Emails with County Attorney Suzanne Hutton yesterday, correcting my report in yesterday’s ”Entitlements – Florida Keys” post that the County Commisson passed an ethics ordinance last year. Followed by a physics exam. Followed by a law exam.
Re: Entitlements – Florida Keys?
| From: | |
| Sent: | Tue 3/09/10 10:35 AM |
| To: | sloan bashinsky (sloanbashinsky@hotmail.com) |
Mr. Bashinsky,
The county policy referred to in the March agenda item has been there for many years, without any enabling ordinance.
Sent from my iPhone
Re: Entitlements – Florida Keys?
| From: | |
| Sent: | Tue 3/09/10 11:02 AM |
| To: | sloan bashinsky (sloanbashinsky@hotmail.com) |
On Mar 9, 2010, at 10:43 AM, “sloan bashinsky” <sloanbashinsky@hotmail.com> wrote:
Thanks, Suzanne. Will show your correction. A policy not enforced?
What, if anything, was enacted last year?
Thanks.
I think what was enacted last year was about advisory board members not voting, but without going to ordinance (& I am in meeting with FKAA right now), can’t recall the specific additional constraint beyond statute.
Re gift policy, I doubt most people knew about it. It was in place from Captain Brown’s time but I know I was unaware of it for well over a decade of my employment. I was well aware of the statutory prohibition of against accepting gifts, including meals, with the expectation or understanding that any action as a county employee was expected by the giver, but not the county policy. I believe that is probably what the majority of employees knew as well.
If staff read the policies & procedures manual, they probably only look for the specific item of interest for the moment. The manual is 70+ pages long.
Sent from my iPhone
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It’s this kind of factual mistake, for which not even I can blame angels, that causes me to think I really ought to be left alone by said angels in matters that require attention to detail. I’m far better suited and equipped for subjective work, than objective work. Have been this way all of my life.
I remember a physics exam in high school. I set up every problem’s formula correctly, then made a mistake in multiplication, division, addition or subtraction on one-half of the answers. The teacher gave me no credit for setting the formulas up correctly. I made a 51.
Later, a fellow student told me that he and the professor had talked ahead of time about who would make the top score on the exam. The student said, “Bashinsky.” The teacher said, “Naw, Bashinsky will figure out and set up every problem, and then he will make a stupid mistake in the arithmetic.” Yep.
Be that as it may, while I don’t expect county staff, or even county commissioners, to read a 70 + page policies & proceedures manual, I do expect the county attorney and the county manager to read it, so they can tell the rest of the county employees when they are messing up. Certainly, not even the county commissioners should want to be told what’s in the County’s policies & proceedural manual by the State Attorney.
Looks to me that the people in Captain Brown’s time walked to a very different drumbeat, than the people in this time.
One other thing about the policies & procedural manual, which I learned yesterday from the State Attorney. It forbids county employees from drinking alcohol while they are on duty. PERSONNEL & POLICIES MANUAL, Section 1.05 CODE OF ETHICS, paragraph H.
Sloan Bashinsky