Pages

The Town of Southwest Ranches, Corrections Corporation of American (CCA), and DHS / ICE want to build one of the largest immigration detention centers in the nation within walking distance of thousands of homes; thus, reducing the quality of our life and our community. We do not agree with the federal government privatizing our immigration detention centers throughout the nation when there is clear evidence that privatizing our prisons creates a clear public safety threat. For ICE to continue to privatize these institutions and bring this safety threat through their "secure communities Initiative" to our community is unacceptable. Depriving someone of their liberty is a non-delegable governmental function and privatizing of such a function is infecting our nation like a virus.

The Town of Southwest Ranches has now entered into it's THIRD Fire Contract within the last year now with the Town of Davie, costing taxpayers $120,000 in ramp up fees. They are now closing several roads in western Southwest Ranches charging the tax payers $80,000 for the gates. They have paid an unknown amount of money for lobbying with ICE regarding this prison. They have several lawsuits against the Town, 1- Involving Open Meeting Violations on a November 5th meeting concerning the ICE Detention Center, 2- Open Records Violations, and 3- The Town is putting together a lawsuit to sue Pembroke Pines for breach of contract because the City utilized their exit clause and cancelled for convenience their Fire/EMS contract which included water and sewer at the last minute for the CCA prison. In the contract it states that there should be no third party beneficiaries. CCA would be a third party in this instance.

CCA has also filed suit in Federal court against the City of Pembroke Pines saying they are denying them water however the City had never seen a water application. The City did file for a Declaratory Judgement in State Court but that has been put on hold until the Federal Court hears the suit from CCA.

Is ANYONE CONFUSED as to why the Pembroke Pines/Southwest Ranches Fire Agreement was cancelled? The Town Attorney Keith Poliakoff attempted to "slip" into the agreement a portion that guaranteed water for the prison at CCA's request. This is something that should have been brought up separately. CCA should have brought it forward on their own in a water application. This is sleight of hand that CCA and the Town attempted to do because they were so afraid of CCA being on the Pembroke Pines agenda.

As of June 2012, ICE put out a statement that the site selection was no longer needed due to the fact that the extra bedspace was no longer needed. READ UPDATE HERE!


Thursday, December 1, 2011

Can SWR Handle the Truth?

As we all were confronted with our inability to process the truth by Jack Nicholson in this famous scene, the question is can Southwest Ranches government and her founders handle the truth?


Since our incorporation a short time ago in 2000, we have shown an amazing inability to manage ourselves.  We are now going on our 5th Town Administrator in 11 years of existance.  This is an average of 2 years and a few months tenure for each Administrator.  One might consider that it takes approximately 2 years in a position to be truly effective.  Our Town administration is very inexperienced at the very least.

Problematically, natura abhorret a vacuo.  This translates to nature abhors a vacuum and in our contemporary parlance is power abhors a vacuum.  In the absence of a strong administrator, the vacuum has been filled by the Poliakoff lineage.  As Town Attorney responsible for the founding of the Town, Gary Poliakoff and his son Keith Poliakoff have run the town as their little kingdom.  Notable investigative reporter Bob Norman ultimately concluded this about the Town and the Poliakoff's:
But Poliakoff -- who manages Becker & Poliakoff, one of the largest legal and lobbying firms in the state -- is just as much to blame for the town's blatant brand of corruption.
...
With guys like Poliakoff running Southwest Ranches, the town will never get much better...
You can read the entire New Times article here:  Bob Norman's Cash Cow 2

Anybody who's followed Keith Poliakoff's underhanded behavior in the entire CCA / ICE immigrant prison fiasco knows that he's acted in a very questionable manner including lying to Senator Bill Nelson's office regarding the prison roads, for example. Another example was reported by New Times and relates to Poliakoff's Cone of Silence which gagged the entire Town Council from talking with their constituents about the prison.

The establishment of the Poliakoff's fiefdom is so underhanded and premeditated that as a precursor to favorite son Keith now earning up to $600,000 for the year in legal service to the Town Papa Poliakoff enshrined their rule in the Town Charter itself.  The charter can be found here:  Southwest Ranches Town Charter .

The worst of corrupt, self serving poison pills is on page 8 and quoted:
Section 3.07. Town Attorney [appointment; removal; terms].
The Council shall appoint the Town Attorney for an indefinite term by an affirmative vote
of at least four Council members. The Council members may remove the Town Attorney
at any time by an affirmative vote of at least four Council members. The compensation
and benefits of the Town Attorney shall be fixed by the Council.  [underline added]
The Town Council has 5 voting members including the Mayor.  So, Gary Poliakoff ensured his control of the Town by requiring a SUPER MAJORITY to fire the Attorney.  The charter requires 4 out of 5 votes rather than the traditional simple majority of 3 to 5 votes.  The bar is raised from requiring 60% of the governing body to remove the Attorney to an unrealistic 80%.  This aspect of the Town Charter MUST be amended so that we have a shot of removing this corrupt force from our presence.

With guys like Poliakoff ... the town will never get much better.  That's the truth.  Can you all handle it?

If you can, then we all need to wake up to the fact that we need a competent administrator AND we need to BANISH the Poliakoff clan from our Town and let them do what they do best, which is lawyering.
Posted by at
Labels: , , , , , , , , ,

1 comment:

  1. AnonymousMarch 16, 2012 at 12:11 AM

    nepotism at its worst. get rid of poliakoff and his son or daughter to follow. in lieu of hiring and firing administrators,rid the town of crippling attorneys and perhaps a competent administrator could be found, retained and function as it fits the town.

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for your comments. Your comment will be posted by the moderator. Any threats of people are discouraged and as such those comments will be removed. Thank you for contributing to our conversation on the Southwest Ranches ICE/CCA Detention Center

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)