Meet Jo-Ann Golden, District #3 Commissioner:

I wish that I decided to stay a little longer at the City Commission meeting last Tuesday. The following item happened to be discussion of whether or not to waive rules so that the decision to purchase Palm Beach County water could be reconsidered. The impetus for this was the item under the "Presentation" section of the agenda offered by Commissioner Golden. The following is exactly how the item appeared on the agenda. The memorandum offered as back-up by Commissioner Golden appears above.

But you ask, Wes, there isn't anything mentioned about the water agreement with Palm Beach County, how did the Reverse Osmosis plant come up for discussion again? And the memorandum offered by the Commissioner as back-up says that there is "No Program Impact" and "No fiscal impact" and "No alternatives are being offered", what gives?

You ask excellent questions. The above was the Trojan horse which started out simply enough as an elementary presentation on elements that make for good decision making, something that the Commissioners, Mayor and City staff need to be schooled on for sure. That was about 1/5 of the "Presentation". By the way, individual items under "Presentations" time-limited by the rules that govern City Commission meetings - meaning that they are limited to 10 minutes. There is also no discussion allowed by the public following presentations.

Mayor Clemens, who later in the meeting seemed hamstrung by the rules in allowing additional public comment and comment after Commission deliberation, chose not to enforce the 10 minute limitation in this case. And, based on the publicly advertised agenda, when the discussion started slipping into the benefits and lack of information provided related to the decision to purchase County water or go with our own Reverse Osmosis plant, he chose to sit on his hands and allowed the presentation to continue even though what was being talked about was not advertised. Then he nearly came unglued later in the meeting (the part that I missed) about how this was brought up again. But, he had the power to control the meeting and didn't. Hmmmm.

The original decision to go with the County water option happened at the April 15th meeting. Under Robert's Rules of Order, a previously made decision can only be called up for reconsideration through a motion by a member of the prevailing side of the question. Hence the reason for the Trojan horse. City Attorney Karns further refined that to be only possible at the same meeting.

Commissioner Golden ultimately proved unsuccessful in her attempt to get the item back on the agenda for reconsideration, and the vote failed 2-3, with the Mayor along with Commissioners Vespo and Lowe voting against it.

Now, all that being said, our decision making process is flawed, Mock-Roos (the City's engineering firm that drove the RO decision) does not deserve the "Contract for Life" that it thinks it has with the City, our procurement of professional services needs a major overhaul, and the City will need a reliable (and economically palatable) potable water supply in the future. But the decision has been made and we have to live with the consequences.

Perhaps if Commissioner Golden had started out her administration engaged in real attempts at reform of the decision making process, perhaps this would not have been the result as we would now be a year along in the reforms. Perhaps her negotiation of the lucrative City Manager's contract, with liberal requirements for being physically in City Hall and no real need (ha!) to respond directly to the public, could have been better directed so that we had a more responsive senior staff able to gather the appropriate information for such an important decision. Instead we get another display of minority rule in the City of Lake Worth.

Other questionable actions by Commissioner Golden so far in her term include:

• Putting the Compass lease back on the agenda after she voted in favor of it, with a room full of saber rattling supporters, without informing anyone directly from Compass about the item being on an upcoming agenda. This coming from a project manager of a non-profit that leases a City building, who has been asked time and again to produce financials of the non-profits' operations by the City Commission when they act to extend the lease.
• Presenting a "script" in the form of a tape-recorded message in her own voice as she sat on the dais regarding our electric utility and possibilities to exist FMPA - which was obviously prepared by someone else without disclosing the name of who that someone was, even though everyone knew who it was. Disingenuous at best.
• Attempting to wrestle control of the CRA Board and bring it under the Commission's already over-burdened purview. She was the LEAD Commissioner in this attempt and called another surprise meeting without advising CRA board volunteers of the item being placed on the agenda. See quote above from Commissioner Golden's campaign materials.
• Also related to the CRA, not recognizing any possible perceived or real conflict of interest as it relates to her own non-profit Community Development Corporation and the Commissioner being a policy maker for the CRA.
• Saying "I will put a "Cop on the Block" in her campaign literature as we find ourselves deep within a crime wave and a budget crisis that has trouble funding existing levels of policing.