Last week, we reported on city code violations involving unfair campaign practices by three of the five Dunedin city commissioners. DunedinReporter.Com (DR) had asked city attorney Tom Trask how the city planned to adjudicate the alleged code violations. “I am … Continue reading City law deemed “unenforceable” by city attorney, but only after 3 commissioners violate it

Dunedin city commision elections are “non-partisan,” and city ordinance 26-202 provides the restrictions on candidates in those “non-partisan” political races. Any violations of those restrictions is considered to be an “unfair campaign practice,”  subject to a fine and/or imprisonment. Candidates are … Continue reading Mayor and two city commissioners violate city municipal code, face sanctions

Ethics complaints have been filed against Dunedin Mayor Julie Bujalski, the city Parks & Recreation Director Vincent Gizzi and former city Finance Director Joseph Ciurro. The original complaints were filed on December 20, 2016. Amended complaints were filed on February 1, 2017. Details and copies of the amended complaints can be found below. NOTE: this appeared as an article until 5:55 P.M. on 2/1/2018. However, after reader comments, we decide to properly label it as an editorial. In 2016, mayor Bujalski and her husband Tom were $2,874 in arrears on their boat slip fees in the city owned marina. Given … Continue reading EDITORIAL – the ethics complaints against the mayor and two city officials

Last August, the Tampa Bay Times reported that Dunedin mayor Julie Bujalski and her husband Tom “fell months behind in payments for their boat slip at the city-owned marina.” As Dunedin Reporter (DR) reported at the time, the Bujalskis had become delinquent in their payments immediately upon obtaining the boat slip in October of 2012. This was well before the “personal circumstance” arose which mayor Bujalski cited as the reason for the payment delinquencies. Bujalski defended herself last August by saying in an e-mail that her husband had set up a payment plan with the city. She further claimed that this payment plan had been “fully vetted by … Continue reading It’s official – mayor Bujalski lied about attorney approval in the MarinaGate scandal

Through 5 home games of a 15 home game spring training season, attendance at Toronto Blue Jays’s games has averaged 4,384 people per game. Attendance is well below last year’s attendance for the first 5 games, and MLB.Com shows hundreds of tickets available for most of the remaining homes games. Dunedin Reporter will publish the Blue Jays season average attendance at a later date, an average which may still exceed most of the recent spring training seasons. The three first homes games of 2017 each had an attendance below 4,000 per game, well below the 4,389 who saw last year’s lowest attended game. There … Continue reading Spring training attendance in Dunedin is down – why?

Allegedly “mysterious” robocalls criticizing the mayor were made this week in Dunedin, according to a Tampa Bay Times article today. However, a disclaimer at the end of the calls identified the source of the call as Main Street Leadership Council (MSLC), a Tallahassee political committee. As the baseball World Series plays out, a different “Fall Classic” is playing out in baseball-centric Dunedin. Far from Wrigley Field in Chicago or Progressive Field in Cleveland, there’s nothing “progressive” about this ugly political fight which saw some brushback pitches today. The Times article today, mayor Julie Bujalski accused her opponent Bruce Livingston of being behind the calls, saying that “it is a shame … Continue reading The Dunedin robocall brawl – a sign of the declining Times

Update: two days after this article was published, the chamber contacted us about providing all documents we requested. Two days after they did, the documents were provided. We will write a follow-up article, post all documents they provided and give the chamber a chance to comment. And now for the original article! In multiple filings with the IRS, the Dunedin Chamber of Commerce has said that its governance documents are something it “makes available to the public upon request”. Despite this promise, and having had three weeks to provide the documents, the chamber failed to provide these documents to a reporter from DunedinReporter.Com (DR). Giving the … Continue reading Dunedin Chamber stonewalls, transparency lacking

In arguing for the recently unveiled “Toronto Blue Jays project“, Dunedin city staff and city commissioners have pointed to the 2016 economic impact analysis (EIA) as support for spending $65 million of public funds on this project. However, the company selected to perform the EIA was not chosen based on a history of accuracy – it was chosen for strategic reasons aimed at securing state and county funding. Professor Roger D. Blair, Chairman of the Department of Economics at the University of Florida, flatly told DunedinReporter.Com (DR) that “no serious studies show that municipal spending on pro sport stadiums pays off.” Blair said that decision makers “often have … Continue reading The economic impact of the Toronto Blue Jays in Dunedin – an analysis of the claims made

On September 26th, citizens had a chance to hear for the first time what the lengthy negotiations between the City of Dunedin and the Toronto Blue Jays have produced. The public meeting, along with all materials presented, can be seen here. No deal has been finalized between the city and the team, and any deal still has to be funded by the county and the state. The Blue Jays are currently obligated to the city until the end of 2017, and the current proposal would bind them for another 25 years from the date the project is completed. The Blue Jays project is being … Continue reading Spending tax dollars on the Blue Jays “comes first”, even before public safety projects