Miami Beach Tennis Scandal Articles

Collection of Articles on the Flamingo Park Tennis Scandal

 

http://www.scribd.com/collections/2616888/Tennis-Future

Sexual Encounter in Collins Park Crawl Space

CRAWL SPACE by David Arthur Walters

Everybody needs some crawl space

I encountered a nicely dressed couple from Europe at the beautiful new Miami Beach library on 22nd Street. I was typing a chapter of my novel on the 15-minute guest computer. I struck up a conversation with the man next to me, who was printing out a pile of financial documents. His wife joined us and we stepped outside and chatted.

Jan and Eric are financial consultants. She hails from Poland, and he from Iceland. They were in Miami to buy a yacht and conduct other business, and would soon go on to Great Britain and Hong Kong to finalize a $ 1.5 billion foreign aid transaction for low-cost housing in Central America.

I feel a certain tour-guide duty towards visitors wherever I might be living for long: I have lived among visitors and strangers most of my life, and have even been in the hotel and tourist business. Jan and Eric wanted to stretch their legs and get some coffee and snacks, so I took them over to the filling station nearby to buy refreshments. Eric and I had cortaditos - short cups of strong coffee. We sat down on the bench in front of the Miami Ballet Center and chatted, more and more rapidly so as we sipped our coffee.

Our conversation turned to politics, and, of course, to the Bush Administration. President Bush is hated with a passion throughout the world, they said. As for Americans in general, they are not hated but are believed to be "morons" who are so interested in their selves that they are blinded to each other and to the rest of the world. The inside story on Bush, I was informed by Jan, is that he had fallen off the wagon in the worst way; his puffy eyes and stumbling speech is a dead giveaway, she observed, and said Mr. Blair had to practically carry him out of a reception.

The smarter Americans, she said, had gotten out of the United States with their money. Some of them, she noted, are part of an expatriate group in Latin America, called La Boca del Toro. After she and her husband winds up the foreign-aid aid deal, for which they will earn $ 3 million, she claimed, they will return to Miami to pay for, pick up the $750,000 yacht they bought and sail it to Panama and parts beyond.

A local resident drifted by as we were conversing - he was yelling incoherently and swinging a golf club over his head. Don't worry, I said, there is a shelter for the formerly homeless and the mentally ill around the corner - but the residents are harmless. They have a place to live, a mess hall, and some pocket change as well; they are not known to panhandle or to steal. I am acquainted with several of them, I said, and the ones I know are nice people. One of them is a mystic and author who might make it big if things go well.

Oh, we are not worried, said the man from Iceland. It is a shame that so many people are desperately poor and sick, and sleeping in the streets, he noted, in this rich country. That would not be permitted in civilized places. Yes, I agreed, it is a shame, almost everybody talks about it but few do anything. Many Europeans have told me they won't come back to South Beach again. But many will still come because it is a major sin city, where you can get plenty of drugs, sex, and booze, and party until you drop dead. As for me, I said, I am not into partying and coffee is my drug of choice, but I would rather be around people having fun. Besides, I love the beach itself: without it I would move away immediately.

"It is awful here, so much poverty and many crooks," Jan said. "There are much nicer places in the world. You have a very nice library here, by the way."

"Let's take a walk in the park," I suggested, and stood up.

"Good idea," Eric remarked - we got up and strolled across the street.

"The library collection was previously located right there, in Collins Park," I nodded towards the old structure.

"I was here before," Eric said. "I remember it - there were many poor people inside with their belongings," he said.

He was right: the facility had become a sort of Potemkin library or unofficial day center for dislocated and mentally ill persons on South Beach.

"They're supposed to tear it down," I said, "everything except the rotunda, the theatre on this end. The sculpted wall of the rotunda relates a symbolic drama, of human development. There's the Egyptian sign of life over there, and you see a Pi here and there. Albert Vidra had concrete poured into the mold which he sculpted in the sand on the ground all around, then the walls were raised. The sculpture was titled 'The Story of Man.' I don't know what they're going to do with the remaining rotunda. A homeless activist thinks the whole building should be replaced with an official day center for the homeless."

"That's a good idea. Maybe those men laying around in front could go inside and get a shower, wash their things, eat some food, and do things," the woman said softly, gazing at the dozen or so vagrants stretched out on sleeping bags, cardboard boxes, and dirty blankets along the front portico.

Portico, a covered porch, a great place for a cynic to live in a tub, I thought to myself, but somebody might steal it.

"No, they can't turn it into a shelter. When Mr. Collins donated the land he put restrictions on its use. And even if he had not of done so, that sort of thing would not be allowed because it is contrary to the revitalization."

"Condos?" Eric asked.

"Yeah. Look there - on the back end of the park - they are already putting up a $ 100-million condominium called Artécity. The area between 21st and 23rd Streets, in and around Collins Park, was named the Collins Park Cultural Center four years ago. As you can see, the area is kind of dilapidated."

"Dilapidated?"

"Blighted."

"Oh, yes. It needs to be, how do you say, gentrified."

"You've got it - you're English is excellent."

"I need English for business."

"They usually say 'revitalized', to be politically correct. The poor residents didn't like the idea that their people were not gentry, or are ill bred because the state wanted to seize their property for rich people. The Collins Park Cultural Center, along with the 'Art District' of which is part", I went on, indicating the surroundings with a sweeping right arm, "is being revitalized by real estate developers who are capitalizing on South Beach's reputation for Art Deco architecture."

"That makes sense," said the man.

"Oh, no!" Jan suddenly exclaimed and put her hand over her eyes as we walked by the old library rotunda.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"Oh, there's somebody under the rotunda, doing it!"

"Doing it?"

"Doing it, you Americans call it screwing," she said. Her husband chuckled.

Sure enough, the shy woman who lives in the crawl space under the library was being laid by her mate - they had a sheet around them, however, so the scene was not that obscene, even in broad daylight right on the luxurious tourist strip.

"She lives under there," I said. "She keeps cats under there too - one just had a litter - so I suppose they keep the rats and roaches off. Maybe she should hang some curtains so people can't look inside."

"Lives there? There is no room!"

"Oh, it's got to be a foot and a half, maybe two feet between the dirt and the flooring. She has lain cardboard down. She's got canned food. She's been there for a few years. They sealed it up once with concrete blocks, but she dug in elsewhere and set up house again."

"Why doesn't somebody help her?" asked my Polish acquaintance.

"Well, they did once. She's about thirty-something, the ideal American age, plainly attractive, a bit mousy, but from what I hear she's a mouse that roars. She drinks heavy sometimes. She used to open up the library door and yell for her mate like a shrew, so she got eighty-sixed from the library. But a decent place was found for her to live in. They threw her out for carrying on, so she came back home. People just let her be.

"Come on," I gestured to the front entrance, "let's take a look at the plaque on the front of the library here," I gestured.

We walked around a few homeless men sprawled out near the entrance. The plaque indicated that the abandoned library had been dedicated on November 25, of 1962 during Mayor Kenneth Oka's term. The dedication read:

The Library is the Mirror of the World

"They can say that again," I declared.

"We've got to be off now," Eric said.

"Where are you staying?"

"We were staying downtown, but we got angry at the crook that owns the hotel, so we came down to the beach."

"Oh, well, I'd put you up at my place, but I live in a dumpy little room." - I indicated my willingness to play host. To which I added, "As a matter of fact, if I don't find some work very soon I might be sleeping on the porch with these homeless people. Maybe I'll have to take up drugs and drinking to fit in."

"Oh, we're homeless, too, this weekend," said his wife. "We're going to sleep on North Beach behind a hotel we used to stay at when we vacationed here. It's being converted into condos now. We'll take a shower on the beach, eat something, sleep on the old pool chairs."

"You're homeless?" I was incredulous.

"Yes," she said.

"Don't worry," her husband instructed. "Funds are being wired to us on Monday. We'll have plenty of money. We just don't want to be around that American hotel-jerk downtown."

"We were very rich, but we had some bad luck right after 9/11," Jan explained. "We know people and how to get money, and this deal is for sure. I am going to buy you something nice when we get our share, maybe a laptop so you don't have to use those library computers."

"That would be great. A local artist is giving me a computer I can use at home, when I get a home. And a laptop would be perfect for traveling around when I'm famous."

Eric called me the next week. They were staying at a luxury hotel in Ft. Lauderdale and would soon fly out.

SEQUELS:

The main library structure in Collins Park has been demolished - the rotunda was retained for its historical significance - and we now enjoy the brand new library across the street. The new library, by the way, has had a positive effect on the attitudes of library patrons and employees.

Prior to the demolition of the old structure, I sent along a copy of my article to several public officials, including Miami Beach Mayor David Dermer and his City Manager, and Florida Governor Bush. I asked them to read my article and have someone reach out to the woman. I also submitted my article to the press, including the "alternative press" - the Miami New Times and the SunPost, and received no response from the editors.

I did not receive a reply from the public officials. I do not know if someone called on the woman to see what could be done about her plight. However, after the Collins Park demolition project was fenced off, I witnessed a police officer accosting her outside the fence. Apparently she was trying to retrieve her belongings and her cats from the crawl space. If she tried to return to the rotunda again, he yelled, he would have to arrest her for felonious trespass, and she would go to prison for a long time.

During the demolition period, the woman was sighted sleeping on the sidewalk around Bass Museum and in the doorways and alleys around the luxurious Lincoln Road Mall. Unsettled by the dislocation, she was apparently drinking heavily again, and was heard shrieking and cursing at no one in particular. She has not been seen for some time now.

Hopefully, the woman who lived in the Crawl Space has relocated to a better place than South Beach.

If any of you are photographers, your assistance with a special photo essay will be appreciated. I need photographs of homeless people who are living on the streets in South Beach - please pay them for the photos and get a signed release. We also need photographs of smiling, well dressed, prominent civic leaders, including public officials and real estate developers. The essay will be a montage of homeless people in humble circumstances at the feet of the civic leaders.

# #

Miami Beach's current Literary 'Genius' for your amusement

http://www.scribd.com/doc/138693234/The-Literary-Genius

I keyboarded The Literary 'Genius' a decade ago while sweeping the streets of the Heart of America. I reviewed the brilliant article this morning, and thought it might be time for my conversion from literary sluthood to literary whoredom. I could still work for Truth for nothing while writing copy on the side. Therefore I am reconsidering the city attorney's suggestion that my services are not needed here hence I will be rendered to some unspecified location, supposedly to write a novel and submit our email correspondence to the National Inquirer. I do not think the Inquirer would be that interested unless I had a photo of him wrestling a gay alligator, but I am honored that such a prominent leader would dignify my work by denigrating it with editors and city officials, so I may use him as a reference. My original plan, to find investors for the Sunpost or a competitor, and then to live at least one year in a South Beach penthouse, has not panned out. As always, any advice preceded by flattery from readers will be deeply appreciated. Of course calumny from civic leaders will be construed as flattery.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/138693234/The-Literary-Genius

Who Are the Morons of Miami Beach?

Apriol 29, 2013

by David Arthur Walters

I thought my constructive suggestion to high officials of the City of Miami Beach was a no-brainer, especially in light of yet another corruption scandal and the allegations that untold millions of dollars are missing as the result of permit fee discounts, fine reductions and mitigations, and other writeoffs.

After all, generally accepted accounting principles state that all transactions having a material impact on finances should be regularly accounted for and reported.

The fact that residents were blaming the city's special masters for letting people off easy for violations or stiffing them for small infractions gave me the idea that any writeoffs whatsover should be authorized and the reason therefor and the amounts should be by means of a special "warrant."

Special masters were being wrongly blamed on some occassions because the city attorney had struck deals prior to and even against the special masters' judgments.

A special master by the name of Babak Movahedi was bucking that system therefore City Attorney Jose Smith tried to get rid of him and chief special master Abe Laeser. Smith denied that he wanted to control the quasi-judicial special master court, but his conduct gave cause for doubt.

My recommendation would up in the lap of interim city manager Kathie Brooks. Smith counseled that my suggestion was "moronic" and advised to simply "follow the law."

I referred my suggestion to several city commissioners because of its political implications. The administration's accounting and reporting has generally been deficient despite several outside audits and recommendations, and it is reasonable to believe that inefficiencies may be cover for corruption at all levels if not due to laziness and ignorance of highly educated and highly paid officials.

Commissioner Weithorn, the only commissioner to respond, was helpful enough to advise that the city is on a modified cash basis system, so revenue for such items is recorded when it is received.

That would not prevent the writeoffs from beng recorded as billed and then deducted since the result would be net cash. We would know exactly who was responsible and why the writeoffs were made.

Brooks passed the buck to an outside auditor that allows no dialogue whatsover with outsiders on the issues, only information that the city officials provide.

Weithorn complained in regards to another issue that she is tired of referring issues to consultants and then having their recommendations ignored.

In addition to being a certified public accountant, Weithorn is a director of the Florida League of Cities. Municipal leagues were established in the wake of muckraking scandals a century ago.

Reformers believed that machine politics fostered public corruption, and that cities should be run like modern business corporations, efficiently, by experts.

Efficiency requires uniform procedures and the creation of accounting and reporting devices to be designed to hold city officials responsible for their actions.

The City of Miami Beach is lagging. We can only wonder why, and who the moron really is.

Request for Opinions on Miami Beach request to waive fines for non-permitted construction

April 24, 2013

Re: City of Miami Beach request for Discretion to Waive Double-Permit-Fee Fines

To Whom it May Concern

Your opinion is requested on the following subject matter:

Pursuant to Resolution 2012-27982 of September 12, 2012, at the behest of Interim City Manager Kathie Brooks for the Administration, the City of Miami Beach has proposed to the Florida Building Commission that it provide the city with discretion to waive double-permit fees (100% fines) on a case-by-case, equitable basis, presumably because the fines may place an onerous burden on owners as the result of a inadvertent mistakes, or on innocent purchasers of property who were unaware of the fault. The city argues that discretion would encourage compliance. The proposal was made despite Miami Beach Building Department Director Stephen Scott’s June 17, 2012, written declaration on behalf of the Building Department that, “We do not support waiving double fees.”

I am informed that it is already rather common to informally waive double permit fees and not to account for or report the waivers. Opponents to the practice believe there has been considerable official indiscretion: it is alleged that unofficial waivers have favored certain developers, owners, general contractors, and their expeditors. Criminal and moral corruption is naturally suspected where there is no accounting and reporting of waivers and other reductions such as mitigations and fine settlements. The City Attorney has determined that a proposal to account for and regularly report writeoffs because they have a material impact on city finances is “moronic,” insisting that all that is necessary is to “follow the law.”

The city’s proposal dovetails with the liberal ideology that the objective of law is not punishment but compliance. But non-compliance may the tendency where punishment is lacking, and too much discretion in the hands of officials charged with exercising the police power renders “discretion”synonymous with “tyranny.”

I shall be pleased to receive your opinion on this important subject.

Thank you,

David Arthur Walters
Independent Journalist

2013-04-24 Press Request for Opinion Double Permit Fee Waivers

Fighting Entrenched Bureacracy in Miami Beach

 

 

Jose Smith, the powerful city attorney of the City of Miami Beach, was provided with an opportunity to answer terminated fire inspector David Weston’s allegations about the involvement of his office in Weston’s wrongful termination on trumped up ethics charges after he persisted in reporting millions of dollars in what he called missing moneys.

Smith categorically denied any involvement of his office whatsoever although the public record easily available to him belied his statement.

Smith, apparently fearing exposure, contacted a third party, Kim Stark, the editor of the SunPost, a journal that does not employ the freelance author investigating the Weston affair, David Arthur Walters, in a characteristic attempt to discredit him with that editor, and implied that had also contacted the editor of City Debate, J.P. Morgan, who is the publisher of Sins of South Beach, with whom we are informed he went to high school. Morgan subsequently denied that Smith had been in touch with him. Smith also implied that he had discussed Walters with other members of the community, and that he had gotten a bad reputation.

Since Smith had already involved the SunPost editor, Walters did submit his exhaustive investigative report, ‘Saving Miami Beach Government from Hellfire,’to the editor free of charge, as a public service. She was interested in it, but she did not run it, we believe, because she is more afraid of Smith than Smith is of her possible publication of the fair and balanced report.

That was the second time that Smith had contacted the SunPost to disparage him, Walters said. “I believe Smith’s behavior when criticized demonstrates a pattern of governance by insult and intimidation, and a tendency to greet any criticism of your official conduct with defamatory statements, including accusing me of defamation although I had said nothing at all or had stated the truth or mere opinions on the facts.

“Nowhere did I see an attempt on Smith’s part at conciliation, an attempt to win opposing talent to his side before trying to ruin them, a tactic well known to godfathers, or simply assigning them to do something on your behalf for the sake of the city.”

Walters recalled that his grammar school teacher assigned him to walk the kids around the block and take sick or unruly kids home to keep him occupied because he was restless. He said something called his reading level caused him to experience class as unbearably boring.

Some of Smith’s intemperate behavior was in response to a little note had Walters sent along to him with a copy of retired firefighter Jim Llewellyn’s formal whistleblower complaint. In that note, Walters said he did not know if it had been filed in court, but he had noticed that it included a complaint about officials similar to Weston’s.

“Mr. Walters: Please see attached,” Smith responded via email. “The complaint was dismissed by Judge Wilson as frivolous. The 3rd District Court of Appeal affirmed the dismissal (P.C.A. without opinion). The grievance was also denied. It was all BS. Weston never even bothered to file a grievance or a lawsuit. Have you confirmed if any of it is true? Keep digging. Keep trying. You’re developing quite a reputation in town. Maybe the National Enquirer will print our emails! Have you no shame? Jose”

“I do not know why Judge Wilson would dismiss a lawsuit that Llewellyn ‘never even bothered to file,’” said Walters, “or why the appellate court would bother to affirm a dismissal of a lawsuit that had not even been filed. The attachment Smith sent along was a memo to the commission stating that the matter had been dismissed on technical grounds: the statute of limitations had run out, and the plaintiff had exhausted his opportunities during the grievance process. The rules are complex, as he should know, those defenses are rather common in such cases, and are frequently successful. Nowhere in his memo to the commission did I see a determination that the complaint was frivolous and/or that the plaintiff and his attorneys were sanctioned for frivolity. I will ask the clerk at the court to pull the record to see if Smith is lying about that.”

Mr. Llewellyn reviewed Smith’s message to Walters about him, and sent Smith an email stating that Smith had resorted to insulting his inquirer instead of addressing the facts Llewellyn had asserted about public corruption. He asked why Smith had no shame, and how he could sleep at night, to which Smith responded:

 

---

Dear Mr. Llewellyn:

Thank you for your tirade about “public corruption”. To date, you have never provided proof regarding any of the allegations made in your “whistleblower complaint”. If you had any, did you ever bother going to the State Attorney’s office? Or the FBI? Or MBPD? Or to me? Why now, 7 years after you left the city. Are you still holding grudges?

What I did find interesting was a very telling “Grievance Reply Form”, dated March 31, 2006 from Linda Gonzalez, Labor Relations Director. It describes, in specific detail, why your grievance was denied and refers to numerous“personality” issues, insubordination, disruptiveness, hostility, paranoia, and“job burnout.”

 

It is hard for me to fathom how all the various city officials named in the report (including your own union representatives) were involved is some huge conspiracy to corrupt the fire inspection process. Why did you not appeal? Call me naïve but it just does not make any sense.

Remember, I was a City Commissioner during the time you made those allegations. You never spoke with me and I never heard about any of this until after you went to the New Times. During the 8 years I sat on the City Commission, I never heard of anyone pressuring a fire inspector not to cite a property owner. If I had, I would have gone straight to the FBI. So, yes sir, I do sleep very well at night, thank you very much.

Jose Smith

---

Walters took Smith to task for his statements in a communication dated March 19, 2013:

Instead of addressing the facts Jim alleged in his complaint, you addressed your correspondent in an insulting manner, strewing red herrings to distract attention from your negligence.

Your reference to the personality issues published by the labor relations director on “a very telling” Grievance Reply Form, which appears to be a typical or formal assertion in many grievance cases, are very telling of what I feel is a goose-stepping tendency to deem anyone who criticizes government or fights city hall as criminally insane. Since medieval church clerics invented standard forms so the illiterate faithful could do business in a legal way, we all too often find professional “thinking”as well as prose limited to hackneyed forms. Indeed, your note to Mr. Llewellyn demonstrates that formal lack of intellectual ingenuity.

I have no doubt that if you had your way, I would be cast into a padded cell without pen, paper, internet access, and visitors. Solzhenitsyn had much to say about that approach under Stalin. I recall that a journalist named Savinkov wrote an article entitled ‘En Route’which was published in a “professorial” newspaper. Because Savinkov was actually en route, the elderly editor was arrested. He was not charged with slander for the journalist’s statement that, "One has to be criminally insane to affirm seriously that the international proletariat will come to our aid." Rather, the paper was charged with and closed down forever for“attempting to influence people’s minds.”

It is no wonder if the editor of the SunPost feared publishing anything I wrote after receiving your tirades about me; she may not be familiar with the Soviet gulag but she is certainly aware of what happened under the Nazis, and may be wary of such a powerful bureaucrat like you, who either runs or is chief advisor of the administrative gulag, especially given the fact that your defamations include accusations of defamation, with implied threats to file SLAPP suits that might very well put the innocent paper out of business due to the expense to defend the suits the outcome of which could never be certain given judicial prejudices, a tactic employed by Montgomery, Alabama, Police Commissioner L.B. Sullivan et al in a nearly successful attempt to destroy the New York Times over a full page ad appearing in the paper Feb. 26, 1960.

And speaking of fascists and communists, have you no shame in saying to Mr. Llewellyn, “Why now, 7 years after you left the city. Are you still holding grudges?”

Should the Jews just forget the pogroms they suffered since the murder of a messiah on charges of blasphemy, including the recent burnt offering to the terrorist all mighty, the holocaust under the Nazis? Can an abused woman, child, slave, prison, or employee forget the abuse and harbor no grudges, after having memorials of abuse literally beaten into them, simply because a messiah advocates forgiveness and loving one’s enemies and going along with the Romans? Some rabbis say not, and even advocate hating enemies unto death unless they sincerely repent and make suitable amends, for to ignore evil is the greatest evil of all: He who ignores evil is good for nothing.

Mr. Llewellyn may not know that your office liaisons with law enforcement agencies. He certainly is not aware at this time that I myself on several occasions have brought to the attention of your office for investigation or forwarding to law enforcement information about what may have been criminal conduct including a suspected conspiracy to defraud the city of permit fees and its ability to regulate conduct to protect the public safety.

To the best of my knowledge, your office did not take up the issues with any law enforcement agency. My belief is based, however, on knowledge limited to the fact that your office was generally unresponsive with few exceptions:on one occasion you personally declined to inquire into corruption because it was an“urban myth”; on another occasion your office accused me of “misstatements”regarding my understanding of an official alteration of a building department record, yet did not respond to my rebuttal; at another time you offered to walk me over to the F.B.I., an offer I initially interpreted as a typical effort to treat people who complain about officials like criminal suspects.

Given the widespread “urban myth” about retaliation, I also feared that you might use your police liaison to retaliate against your critics, but dismissed that notion because of my faith in the greatly improved police department, and because I assumed that the attorneys in your office had consciences independent of your whims, and would not resort to unethical behavior to support your vindictive campaigns. Let me make clear here that I have admired some but not all of their representations of the city: Nothing is perfect, but practice may tend to perfection.

And you say you have difficulty fathoming how there could be a “huge conspiracy” when you yourself, as commissioner, together with other city officials had to settle a complaint filed in federal court alleging your conspiracy to deprive a local businessman of his constitutional rights, and then the settlement was referred to as a dismissal of an unwarranted complaint—did you say “frivolous”? The complaint quotes the Ethics Commission as saying its efforts to obtain information were frustrated, and that there was an appearance of impropriety at least. In common-parlance and non-euphemistic language, the impropriety would be called extortion. Oddly enough, given your frequent disavowal of your powerful role as the attorney whom the commission would appoint to represent the city, and your inclination to report misconduct when you were a commissioner, it was City Manager Jorge“Boss” Gonzalez who allegedly advised the businessman to sue you and the other conspirators, including the then current city attorney, and it appears that the businessman would have won that suit if. Indeed, this and other incidents make a mockery of your dismissive references to conspiracy theories and urban myths.

Now you have said that you would have, as commissioner, gone straight to the F.B.I. with allegations such as Mr. Llewellyn’s.It is very telling that you did not say you would do so as a city attorney. It appears that the role of a city attorney differs from that of a commissioner: that you are under no legal or ethical obligation as an in-house attorney, except in certain peculiar circumstances, to turn in your clients, the high city officials, or to investigate or advise them, as you have stated to me in writing, unless they ask for an investigation or advice. Instead, you are bound to defend them. As you know, I have objected to your interpretation of the Charter in that regard, and have urged you to be more proactive, to represent not the entrenched bureaucrats but the city itself.

Finally, you have presented Mr. Llewellyn with a copy of your and the interim city manager’s report to the city commission in response to the inflammatory New Times article that shed some light on the negligence if not the probable corruption of members of the previous administration.

I have offered additional information to the commission in respect to Mr. Weston: my Hellfire investigation along with a small portion of the file in support thereof. I have elsewhere stated my perspective that a clean break must be made from previous maladministration.

We now have a new city manager who has far more experience actually practicing law than you do, and he claims to have a far keener and broader “perspective” on the issues crucial to improving the administration of the city including the entrenched bureaucracy. We had some doubts because he seemed overqualified, someone who should run for a slot in the state or national legislature; further we worried that he is a political insider in the county, and that what the city needed was fresh blood from outside, not a homeboy who, as far as we know, went to school with you and some of the commissions. Of course local savvy, on the other hand, may be helpful, and the man has been out of town for a Harvard education and practice in the national capital and in the greatest of all cities.

“Perspective,” understanding moral and criminal corruption and entrenched bureaucracy, writing legislation, and heading committees is important, but who is going to actually enforce the laws and regulations, make sure that complaints are carefully investigated and if found meritorious acted upon instead of shelved underprotection of the “discretion” of sovereign immunity, i.e. tyranny?

And who is going to get rid of the entrenched bureaucracy? Perhaps you can help the new city manager get rid of the entrenched bureaucracy. If you do, I may sit down and shut up.

Sincerely,

David Arthur Walters

World's Worst Burger King in South Beach Florida CLOSED

World's Worst Burger King


8/30/2006 5:50:00 AM
by David Arthur Walters

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Consumer report on a South Beach Burger King

WORLD’S WORST BURGER KING BY DAVID ARTHUR WALTERS “Gimme a dollar, I’m hungry,” demanded the obese, unkempt vagrant who accosted me as I exited Walgreen's on Collins Avenue and Lincoln Road, the epicenter of South Miami Beach tourism near the grand Loews Hotel – I was amused that a clerk therein had complained about the “stupid americanos” who had lived in Miami for years but could not speak Spanish. I stepped around the vagrant, pronouncing a firm and polite “no”, and went on my way. “You selfish bastard! May you go to hell!” he yelled and hurled a soda can after me. It spontaneously occurred to me that such contumelious characters should be beaten to a pulp, and then I regretted the thought and felt sorry for what the human race had done to that poor man. Nevertheless, I gave him nothing but a thought, selfish man that I am. I entered the Burger King across the street and stood in line for quite awhile. Finally it was my turn. With my cramped budget in mind, I asked how much a milk shake cost. The cashier did not so much as look at me – she grimaced and pointed at the menu overhead. I ordered a small chocolate shake and a bowl of chili. She rang up a higher price than I had expected, so I politely asked why, explaining that I wanted the smallest shake, and not the so-called small shake she had rung up. She bawled me out for having asked for a "small" shake instead of the "value" shake. I promised to say several Hail Marys; my sense of humor was obviously lost on her: she sneered and shook her head, never looking directly at me. Duly humbled by the contemptuous fast-food service, and wishing for a Wendy’s on the beach, I sat down to eat my food. While doing my best to suck the brown, chalky substance up the straw, an emaciated teenage prostitute, sixteen years of age at the most; approached my table with narrow but swiveling hips. “Want a date, mister?” she asked. "No, but thanks for asking," I said. “Twenty bucks will get you a blow job, fifty will get you everything.” “That’s nice, but no thanks.” She went on to the three guys sitting behind me, with whom she eventually left. What a shame, I mused. Her parents are probably looking for her, but maybe not. Anyway, if I had called the police, she would be long gone before they showed up, if they showed up at all. It was evident from the neighborhood that the cops were not concerned about that sort of thing, which I have heard them blame on “Social Services.” They really don’t like to get out of their cars for the small stuff, except to get coffee. At least the teenaged hooker is offering something for the money, I thought, instead of wanting something for nothing, like the panhandlers and the cops. Why should I condemn her business? People are renting out their souls and bodies every day, I reflected. And South Beach is all about buying and selling sex, booze, drugs, tattoos, hip hop, and condominiums. The chili was god-awful – barely warm and extremely salty. The shake was lousy, but that was to be expected. In fine, I had wasted my money. The food is not that bad in some Burger Kings, depending on their location. The operation is called “Homeless Burger” in Manhattan and Honolulu because of its lax attitude towards vagrants and panhandlers. The best Burger King in my opinion is in Lawrance, Kansas. I decided to give the manager a heads up on the salty chili as I left. “May I speak to the manager?” I asked a fellow behind the counter. “He’s busy. What do you want?” “Would you tell him the chili is very salty, too salty, and that…” “It’s not salty.” he snapped. “What?” “I said it’s not salty.” “But it is very salty. Would you please taste it?” “I don’t have to taste it. It’s not salty. What do you want?” “Hey, I don’t want anything. I just want to be helpful, and let the manager know that the chili is too salty. Would you give this chili back to him and tell him what I said?” I handed the bowl of chili to the food server, and he promptly threw it in the trash. One of the cooks in the back called up to the young man, asking him what the problem was. “He wants to see the manager.” “Ha, ha!” laughed the cook, and two other employees gleefully repeated, “He wants to see the manager!” Whereupon they lapsed into a Spanish conversation amply interspersed with such terms as americanos, gringos, cabrons, anglos, and pendejos. Geez, I thought, if they don’t like us, why don’t they go back to where they or their parents came from? At which point a big man, evidently the manager, judging from his attire, came out of the back. “He wants to see the manager,” someone said, pointing me out to him. “Hmmph!” he grunted, walked towards me, pulled up abruptly, folded his arms, taking a stare-down stance. “What do you want?” he glowered at me. I was obviously the enemy, a customer. “I want you to know that the chili is very salty, so that you can change it.” “It’s not salty. We don’t put salt in it.” Well, somebody puts salt in it because it is much too salty. You would know that if you tasted it.” ”I said it is not salty,” he reiterated, placing the emphasis on ‘not.’ “Then I must say you are a liar,” I responded angrily. “The customer is right, the chili is too salty, and you, the manager, are a liar,” I said to clarify the situation. Finally, “The chili is not hot, either.” “I told you, sir, our chili is not salty,” he persisted. “We do not put salt in the chili.” “And I told you that you are a liar for saying so. Maybe you don’t personally over-salt it, but somebody does, and you are responsible.” I said as I walked toward the exit. “Remember this, the customer is right, and this will come back to haunt you, manager of the worst Burger King in the world!” I shouted as I left. The employees were laughing out loud, the word of the evening being “loco.” I wondered why they did not offer to replace the chili with something else. The last I heard, Burger King no longer serves chili. Maybe there was too much salt in it, or too many thumbs. Miami Beach 2004

Don't Blame the Cops if You Don't Call The Cops

 

 

 

20 April 2013

 

Report by David Arthur Walters

 

I hesitate to patronize the Burger King at Lenox Avenue and Fifth Street in South Beach in the morning because in the past it has been filled with so many unruly homeless people that it has been dubbed Homeless Burger by former customers.

 

Homeless is not the issue. Disrespect is. Like aggressive panhandling. For example, when a manager asked a panhandler to leave, he walked outside the door on 5th Street, pulled his pants down and pressed his buttocks and genitals up against the glass, then re-entered the premises laughing and cursing. She did not call the police, she said, because the police show up to late or not at all, and the objectionable people just return, anyway, so nothing can be done.

 

But things have recently changed at the MBPD. They have responded effectively over public clamor over several issues, one being agressive panhandling--arrests have soared for that category.

 

At the same time, a new manager by the name of Dion took over at the BK on Fifth. He ordered disorderly people out of the restaurant. He immediately ejected repeat violators upon entry. Residents started returning for breakfast. Businessmen in the area complimented him, but Dion was terminated, according to a staff member, who said the young man was very strict with the employees.

 

This morning I decided to have breakfast at BK. I saw a well-known vagrant entering the premises, so I considered waking across the street to the Subway, mainly because the man is extremely hostile on the street, insulting passersby. I entered anyway, and observed him going from table to table, rudely accosting customers. Then he came to the counter where Brenda was running the register, and he proceeded to demand a free breakfast, and to accost customers for change."

 

"Excuse me, sir, I regret to say than panhandling is prohibited here."

 

"This is not panhadling! This is exchange!" he yelled. And then he started cursing me.

 

Well, he had nothing to give in return, and had no right to demand a true exchange, anyway. His kind of ex-change is extortion of change, a form of theft.

 

I asked Brenda to put the man out. He glared out me and cursed me again. She ordered him to leave three times.I called the police at 9:36 am, and observed him going down the street, reporting his location and direction to the dispatched. I was asked for a description:

 

"About six feet, black, dreadlocks, pants dark, too dirty to see the color, blue jacket with yellow shoulders."

 

Four cops in all showed up wihin a few minutes. A female officer headed toward a gentleman who had just shown up and fit the description almost exactly. What an awful coincidence, I thought.

 

"Officer, officer, that is not the man. He left some time ago. I called it in." 

 

I told her what happened, and that I would be glad to testify against the man for violations of city and county code. I pointed out several witnesses besides Brenda. The officers asked me for my identification, birthdate, and address, and whether the man touched me. 

There had been no touching, or battery, but I perceived his threatening conduct and words an assault, and was visibly shaken.

 

I said surely the cops know him well--on second thought, there is vagrant who does look exactly like him, but he never asks for money, just smells badly and sometimes masturbates in broad daylight on Washington Avenue.

 

I told the officers that it is unfair to people to complain about the cops when they do not call the cops, so I had called them and wished more people would do so.  

A man with a group of four Australian tourists came over to my table after the officers left. He  thanked me for calling the cops, and said he told the officer that the panhandler was extremely abusive, and that he would be glad to testify but was returning to Australia. We chatted about what tourists experience on South Beach, how cops are improving the situation. We agreed that this man was potentially violent. For all anyone knows, he will pull out a knife and stab a customer someday, perhaps kill a BK Burger employee.
 

 

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