A failed petition, a $64,000 question

During the critical period when a citizens group was seeking more time to put a county mayor initiative on the ballot, Hillsborough Elections Supervisor Buddy Johnson said his office was too busy to grant an extension.

He did not answer the group's letters. Nor did he return their phone calls.

During this time, Johnson did accomplish something else: Beginning July 7, and every business day through July 17, Johnson sold blocks of his restaurant stock, according to Securities and Exchange Commission records. His profit after selling 22,500 shares of Star Buffet stock, excluding expenses: $64,032.

The Taking Back Hillsborough citizens group now says its effort to get the county mayor question on the November ballot failed, in part, because of Johnson's neglect and mismanagement. Story here.

Comments

Jesus, is this a non-story or what? I bet if they checked deeper, he spent more time going to the bathroom than executing these trades. And what about all that time he took for eating and sleeping.

I don't know him, he may be an incompenent beaurocrat, but you have to connect the dots better than this for me to get upset about some public worker actually having a life outside government.

He must be a friend of Gallaghers.

This is not a story, but where there is smoke there is fire. I bet if the Times would really investigate Johnson, they would find all kinds of crap. The guy is a sleaze bag.

Rob MacKenna wou.d have done so much more for Hillsborough voters. shame such ignorance runs rampant through the county

Buddy Johnson, just another incompetent Republican hack.

Why do Republicans hate Florida and her people?

So why was he selling so much stock? What'd he buy? or payoff? gambling debts? just wondering ...

[politicalspectator]

I suppose trading stocks and ignoring citizens of Hillsborough County is better than downloading porn...sort of. After all, who do you really work for?

[jaguar]

Granting an extension is not automatic. The cry babies knew the timeframe to collect signatures, they couldn't muster enough signatures, and now they blame the Supervisor for coming up short. They MUST be Democrats because they do not accept personal responsibility for their failure, and try to play victim.

How many times does Buddy Johnson have to screw up before something is done? He screwed up the 2004 primary, screwed up counting petitions and even lost petitions. Come on people, 3rd world nations run elections better than "Duddy Buddy."

[politicalspectator]

Everyone should leave the voting booth with a blue finger.

11:17, At least as many times as Clark gets to. Pinellas County, under SOE Clark, hasn’t had an election go off with out a hitch yet… and the obligatory SOE response “Oh well, it really wouldn’t have mattered anyway”

12:36, Our elections are becoming a joke, a sham due to the way SOEs are operating. Worse, none of the elected officials give a crap and they know how bad it really is.

[KC Jonz]

Let's see.. How long do you think it takes to sell some stocks. I can do it in 45 seconds or less on my scottrade account.
Like someone else said, this is a non-story. Maybe he is an incompetent sleazebag, maybe not. Don't know him, don't care. But this attempt to make him seam like a sleazebag just throws more sleaze on the sleazy media.

if it wasn't so damn sad state that our elections offices are in, this might be funny and the comments of this being a nonstory might even deserve a chuckle.

what's another word for incompetent?

[politicalspectator]

12:55 - See "politician".

[Boca Grande]

Dig deeper Times. During that same period, Buddy probably paid his Visa bill, picked up his laundry and made a couple of personal phonce calls too. Scandalous.

[Omega83]

I don't know if Buddy is a sleaze.

I do, however, know that he is an idiot

Check Google News for coverage of all of Buddy's other ethical and management problems that the Times has dug up over the last few months. He's paid off former employees with taxpayer-funded hush money, taken all his office's legal work away from the county attorney's office and sent it over to the same lawyer who headed the Bush-Cheney legal team in Tampa in 2004 and then lied about it, he's a serial sexual harasser (including the time he had to leave the Florida legislature after sexually harassing a woman in her hospital bed), and oh yeah, Al Higginbotham's wife just built his new house at a serious discount.

With all due respect to the nuts on the County Commission, I'm pretty sure Buddy Johnson is the most inept and corrupt public official in this part of the state, at the very least.