Issue link: https://newsleader.uberflip.com/i/235968
Sarasota News Leader January 3, 2014 the county. Chairwoman Carolyn Mason and Commissioners Joe Barbetta and Christine Robinson vote to fire Reid. In evaluations made public Oct. 15, the three commissioners gave Reid a below-average rating for his overall job performance from April to September of this year. Barbetta says he was frustrated when Reid wanted to hire an independent consultant from the University of South Florida (USF) to appraise changes to the county's 2050 Plan and the way the administrator applied the county's public records policy. Barbetta references several instances when he felt Reid was not doing his job properly — from mowing fiascos to the resignation of Suzanne Gable. Gable left her post in the Office of Financial Planning during the summer after staff discovered she did not have a valid CPA license. Yet, commissioners voiced frustration that Reid did not mention the CPA factor when he first informed the board members about her resignation. Meanwhile, Commissioner Nora Patterson and Vice Chairman Charles Hines support the administrator for hiring quality staff members to fill vacancies, tackling problems left in the aftermath of former Administrator Jim Ley's resignation and working to bring the World Rowing Championship to Sarasota in 2017. The County Commission votes 3-2 on Oct. 23 to extend an offer to the University of Miami for Little Salt Spring. Under the proposal, the county would clean up the property and maintain and manage it if the university transfers ownership of it "as is" to the county at no cost. Commissioners Joe Barbetta and Christine Robinson and Chairwoman Carolyn Mason direct county administrative staff to Page 107 proceed with discussions on those points. Commissioners talk about how little the county should pay upfront for the 112-acre spring and surrounding property, because the county, as the new owner, would have to cover annual costs of maintenance, upkeep and security. A recent victory in Tallahassee for the Sarasota Housing Authority means the completion of the final phase of the stalled Janie's Garden redevelopment project may finally be within reach. And with that will come the demolition of the last 60 units of Newtown's Janie Poe complex, notorious for its extreme disrepair and a "horrible mess" in the words of County Commissioner Nora Patterson last year. But it took a fight to make it happen. The Authority had applied for federal tax credits for three straight years with no luck. The Low Income Housing Tax Credit program, also known as the 9 percent program, is really the only major affordable housing initiative left at the federal level, Housing Authority Executive Director Bill Russell tells The Sarasota News Leader. And it had been structured to the disadvantage of housing authorities: The application process was weighted to favor proximity to public services such as bus routes and schools. "Developers would read that and go around the state and try to find parcels of land to put under contract to maximize their profits," he says. The Authority doesn't have that flexibility. "We are really focused on redeveloping a specific property. So we're kind of caught because we can't pick up and move." But this time around, the Florida Housing Finance Corp., which administers the tax credits in Florida, put out a specific Request