board of county commissioners

One of my biggest gripes about the Board of County Commissioners is how they approach the concept of appointed governmental boards, commissions or committees. Not just the present Board, but every County Commission, and there are many ways improvements could be made. One quick and easy improvement - the BCC can act like the volunteer citizen appointees and their various groups are worthwhile.

Those various citizen advisory groups are rarely treated as more than an annoyance by County Commissioners, and it really showed again last week when a vacancy was filled on the Board of Adjustments. According to the county's website, the Board of Adjustments "acts on variances to the Zoning Code" at monthly meetings.

I hate the way politicians talk around things. Happened again Tuesday when the Board of County Commissioners discussed both emergency maintenance and establishing municipal services taxing units for regular county maintenance of private roads.

Not one of the Commissioners, four of them since Travis Cummings sat out this meeting, offered the blunt, "this could get me unelected" truth. Government, even if it is reimbursed through emergency fees or regular special tax assessments, should not be in the business of maintaining or improving private property. Period.

Harsh, I know, and certainly not what the many citizens living on private roads who attended Tuesday's meeting would want to hear. But that's the bottom line. It's a private road. The owners need to keep it maintained at whatever quality they desire because it's their property.

At Tuesday's meeting of the Clay County Board of County Commissioners, our elected officials were asked to endorse the concept of Foreign Trade Zone services areas.

I can't figure out why the Board would vote its endorsement, and unanimously at that, of something that will only result in more revenue for Uncle Sam to waste.  And it won't be coming from foreigners, either. Uncle Sam's dipping his hand into our pockets again.

The Foreign Trade Zone service areas are just a tax adjustment, and we all no there's only one direction government knows how to adjust taxes. Now, when foreign parts are shipped to the United States, there's usually a 10 percent duty - or tax - paid upon entry. In the proposed Foreign Trade Zones (FTZs) service areas, that won't be the case any longer. Uncle Sam decided to adjust that duty and collect its pound of financial flesh as 2.5 percent on the locally-manufactured good when sold.

Sen. Bill Nelson was in the area a few weeks ago and held a town hall meeting in Orange Park.  Unfortunately, I was not able to attend, but did read in the local press something that floored me.  With all of the wailing and gnashing of teeth about transportation issues in Clay County, and the dire need for money to fund transportation solutions, no one from our local governments, county or cities, has thought to ask the Federal government for financial assistance.  A concerned citizen asked Sen. Nelson why Clay County was not receiving funds for transportation and he reponded that he had not received a request for money.  Really?!?I'm curious as to #1 - why hasn't anyone made such a request? #2 exactly who in our county government dropped this ball?