We’d like to thank Sumter County Administrator Bradley Arnold for appearing before the Property Owners’ Association this past week to answer questions about the county’s controversial 25 percent tax increase that was approved last month.
Whether you agree with the explanations Arnold offered at the meeting or not, at least he had the class and the guts to show up and explain why he recommended such a big tax increase all at one time. He easily could have stayed in the background, but unlike the cowardice bosses he works for – the five Sumter County commissioners – he didn’t hesitate to accept POA President Cliff Wiener’s offer to come speak before about 350 members and area residents.
Wiener also had extended the invitation to Commission Chairman Don Burgess during the second of two public hearings on the tax increase that was held at the Savannah Center last month. Wiener was one of many Villagers who spoke at those two meetings and offered their shock and disappointment at being hit with such a large increase at one time.
We think it’s terrible that the five commissioners would stay in hiding while Arnold clearly has to do their dirty work. Some might suggest they threw him to the wolves and sent him to speak to the POA. But knowing Arnold and what he stands for, we’re not surprised he came to speak to residents who clearly are still reeling from the tax hike and might not be happy with any explanation he had to offer.
If you ask us, Burgess or any other of the other four commissioners – Al Butler, Doug Gilpin, Steve Printz and Garry Breeden – should have been on the stage alongside Arnold. After all, they’re the ones who voted for the controversial tax increase and are viewed more and more each day as puppets for The Villages Developer.
Ahh, the Developer. If you want to get right down to it, he’s the one who really should have been sitting on the stage addressing residents who spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to live in his mega-retirement community and now are being asked to fund infrastructure for the sprawling Village of Southern Oaks that apparently will be offering things like food trucks instead of country clubs and putt and plays with inferior parking.
At the very least, the Developer could have sent some of the Morse Millenials – the first group of family members who haven’t had to work for it – over to speak to the POA about their sneaky ways of avoiding paying higher impact fees that could have eliminated the need for such a large tax increase. But, God forbid, that would have taken dollars away from the billions they stand to make as the new section of the mega-retirement community grows at a record pace – and they aren’t about to stand for that.
As some of you may know, the Developer isn’t a fan of the POA and for years has ordered his employees to follow his lead in refusing to acknowledge them as a legitimate group. Villages Founder Harold Schwartz and his son, retirement community guru H. Gary Morse, also weren’t big fans of the organization. But that was a different time and these days it’s obvious that the POA has long surpassed the Developer-controlled Villages Homeowners Advocates as the group of choice for concerned residents – some of whom are elected officials representing various Community Development Districts. We’re guessing that doesn’t make the Developer too happy!
Frankly, we find it amusing that the Developer takes the head-in-the-sand approach when it comes to the POA. Does he honestly think if he ignores them, they simply will go away? Can he not see that the group’s meetings are packed with Villagers who are concerned about their community and have some good ideas to share?
The answer to those questions, unfortunately, is a big “no.” Because unlike Schwartz and Morse, the current Developer and the next generation of so-called leaders don’t spend a whole lot of time out and about in their community. They just roll from the compound where they live to the Taj Mahal in Brownwood where they work and then back home again at night. Heck, we’d be surprised if half of the Morse Millenials could even find the Historic Side of The Villages, much less identify the house where their great-grandfather Schwartz once lived.
The bottom line is this: The current group of Sumter County commissioners clearly is tied to the Developer and just like him, they’re way out of touch with their constituents. Some of them are likely to lose their jobs when the election rolls around next year. And if that happens, we can only hope that the next group of commissioners will stand on their own and not sell out to the Developer and become nothing more than isolated puppets who do his dirty work while he sits back and counts stacks of hard-earned cash taken from the wallets of residents he’s long forgotten about.
