Thursday column: Heckuva job on that toxic plume, y'all

Here's Thursday's print column. I was going to start out with a little scene-setting description and an interview I did from the Azalea area of St. Petersburg. But the more I thought about it, the more urgent it seemed for the column to make the point as vigorously and quickly as possible -- it just can't be enough for the government just to sit around and wait for the next report, as it's been doing for 15+ years.

Hence the slapstick, visual image of the governor literally kicking the DEP secretary in the seat of the pants until he fixes it. Would that government worked that way at times...

* * *

Here is what I would do if I were the governor. I would march down to the office of my secretary of the Department of Environmental Protection and start kicking him square in the butt.

"Ow, governor!" DEP Secretary Michael W. Sole would exclaim, trying to protect the region in question from my gubernatorial brogans. "Why are you kicking me in the butt? Please stop!"

But I would just kick him in the pants again and say, "Not until you fix this toxic chemical plume in my hometown of St. Petersburg! Your department has been dillydallying about it like a bunch of $#%$%s forever!"

Then I would hand DEP Secretary Michael W. Sole a bucket and a shovel and tell him to get down to St. Petersburg, and not to bother coming back until it was fixed. And by "fixed," I would not mean, "Scheduled to receive another report."

Okay, my little fantasy is finished now. This is not going to happen.

Here, instead, is what is going to happen with the toxic chemical plume that we now know to be on the move, making its way through underground western St. Petersburg, migrating toward Boca Ciega Bay:

Nothing.

How sausage is made (or not)

Update, Wednesday p.m.: The Justice amendment was adopted and the overall bill was approved on second reading. The Fasano amendment was withdrawn, as often is the case when a legislator makes the point but does not expect his or her idea to be accepted.

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An issue I've written about a lot over the years, and a favorite pet peeve of mine, is the use of tax dollars by local government to tell people which way to vote. Sometimes it's a blatant use of public resources to say, "Vote yes on Measure So-and-So," "Vote No on Amendment 1," and so forth. Sometimes it's a more subtle campaign meant to "educate" the voters. The government has a powerful itch to influence the outcome of elections. Worst of all, doing it is usually portrayed as an apple-pie deed -- the government claims to have a "duty" to educate the voters on which way to vote!

Anyway, for the past couple of years, two Pinellas legislators -- state Sen. Charlie Justice, D-Tampa, and state Rep. Janet Long, D-Seminole, have offered a bill that would prohibit such "electioneering" by local governments. The bill is fairly tame -- it makes it clear that public OFFICIALS continue to have free speech just like everybody else. The bill even has a loophole for truly "educational" material, as long as it doesn't urge a particular election outcome. But Florida's cities, counties and school boards naturally dislike this bill, and it has failed to gain much support in the Legislature. The bills have languished in committee. (Bills that do not get passed always "languish" in committee, don't they?)

This brings us to today. An unrelated elections bill, Senate Bill 866, is up for a vote on the floor of the full state Senate today. And so two senators, Justice (pictured at left) and Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey (right), will try to amend the no-electioneering language into that bill. Fasano's amendment pretty much is the full text of the bill. Justice's amendment says that any electioneering information published by the government has to contain a notice saying it was printed with public money.

I kinda doubt the amendments will make it through, but I am glad to see them in there pitching. I think this is an issue that's been growing in recent years and will sooner or later require the Legislature's intervention.

You can't USE that water, but it's okay for us to DUMP it

I wanted to call double-plus-good attention to the article in this morning's newspaper by my colleague Nicole Hutcheson. Several days a week, the city of St. Petersburg is sending trucks down to the southern end of the city, opening the fire hydrants, and letting them gush most of the day into the bay. This is wasting about 30-million gallons a month.

This is not just a little bleeding of the lines -- it's a six-or seven-hour flood that fills the streets. You can't cross it in your shoes -- I've seen folks back their car out the driveway to be able to cross the street. Here's a link to a video taken by our staff; I hope you'll take an extra few seconds to check it out.

The purpose of all this is to flush the city's water pipes. This is happening at the southern tip of Pinellas County, which is sort of a dead zone where the water otherwise would grow stagnant. Still, it's pretty ironic that it's illegal for the residents to use this water to irrigate their lawns. We're in a drought, you know! (Sometimes some of the neighbors go out with buckets, grab some water and water their gardens.]

I wonder what the governors of Georgia and Alabama would think if they saw this video? [Times photos | Lara Cerri]

Column: Hands up! Step away from that rock pile!

Until this week, I never knew there was a Florida law against the "unlicensed practice of geology."

But there is indeed such a law, and the state of Florida can use it against you - especially if you say the wrong things about the mining industry in this state.

"What are you, a geologist?" the state might demand of you. "How do you know that mining is bad for the environment?"

Our story begins in 2005, when a environmental activist named Sydney Bacchus attended public hearings in Putnam County, speaking on behalf of the opponents of proposed sand-mining there.

After that appearance, Bacchus got a "cease and desist" letter from the state Department of Business and Professional Regulation, accusing her of unlicensed geology.

The state was acting on a complaint from a geologist-supporter of the mining. He accused Bacchus of "making a mockery of our profession." [Entire column here]

Should The Government Use Public Transit?

Everybody has an idea about what's "waste" in the government, and everybody has an idea for how to cut the budget. Here's one reader comment:

It seems a shame that the city cuts 25% of staff when other ways to save the jobs and save even more money may be out there. For example, if the city were to cut all code enforcement personal use of city  vehicles and issue bus passes in conjunction with a bicycle the job could still be done. This would save money and reap many benefits, for example:

1. No expensive fleet to maintain.
2. No insurance on the fleet.
3. Less C02 emissions.
4. Improved health for personal from all the exercise making for less in medical costs and lost days at work.
5. Enforcement personnel would get to really know the neighborhoods they service.
6. Our excellent public transportation system would get some use.

This is just one example of how the city could cut costs while keeping personal. I am sure if our elected leaders would start thinking outside the box they could come up with many more. -- Jim, St. Petersburg

Dear Jim: Thanks for the e-mail. You know, for public workers whose job did not involve lugging equipment around the city, I could see something like this. It would be brutal to ride bicycles in the summer, but -- using the bus system? Interesting.

I could hear the city trying to say that it would be too "inefficient" to ride buses to get around -- but that would be a heck of a thing to admit, since we expect the PUBLIC to use that same bus system...

Tuesday Column: Citizens Are Left To Watch, Not To Be Seen

Today's newspaper is filled with news of all the ways that citizens will suffer through service cuts if local governments are forced to cut their taxes. I didn't plan it this way, but it makes today's column about Pinellas County eliminating its public-access cable channel, while keeping its government propaganda channel, all the more timely....

Here is a tale of two channels on the TV dial, and why one must die so that the other can live.

The one to be axed is Channel 96, the "public access" channel on some of the cable TV systems in Pinellas County.

(Some cities have their own city channel and don't carry public access.)

Known as "Access Pinellas," Channel 96 features citizen-producers churning out their own programs - religious, cultural, book talk, dance, politics, personal rants.

But the Pinellas County government plans to eliminate Access Pinellas' budget as of Sept. 30.

There are tax cuts taking effect, see. Everybody has to tighten their belts.

This brings us to the other TV station. Pinellas 18 is the county government channel... [rest of column]

A Tale Of Two Budget Cuts

Our old boss here at the Times. Gene Patterson, was a WWII tank commander under George S. Patton. He tells the story of Patton chewing out his men for not gaining ground fast enough -- he knew it was not fast enough, Old Blood and Guts yelled, because he wasn't seeing enough second lieutenants getting killed.

That story popped up in my mind on Wednesday when, by coincidence, I had a previously arranged lunch meeting with Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio. It turned out to be the eve of her announcement  of how she would meet the tax cuts just passed by the Legislature. The next day she laid off 121 full-time employees, and eliminated 133 part-time and seasonal jobs and 115 other posts. Here's this morning's article by Janet Zink. [Times photo | Brian Cassella]

Why did this remind me of Patterson and Patton? Because Iorio said she specifically told her top managers that she wanted to see assistant department heads and management included in the cuts, and not just low-level workers or things that were most visible to the public. "I got the message," Iorio said, talking about public opinion in favor of property tax cuts. "And I decided we were going to do it, and do it without any hand-wringing."

It is tempting to contrast the Tampa story with this morning's article by Aaron Sharockman about the comparable cuts proposed by Mayor Rick Baker in St. Petersburg. Sharockman's article says Baker's cuts are more targeted toward lower-level workers. My Thursday column also criticized the direction of the cuts under the headline, At least the deputy mayors survived.

However, in the Tampa-St. Petersburg comparison, there is an important difference that ought to be factored in. St. Petersburg, under Baker, has made at least SOME cuts to its tax rate year after year, while Tampa's millage stayed the same. That meant Tampa was riding the full tide of soaring property values, while St. Pete was giving back to taxpayers at least some of it (not all, but some). So if Tampa's response to the new order seems more dramatic, it's also the case that Tampa might have had further to go.

The Desal Plant

I've been asked a couple of times in the weekly live chats here on TroxBlog for an update on the desalination plant operated by Tampa Bay Water, our regional water utility. I asked for and got a response from TBW spokeswoman Michelle Biddle Rapp. (That's a file photo of the plant in the foreground, left, in front of TECO's Big Bend Power Plant). [Times photo | Skip O'Rourke]

Rapp said the plant has been operating since mid-March and is producing 10 to 20 million gallons per day. It has produced up to 22 mgd, but it needs to have sustained production of 25 mgd before the plant can be tested and considered to be "complete."

The company hired to fix the plant's problems, AWP, is still not happy with the performance of the sand prefilters, which has been a problem throughout. They continue to test various sand sizes and changes in water chemistry and the diatomaceous earth filters. (Basically, you don't want the stuff clogging up too fast, and the better you do at each step of the process, the better off you are further down the line.)

"The plant will continue to produce 10 and 20 million gallons per day during the testing over the summer," Rapp says. The plant's cost to Tampa Bay Water: $158-million. Total production to date: about 1.2-billion gallons.

Tampa Bay Water settled its litigation with earlier contractors in April.

Now, the question in our live chat was whether the desal plant was the area's biggest boondoggle. I dunno. I mean, at least it's working now.

If we could, I would line up the previous contractors and let everybody in Tampa Bay kick them in the butt. I distinctly remember how questions of filtering problems were brushed aside --  I was in the room at the time. Then subsequent contractors either screwed up (or didn't screw up, depending on your side in the lawsuit) the prefilters even more... while Tampa Bay Water, a board made up of local governments but has never struck me as a particularly strong institution, muddled along.

Water over the dam, now? 

Thursday Column: Brad Pitt Never Had No Stinkin' Auditors

What we need here is George Clooney, Matt Damon and the rest of a charming movie cast to tell the story of this caper.

But we don’t have a glamorous cast. There is only a cast of extras, a list of faceless names who fade into the background of the years, blameless.

Here is the plot:

• The Florida Legislature creates a five-member board to privatize Florida’s prisons in 1993.

• The board (surprise!) does a sloppy job of overseeing contracts with private companies... [rest of column]

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Here's the 2005 audit that criticized the private prison board: [Download final_report.pdf]

Here's this week's FLDE report finding no criminal violations: [Download 062507_cpc_final_summary.pdf ]

Tuesday Column: At Least The Deputy Mayors Survived

What does charging $3 per car at Fort De Soto Park have in common with whacking Santa and New Year’s Eve?

Both are responses that some in local government are talking about after the Legislature’s command to cut property taxes next year.

Let’s start with the city of St. Petersburg, which says it needs to cut about $14-million to get down to the required level of $223.9-million.

Actually, that level of spending would be a hair above this year’s $223.7-million. It’s not an overall “cut.” It’s just less than the government would spend otherwise.

At any rate, the city has to lose $14-million from what it wants to spend. Mayor Rick Baker’s plan calls for cutting... [rest of column]

City Of Tampa Officials Warn Of Dire Flat-TV Shortage For City Council Members If Budgets Slashed

Across this state, local elected officials in Florida are watching Tallahassee, mindful that their local taxes might be cut, and warning the people that local services might be cut, too.

And then, there's this story in today's St. Petersburg Times by my colleague Janet Zink:

TAMPA - About the same time the head of the City Council said she couldn't agree to the mayor's request to slash council spending, she had a special purchase on order: Two flat-screen televisions worth about $1, 100.

Council Chairwoman Gwen Miller said she bought the televisions - one for her office and another for the City Council receptionist - because current televisions were old, and she wanted to see how the flat screens "would fit in the office." She said she was considering ordering them for any council member who wanted one. Staff members sometimes watch council meetings on television.

But after a conversation with Darrell Smith, chief of staff for Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio, Miller returned the televisions...  [rest of story]

Our Tax Dollars At Work, Part II

This article from the morning paper by Mike Donila says everything there is to say about the nature of local government, and why it can't cut its own budget.

The city of Clearwater, after months of threatening its residents with terrible pain if the Legislature cuts its budget, is nonetheless still sending its mayor, City Council and top officials on a taxpayer-paid trip to Philadelphia so the mayor can throw out the first pitch at a Phillies game.

Sure, the city has a long-standing relationship with the Phillies, who conduct their spring training there. But the city can NOT threaten to close all the local parks, and punish the citizens in all kinds of ways, and then turn around and go "woo hoo!" and take junkets. Maybe it's a "good" expense -- but so what? LOTS of "good" things will have to be cut; if the government acts this way it will have zero credibility.

As Donila reports, the city of Dunedin just canceled its own such trip to Toronto, and the city of Tampa has not even spent tax dollars sending the local pols to Yankees games in New York.

Our Tax Dollars At Work, Part I

So, in the middle of a terrible drought, with Lake Okeechobee on fire, as well as many thousands of acres in the states of Georgia and Florida, meanwhile the city of St. Petersburg continues to send out code inspectors to warn people about having brown or bare lawns.

As Michael Kruse reports this morning, the city is sending out warning letters that say things like "the conditions," "the health and safety of residents," and making "our neighborhoods nice places to live." Such letters refer to "bare dirt areas" and cite Chapter 16, Sec. 16-1064 d (2). The code says the owners of one- and two-family properties must maintain a "herbaceous layer of sod" -- that means grass, Kruse notes wryly (or should that be rye-ly?) -- "or ground cover plant material."

Now, I have a helpful suggestion, since the government is about to engage in budget cuts. I propose that we combine the job of the guy who goes around telling people NOT to water their lawns because of the drought with the job of the guy warning them that their lawns are too brown or bare. In fact, the same guy can cite them for both at the same time.

Good God! Meanwhile, the local governments are threatening to punish the citizens by closing down all the parks if the Legislature dares to make them cut their budgets...

What A Turkey Is NOT

Even Florida TaxWatch, the group that on Tuesday released its annual list of "turkeys" in the Florida state budget, has gotten stronger and stronger about saying what its definition of a turkey is NOT: A turkey is not necessarily a bad idea, or government waste. To quote directly from TaxWatch:

The budget turkey process does not condemn a project's worthiness, but instead focuses on the budget process, including instances where the Legislature has not followed its own policies and procedures...

In other words, a TaxWatch "turkey" can be something that was stuck into the budget by individual lawmakers without a lot of debate or review. Often they were items not originally included in a department's proposed budget. Here's a link to a summary of TaxWatch's report this year, which identifies 507 items in the state budget that are worth $267.3-million.

To be sure, there is politics involved and there are goofy projects -- a fifth of the turkeys are in the home area of House Speaker Marco Rubio. This report also shows the Legislature is being two-faced, by huffing and puffing about how local governments have to tighten their belts and cut waste, while the Legislature is willing to spend money on anything that its members reckon is a decent idea (and even some that aren't decent.)

But there are plenty of good-cause "turkeys'' too -- hurricane shelters, aid for the disabled and so forth.

To that point, TaxWatch said something quite interesting in its report: The group is NOT recommending that Gov. Charlie Crist veto social-service "turkeys" automatically, but only that he pay "special attention" to them and review them on a case-by-case basis.

At Least We Didn't Blow That $89 Million On Deadbeat Poor People, Public Health, Education Or Social Justice

The two biggest legacies of former Gov. Jeb Bush were his changes to Florida's K-12 school system -- he successfully created a culture of standardized tests and school grades -- and his at-any-costs rush to privatize functions of the state government.

The trouble is that a lot of Bush's privatization efforts resulted in boondoggles. It turns out that "running the government like a business" often has meant the opposite -- business turns out to be just as good as blowing Other People's Money without results as the supposedly awful government.

Somebody ought to write a book that captures the full scope of the rip-off of Florida taxpayers over the past decade under the mantra of privatization -- fake schools gobbling up voucher money, failed computer-system disasters, campaign donors getting key contracts, ad nauseam. Just for today, though, be sure to check out today's article by our Tallahassee bureau chief Steve Bousquet:

TALLAHASSEE -- The state of Florida on Thursday declared its effort to privatize its accounting systems an expensive failure, as Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink suspended all work on the 3-year-old project.

After spending $89-million to build something new, the state is left with the 25-year-old system it had before... [rest of story]

Let The Budget-Cut Threats Begin

Here's a story this morning from St. Petersburg, warning that the city will cut off money to the Florida Orchestra and so forth if the Legislature cuts property taxes.

I eagerly await the city's predictions on how many assistants to the mayor it will have to fire.

Oh, Good Grief, Buddy

See this story by my colleague Jeff Testerman in our editions this morning with the latest turmoil in the office of Hillsborough Elections Supervisor Buddy Johnson. The man goes through hired help like Tammy Faye Baker through Kleenix. (Is that reference too dated? How about Paris Hilton through nightclubs?)

There's been one snafu and ridiculous, unprofessional, ungovernmental handling of them after another. Come on, now -- payoffs to ex-staffers to keep quiet? A bunker mentality with media questions submitted in writing through a lawyer? How long will Gov. Charlie Crist let this go on?

Incidentally, here's a community association newsletter (Download TempleCrest.pdf) showing more local criticism of the supervisor's office, in the wake of city elections where some precincts' voting places were moved, with considerable confusion...

And These Mini-Comments...

I do not care so much whether Tampa Bay Water has settled its lawsuit over its four-year-late desalination plant, but only if the danged thing finally works. They soft-soaped me a couple of years ago about how it was going to be any day now... at least they're not calling the delay "a hiccup" any more.

So, Florida gun ranges operate on the honor system, counting on customers to tell them whether they are, say, convicted felons. The Tampa range where a patron took hostages last week just "pays careful attention to newcomers.'' In today's day and age, is it THAT hard to check somebody's record? I mean, I have to be treated like a criminal just to buy Claritin at the drugstore...

Hillsborough County Commissioner Jim Norman wants to know whether the county is duplicating its efforts with too much regulation of growth. You know, that's what I've been thinking for years... why have all those bureaucrats hanging around, when the County Commission is going to let people build whatever they want anyway?

Wait! Do You Have A Form 27-B-Slash-6?

Yesterday I got a two-page mailer from an outfit called the Pinellas Planning Council with the headline, "Notice of Amendment of Countywide Future Land Use Map.'' See if you can make it through the first paragraph:

The Pinellas Planning Council (PPC) and the Board of County Commissioners, in their capacity as the Countywide Planning Authority (CPA), will conduct public hearings on proposed map amendments to the "Countywide Future Land Use Plan for Pinellas County" (Countywide Plan Map), pursuant to the "Rules Concerning the Administration of the Countywide Future Land Use Plan,'' as amended (Countywide Rules), as set forth in the listing below.

Wait, please bear with me. A couple paragraphs later, the mailer says:

The public is hereby advised that the effect of any proposed amendment may significantly impact the type and intensity of use of the subject property and may be of interest to neighboring property owners. The PPC will make an advisory recommendation to the CPA for approval, approval with modification or conditions, denial, denial with alternative recommendations, or continuance of the items. The recommendation by the PPC and the action of the CPA may amend the Countywide Plan Map from the current plan category to the proposed plan category as referenced on the face of the brochure for the amendment, or to another plan category as may be determined appropriate based on the public hearings and consistent with the Countywide Plan, Countywide Rules and procedures related thereto.

I gather that this means: "Hey, You! We are re-drawing the maps that say what kind of stuff can be built where. You might be affected so you should check this out.''

Now, I would like to stress that the purpose of this mailer is, apparently, TO INFORM THE PUBLIC. Which means that whoever wrote this ought to be fired. Whoever approved it should be fired, too. Well, okay, maybe that's being harsh. Whipped with noodles. Made to sit in the courthouse lobby to be mocked. Something to shame them for sending out this ridiculous gunk.

Here's my favorite part. The brochure informs me that my own home's category is proposed to change from something called "Residential Urban'' to "Residential Low.'' There's a paragraph saying that in general, this allows no more than 5 dwelling units per acre. It does NOT tell me what the existing category allows, so I don't know what's actually changing.

Then it adds:

For a detailed listing of potential uses and applicability for this proposed category, please reference Article 2 contained in the Countywide Rules at the following website: www.co.pinellas.fl.us/rules/cntyrule.htm.

So apparently, despite the two-sheet, four-page mailer (one of which is blank), they could not get around to telling me the actual changes affecting me, and instead spent money telling me that I needed to look it up somewhere else!

By the way, the headline of this post and the artwork come from the film Brazil, which was intended as a parody of, among other things, out-of-control bureaucracy.

Oh, And If You Cut Our Budget, All The Cute Little Puppies Will Starve, Too

Check out the attached letter from the city of St. Petersburg dated March 30,addressed to various neighborhood associations in the city, talking about the dire impact of the various tax-rollback schemes being kicked around in Tallahassee.

Certainly, the proposed cuts are extreme, but I always get a kick out of the way that government threatens the most popular things first. You don't see any warnings such as, "Holy cow! We'll have to fire all the deputy mayors and central administrators!'' (See the earlier post titled, "The Washington Monument Syndrome.")

Here's the document: Download city_letter.pdf

The Washington Monument Syndrome

The "Washington Monument Syndrome" is a joking term I first heard many years ago about the tendency of government, when faced with a budget cut, to threaten the most publicly popular things first, such as closing the Washington Monument. You rarely hear someone say, "Oh, my gosh! If this happens, we'll have to fire some assistant city managers!''

Reader Rob Skerkavich notices it happening now:

Clearwater & St.Pete officials are saying they would have to cut all these things if the property taxes were rolled back to the 03-04 budget. You know,close 4 of 5 libraries, 4 rec centers, eliminate jolly trolly, etc,etc,etc. This budget was only 3 yrs ago and all these services were here too. So what gives Howard? How were they able to pay for these things then,with a lower budget but now everything will be cut.

Well, Rob, of course we'll will talk about closing libraries and rec centers first. It would be a fun exercise to take a city budget and make drastic cuts to it WITHOUT touching those things. But the answer to your question is that three or four years of steady increases can add up to a huge amount of money, and I suspect there really is no way to accomplish the kind of cuts the Legislature is talking about without cutting into muscle somewhere in local government.

Along those lines, reader Robert Vincent of St. Petersburg makes level-headed observations:

Unfortunately, personnel costs have been much higher than that [proposed annual cap]. Union contracts are in place and have been over the past several years which have given employees in all levels of government raises much higher than 3 or 4 percent per year.  These contracts were agreed-upon by government officials because such pay levels were required in order to retain employees and conduct effective recruiting in a very competitive market...

Mr. Vincent, you are right that some salaries and overall personnel expenses have risen according to contract, although not for "all levels of government.'' But the general point is, the cost of some things DOES go up faster than the proposed cap, which means either doing less of it (even if it's hiring police officers and firefighters), or cutting something else. 

Elections, Schmelections, Or, Buddy, Can You Spare The Time -- To Do Your Job?

Sometimes I think elections are too important to be left to elections supervisors, especially when they seem to take such a lackadaisical approach to what ought to be a near-sacred process. We keep seeing such stories from the Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections office such as this morning's by my colleague Jeff Testerman. Supervisor Buddy Johnson moved two precincts in the last city election without notifying the voters. First his office said it had notified them, but actually it hadn't. Next Johnson said it was okay because the turnout was good anyway, but it wasn't. And so forth.

Here's a list at the end of Testerman's article about past incidents involving the Hillsborough office:

August 2004: At an early voting site, one of Johnson's workers leaves a voting machine in the "test" mode, resulting in the loss of 245 votes. Johnson's staff does not report the lost votes to the state for 13 days, making the 245 votes void.

September 2004: Johnson's vote tabulation machines slow to a crawl, delaying final vote counts until almost dawn, making it one of the slowest vote counts in the state. Johnson blames the failure of a "software indexing system."

November 2004: Witnesses say Johnson tries to butt in line to vote in a crowded early voting site at the College Hill Library. Johnson backs out after being caught on videotape, denies doing anything wrong and later votes on Election Day at his Plant City precinct.

July 2006: A private group seeking to put the question of a county mayor on the 2006 ballot fails. After a private audit, the Taking Back Hillsborough Group says the petition drive failed because Johnson's office lost hundreds of petitions and inexplicably rejected many others that bore valid signatures.

Johnson, a former state legislator, was appointed supervisor in 2003 by then-Gov. Jeb Bush.