Saturday night at Chile's and driving that old mini van every morning to drop off the kids. My sister's husband makes five times what you make and they go skiing every winter in Colorado. Get a new job!!!!!!!!!!. And my MOTHER agrees with me!!!!!!!!!!" Try listening to that every day.
3. The career grunt. These are people who have been there forever and continue to produce top quality work. Everyone admires them for their commitment to public service. But I dissent. They do it for one simple reason: they enjoy it. And that is a good thing. They have calculated that the quality of the work, personal satisfaction, and the benefits of public employment, outweigh whatever perceived rewards there might be in the private sector. 99% of this group is honest, hard working, and a credit to the office. But they are motivated by personal happiness. If they were really committed to public service, they would be working in a homeless shelter. But I tip my hat to them.
4. Dead Wood. These are the people (and we all know who they are) who are incompetent, egomaniacal, and cannot be fired. They proliferate in just about every government bureaucracy. They work five hours a day, do the minimum necessary, and collect a salary. In an ideal world, they would have been fired a long time ago. They have something in common with #3: longevity of service but that is about it. They are primarily female.
A footnote: many of 3's and 4's become judges. The former because of reputation and hard work and the latter because of political connections. And you know who they are.
Rump- I think I'm on to something- Here's a song I've been tinkering with: It's about a guy, sitting in a bar regretting getting into a fight with his girlfriend while on probation. It's based on my experiences as a public defender. Here is the chorus:
I'm sitting in a bar on the inside
waiting for a ride on the outside
She stole my heart in a trailer park
so I jacked the keys to her f'ing car
and crashed that piece of shit
then I walked away.....
There are several verses that tell the story of this sad sack. I strum my guitar while I sing it. I have tried it out in SOBE clubs a couple of times and gotten a fairly good reception. What I am looking for is a producer who can pay for some studio time so I can cut some tracks. Can your readers help?
anybody else catch Rumpole's sly reference to the Godfather in the 3rd DCA Roundup?
"Just to show you that I'm not a hard hearted man and it's not all about dollars and sense..."
Really Rumpole. Do you need Mario Puzo as a ghost writer?
Plus, just where is Salt? And was dinner any good?
8:04--you forgot the last category, #5, the burnouts. They are mostly would-be #3s, but are so sick of dealing with the office politics, getting shit on, needing approval from three supervisors to use the restroom, watching nincompoops get promoted and great lawyers screwed over, etc. that they finally get fed up and leave the office.
8:04 am - brilliant. really. particularly no. 2. note to those poor men traped in that horrible marriage - get out! divorce is good!
Rump eats at Salt? As in the Amelia Island Ritz restaurant? Naaah.
Anyone who drinks Chateau Miami River wouldn't be such a food snob.
But anyone know someone who was in North Florida on tuesday evening?
Wrong SALT. I ate at the one at the 1919 Hotel in Reykjavik, Iceland, where I happen to be Fjod hopping.
I highly recommend it. Weather much more tolerable than Miami.
My Client- Elmskip was gracious enough to fly me here and put me up.
8:04 - the only problem I have with your assessment of employees (which is fairly correct from my experience) is that they are mainly female. I've noticed a lot more deadweight males myself. Anyway, let's not be sexist, ok? Thanks.
Female Lawyer
I''m in favor of sexism. I'm sexy and I flaunt it and men do stuff for me they would not normally do. I haven't paid for a drink since I was 17.
Rumpole- OMG! I so wish I was with you to keep you warm during those cold long dark Icelandic nights.
Eimskip is an Icelandic Shipping company. What are you doing for them Rump de la Rump?
THE CAPTAIN REPORTS:
Rump, Is Miranda dead .....?
Peter D. Baird, the last attorney directly involved in the legal defense of Ernesto Arturo Miranda —whose seminal U.S. Supreme Court case lead to the enshrinement of the Miranda warning against self-incrimination — died on Aug. 27 of leukemia. Baird, 68, was a partner at Phoenix firm Lewis and Roca, where he specialized commercial and professional liability cases.
Cap Out ....
"I believe Riley Martin"
Miranda is dying. They have a very unusual way of dealing with statements in criminal cases in Iceland. They actually don't hit or threaten the person before hand. As strange as it sounds, it works. There are virtually no false confessions here.
8:04.......Without commenting on your other categories (I get the attempt at humor), I find your comments on category 3 to be more than demeaning to those who become career prosecutors (I was a prosecutor, but left several years ago) and APDs. In fact, I think it's one of the dumbest things I've ever seen posted on this site (and that says a lot).
Many of those people stay because they LOVE public service, not because they're looking for more time with the family, appreciate the state benefits, etc. (many work longer hours than they would in private practice). The fact that they ENJOY working for the public doesn't take away from their sacrifice or make their commitment any less admirable.
Your comment: "If they were really committed to public service, they would be working in a homeless shelter" is ridiculous and insulting to them. Is working in a homeless shelter really a higher calling? If someone liked working in the homeless shelter would that make their sacrifice any less noble? Mother Teresa enjoyed helping children and others. Do you respect her any less because of that?
BTDT
Wow! You were right on point with your 4 levels of public service. I left after 3 due to the "nagging wife" but, you know what, sometimes it takes that nagging wife to push you forward.
Dear 8:04
Please stop channelling my wife.#2 is all her, foresure....lol
D. Sisselman
Rumpole
Did you see the new edition of the Fla Bar News. Ina letter to the editor a Kissammee lawyer states that he has handled a score of FIRST Degree Murder cases and NEVER BILLED OVER $3500 to the State. What ya think about that?
D. Sisselman
CHeck out Time mag. online edition about Florida and how for the first time in 63 years the State populatios shrinking. What's to blame, politics as quaul starting with the hefty payraises to the Mayor's staff. Once again our local pols have made us look like $%$#@.
Repost from this morning under the previous post. Maybe Mayor Alvarez will read it:
Part 1
Mr. Mayor, how about getting rid of George Burgess and overpaid assistant county managers? That's what we expected from you when we voted to make you a strong mayor responsible for running the county. Having a county manager is duplicitous, costs more than a U.S. president and provides a convenient non-elected lightning rod to protect the political butts of the elected officials. If you fought so hard for the strong mayor's powers, why don't you use them? Why keep leftovers from the nefarious Penelas administration. People elected you because they were sick and tired of how the county was being run by the insiders and wanted an outsider, a career cop, to clean the county government house. Imagine the people's disappointment when commissioners like Bruno Barreiro, Pepe Diaz, etc. supported and endorsed you for reelection last year.
Why do we have the budget crisis now? Because, during the bubble years, the board of county commissioners chose to keep the millage rate high instead of lowering so that the revenue stream could remain evenly constant from year to year. You could have vetoed those budgets. The result is that, now, after getting used to wastefully spending the windfall tax money from the bubble years, you and the commissioners find yourselves in a bind trying to squeeze money out of taxpayers to keep up the same level of spending and the same inflated budget as in the bubble years even though the economy is in recession and Dade Countians simply do not have the income to afford the unrealistic property taxes that the budget calls for.
Why waste taxpayer money on a stadium for a private professional sports franchise team in a deal that will end up costing at least $2.4 billion when all is said and done but that will only provide new jobs for the next three years and then provide only minimum-wage service jobs. Undoubtedly, George Burgess did such an excellent job negotiating the stadium deal in such a one sided way in favor of the Marlins and against the taxpayers that a casual observer could reasonably believe that he was a Loria employee instead of the county manager. Why did you support this one-sided deal? Why didn't you insist in a deal that would have actually benefited the taxpayers? Can you build us an office building and parking garage next to the Justice Building for us attorneys who work here? We would bring lots of jobs to the area hiring associates, secretaries, paralegals, investigators and contribute to the county budget and economy more than what Jeffrey Loria will under the deal worked out by Burgess and the commissioners.
(Continued in part 2)
Thursday, September 03, 2009 12:37:00 AM
Repost from this morning under the previous post:
Part 2
Why didn't you insist in using the tourism bed tax money for something that would actually contribute to the local economy in an expansive way such as remodeling and updating the Miami Beach Convention Center which is one of the main economic engines in Dade County along with the airport and the seaport?
Why waste at least $450 million of taxpayer money on an unnecessary port tunnel when a couple of downtown streets can be dedicated to truck traffic for the cost of the traffic signs or when a much cheaper truckway ramp can be built from SR 836 to the entrance to the port's bridge?
It is not right to find taxpayer money to these megaprojects while at the same time cutting off, or threatening to cut off, the meals and social services for senior citizens. It's a time honored tradition in this county to manipulate senior citizens and their votes with these threats in order to justify tax increases just like when county government uses scare tactics such as cuts in police and fire protection for the same purposes.
People are sick and tired of the demagoguery coming out of the 111 building. People got shamelessly conned into voting for the transportation half-penny but when it came the time to do the right things and put it before the voters for a possible repeal, you and the commissioners opposed this option, because, again, the county counted on that money to be used for purposes not contemplated in the plan that taxpayers were lyingly sold on.
Dade Countians are sick and tired of political corruption, scams, mendaciousness, special interests, sweetheart deals, refusals to let the voters decide important things like the stadium deal, outright lies to the voters, etc. and that is why they elected you as mayor. People are understandably disappointed because all they see is more of the same.
You have three years left in your term, Mr. Mayor. That's more than enough time to exercise the strong mayor powers that we gave you and clean house. Make Dade County a good place to live again and fulfill the promises for which we elected you.
Thursday, September 03, 2009 12:38:00 AM
I'll tell you what I think Mr. Sisselman:
1. The lawyer is one of those rare types that doesn't care about money at all.
OR
2. The lawyer has "incompetent" and "Rule 3" tattooed on his forehead.
BTDT2
Crime report by the South Florida Sun Sentinel reports: "WILTON MANORS - A Wilton Manors man who has Britney Spears' name tattooed on his body will be charged with grand theft for allegedly stealing a Chihuahua with pink earrings from a popular gay bar, police said today.
Channing Reynolds, 33, who is originally from Pennsylvania, will be charged in the theft of Hudson Hayward Hemingway, a 4-month-old Chihuahua stolen from outside Georgie's Alibi in Wilton Manors in July, according to Wilton Manors police spokesman Detective David Jones." If anyone sees a chihuahua with pink earings answering to the name Hudson Heyward Hemingway they are urged to call crime stoppers.
you can re-do your criticism of the Mayor without the ad hominem attack.
You want me to dig up the hyperlinks, snip the quotes and post them again so the Mayor won't get his feelings hurt?
ASA's, PD's, and Judges are working like dogs while Carlos Alvarez pays his assistants more than a judge on the Florida Suprem Court. The frustration level has pushed people past the tipping point. They're giving up.
The judicial system is collapsing under the weight of petty crimes, foreclosures and hate-mongering by jackboot Republicans crusading against fictitious "activist judges."
Against that, the grotesque nature of county pay rubs salt in the wounds of every ASA, APD and Judge.
And you're concerned that my conclusion? was offensive?
I wonder who wrote this for him. His $43,000-a-year speechwriter or his $125,000-a-year speechwriter?
great post 804. I am a long time government lawyer who has a sucessful wife and i would like to think i fall into category three. I always get annoyed with people who say they are "doing gods work" becuase they are at PDO or SAO for a long time. you are right sir, go work in a homeless shelter if you want to do "gods work". Hate to break it you self righteous jerks (Ray Tasseff at PD's office what the poster child of this type of person) but defending crooks or throwing them in jail just aint gods work
If you take U.S. dollars to Kissammee, you can live high on the hot for pennies a day. 3,500 dollars in Kissamee is a fortune.
I took the dog and he no longer has earrings.
He is a the vet right now having a dog sex change operation.
Tell the owner, I am sorry.
9:36........and others.......while I may not agree with folks like Tasseff on a variety of issues, I respect his motivation........and I find it sad that you find fault with those proud of their public service.
BTDT
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