Sarasota News Leader

12/28/2012

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Sarasota News Leader December 28, 2012 Page 79 DEC. 18 Robert Waechter/Contributed by Sheriff���s Office The North Port City Commission agenda simply calls for a discussion about how to proceed in managing Warm Mineral Springs, the 87-degree ���Fountain of Youth��� the city co-owns with the county, but one commissioner places a very different motion on the table. ���My motion is to sell the Warm Mineral Springs in its entirety to a private entity,��� North Port Commissioner Cheryl Cook announces just minutes into the commission���s meeting. In less than two hours, that motion has been approved by a 3-2 majority, sending the county a clear signal that North Port has no desire to continue its joint management of the property. DEC. 17 Having served with Robert Waechter for years on the board of the Siesta Key Association, Lourdes Ramirez tells The Sarasota News Leader she was not surprised he had enough of her personal information to be able to use it in making a fraudulent campaign contribution in her name. ���We���ve known each other for 10 years,��� she adds, though they have had little contact since she stepped down from the SKA board in 2011. Ramirez is now the president of the Sarasota County Council of Neighborhood Associations (CONA). She served on the SKA board from 2003 until 2011; Waechter remains on the board. Waechter, 70, a former chairman of the Sarasota County Republican Party and a member of the Sarasota Manatee Airport Authority, was charged Dec. 14 with a third-degree felony in connection with a $200 contribution made in Ramirez��� name to the congressional campaign of New College professor Keith Fitzgerald. The Sarasota County Commission appears to be on its own in deciding how to plan for the future of Warm Mineral Springs. Photo by Rachel Levey-Baker

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