The biggest lie has always been to keep quiet; and the best life-enhancer is to provoke, unsettle, rile – in short, to make people face the truth.
Gore Vidal
Bart, who is gay, sent me this. I printed it out for my husband.
Bart and I are attending my tenth, his first Wagner Ring Cycle in June. I am trying to get the hotel to give us twin beds.
This will be a fun trip. Bart makes me laugh.
I am working on a piece damning Gonzalez and the awful bases for the board's employing him. Be patient. lee
From: William Birdsall [mailto:montolino@aol.com]
Sent: Friday, April 30, 2010 2:24 AM
To: lee de cesare
Subject: Good Gay Joke
THE GAY FLIGHT ATTENDANT My flight was being served by an obviously gay flight attendant, who seemed to put everyone in a good mood as he served us food and drinks.
As the plane prepared to descend, he came swishing down the aisle and said....
'Captain Marvey has asked me to announce that he'll be landing the big scary plane shortly, so lovely people, if you could just put your trays up, that would be super.' On his trip back up the aisle, he noticed this well-dressed and rather Arabic looking woman hadn't moved a muscle. 'Perhaps you didn't hear me over those big brute engines when I asked you to raise your trazy-poo, so the main man can pitty-pat us on the ground.' She calmly turned her head and said, 'In my country, I am called a Princess and I take orders from no one.'
To which (I swear) the flight attendant replied, without missing a beat, 'Well, sweet-cheeks, in my country I'm called a Queen, so I outrank you. Tray-up, Bitch'.
Why don't you look at the reimbursement records we have here in our office the next time you come to the building. If those don't suffice, we'll have someone go through and copy the receipts. The estimate I have for the time it would take to copy four years of receipts for three board members is about $80. That is for one hour each for three different secretaries (each of those board members has a different secretary) to copy their member's records. If the records we have here meet your needs, you'll only have to pay for copies you take with you. Let me know if this is okay.
Linda E. Cobbe
External Communications Manager
Hillsborough County Public Schools
901 E. Kennedy Blvd.
Tampa, FL 33602
813-272-4602 (O)
813-493-6964 (C)
813-272-4510 (F)
Please do not print this message unless it's absolutely necessary.
Our mission is to provide an education that enables each student to excel as a successful and responsible citizen.
I want the four years' travel receipts.Include the localparking receipts and the out-of-country receipts.I had no idea the board members traveled out of country.
The opponents should have these data, but they don't know enough to ask for it.I didn't know to ask for garage and travel receipts and out-of-country receipts.Thank you for educating me. ldd
From: Linda Cobbe [mailto:lcobbe@sdhc.us]
Sent: Wednesday, April 28, 2010 11:29 AM
To: tdecesar@taMPAbay.rr.com
Subject: Re: RE:
I need to clarify what you're looking for and let you know that we keep four years of travel reimbursement information for board members. Do you only want receipts? Are you interested in local parking garage receipts or out-of-county travel receipts?
Linda E. Cobbe
External Communications Manager
Hillsborough County Public Schools
901 E. Kennedy Blvd.
Tampa, FL 33602
813-272-4602 (O)
813-493-6964 (C)
813-272-4510 (F)
Please do not print this message unless it's absolutely necessary.
Our mission is to provide an education that enables each student to excel as a successful and responsible citizen.
Lee - The school board members file their own financial disclosure forms with the state division of elections. I believe they handle this, rather than their secretaries, because it is related to elections and the secretaries are prohibited from participating in election-related work. We all are when we're on taxpayer time.
Board members do submit receipts for reimbursement.
I don't know where old law suit files are kept in the state. I would start with the 13th judicial circuit. We don't store files past the retention timeline because we don't have space for that many files.
Linda E. Cobbe
External Communications Manager
Hillsborough County Public Schools
901 E. Kennedy Blvd.
Tampa, FL 33602
813-272-4602 (O)
813-493-6964 (C)
813-272-4510 (F)
Please do not print this message unless it's absolutely necessary.
Our mission is to provide an education that enables each student to excel as a successful and responsible citizen.
I must have just believed I had sent you the request. My apologies. My question on the board members' financial information is how long a period may a citizen ask for of an elected official's financial information? Candy Olson, for example has been on the board for sixteen years? Does public records law mean I can ask for her sixteen-years span of financial information?
And when board members spend state money for travel, etc., Is that itemized like Mark Rubio's revealing credit-card statements are? Are board members itemized receipts for the spending of public monies available for such things as board travel and/or other expenditures?
Whitehead: The question I still don't know the answer to is when the schools don't have to maintain a case such as Whitehead's, which state agency does it go to for storage? The government can't just throw away these documents. They have to be stored somewhere. ldd
I never got an email from you with this question before. Regular employees don't have to file financial disclosure documents, but elected school board members do. I will put in a records request for you for board members' financial disclosure forms. I need you to specifiy a time frame.
We don't retain files (Whitehead) beyond the retention schedule.
Linda E. Cobbe
External Communications Manager
Hillsborough County Public Schools
901 E. Kennedy Blvd.
Tampa, FL 33602
813-272-4602 (O)
813-493-6964 (C)
813-272-4510 (F)
Please do not print this message unless it's absolutely necessary.
Our mission is to provide an education that enables each student to excel as a successful and responsible citizen.
Linda, I left out a pivotal word in my message to you. See below. lee
Linda, does the Public Affairs Office provide legal financial data on school board members and employees?
You have not answered my question yet about where files like the Whitehead case are stored in the state archives, at which a citizen may ask for it. ldd
I think it's legal to look at anything of any public official's money interests. Just ask for it. They have to provide. They probably have to disclose it somewhere... probably all lies
THE COUNCIL OF TRENT CONVENES TO DECIDE IF THE SCHOOL BOARD AND ADMINISTRATION IS TRYING TO EVADE GOVERNMENT-IN-THE-SUNSHINE ATTENDANCE AT THE SACS WRAP-UP REPORT ON WEDNESDAY AND A CHANCE FOR THE PUBLIC TO COMMENT EVEN IF NO NOTICES HAVE GONE OUT TO ADVERTISE THE EVENT
THE OPPONENTS OF SCHOOL-BOARD MEMBERS OLSON, FALLIERO, AND GRIFFIN SHOULD TAKE NOTICE OF ANY ATTEMPT TO PREVENT THE PUBLIC AIRING OF THIS IMPORTANT MEETING.
Linda, I understand that the SACs reports wraps up Wednesday at 3 pm. Did the administration advertise this open-government event? Is there audience participation? ldd
