I just read an e-mail from County Commissioner Rob Bradley to one of our fellow MCS bloggers, Marsha. (It's public record.) The e-mail relayed County Attorney Mark Scruby's opinion of the situation at The Ravines, something near and dear to Marsha's heart.

I imagine her heart's aching now.

I'll sum up the attorney's opinion of local government's two-step role in the controversial future of what used to be one of the most beautiful and challenging golf courses in Florida: First, watch while a bankrupcty court strips Ravines residents of the contractual rights guaranteed in the deeds to their homes and, second, hold down those stripped residents while they're being deflowered by a developer.

I understand the context of Scruby's opinion and it makes perfect legal sense. (Perfect legal sense. How's that for an oxymoron?) If a developer takes the proper steps, the county government does not have the right to deny his or her requests as they move along the process. And bankruptcy courts have powers we mere mortals can hardly imagine, up to and including approving a bankruptcy trustee's plan to sell off a golf course so a developer can have a field day building new homes - even if everyone around the golf course have deed their deed restrictions that say otherwise.

Remember back in elementary school, when we first started learning about what makes America the greatest country in the world? Part of it, they taught us, was that individual rights are paramount and that they would be protected, not taken away, by our government. The idea of government protecting the citizens who live at The Ravines got lost somewhere along the line. Money and paying back some entrepreneur's debtors became more important than real people.

Government should be more than that.

Michael S. Mann

michaelsmann@comcast.net [1]