Dear Southwest Ranches Friends and Neighbors:
Good Morning, Good Afternoon, Good Evening and if I don’t see you later…well then…Good Night!
More than a third of the customers, politicians and business leaders who praised Florida Power & Light at three South Florida forums on a proposed $1.3 billion rate hike have financial or family ties to the company and its employees, a Sun Sentinel analysis found.
Read the Sun Sentinel article below.
Disgraced SWR council member Don Maines' excuse for supporting FPL is not even plausible. He mentions that he got the idea to support the largest rate hike in FPL history in apparently casual conversation. Sure! Don Maines hangs out will FPL managers? When Don, while riding your horse down Griffin Rd? That is about a believable as me stating that “W” and Laura are stopping by this afternoon at the Wanch’s for drinks. He implies that he was not aware of the hike until then. Doesn’t he read the papers? Stories have been in the two local papers for more than a month. It is likely the conversation when more like this:
Ronnie said, “Donnie, we need your support”.
Donnie inquired “For what? Hay for the homeless? Horse feed for the poor?”
Ronnie stated, “FPL is looking for more money.”
Donnie bumbled, “But I paid my bill, I think?”
Ronnie remarked, “No, this is a chance for you to really help us out” while wondering why he called and thinking, “We’re not this desperate yet.
Donnie said, "I don't have any extra money for them!"
"No we just want you to show up and say a few kind words for FPL".
Donnie questioned, “Do you need me to show up somewhere on my horse?” with a big smile on his face.
Ronnie shouted, “No” into the phone and pounded his fist on his desk.
Then Donnie thinks to himself “I will show SWR that I am still important and I will help the machine, they really like me and know how important I am.”
“I’ll be there boss, just tell me where and when. Just tell me what you want me to say. Bandit will figure out what trails will get us there!”
Maines supports this mammoth increase for the residents of SWR because his lobbyist gave him $500 when he unsuccessfully ran for office last year. We are not sure whether Mr. Maines did this because it was a chance to stand up and announce himself as Southwest Ranches Council Member Don Maines or that next time he runs for office in our town he will be able to go to FPL for a contribution like he has gone to Ron Book and Ron Bergeron in the past.
For those who think Maines does not have continuing political aspiration, you are mistaken. Remember, this man has used his office for political vendettas, was recently convicted by the Florida Election Commission for a election violation, and now he has sold out our community and the rest of South Florida to FPL for his own glory and a chance to garner future contributions. He salivates for press. Right now, he has no power, but does have powerful puppeteers.
How low will he continue to sink? He knows no shame!
That’s All Folks!!!
Wanch Waggler
Meet some of the FPL cheerleaders
Sun Sentinel
September 13, 2009
Examples of people who praised FPL at three South Florida hearings who have financial ties to the utility:
Pam Calzadilla mentioned that she works for the American Heart Association at a customer hearing in West Palm Beach but not that the group gets about $5,000 a year from an FPL company and about another $20,000 from FPL vendors whom the utility encourages to donate.
She said Don Kiselewski, an external affairs manager for FPL who is on AHA's Heart Ball committee, asked her to attend. "I would have gone either way whether they gave money or not," she said. Joan Goodrich, executive vice president of the Broward Alliance, said at the hearing in Fort Lauderdale that she supports the utility's "plans to provide affordable, reliable, sustainable, quality, state of the art green energy." Goodrich didn't mention that FPL donates about $50,000 a year to the group. "Strong, responsive utilities are one of those top business factors companies look at when looking to make an investment in a community," she told the Sun Sentinel.
Howard Berger, a Lauderhill city commissioner, and Don Maines, a former Southwest Ranches city council member, praised the utility at the Plantation hearing. Neither mentioned that FPL lobbyist Ron Book contributed $500 to each of their campaigns last year, according to finance records, because they both said they did not know Book was an FPL lobbyist.
Maines said he's in touch with several FPL managers and one mentioned the hearings in conversation and "asked how I felt about FPL. I said I have a good feeling. They said would I be willing to say that? I said, 'Sure, be glad to.' "
Berger said he read about the hearing in a newspaper.
Gary Hines told PSC members that he supports the FPL rate hike at a West Palm Beach hearing, but didn't mention that he's a senior vice president at the Business Development Board of Palm Beach County. Hines told the Sun Sentinel that FPL donates about $10,000 a year to the group "but that has nothing to do with my wanting to be there." An FPL employee active in his group personally invited him to the event but he said he planned to go anyway because "there are certain things I'm not willing to do without" like reliable electricity.
Nicole Christian, president of the Northern Palm Beach Chamber of Commerce, also testified in favor of FPL at the West Palm hearing but said she didn't mention her position because she attended "purely" as a customer. FPL paid about $7,000 a year to help sponsor chamber events and $2,000 for membership dues.” I shouldn't be denied the opportunity to speak" just because of the affiliation, she said. She said she read about the event in mailers and e-mails. "I had time in my schedule so I actually contacted someone I know at FPL to say I heard about this and I'd like to go speak."
Copyright © 2009, South Florida Sun-Sentinel
2 comments:
Wanch Waggler said "How low will he continue to sink? He knows no shame!"
This man is a Goon Wanch. He is so blinded by the person he thinks he is, as opposed to the moron that he actually is. Don Maines is a legend in his own mind. The people who are even more stupid than Don Maines are those who support him or ask him to speak on their behalf.
Bergeron, Quittner, Hickmore, Mejia, Fonte, Book, Morris, Laurentano, Davilla (he's already done), Parrish, Sayer, Mitchell, Luaces, Slazberg, Bolt, Rickles and everyone else associated with this scumbag Maines will soon be covered with the slime that this Goon leaves behind like the snail snot that he is and descend to the lowest point a human being can descend to.
If any person ever votes for him again, even (God Forbid) it was for the position of dog catcher; then they deserve what they get. Don Maines is done here in Broward County. Since he is so well known in Palm Beach County due to his arrests there, maybe he should go back there and try to get back into the criminal system of politics there.
Post a Comment