VOTOMATICS SET TO PUNCH OUT FOR FINAL TIME
It could be The Last Punch Card Show.
With state legislators declaring them illegal, Palm Beach County commissioners pledging $14 million for high-tech replacements and eBay hoping to auction them off, the world’s most famous fleet of Votomatics is about to be decommissioned.
Tuesday’s balloting in Lake Park for mayor and a commission seat is the last scheduled punch-card election in Palm Beach County. There’s still a chance, of course, that some other local government will spring a special election or referendum in the next few months that would require breaking out the Votomatics again.
Lake Park (population 8,721; it’s between Riviera Beach and North Palm
Beach) isn’t much of a political hotbed. But, in a testament to the creeping professionalization of local politics and the slim pickings for hired guns during odd-numbered years, two of three Lake Park mayoral candidates have retained consultants.
Commissioner Mark Mullinix has hired Donna Brosemer while Bob Gerber has enlisted the Patriot Games tag team of Richard Giorgio and Francine Nelson. The third mayoral hopeful, former Commissioner Paul Castro, is flying solo.
There’s also a four-way scramble for the commission seat Mullinix is vacating to run for mayor. So punch-card diehards have a good chance of seeing a Lake Park runoff or two to prolong the life of the Votomatics for at least a few more weeks.
You gotta pay to play in Lake Worth. Businesses hoping to profit from a proposed $14.7 million redevelopment of the city’s beach and casino were advised recently by Mayor Rodney Romano to contribute to the PAC he wants to form to back the redevelopment referendum.
“I’m putting everybody on notice that if you’re going to ask to be the architect or the engineer or the landscaper . . . be ready to pony up to help us get this passed,” Romano said at a recent meeting.
Palm Beach County’s anemic Republican Party is muscling up, bringing in Washington, D.C., operative Danielle Morris to be executive director at $60,000 a year. Morris was hired by county GOP Chairwoman and County Commissioner Mary McCarty after being vetted by party activist and fund-raiser Gay Gaines.
Morris, 27, worked for Secretary of State Katherine Harris’ 1998 campaign and then in Harris’ Tallahassee office before going inside the Beltway to work for the conservative group Citizens for a Sound Economy. County GOP Executive Director Mark Hoch will work on special projects in a newly created political director’s job.
McCarty said she’s been assured by the state GOP that, in addition to Morris, a new South Florida field director will begin working out of the county Republican headquarters next year.
Backers of a petition drive to impose term limits on county commissioners say they’ve collected about 5,000 signatures to try to put the measure on the November 2002 ballot. They need signatures of 45,969 registered voters to force a referendum. The group, which has raised about $6,000, has used volunteer petition gatherers so far but plans a fund-raising push in coming months and might eventually use paid help, said treasurer Philip Blumel.
Boynton Beach City Commissioner Charlie Fisher is considering a Republican run in 2002 for the state House seat of term-limited Rep. Bill Andrews, R-Delray Beach. Boca Raton attorney and GOP activist Peter Feaman is eyeing Andrews’ seat as well. . . . Within hours of liberal Vermont Sen. James Jeffords’ defection from the GOP Thursday, Boca Raton businessman Gene McDonald was offering “Judas Jeffords” stamps at his www.0cents.com Web site. . . . Former Boca Raton Councilwoman and unsuccessful GOP clerk of courts candidate Wanda Thayer has started a consulting and lobbying biz. . . . County Democratic Party Executive Director Cathy Dubin has invited about two dozen black leaders to a June 14 issues confab.
Staff writer Scott McCabe contributed.
george_bennett@pbpost.com
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