Treasure Island Florida City Commission

Gulf Beach News

You Would Leave Too

By now you have undoubtedly heard that Treasure Island’s City Manager, Ralph Stone, is leaving for greener pastures. As in any major move one makes, I’m sure there were many elements that Ralph took into consideration before deciding to leave.

Now Ralph is not going to tell me why he is leaving, however, if I was in Ralph’s position here are a couple of factors I would have considered.

(Definition: Know-it-all, somebody who professes to know more or better than anyone else about everything.)

I’m not naming names but when you spend thousands of tax payer dollars on a traffic safety study and 3 out of 4 Commissioners dismiss the findings of the study and decide they know more than the experts and institute their own traffic safety programs then you are probably going to ask yourself why am I here.

(Definition: Browbeating “to bully or intimidate somebody sternly”)

Again, I’m not going to name names which I guess is sort of like saying a concept plan, however there is a Commissioner who must have a doctorate from a major institution in browbeating. Somehow, Ralph was able to put up with this Commissioner’s frequent classless displays of “browbeating” over seemingly trivial points of rule. For example there was the out of the blue browbeating over whether a plan is a plan or a concept is a plan or is a concept plan a plan concept, well you get my point. Anyways, while all this nonsense was taking place and most residents were running into the streets hoping an asteroid would come crashing into Treasure Island and put all of us out of our misery, you sit there with a not so masked “you got to be freaking kidding me” look on your face and are probably going to ask yourself why am I here.

(Definition: Mean spirited: “harsh, spiteful, nasty”)

No name again, but if a Commissioner jumps all over you because you spent a donation from civic group that was to be used for beatification on flowers and that Commissioner was upset because he wasn’t asked if a flower fund could be spent on flowers you are probably going to ask yourself why am I here.

Definition: Anal Retentive: “overly worried about small details, uptight or distressed over ordinary small problems”)

This unnamed Commissioner voted to allow Segways to travel upon our beach trail. Prior to the next meeting this Commissioner read that the Segways had been recalled due to a minor software glitch. At that next meeting this Commissioner was so afraid that the Segways he had voted to allow on the trail now posed such a threat to the residents of the Island that he called for a vote to overturn the previous vote which had allowed the Segways on the trail. A half hour debate ensued in which the frustrated Seaway business owner tried to explain how minor the problem that had spawned the recall was but this Commissioner refused to budge and wanted the vote allowing the Segways overturned. Another Commissioner called for a vote to overturn the previous vote and when it came for someone to second the call for a vote to recall the previous vote the Commissioner who started the whole insane episode sat there like a lump on a log and didn’t second the call for a vote to overturn the previous vote and the whole issue died. If you had to sit through this type of nonsense week after week you would probably ask yourself why am I here.

Apparently Ralph asked himself why he was here one too many times and finally couldn’t come up with a good enough answer. We will all miss Ralph but can you blame him for leaving?