Council member to talk about illness

NEW PORT RICHEY - City council member Tom Finn plans a 1 p.m. news conference Friday to discuss his unnamed terminal illness and its implications.

The conference will take place outside Finn's home on Tennessee Avenue.

"It's not the most comfortable subject to discuss, so I want to get it all out at once," he said Tuesday. He said Dr. Marc Yacht, director of the Pasco County Health Department, and his own personal physician both will be there to answer questions.

Finn, 47, announced he was sick Aug. 21 during a controversial vote on proposed fire and street light fees. The fire fee failed; the streetlight fee passed.

As an angry audience blasted council members for considering the fees - some saying it would force them to choose between medicines and paying the city - Finn spoke into the microphone and said he understood their plight:

"Two weeks ago I was told I have a fatal disease . . . that I believe was given to me maliciously," he said, adding that he could die within five years. The "best case scenario is that you just live and deal with it, but there is expense there. It's definitely not going to be a return to the carefree life that I've lived."

Finn said his illness was neither SARS nor AIDS, but declined to discuss it further because of the stigma attached to it. He also said he thought the illness was contracted (possibly after attending a function in July) from food or drink and that he would press charges if guilt could be determined.

Finn said the disease would not affect his service on the City Council or the city's Community Redevelopment Agency board of directors.

"I will not step down because of it," he said.

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