{"id":40931,"date":"2024-01-13T12:15:55","date_gmt":"2024-01-13T17:15:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=40931"},"modified":"2024-01-13T12:15:59","modified_gmt":"2024-01-13T17:15:59","slug":"neil-combee-adopts-the-public-complaint-norm-and-creates-function-on-the-polk-county-commission","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2024\/01\/13\/neil-combee-adopts-the-public-complaint-norm-and-creates-function-on-the-polk-county-commission\/","title":{"rendered":"Neil Combee adopts the public complaint norm and creates “function” on the Polk County Commission"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Whatever one thinks of Neil (and I’m tougher on him in public than *any* of you) his act of formal, public confrontation with “Leadership Club” is a huge, positive moment for Polk County.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

By BILLY TOWNSEND<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A rather momentous thing happened on the Polk County Commission a couple weeks ago: one sitting Republican county commissioner publicly and formally accused at least one other sitting Republican commissioner of committing an open government crime and an ethical violation in the political effort to get an ill-conceived road-building sales tax on the ballot for Polk County voters. Here\u2019s the full background from The Ledger.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I do not know if these allegations are true. But Commissioner Neil Combee put his name and reputation at risk by making his allegations clearly, publicly, and formally, through the prescribed legal processes available to all Florida citizens. That forces our system of government to address the accusations on their merits<\/strong><\/em> and come to a public conclusion. That, dear readers, is \u201cthe system\u201d functioning<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A thunderclap of behavioral discipline for elected officials<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Forcing our system of self-government to function, based on the merits of a specific ethical situation, is why I have taken to filing formal complaints myself. I detailed this in an earlier article, sub-titled:\u00a0\u201cCitizenship can discipline misbehaving leaders, if we use it.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0You can read it here:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Four complaints: citizenship can discipline misbehaving “leaders,” if we use it<\/a><\/td><\/tr>
<\/td><\/tr>
\"Four<\/a><\/td><\/tr>
Consider these four facts, created by formal complaints I have filed with state government or professional governance organizations in the last year or so. Ron DeSantis-endorsed Polk School Board Member Rick Nolte has a hearing set for August 15 before the Florida Elections Commission.<\/a><\/td><\/tr>
Read full story<\/a><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s sort of thrilling to see an elected official choose the same approach for basically the same stated reason I\u2019ve given. Here\u2019s Combee from The Ledger<\/em> article:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u201cI\u2019m in my 20th<\/sup> year (as a commissioner) over a period of several decades of doing this, and I’ve served with at least 19 people that I can recall,\u201d Combee told The Ledger, \u201cI’ve never heard of a commissioner doing this with a fellow commissioner. I mean, there’s no other way to look at it. It\u2019s just misconduct. It\u2019s an abuse of power, trying to use the power of the chair to coerce desired behavior in private.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

I know from personal experience that the political class in Polk, especially the countywide (as opposed to municipal) class, will look at Neil\u2019s formal complaint with dismay. They will call it \u201cdysfunction\u201d on the County Commission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s what they grumbled during my School Board term when I publicly and formally attempted to hold people of power, myself included, to a standard of ethical and moral and legal behavior. The discomfort <\/strong><\/em>that effort causes is what they consider \u201cdysfunction.\u201d And that is why I dubbed them, collectively, \u201cLeadership Club.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leadership Club never cared about the underlying behavior of officials in the course of doing their important public jobs. They resented my talking about it, confronting it publicly, and trying to address it formally at my own political and personal risk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first rule of \u201cLeadership Club\u201d is you don\u2019t talk about Leadership Club<\/strong><\/em>, or the behavior of its members. To do so is \u201cdysfunction.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But what I did (and what Neil Combee is doing) is actually the opposite<\/strong><\/em> of government dysfunction; it is function<\/strong><\/em> designed to discipline the behavior of officials on behalf of the public they are supposed to serve. And if there\u2019s one thing the governing powers of this county do not want<\/strong><\/em>, it is someone to discipline them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Will Brian Haas be able to duck investigating George Lindsey\u2019s interactions with Rick Wilson and Martha Santiago?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Combee\u2019s ethics complaint, which he released to the media when he submitted it to the Ethics Commission, accuses George Lindsey of threatening or cajoling county commissioners Martha Santiago and Rick Wilson in an out-of-the-Sunshine effort to get them to vote to place a sales tax referendum for road-building on the ballot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The means of threat or inducement were seats on public committees that both commissioners wanted to retain or receive. Combee\u2019s complaint does not specify how he learned of the alleged conversations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the entire scandal, if true, on its face, is a criminal violation of the spirit and intent of Florida\u2019s open government laws. However, these laws are rarely enforced because most elected officials and their most powerful supporters are clubby and hostile to having self-government function with transparency and ethical intent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

About the only way to get these laws enforced is for someone like Combee to take the political and social risk of making the \u201cleadership club\u201d very uncomfortable in public.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The most uncomfortable person right now, I suspect, is 10th Circuit State Attorney Brian Haas. He has to decide whether to investigate George Lindsey, the object of Combee\u2019s complaint and the county commissioner most closely identified with big Polk County developers and powerful leaders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you want to get a sense of the powers Neil Combee crossed<\/strong><\/em> by going public with this accusation, take a look at the newly formed \u201cFriends of Grady Judd\u201d political committee, chaired by Seth McKeel. <\/a>You\u2019ll see J.D. Alexander and the Cassidys and various other familiar folk. Grady has many many many more developer \u201cfriends\u201d than he has law enforcement \u201cfriends.\u201d He is the sheriff of the people who \u201crun\u201d Polk County. In the power structure, Grady Judd far outweighs Brian Haas, who does not have a \u201cfriends\u201d committee of his own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But I assure you Grady Judd and his wealthy developer donor \u201cfriends\u201d are very high on any list of friends Haas wants to keep happy.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

All<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0of these folks (or their companies) \u2014 and I suspect Grady, too \u2014 will be far madder at Neil Combee for reporting George Lindsey\u2019s alleged criminal behavior than they will be at George Lindsey for how he behaved if he did what Neil alleges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Call me old-fashioned, but that\u2019s what I<\/strong><\/em> consider dysfunctional.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s not a feud; it\u2019s a formal complaint about specific behavior<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The background of this complaint is a long-standing public antipathy between George Lindsey and Neil Combee. Lindsey blamed that feud for the complaint, according to The Ledger<\/strong><\/em> article.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u201cIt was pretty inflammatory,\u201d Lindsey said of the letter. \u201cI’ll respond in the appropriate forum and not to the media. I don’t know what the timetable is for all that, but whatever it is, it will be made public when it’s concluded and, as far as I’m concerned, the sooner the better.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lindsey suggested that Combee might have other motivations for filing a complaint against him, saying they had \u201ccrossed swords\u201d many times over the years. Lindsey mentioned his opposition to a proposed increase in the homestead exemption when Combee was in the Florida Legislature, a referendum that if passed would have reduced property tax revenue to counties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lindsey also cited his vote in 2018 to remove Combee\u2019s name from signs outside the county administration building in Bartow and his opposition to Combee\u2019s push to have Polk County recognize a court ruling from Orange County requiring partisan elections for county constitutional officers. Lindsey said the change would benefit Combee, who is running next year for Polk County Property Appraiser as a Republican.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lindsey also mentioned his support for Gow Fields, another Republican also seeking that position.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

That doesn\u2019t sound like much of a denial to me. Rather than worrying about whether Neil Combee is pure in his motives, George should probably worry about whether he actually did what Combee alleges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And consider this from Commissioner Rick Wilson:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

Asked if Lindsey had talked to him about the road tax outside of public meetings, Wilson said, \u201cNo, no, that wouldn’t be a good thing if we did that. We\u2019ve got to do it in public.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

We didn\u2019t do it. And if we had done it, it would be bad, <\/strong><\/em>is quite a bit different than what George is saying. I wonder if Wilson will repeat that under oath if Haas does his job.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can\u2019t argue with the scoreboard<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I have known and covered Neil Combee on and off since 1999 when I arrived in Polk County. We share a weird sort of personal affection and comradeship, for people with very different cultural and social points of view. Perhaps\u00a0because<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0of that, I have also been harder on Neil, in public, than probably any else I\u2019ve covered,\u00a0or at least written things more likely to be personally wounding<\/a>\u00a0than I have about anyone else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think Neil suffers from some MAGA gunsickness and is far too willing to believe J6ers are something other than what they do and did.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But he also has some pretty good moral and intellectual instincts at the local government level. And he\u2019s now demonstrated a public courageousness no other currently sitting elected official<\/strong><\/em> in Polk County<\/strong><\/em> has demonstrated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Various folks have sent me notes and eye-rolls that at least rhyme with George Lindsey\u2019s take on this. Many suggest Neil has his own skeletons that make him vulnerable to retaliation. To that, I say: fine, if you\u2019ve got goods on public officials, act on them in public.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bring it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s certainly what I said about myself when I was a School Board member and the Ethics Commission swatted away two silly complaints against me without even investigating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Neil Combee has put a substantive complaint on the scoreboard and served notice that private behavior in matters relevant to the public is now at risk of exposure from within<\/strong><\/em>. That fact alone will have a functional effect on the Polk County Commission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If other officials follow suit \u2014 including against Neil himself if anybody has anything \u2014 it will create a massive, beneficial culture shift for the better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So Bully for Neil; and let\u2019s see what happens.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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