County commission candidate Maria L. Scruggs addresses the audience during the Pinellas Park/Gateway Chamber of Commerce forum Junej 21. Behind her are candidates, from left, Commissioner Neil Brickfield, Janet Long, Commissioner Nancy Bostock, Charlie Justice (not seen) and Buck Walz.
PINELLAS PARK –The Pinellas Park/Gateway Chamber of Commerce hosted its first candidate forum at the Pinellas Park Performing Arts Center June 21, inviting those up running for county commission in districts 1, 3 and 7, and for sheriff.
A panel of nine candidates gave brief introductory statements and then answered questions submitted by Pinellas Park residents. Ricky Butler, government relations chair for the chamber, emceed the event.
Sheriff candidates
Democratic candidate Scott Swope, current Sheriff Bob Gualtieri and write-in candidate Greg Pound were first to field questions in the forum. Everett Rice, running in the Aug. 14 Republican primary against Gualtieri, did not attend.
Swope said in his opening statements that some of the budget cuts made at the sheriff’s office were “in the wrong places,” contrasting Gualtieri’s crackdown of sweepstake cafés with his cuts in units dedicated to crimes against children and human trafficking.
“I would like to refocus the sheriff’s office (to) public safety related issues,” he said.
He also said he would save resources by prosecuting but not arresting violators of nonviolent misdemeanors like shoplifting and minor possession of marijuana.
Gualtieri defended the budget decisions he made in the last several years.
“I’ll suggest to you that the proof’s in the pudding,” he said. “When crime’s down by 12 percent and you cut 100 million bucks, you have 100 percent case closure in your homicides, and arrests are up by 28 percent, we made the right decisions.”
He also contended that Rice, his current opposition, ran his administration by increasing the sheriff’s office budget.
“The agency is a totally different agency, and his learning curve will be steep,” Gualtieri said. “We can’t go back to that type of spending. We can’t go back to solving problems by spending money. It doesn’t work that way.”
Avoiding a question about his qualifications for office, Pound said he was adamantly opposed to DUI checkpoints, claiming it was a violation of the people’s fourth amendment rights. Swope pointed out that that practice had been ruled constitutional, but said he still thought the concept was an “unconstitutional intrusion” on drivers “not doing anything wrong.”
“I think there’s a better way to do DUI enforcement,” Swope said.
Gualtieri defended his decision to reinstitute the DUI checkpoints in December.
“If they saved one life, then they’re worthwhile doing,” he said.
County candidates
Up for election at the county level this year are representatives for at-large districts 1 and 3, chosen by all Pinellas County voters, and for District 7, who will be voted into office solely by voters in the south Pinellas area. The candidates challenging incumbents were asked to give three things they would do differently if elected to the commission.
District 1 incumbent Commissioner Neil Brickfield, a Republican, emphasized the past current commission’s reduction of the budget.
“Your county commission last year went through our budget, department by department, page by page, line by line, dollar by dollar so we know where every dollar is spent,” he said.
His opposition, Democratic candidate Janet Long, served for four years each in the Florida House of Representatives and Seminole City Council.
“I’m running for the county commission because I’m very concerned about where we’re going and what the future has in store,” she said. “I find that there is a serious lack of leadership in our county commission.”
Long said she would vote to put fluoride back in the county water supply, reduce her own salary by 5 percent and work with municipalities to reduce duplicative services within local governments. The issue of duplicative services was later discussed by all candidates, who each suggested different ways the county and cities could work together to save residents’ time and money.
Buck Walz, a Republican candidate for District 7, cited his experience in the business realm.
“I fight battles every day that small businesses take on from their government,” he said.
Walz said he would “squash light rail” and emphasized a need for government to get “out of the way and let the private sector thrive.”
By contrast, Democratic candidate Maria L. Scruggs said her experience in the public sector gave her the right background for the job.
“It’s time for a leader who understands what the public arena is all about and it’s not always about how do we decrease revenue. We’ve got to come to the public arena with ideas,” she said.
She proposed a development community investment fund that would offset some of the costs of social services.
The District 7 Commissioner Ken Welch did not attend.
Like Brickfield, District 3 Commissioner Nancy Bostock, a Republican, also cited her vigilance in lowering the budget.
“We’ve made tough decisions, we created efficiencies, and we have kept our county budget in check,” she said.
Democrat Charlie Justice, who served in both the state Senate and House, is running against Bostock and called for “principled pragmatic leaders” on the commission. He said he would oppose drilling for oil off Pinellas beaches, support measures to keep fertilizer from running off into lakes and streams and vote to add fluoride back to the water supply.
“We need commissioners who will make the decisions that are right for our entire community, not just the loudest voices in the room,” Justice said. “You don’t do it based on people screaming in the room, and you don’t do it based on polls.”
The forum later covered the fluoride issue directly. Walz agreed with Brickfield and Bostock’s decision to stop adding the substance to public water. Scruggs agreed with Justice and Long, adding that the issue was an example of “a lack of strategic management.”
Weighing in on another hot topic issue, all candidates said they would be in favor of allowing local firefighters to transport patients rather than the private contractors, Sunstar Paramedics.
A question also asked the candidates to give their plans for mass transit.
Scruggs and Walz both said the current bus system needed to be improved before they could support a light rail. Brickfield agreed, citing a “complete operational analysis” in the works. Bostock said she had “big concerns” with integrating a train system with existing roadways.
Justice called for a better mass transit system, but said the current light rail plan proposed by the Pinellas Alternatives Analysis was not the best choice for Pinellas. Long said she wanted to keep all options open.
“Our young people are not going to stay here if they don’t have a better way in which to move around our county or our region,” she said.
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