These are all the Blogs posted in September, 2011.
Friday, 30
If you don't know Lennie Tristano's music, now is a time to get acquainted.
This recording was made in 1965 and it speaks for itself in style and harmonic improvisation. Enjoy!
Thanks Mike. (Mike Dowd produces the free Venice Jazz Festival in Venice for the Sarasota Jazz Club.)
Click Here to Link directly to this article publisheed in the
You Tube.
Posted By Mike Dowd at 11:12 PM in Category:
Jazz Corner
Jazz Clip: "Subconscious-Lee" by Lee Konitz in 1949 with the Lennie Tristano Quintet.
One night in a club at the north end of Times Square, at one time "Bop City" and perhaps still named that when we were there, Paul Desmond stopped to chat with Peggy and me. The Dave Brubeck Quartet was taking five.
We did not know Desmond, but he was so natural and welcoming conversation that we spoke a little of "Alice in Wonderland" which he had recorded beautifully. The subject turned to saxophonists and I mentioned always liking Lee Konitz. Desmond paid him the ultimate co
Click Here to Link directly to this article publisheed in the
You Tube.
Posted By Ed Martin at 10:42 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Mayor: "City Got Sweetheart Deal" and Other Fairy Tales
Two days ago, Chuck Schmeiler wrote a comment suggesting I print the Mayor's letter in response to Marshall's. Meanwhile Marshall replied, even more persuasively I thought. I have not been able to do that until tonight as I shall explain through this open letter to Chuck (and all who are reading this.)
Chuck, Thanks for writing and sharing your views;
I am in South Carolina tonight as Peggy and I return from Canada. Last night we were visiting friends and did not have intern
Posted By Ed Martin at 5:19 AM in Category:
Inside Venice
Thursday, 29
South County Jazz Organization Lists a Full Calendar of Events
We, in Venice and Sarasota County, are blessed with two active jazz organizations producing concerts of America's home-grown music, loved around the world.
The Jazz Club of Sarasota, with grant assistance from the Gulf Coast Community Foundation, local businesses and citizens will present free Joy of Jazz Concerts this fall in Centennial Park at the Gazebo. This is the fourth year of the free admission Festival. There is a link to the Jazz Club of Sarasota on the left side of t
Click Here to Link directly to this article publisheed in the
South County Jazz Organization.
Posted By Ed Martin at 8:21 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Wednesday, 28
Correspondence on Sharky's Lease, Marshall Happer, Mayor Holic and Airport Director Rozansky
Read it and weep. ED
Dear Mayor Holic:
Thanks for your prompt response to my email recommendation to you and the members of the Council relative to the valuation of the Sharky’s Lease and for the information included in Mr. Rozansky’s email.
With all due respect, the two appraisals summarized by Mr. Rozansky which appraise the Sharky’s property at $540,000 and $585,000 are so low as to be totally unreliable for the City Council to consider. Those appraisa
Posted By Ed Martin at 11:38 PM in Category:
Guest Bloggers
Monday, 26
MARSHALL HAPPER COMES UP WITH A RADICAL IDEA; CHARGE SHARKY'S APPROPRIATELY FOR THEIR 70 YEAR LEASE
Want to bet Mayor Holic and Council majority ignore his sensible idea to benefit the City?
Happer's letter follows:
Dear Mayor Holic and Members of the City Council:
At the September 27, 2011, meeting you have before you the approval of a draft Second Amendment to the Pier Group, Inc., Lease for Sharky’s restaurant on the Gulf of Mexico at our Venice public pier.
Sharky’s restaurant by the Venice pier is an important destination business attr
Posted By Ed Martin at 10:19 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Sunday, 25
New Jazz Clip Program Gets Positive Response; Suggestions and Links. Here's a winner.
MikeDowd, who has produced the Venice Jazz Festival affiliated with the Sarasota Jazz Society and sponsored by the Gulf Coast Community Foundation has sent a marvelous link to a performance by Paul Desmond and Gerry Mulligan from 1962. The opening bars alone are worth four stars.
I will ordinarily put up links on the site's Jazz Corner. ( scroll down right side until you see Jazz Corner.) I expect not to overwhelm you, just one or two a week. Enjoy
Click Here to Link directly to this article publisheed in the
You Tube.
Posted By Ed Martin at 10:40 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Saturday, 24
Jazz Clip of the Week
Listen to two greats, singer Johnny Hartman and John Coltrane. It may be the finest ballad album ever made.
Click Here to Link directly to this article publisheed in the
You Tube.
Posted By Ed Martin at 8:39 PM in Category:
Jazz Corner
Jazz Clip of the Week
A new way of sharing our love for music from Inside Venice.
Johnny Hartman and John Coltrane performed a wonderful collection of ballads, perhaps my favorite album by male vocalists. Here is a track, "You are Too Beautiful" from the album Lushlife. Lushlife has never been sung better, in my mind. It is on You Tube as well.
Click Here to Link directly to this article publisheed in the
YouTube.
Posted By Ed Martin at 6:35 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Healthcare Issues Hit Home in Florida, U.S. and Venice
For the full article from the Venice Gondolier Sun, Click below.
The pathologist’s report a few days later, was “negative”— which was positive for me.
Because the physician accepted Medicare reimbursement, I walked out of the door without financial burden and without the earlier worries, just as I might if I had been home in Venice. It is a national program.
I went to an emergency room in the U.S. with a person needing diagnosis and, as it turned out, no surge
Click Here to Link directly to this article publisheed in the
Venice Gondolier Sun September 24 2011.
Posted By Ed Martin at 12:22 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Friday, 23
A six-sigma signal of superluminal neutrinos from OPERA
In Washington in the 1970's a young MIT graduate, Ray Kurzweil, petitioned the Bureau of Education for the Handicapped, of which I was Director, for support in developing a breakthrough product, "The Kurzweil Reading Machine for the Blind."
The machine could recognize printing fonts, (omni-font recognition was a breakthrough in itself, Ray told me),then interpreted by computer programs he developed it would instruct a voice generator to read or, if necessary, spell out the words o
Click Here to Link directly to this article publisheed in the
Kurzweil Accelerating Intelligence.
Posted By Ed Martin at 4:20 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Thursday, 22
Are you Working Without Healthcare in Florida? You are 50% more likely to be than American average.
"Floridians who work full time are more than 50 percent more likely to lack health insurance than the average American worker.
Nationally, 13.5 percent of workers with full-time jobs are uninsured, but in Florida that figure is 20.3 percent, according to new census data released Wednesday. The data breaks out figures for the uninsured by state and county for the first time." SHT, Sept 22,2011.
*****
However, Governor Scott, is rejecting federal grants to improve
Click Here to Link directly to this article publisheed in the
Sarasota Herald Tribune.
Posted By Ed Martin at 11:41 AM in Category:
Inside Venice
Wednesday, 21
Boone: We Scheduled a Workshop on Columbus Day, (our bad), and the City wants $200 fee for Waiver!
Here is Jeff Boone's hand-delivered letter to Mayor Holic, which explains this sad story and his complaint about the $200. I suppose if the City does not give him the waiver of the $200 Venice on the Isle will have to pay it. Or should the firm that made the mistake pay it? Stay tuned. If Jim Collins made the mistake will this faithful understrapper survive? Or if the City gives Boone and his client the $1million waiver for the Tuscana Isles impact fees, (currently withdrawn), perhaps the $200
Posted By Ed Martin at 4:43 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Human Rights Ordinance On Hold In Venice After City Council Approval Almost One Year Ago:-- Happer
Dear Mayor Holic and Members of the City Council:
The following is an excerpt from the minutes of the October 12, 2010, meeting of the City Council:
“Ms. Lang moved to direct staff to research and present to council an ordinance similar to the model Human Rights ordinance. Seconded by Mr. Bennett. MOTION CARRIED ON VOICE VOTE UNANIMOUSLY.”
http://www.venicegov.com/Files/Meetings/2010_Minutes/City_Council/10.12.10.pdf
A copy of the draft Human Right
Posted By Ed Martin at 3:13 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Tuesday, 20
Article On Deficiency Judgements Fails To Mention The Big One Involving Some Venice Notables
To Doug Sword and Tom Tryon of the Herald Tribune. Sword is the author of the article, Tryon the editorial page editor.
I read your article this morning re: banks exercising their right to file and receive deficiency judgements against developers who have defaulted on their loans. You cite a few examples including one that you say is one of the largest in this area: $5.34 million plus interest awarded to a lender against Riviera Dunes Development Partners. I find it very od
Posted By Steve Trombeta at 3:27 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Florida congressmen make ‘Most Corrupt’ list
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington has released its annual report on the “most corrupt” members of Congress. Making the list for the third time is Florida’s own Vern Buchanan, R-Sarasota.
“Witness tampering, obstruction of justice, and bribery are all in a day’s work for the ethically challenged Rep. Vern Buchanan,” reads the report. “The Sarasota congressman orchestrated an elaborate scheme that forced his employees to contribute to his campaign, ensuring they wo
Click Here to Link directly to this article publisheed in the
Florida Independent.
Posted By Ed Martin at 3:21 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Monday, 19
Jim Collins of Boone, Boone, ad infinitum asks for a workshop for a proposal, subject unknown as yet
Mayor Holic:
We would like to make a request to City Council to allow us to conduct a Public Workshop, in connection with a land development petition, on Columbus Day (October 10th, 2011). Our request would be for the matter to be placed on the agenda for consideration at the next City Council meeting. We will follow up with a formal letter detailing our request before the end of the day tomorrow.
Jim Collins, Planner
BOONE, BOONE, BOONE, KODA & FROOK, P.A.
Posted By Ed Martin at 5:57 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
A LESSON FROM HARRY TRUMAN FOR THE PRESIDENT, DEMOCRATS, INDEPENDENTS AND THE THINKING REPUBLICANS.
Several years ago I read David McCullough’s biography of Harry Truman. It was a fascinating read and brought much more of Truman’s personality and actions to my attention than I had known.
A very relevant part of his life for today is that when he ran, he was judged by the professional politicians of both parties and even the reporters on his campaign train as having no chance to win. Even those who admired him, felt that was the case.
The only one who did not let t
Posted By Ed Martin at 3:50 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Saturday, 17
Anthony Pinzone Representing Bay Indies, Works to Get Five Dollar ($5.00) Annual Tax Increase Killed
Ed Note: A daily reader wrote asking why I did not support this "rollback" increase to preserve reserves. He thought I had always supported that, even when on Council. I realized I must have been unclear in the posting below. I don't share Tony Pinzone's view, I meant I wanted to "share" his message, which, I feel is unsupportable. I did not want to be too harsh on a citizen who has the right to his views and to petition his elected officials, but I felt that readers could draw their own c
Posted By Ed Martin at 9:22 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Friday, 16
On the Sunshine Law Suit
An anonymous attacker on John Patten’s website has accused me of “unethical” behavior while I was Mayor. I have never fully detailed my involvement in the Sunshine suit, but perhaps now is a good time to put some of my views on the public record. I have deliberately waited for this issue to be “seasoned” a bit by time.
1. I did not behave “unethically” as Mayor. In the Sunshine case, to which he/ she referred, three separate lawyers with different interests, told me they did
Posted By Ed Martin at 4:11 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Thursday, 15
Council Member Jim Bennett Provides Comment About His Views on Retired Council Members Healthcare
Ed:
I'd like to give a brief response to this for your use. I'll copy others in due course.
The section (2.20) of the Personnel Procedures and Rules, 2011 edition that you cite was adopted by Council at its June 14 meeting, by Resolution No. 2011-16. That resolution correctly says that Sec. 50-35 of the Code allows amendment to these procedures and rules by resolution. (I have previously posted to you and others that the Charter has for many years provided that Counc
Posted By Ed Martin at 12:49 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Jeanette Gates Provides the Venice Quote of the Week
A reader writes: Ms. Gates said,
“ If we call this a tax increase the voters will see this as a tax increase, if we call it a roll back they will not think of it as a tax increase so lets call it a roll back”.
True story. Lets see if that statement makes the local rags ……………. Where does she think she is, the bathroom ?
Last night the council voted 4/2 to increase the mill rate from 2.779 to 2.9350 which will generate about 420,000 in additional r
Posted By Ed Martin at 12:15 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Wednesday, 14
Council Gets It Wrong On Retired Council Member Health Insurance Benefits—It Seems to Me.
Having examined the news reports, it appears Council has decided to require former Charter Officers and retired Council members to pay partial costs for their post-retirement health benefits. (Quotations appear below from these sources.) I believe the proposal as it pertains to former Council Members is inappropriate and probably illegal. City Attorney Anderson has already said the 2003 language allowing the free health insurance for life, should have been submitted to voters, and so in
Posted By Ed Martin at 1:58 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Tuesday, 13
Breaking News: Council Ends Free Health Insurance For Marty Black and Other Retired Charter Officers
Council, by a 4-2 vote, ended the free health insurance for life for former City Manager Marty Black and former Finance Director Michael McPhail and clarified that former City Manager Isaac Turner would not qualify either.
Black and McPhail had argued that their agreements with the City provided healthcare after retirement at the same rate as when they were employed. They paid nothing during their employment, it was a benefit as part of their compensation.
City Attorney Bob A
Posted By Ed Martin at 10:17 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Monday, 12
Florida-ranks-44th-in-the-nation-for-long-term-medical-care
This explains why the Governor and the Republican Majority in the Legislature are turning back healthcare money. Who needs it?
Click Here to Link directly to this article publisheed in the
Florida Independent.
Posted By Ed Martin at 7:08 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Anderson Memo to Council, May 2010, Stating Health Insurance Benefit Did Not Require a Referendum.
This memo was in an Adobe PDF format and could not be highlighted and copied. In order to share it, I retyped it, without paraphrasing. It should answer questions about why Council did not consider the existing benefits illegal. (Perhaps poorly conceived and that led us to begin a payment program for Councilmembers' health insurance.
Yesterday, Councilmember Bob Daniels asked me why the insurance issue was not resolved during my time as Mayor, (see www.insideveniceflorida.com Sept
Posted By Ed Martin at 3:17 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Venice Diocese Backs Fair Food Program For Farmworkers
"On Aug. 30, Bishop Frank J. Dewane met several delegates from the Coalition of Immokalee Workers at Epiphany Cathedral. These delegates were bicycling from Immokalee to Lakeland -- a roughly 200-mile trip. Their mission was to encourage Publix Super Markets Inc. to participate in the Fair Food Program for the farm workers in Immokalee, which, in part, ensures that farm workers have a pay increase of one penny per pound of tomatoes picked. Other aspects of the program support improved working co
Click Here to Link directly to this article publisheed in the
Sarasota Herald Tribune.
Posted By Ed Martin at 12:52 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Sunday, 11
Council Member Bob Daniels Asks Why I Did Not Resolve the Health Insurance Issue When Mayor
Sep 11, 2011 07:02:33 PM, rdaniels@ci.venice.fl.us wrote:
Ed what is interesting in your e-mails is that in your term in office why did you not take care of this issue???
Bob Daniels
*****
Bob, that is a very fair question. When I was elected a program of insurance, retirement, etc. was in place and offered to me and to other new Council Members. I know that you had a similar offering and opted to take the health insurance benefit. I
Posted By Ed Martin at 9:46 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Marshall Happer Replies to Jim Bennett. Readers are Fortunate to Have Such Dialogue
Dear Jim:
Thanks for your email which I note you copied to the members of the Compensation/Charter Review Committee. It has been my understanding that the Committee's charge does not include anything related to health insurance benefits for retired Council members or retired Charter Officers so my correspondence to you and the members of the Council was intended as a private citizen effort to assist with the analysis of this complicated and complex issue.
You are corr
Posted By Ed Martin at 8:44 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
John Patten Argues With Jim Bennett's Analysis
>>> John Patten 09/11/11 10:18 AM >>>
Jim:
Why do you always complicate the obvious with the superfluous that borders on non sequiturs? It's like there is a New England Egghead Attention Deficit Syndrome, I've seen it in you and in Ed Martin on a number of occasions, and your stated argument here is a spot-on example. I'm not trying to be insulting, but The Cartoon Laws Of Physics are about as equally on point here with a couple of rungs of your legal reasoning ladder
Posted By Ed Martin at 8:33 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Jim Bennett Responds to Marshall Happer's Letter to Council
Editors Note: The following emails, (published with separate headings), were stimulated by Marshall Happer's letter to Council, published here September 9, detailing his concerns with allowing Council Members and Charter Officers to have free health insurance for life. Council Member Jim Bennett's reply is below, followed by a letter to Bennett from John Patten, longtime website writer and publisher and now Council candidate.
Happer and Bennett display the kind of intelligence
Posted By Ed Martin at 8:26 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Friday, 9
CITY CHARTER VIOLATION? FREE OR SUBSIDIZED HEALTH BENEFITS FOR RETIRED COUNCIL AT SEPT. 13 MEETING?
As citizens have kept digging into the FREE HEALTH INSURANCE FOR LIFE, it appears to me that my understanding from the City Attorney about the legitimacy of these benefits was incorrect.
Some Council members had been participating in the City Health plan for many years according to City Attorney Bob Anderson and City Clerk Lori Stelzer. Anderson opinioned that since that preceded the 1986 charter provision requiring any changes in Council compensation to be approved by citizen ref
Posted By Ed Martin at 12:23 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Thursday, 8
City Planning Staff and Commission, Correct Weakness in Proposed Comp Plan Amendment
In approving a provision in the Comp Plan, requested by property owners, that provided some additional opportunity for heights greater than 3 stories/42 feet, consideration of height changes in certain "overlay" zones was approved by the 2010 council.
Overlay zones require Council approval in a complete review after Planning Commission approval.
In language proposed by staff recently, the consideration of height increases was modified to include "variances" and other f
Posted By Ed Martin at 5:16 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Wednesday, 7
PUBLIX CONTINUES TO TURN A BLIND EYE TO INJUSTICE IN A SITUATION WHERE THEY COULD HELP OTHERS.
Several years ago I became aware of the miserable conditions that Immokalee farm workers were enduring and after first hand contact, spoke with the local Taco Bell about the farm workers request to have a one-cent per pound increase in their payment.
That payment had been the same for many years. A number of church groups, students and other interested people expressed their views and after a while, Taco Bell, McDonalds and others agreed to the one cent per pound increase, to go
Posted By Ed Martin at 1:02 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Tuesday, 6
Kruithoff at Airport in 2001 and Earlier Advised Foreign Students How to Skirt Immigration Laws.
Here is an excerpt of a letter from Sue Lang to the Venice Gondolier on News Editor Greg Giles' report on the Airport Training prior to 9/11.
Mr. Giles' supposed news article on Arnie Kruitoff, owner of Florida Flight Training.... ignores key facts and does not bother to present an unbiased report. Facts that have already been exposed and didn't even require much investigating.
Several years ago in 2005 or earlier, residents pointed out that Mr. Kruitoff's website
Posted By Ed Martin at 1:52 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
Thursday, 1
Conversation- Emilio Carlesimo and Sue Lang. What is not in the papers, but is relevant to decisions
This exchange if from most recent to earliest. Not the easiest way to follow it. It began with some questions asked Alan Bullock. Scroll down to bottom if you wish to read up, like people in a foreign language. The content is there.
*****
Sue Lang replies to Carlesimo:
Mr. Carlesimo is now rewriting history. I was told that only the regular FRS pension plan was available to us when I was elected and no one ever mentioned that the alternative investment plan came with
Posted By Ed Martin at 5:36 PM in Category:
Inside Venice
