Hament: WWSB ABC7: "Pervasive partisan bias"

Email of May 15, 2020 from Gabriel Hament of Sarasota:

Open Letter to Jeffrey Benninghoff, Vice President and General Manager of WWSB ABC7: "It Is Now Confirmed WWSB ABC7 Is a Partisan Organization, Advancing a Partisan Agenda"

Mr. Benninghoff:

According to your LinkedIn profile, you are the Vice President and General Manager of WWSB ABC 7.

The body of evidence is now growing that you, Mr. Benninghoff, are advancing your personal political preferences through (1) the selection of guests of one political party over the other, and, by extension, (2) unequal air time granted to members of one political party over another, in conflict with the Federal Communications Commission equal-time rule. 

In compliance with the Federal Communications Commission handbook section titled "Complaints or Comments About a Station," by copy of this e-mail, I have filed a complaint with your federal supervisory body. I urge others to do so by replying to this email. I will then gather and aggregate community complaints and share them with a wider audience next week.

After last night's 7PM broadcast, and an examination of your publicly available Facebook page in combination with the facts outlined below, a fact pattern has now been established that points to pervasive partisan bias within your news organization.

During last evening's 7PM broadcast, two Republican politicians were featured. No elected officials affiliated with the Democratic Party were included in the broadcast.

Not only did one of your regularly scheduled guests--local Congressman Vern Buchanan--share incorrect information on air, the Congressman made a sexist refrain in one segment and, in a continuation of a pattern now established on the news mediums of both print and television, insulted unemployed constituents in another. Compounding the problematic comments issued by the Congressman is the Congressman's continued insistence on the violation of your station's policy of visiting in-person rather than using a video conference function from the safety of his own home.  

At minute marker 4:57 of last evening's 7PM "Ask the Congressman" segment, the Congressman recounted how desperate and frustrated Suncoast constituents are becoming due to their inability to register for unemployment insurance. 

• "We do have a lot of people calling our office. 500 e-mails a day. Many of them calling, talking to our representatives. Actually crying on the phone--ladies and others. It's really kind of a sad scenario."

Mr. Benninghoff, was the Congressman saying that only members of the female sex have called his office crying, while male constituents remain stoic as they attempt to navigate the labyrinthine CONNECT system--a system admittedly designed to deter constituents from seeking relief during challenging periods of economic dislocation, so that reported unemployment statistics would remain artificially low?

Twenty minutes later in the broadcast, after state Senator Gruters concluded his ballad of syrupy and effusive praise of the Congressman (for doing what, I do not know), at minute marker 24:44, the Congressman began again to rail on the working people within his district, insinuating that they would prefer to "shelter in place" and collect unemployment checks for an indefinite period.

• "But there's gunna be people who are gunna get the $600 plus the $275, and a lot of people are unfortunately not making that. It would be nice if they were but that's one of the challenges with the unemployment in general. In fact this new bill that's coming out tomorrow that I'm going to be voting on, they're looking to extend that--the $600 a week--until next March so that'll be one of the challenges when we get up there that we'll be talking about as well. Because we want to encourage people to go back to work. The employers are gunna start needing people as we start ramping up this economy."

Then, Ms. Matter asks the Congressman to clarify:

• "So you're saying that new bill tomorrow would possibly extend unemployment for almost another year?"

The Congressman's response:

• "Well I think it's another seven or eight months. That's what I've been told, at six-hundred dollars a week. That's what Speaker Pelosi is proposing. I think a lot of our small business people and people in the region are concerned that they're going to need these workers back ideally sooner than later. We don't want to have a point where you're making $60,000 to stay home, a year."

Mr. Benninghoff, don't you find it insulting that one of your guests, and a member of your political party, is insinuating that his constituents are lazy and would prefer to stay home and collect unemployment rather than earn money through gainful employment?

Additionally, Mr. Benninghoff, how did the Congressman arrive at the erroneous figure of $60,000?

By my calculation, $275 plus $600 equals $875. $875 multiplied by four is $3,500. $3,500 by twelve is $42,000. 

Given your credentialing as a Certified Public Account, Mr. Benninghoff, can you please verify my math?

Mr, Benninghoff, is my request for equal air time unreasonable? 

Why are you allowing your personal political preferences stifle the expression of other points of view?

Isn't stifling other points of view, just because they are divergent from your own, on a publicly regulated television station, contrary to the first amendment to the Constitution of the United States?

Thank you, Mr. Benninghoff,

--Gabriel Hament

Questions raised about legislation revising impact fees

Letter to State Rep.Margaret Good from Sarasota citizens regarding a new bill revising how impact fees are defined and administered. One of the bill's sponsors is State Sen. Joe Gruters of Sarasota. In part it would require counties to create a new bureaucracy to administer, review, and approve such fees on developers. Text of the bill which is still pending.




To: The Honorable Margaret Good;
From: Dan Lobeck, Glenna Blomquist
Date: 02/05/20

Dan Lobeck and I have reviewed this pending legislature (related to HB 637 and SB 1066). Following please find relevant comments:

One problem is that it limits impact fees to “public facilities” defined (by reference to another statute) as “major capital improvements, including transportation, sanitary sewer, solid waste, drainage, potable water, educational, parks and recreational facilities.”

While the bills then add, “and includes any fire and law enforcement facility”, it is not clear if the word “including” in the referenced statute is meant as a limitation or as providing for examples. If the former, Sarasota County’s impact fees for libraries, courts and administration facilities would be rendered illegal. (Case law would need to be researched on statutory construction of the word “including” in the absence of “but not limited to”).

Also potentially problematic is that impact fees would be limited to “infrastructure,” that is the “construction, reconstruction, or improvement of a public facility …” and (again under the above referenced statute) “major capital improvements,” thereby potentially preventing impact fees from being spent on school buses or mass transit, as they are today.

The requirement that impact fees be based on local data gathered within the past 36 months (apparently on a rolling basis) imposes a burden on local governments to gather that date every three years. However, if done right that is not an entirely bad idea, as Sarasota County has long based its transportation impact fees on outdated national data from the last recession (which the County then seeks to apply through a methodology to local conditions) which understates trip length and frequency.

Truly local data, if done correctly, may be more reliable, although that could be subject to manipulation to keep the fees artificially low.

The composition of the local committees is unfairly loaded to those favoring lower impact fees, with most seats reserved for contractors and other business representatives and only one for the general public. (In Sarasota County, this would not much change the makeup of the Public Facilities Financing Advisory Board, which mainly advises on impact fees, as it is typically loaded with development interests and their allies).


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News about the bills from Joe Gruters (Sarasota) and Nick DiCelglie (Pinellas):

Florida House panel OKs bill overhauling local government impact fee levies

The bill would require local governments segregate impact fee revenues into accounts for each improvement category, calculate impact fees with data no older than 36 months, create seven-member committees to review how fees are allocated and exclude costs from fees that don’t meet a revised definition of infrastructure.

Tighter restrictions on impact fees are one step closer to House passage

Some lawmakers expressed reservations about the current language and cautioned they may vote it down if it makes it to the House floor if some concerns aren’t addressed. That includes fears about the fiscal impact to local governments as they are faced with additional administrative burden when levying fees.

Local Candidates on Twitter

Check out what these new candidates have to say. They're intelligent, energetic, passionate about issues, and they're challenging the entrenched incumbents who have done little or nothing for Sarasota or for Florida.

Each link takes you to the candidate's Twitter stream - you can tune in and see their concerns, and how they address them:

Ruta Maria Jouniari Sarasota County Commission Dist. 2

Wesley Ann Beggs Sarasota County Commission Dist.  4

David Shapiro US House Dist. 16

Olivia Babis Florida Senate District 23

Tracy Pratt Florida State Rep. House Dist. 71

Margaret Good Florida State Rep. House Dist. 72

Liv Coleman Florida State Rep. House Dist. 73

Tony Mowry  Florida House Dist. 74

l to r: David Shapiro, Shirley Brown, Wesley Ann Beggs, Ken Marsh, Ruta Jouniari, Tracy Pratt
(Shirley Brown has won her School Board Race, Mr. Marsh is president of the LBK Democratic Club)
Photo from LBK Observer

State Rep Forum at CONA Sept. 10

Sarasota County Council of  Neighborhood Associations - CONA                 - monthly meeting -       Monday, September 10, 2018                 candidate forum state representative         All candidates competing on the general election ballot for our state representative districts have been invited to participate in the CONA forum on September 10, 2018. The forum will be divided into two panels.               The first panel will combine Tracy Pratt and Will Robinson of the district 71 race with Margaret Good and Ray Pilon of the district 72 race.               The second will combine Liv Coleman and Tommy Gregory of the district 73 race with James Buchanan, Robert Samuel Kaplan, and Tony Mowry of the district 74 race.          Written questions may be submitted in advance or at the meeting to be included, as time allows, following the questions posed by our moderator.           Candidates appearing on our ballots for any races are welcome to attend the social before the meeting in order to make contact with voters and to distribute literature and yard signs, even if not scheduled as a member of a panel for the forum. Information about ballot initiatives appearing on the ballot also may be provided to inform voters.                   The meeting will open with brief neighborhood updates about their issues, including Chris Bales on Arbor Lake Preserve, Ben Cannon on Bath and Racquet Club, Sura Kochman on Siesta Promenade, and Tom Matrullo on the Celery Fields.                                                                             See www.conasarasota.org/meetings.html for more information.                 social 6:30 p.m. -  meeting 7:00 p.m.          neighbors helping neighborhoods since 1961                        anniversary party  -  honoring John McCarthy  -  November 5, 2018 make your reservation at the meeting ticket purchase information is on the 'contact us' page of our web site     CONA meetings are free and open to the public as well as members of the more than seventy associations the organization represents and its individual members. Unless otherwise noted, the meetings are held at the Sarasota Garden Club, 1131 Boulevard of the Arts in Sarasota, which is at the intersection of Tamiami Trail, south of the Municipal Auditorium. Parking and the entrance are reached from Van Wezel Way. Socials precede the meetings at 6:30 p.m., the meetings begin at 7:00 p.m.                       For additional information about CONA and our schedule of upcoming meetings,  please see the CONA web site copyright © 2018 Sarasota County Council of Neighborhood Associations  all rights reserved