The future of the St. Augustine Record remains uncertain as the newspaper shuts down its local printing facility and its publisher, Morris Publishing Group, LLC, continues to accumulate debt – failing to pay the $9,746,730 interest payment due to its lenders February 1, 2009 and an additional $9,746,730 interest payment that was due August 3, 2009.

I’ve taken the last week to sort out my feelings about the response of the St. Augustine City Commission in unanimously voting August 24th to raise the city’s fire assessment fee.

Spending our way out of debt…….Isn’t that an oxymoron?

Florida is well known and widely recognized as a leader in open records laws — what we call “government in the sunshine”. As an investigator and news publisher my job is a lot easier here than it could be in many other states like California or Pennsylvania.

I’m sure by now that everyone who reads this weekly Op/Ed has no doubt in their mind that I am a Conservative. Most of us Conservatives question ourselves everyday about how America got to where it is today, when in fact there is no easy answer.

To the Editor:

Re: Carriage operator proposes new route

Anybody can create a fancy website and fill it with a lot of fluff and fancy talk, but without facts and sources how do you know what to believe?

The proposed city fire fee has me thinking about the maneuvers all government bodies are taking in order to conform with mandates to lower budgets while meeting the need to providing essential public services.