Leary: Tough answers on 450th commemoration

Historic City News caught up with Seat 4 St. Augustine City Commission hopeful, Bill Leary, on Friday morning to clarify some recent comments published and attributed to him.

“Government does some things well, but (organizing a major celebration) is not one of them. It should be run like a business,” Leary was quoted. When asked, Leary told our editor, Michael Gold, “It wasn’t so much what was said — as it is what wasn’t said.” Leary implied that we may be starting in the middle of this process, because, he says, “The city commission has not articulated what this two-year-long celebration (from 2013 – 2015) means to the local residents.”

“If you don’t know where you’re going,” Leary said, “you can’t know how to get there.” At this point, Leary tells us, the city commissioners haven’t sufficiently canvassed the local citizens to determine what the scale of this event should be.

“You have some people who want to see us put on a Super Bowl sized show and others who feel the city’s role should simply be to provide the infrastructure,” referring to things like police, fire rescue, sewers, parking and garbage collection.

City Commissioner and Vice-mayor Errol Jones persisted in his concerns two weeks ago at the last regular meeting of the commission; saying that he and other commissioners didn’t know enough about the city’s plans for the 450th birthday celebration — and it isn’t the first time commissioners have commented that they aren’t as up to speed as Mayor Joe Boles.

Put on the spot for a direct answer, Leary said that he agrees with Jones. To avoid possible sunshine law conflicts, the commissioners agreed to a public workshop to discuss the plans that are being made for the celebration, and that meeting was held last week. Leary attended.

If these events “should be run like a business”, as Leary was quoted, Gold, and several local businessmen in attendance Friday, wanted to know more specifics about the money — where is it coming from and how is it being spent?

The city, specifically the Mayor and his hand-picked “steering committee”, seem to be relying heavily on Leary’s former connections as a federal employee of the Interior Department to deliver what Leary estimates to be $500,000 a year in federal funds.

Leary admitted, when pressed for some “yes” or “no” answers, that the federal government hasn’t given any money to the city for these events. The federal commission has not been approved yet. If the commission is approved, there is no guarantee that the government will actually appropriate funding at any particular level – or at all.

We asked Leary about comments from Dana Ste. Claire who serves in a reportedly un-paid role as Executive Director of the St. Augustine 450th Commemoration Commission as well as a paid role as the city’s Director of the Department of Heritage Tourism and Historic Preservation. We left a message for Ste. Claire who did not return the call as of today.

Ste. Claire supposedly asked the Tourist Development Council for $1.5 million over the next six years for the celebration. He was quoted as saying that the TDC approved the money “in concept”, although Leary said that is not a certainty, either.

In Ste. Claire’s TDC request, he indicates that the $1.5 million would support “marketing, arts and culture events, recreation and leisure and the not-yet-formed foundation’s administration.”

Leary thinks that there should be a private foundation created to accomplish the mayor’s plan to bring together a public-private partnership to raise money and coordinate the 45 or more organizations that have their own ideas of what we need to be spending the money on.

To date, there is no private foundation. There is no federal commission and more importantly, no federal money. There is no provision in the state budget to fund a 450th celebration. There is no TDC money.

As to “administration costs” of a new foundation, we already have a mayor, a mayoral appointed “steering committee”, a management committee from within a city-funded department, and, what Ste. Claire describes as “files and more files of great ideas called in by local residents.”

Based on the Leary interview, Historic City News and others are concerned that there will be a dangerous game of “musical chairs” when it comes time to pay the bill for the dreams of 45 uncontrolled special interest groups; whose scope is uncertain, at best. Too much depends on federal, state and local tax dollars that have not been allocated and the imaginary scores of private businesses who are just waiting to flock to the table for a chance to give private funds to pay for this public celebration.

Not to mention, the uncontrollable reality of the economy. What would happen if we threw a party and nobody showed up? At worst, we create a colossal “spending machine” for tax dollars that we don’t have available.

Photo credit: © 2010 Historic City News staff photograph