Two Daytona Beach Shores city commissioners have resigned as the latest in a wave of local elected officials leaving before Jan. 1, when they face more stringent financial disclosure requirements.
Mel Lindauer, a Shores commissioner since 2016, told The News-Journal on Wednesday the new requirement − submitting what’s known as Form 6 − is “totally invasive” and serves no purpose.
Commissioner Richard Bryan, who has also served since 2016, said in his Dec. 21 resignation letter that he had another priority but added the Form 6 issue “affected the timing” of his decision.
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Many state officials already file a Form 6, including the governor and Cabinet, legislators, county council members and sheriffs. The forms require disclosure of the filer’s net worth and holdings valued at more than $1,000, including bank accounts, stocks, retirement accounts, salary and dividends.
LOL. How in the world did this legislation get passed? In Florida, of all places.
Also sponsored by Republicans, voted for by a state Congress with a Republican super majority, I’d love to know what the catch is, but it’s definitely a law that should be everywhere, public servants should always have transparency to prevent corruption and as the sponsor said “bring parity” to local elections.
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Absolutely obscene. Just thinking about my average apartment that would include 5 desktops, 2 phones, 2 tvs, couch, sundry jewelry, etc. Plus cars and other big ticket items. And I really don’t have a lot of stuff outside my computer hobby. I’m almost certainly missing quite a few things, as well.
I also see room for creative interpretation.
That laptop might have been worth more and $1K a few years ago, but is it still? Probably not, but does the law make that distinction?
Yes, depreciation is a pretty standard thing.
The law was written to specifically target city level officials (who are often Democrats) and includes jail time for any errors found during an audit.
The law specifically does not apply to state level officials (who are almost all Republican).
So it is an open question if depreciation is considered at all, because this law is not a Transparency Law, it’s a “Punish Democrats we don’t like with Jail” law.
I live in Florida too, just didn’t see what the catch was in this one instance, but I’ve been paying attention to the Monique Worrell fuckery that DeSantis pulled to get her out of office over her political affiliation. There’s been a whole lot of stupidly specific legislation to gain the Republicans meaningless or homophobic/racist political clout, my own in the closet state rep sponsored the anti-Drag show bill, while his wife hosts an event where pageant kids get sexualized. Overall the GOP are trying govern via legislation while doing all kinds of corrupt and inhumane shit like participating in sending migrants all over the country with our tax dollars, yet next election these idiots will keep them in office while they continue to not improve the state for anyone but the rich, white, and Christian.
The catch is that it applies to city officials, not state or national level. So, not to any of the Republicans who sponsored or supported it.
Nah. It already applies to everyone else - this is maybe just about limiting the pool of challengers.
From the Florida Government site :
I’m surprised too but it sounds like its working as intended!
I was about to say that finally something good is coming from the state. Got used to disappointing headlines.