Inside baseball: Who applied for ABC

So the ABC coalition just turned over a list of the 300-or-so applicants who applied for one of 10 available baseball board member positions. You can see the entire list and their applications here (its 400 pages).

I've gone through the list and can make a couple of observations. By and large, the applicants appear to be "regular" people, but we did have some well known folks apply or be nominated. Among those considered, but not selected:

Former Clearwater Mayor Brian Aungst and current Clearwater Mayor Frank Hibbard, Clearwater City Council member and former Bill Young aide George Cretekos, former St. Petersburg City Council member Bill Foster, one time state house candidate Charlie Gerdes, former St. Petersburg City Council candidate Ed Montanari, architect Tim Clemmons, POWW members Niel Allen, Hal Freedman and Hamilton Hanson, Clearwater Beach chamber leader Sheila Cole, and  Tim Clemmons, Dave Feaster, Dave McKalip, and Mark Ferguson.

Also, in a somewhat interesting turn, it was Pinellas County Commissioner Ken Welch that nominated colleague Bob Stewart for the ABC board.

Four of the members appointed by chairman Jeff Lyash (CONA's Barbara Heck, Russ Kimball, Chuck Sykes and Steve Raymund) appear to have not been nominated in writing. Lyash did say he accpeted nominations orally as well from community leaders and potential stadium stakeholders.

Comments

[Clear Direction]

Aaron,

Can you smell it? The stench of stale cigars and B.O. wafting from the proverbial smoke filled room?

I can! This community was promised an open, inclusionary and transparent process in which anyone had the opportunity to nominate themselves to serve on the ABC Coalition.

We were further promised that ALL of the stakeholders would be represented on this board.

Hundreds of eminately qualified people who feel strongly about the stadium issue signed up on the ABC website to be considered to serve on the Coalition board.

It turns out that 10 board members were selected to serve on the ABC Coalition. Of the ten selected, (Mr. Lyash was appointed by our Stealth Mayor) only three (3) felt strongly enough about wanting to serve to log-onto the ABC website and nominate themselves!

Seven (7) of the ten who were asked to participate did not feel strongly enough about the stadium issue to log-on and nominate themselves.

Four (4) of the seven mentioned above were not nominated by anyone on the ABC website.

According to the Nomination forms received through the ABC Website, 70% of the ABC Coalition members selected apparently had not asked to be considered!

Two (2) additional members it appears may have been asked to participate prior to the nomination process even beginning. I make this assumption because, Craig Sher and Barbara Heck were at both of the ABC Coalition press conferences (one at Val-pak the other at the EPI Center).

This process appears to have been anything but open, inclusionary and transparent! It appears to have been highly engineered! (By Mr. Strong-arm & Ken Welch, who may ultimately have to vote on this issue)

Can you smell it now?

[George]

Looks like you're the only person who cares who applied for this committee Aaron. I bet you thought this was gonna be your big break too. Ya better hope you're not in the next big round of Times job cuts.

[who cares?]

We are paying attention to what Ken Welch is doing. Both he and Bob Stewart appeared before the Grand Jury for squirrely conduct in the Jim Smith land scam. It is a pathetic and powerless group!