The City Council and I made a decision early on that we would not participate in chatter about the city or HISID on any of the social media sites. Generally speaking, it does no good because the critics cannot be persuaded to change their minds and to engage with them allows them more opportunity to make accusations and false claims. However, in the most recent City Council meeting it was decided that in certain cases the City should respond in order to set the record straight. This is one of those occasions.
Recently a Holiday Island resident posted on Nextdoor that during the incorporation process, the public was led to believe that if we incorporated, the SID would go away. That is totally false. In every presentation made by the incorporation committee, bringing in new sources of revenue in order to extend the life of the assessed benefit and the SID was stressed as a primary reason for incorporating. It was repeatedly stressed that Holiday Island did not have a sufficient tax base for the city to take over everything. There was no ambiguity about the message.
In that same post, the resident also stated that the city “codes and regulations” had the Recreation Center project on hold. The City in this case did delay the start of the project while the plans and specifications were under review by the building inspector. However, that should be seen as the system working as it should. Had the construction of the original Recreation Center building been put under that same scrutiny, it is very likely that the building’s footings and crawl space would have had proper drainage and ventilation and would not have had to be torn down due to the floor joists rotting. The building permit for the project has been issued.
The resident’s final statement about “the two forms of government” not working so well couldn’t be further from the truth. The City and HISID are working well together.
And on a related subject, there is a rumor floating around that our Building Inspector, David Dobrin, has resigned. That also is not true. David is on the job not only as our building inspector but also as a volunteer fire fighter. We’re lucky to have him.