Pay raises? The track record says it all: NO!

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By HOWARD TROXLER

© St. Petersburg Times,
published July 13, 2001

We are sitting in the back of George's Meat Market, which is at 4611 Haines Road in St. Petersburg. The owner, Larry Mevoli, 51, son of George, is telling me that he paid the city $4,500 in utility taxes alone last year and is of the opinion that the City Council deserves neither the raise, nor the pension, nor the perks that it wants to give itself.

"They just got in there, and they want a raise?" Mevoli asks, referring to the fact that the city elections were in March and this is only July, barely into the four-year terms of the new members. "Let them do something to deserve it first." I say, that makes sense.

We watch as one of Mevoli's five offspring, Bob, makes sausage, which is not as unpleasant a sight as is popularly reported, and compares favorably to watching a City Council meeting. The fourth generation of Mevolis in the business, represented by Bob's son, Zach, 6, wears an apron and observes the process with a certain dignity.

To be honest, I could have gone anywhere in the city to hear the same complaint. No one has called yet to say, "You know, the City Council is doing a great job, and its members deserve a big pot of extra money," not even their kin.

A raise for the full-time mayor is a separate issue. But as to the City Council, the first point is, does the council deserve a raise? As a continuing, corporate body, the St. Petersburg City Council has compiled a record of staggering chuckleheadedness that would, in the private sector, result in dismissal, and in the meat business, loss of digits.

Must we revisit the highlights of the past decade? The hoax called Bay Plaza? Satellite-guided garbage trucks? Solar-powered, computerized, unusable parking meters? Not reading the fine print of Bayfront Medical's ill-fated partnership because, you know, Aunt Bee was baking a pie and everybody was due over at Andy's house? As recently as the Super Bowl in January, we saw that any huckster can breeze into town and get the council to co-sponsor the thin air. You may propose to exhibit two-headed boys and pickled Martians and predict an attendance of 2.5-million, and the council will surrender Vinoy Park to you in gratitude.

In short: The council's track record is of proven nitwittery. The current members should not ask for a raise until they have proven otherwise, instead of this bout of unseemly money-pawing, and scheming for goodies for their skybox at Tropicana Field. One member apparently chooses not to pay property taxes on time, as an investment strategy. They want a pension, too! It is unbearable. Whether from principle, or practicality, only member Bill Foster has spoken against the whole enterprise.

As to the second point, they are hired to engage in part-time nitwittery, and they occupy these posts of their own will and for their self-gratification. They make it sound as though we have dragooned them to clean the toilets. The truth is that the rest of us are forced under penalty of law to pay taxes to them, and to obey any fool ordinance to which five of them agree. This is an intolerable situation already. Pray to a merciful deity against the day St. Petersburg gets a full-time City Council.

If they have the slightest decency and self-respect, they will decide that any increase in salary or benefits will not take effect until after the next election for each seat. The alternative is to admit that their true agenda is grubbing mixed with penny-ante bloviation. It then will be one of the sweet joys of life here in Gooberville, as the next election inevitably arrives, to see the dawn of panic in their eyes as they realize that the voters did not forget after all. I said some of this, more or less, to Larry Mevoli, but the afternoon trade was picking up, and he had to go back up front to earn his living, so he can keep paying his 14 employees, which seemed like a good use of time, compared to, you know, how some people spend theirs.

- You can reach Howard Troxler at (727) 893-8505 or at troxler@sptimes.com.

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