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Marty Black on airport sunshine debacle: I didn't do it, it
wasn't my fault
"I saw that all who lived and walked under the sun
followed the youth, the king's successor. There was no end to all the people who
were before them. But those who came later were not pleased with the successor.
This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind."
-- Ecclesiastes 4:15-16
-- posted to the web on 05/02/08
Got a comment?
Make
it here.
From: Martin Black
To: City Council
CC: Frederick Watts; John Patten; kim.hackett@heraldtribune.com; Larry Evans;
Lori Stelzer; Pam Johnson; victor.hull@heraldtribune.com; Zac.Anderson@heraldtribune.com
Date: Friday - May 2, 2008 1:55 PM
Subject: Airport Master Plan and ALP
All, please let me clarify several points that apparently have caused confusion
for several members of the community and staff regarding the plans that were
presented at the meeting in Washington and those that were sent to FAA last
week:
I did meet with Jim Marble, Mike Rafferty and others to preview a draft plan
that they were working on prior to the city representatives meeting in
Washington this spring. The plan that was reviewed with me, however, was not the
same plan that was ultimately shared in Washington with the FAA representatives.
During the city council meeting prior to the FAA visit, Jim Marble did attempt
to speak with me. But due to the length of the agenda, we were not able to meet
so I was not afforded an opportunity to see the new plan until it was then
presented by the Mayor that week to FAA Planning & Programming Director Benito
De Leon and FAA Safety and Standards Manager Rick Marinelli. This plan is
distinguished from others in that it provided for the existing paved run way
areas to become the safety limits. For that reason and others, FAA rejected the
plan as not in compliance with their standards and then provided guidance on
alternatives that included the use of EMASs and the possibility of lengthening
the run way toward the intracoastal waterway so that the RPZ could possibly be
relocated off of Gulf Shores area homes and on to airport lands (consistent with
city council policy direction). The FAA at that time also confirmed that they
would not require the city to seek purchase or removal of any of the Gulf Shores
homes in the RPZ based upon their own FAA standards and policies.
The Mayor did inform me that he had spoken with Jim Marble and had asked whether
I had seen the proposed ALP that Marble, Mike Rafferty and others had provided
him, Mr. Marble said yes, but that was not the same plan that they ultimately
provided to the Mayor to take to Washington. This was all previously reviewed at
the de-briefing the Mayor provided to Council after our return from Washington.
Mr. Marble and I met after the DC visit and we clarified that misunderstanding.
As best I can tell, there are actually more than two versions of various ALP
alternatives that members of the community have been working on and that have
been shared with several members of city staff, some members of council and the
Mayor. To my knowledge, up until this point only one of what I will call the
'Rafferty plans' has been shared with FAA (I refer to that way because he is
listed on the title block and has previously shared with council his experience
with engineering and aviation plans) and for which we received FAA guidance -
the results of that review were shared by the Mayor is his de-briefing report to
city council following our visit to DC. The second plan that has now been shared
with FAA was received by the Mayor, he reviewed it with me and I suggested we
make copies for the public record together with an advance copy he was sending
to FAA prior to our meeting so that they could have an opportunity to consider
it before the meeting. My understanding is that this plan was prepared by a
broader group of the community that included at least Mr. Marble and Mr. Chuck
Schmieler.
I believe that some of the media concern that has arisen was related to some
questions to the Mayor as to whether the plans he had from the community were a
public record. A representative of the Herald Tribune requested a copy of these
most recent plans from the Mayor early last week. The Mayor first asked me
whether I thought that the plans were subject to disclosure and I indicated that
I was sure that they were. Prior to releasing the plans, the Mayor confirmed
with the city clerk and city attorney that they were subject to public records
disclosures. With the Mayor's concurrence last week, Mary Holcombe and I made
arrangements to have copies made for the Herald, city airport files and for the
Mayor to transmit to the FAA. While out of town this week I did speak with Ms.
Hackett and she shared with me that as part of her early attempts to get a copy
of this plan that she had been referred to Mr. Schmieler by the Mayor for his
comments. According to Ms. Hackett, Mr. Schmieler indicated that he was working
at the 'behest' of the Mayor and could not share any information without his
authorization. If that is the case, perhaps a clarification of this aspect may
help settle the confusion.
The Mayor, Fred Watts, Mr. Marble, Mr. Schmieler and I are scheduled to meet
next week Wednesday prior to the Thursday meeting in Orlando with FAA officials.
Mr. Watts has a copy of the plan should any member of Council or the public like
to review the plans prior to then.
As stated previously to Council, my concerns continue to rest with the time
constraints now imposed by the current policy that has placed a hold on staff
efforts to engage a new consultant to complete the Master Plan and ALP as
previously directed by City Council, or conversely to continue work under the
existing contract with MEA/Hanson, while still meeting the expectations of the
community and FAA. Hopefully after next week's FAA meeting, City Council will be
able to confirm policy direction that will allow us to move ahead with one of
these alternatives to bring closure to this project. I believe that we have
received previous direction from FAA that indicates that they are open to
several options and it is incumbent upon the city to complete this work and
submit a formal plan for their consideration.
Please do not hesitate to contact me if you any questions.
Marty Black
City Manager
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Schmieler questioned on Black's memo
From: "John Patten" <jpatten@veniceflorida.com>
To: "Martin Black" <mblack@ci.venice.fl.us>
CC: "Ed Martin" <EMARTIN@ci.venice.fl.us>, "Ernie Zavodnyik" <EZAVODNYIK@ci.venice.fl.us>,
"John Moore" <JMOORE@ci.venice.fl.us>, "John Simmonds" <JSIMMON@ci.venice.fl.us>,
"Linda Depew" <LDEPEW@ci.venice.fl.us>, "Rick Tacy" <RTACY@ci.venice.fl.us>,
"Sue Lang" <SLANG@ci.venice.fl.us>, "Vicki Noren" <VNOREN@ci.venice.fl.us>,
"Frederick Watts" <FWATTS@ci.venice.fl.us>, "Lori Stelzer" <LSTELZE@ci.venice.fl.us>,
"Pam Johnson" <PJOHNSO@ci.venice.fl.us>, <Kim.Hackett@heraldtribune.com>, "Larry
Evans" <larry.evans@heraldtribune.com>, <victor.hull@heraldtribune.com>, <Zac.Anderson@heraldtribune.com>
Date: Friday - May 2, 2008 8:32 PM
Subject: Re: Airport Master Plan and ALP
I talked to Chuck Schmieler earlier this evening to double
check on the "behest" quote. Schmieler states that he doesn't recall using the
word. He stopped just short of denying it, stating he was at the beach with his
wife on a cell phone when he talked with Hackett. He asked his wife if she
recalled hearing him use the word, she stated that she didn't remember either.
Schmieler stated that if he did use that word, it was an admittedly poor choice
given the meaning and emphasis being placed on it by Mr. Black, and that the
emphasis now being placed on it would be a total misconstruing. He stated that
[Herald-Tribune reporter Kim] Hackett wanted copies of
some docs from him and that she was making him a bit uncomfortable, so he was
attempting to get out of the conversation by redirecting Hackett to the mayor to
answer any questions.
He further stated that he had recently talked with Hackett again and that he
felt she was trying to pin him down by getting him to say that somehow all of
the work he was doing was under direction of the mayor. He told her no multiple
times, but did not fully understand why she was pursuing this line of
questioning. After he had read Black's statement, and after I explained that the
Herald-Trib was retreading the ground trying to buttress the article that was
recently pulled, he had one of those epiphanous moments where everything
suddenly made sense.
He thanked me for mapping out the territory for him and explaining everything
and vociferously denied receiving any direction from the mayor at any time. He
was pretty angry, and he doesn't seem to be the kind of guy who gets angry
easily. He said he is going to sit back and watch what happens next, but that if
the Herald-Trib or anyone else tried to make it look like he was stating that
the mayor had been part of the brainstorming and idea development process, he
would become very loud and recruit McKeon, Rafferty, et. al. to further refute
the allegation.
Nice icepick-in-the-eye memo there, Marty. Top notch job.
Did you think maybe you should have called Schmieler before running that
third-party quote in your press release either to validate it or to put it in
context? I sure do. See in journalism, we call that an ethical lapse when you
run an attribution like that before double-checking it. Reporters have actually
gotten into big, big trouble.
You remember ethics, right?
-- John Patten
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