The Political Whore

Update: Late Wednesday afternoon (4:37pm to be exact) the applicant pulled CPA 09-13 and CPA 09-14 from consideration in front of the Board of County Commissioners. The letter states in part “Please be advised that we intend to re-file these applications although we will make every effort to address issues raised in the process to further resolve many misconceptions regarding the project.” Nimby translation: Crap, we just didn’t have the votes so we will try again later. Don’t go to the hearing Thursday as it will not be heard.

By Kelly Cornelius
PoHo contributor & R-LAND activist

Is it appropriate for State Rep. Darryl Rouson (D-St. Petersburg and shown above with President Barack Obama) to lobby Hillsborough County Planning Commissioners (and copy the County Commissioners on his letter) pushing sprawl?

He must have thought so, according to his letter. He openly advocated for a “multi-modal” center (nimby translation: big ass WAREHOUSE) out in the far corner of the county, where we purposely do not have urban services such as water and sewer and where the land use designation does not allow for this sort of thing. If Democrats are good for anything, isn’t it usually being anti-sprawl and pro-gay rights? Rouson appears to be neither, but then I found he used to be a Republican. Also interesting is the very tiny portion of Hillsborough that Rouson represents……………looks to me to be mainly underwater. How would this project help the fish in your district, Representative Rouson?

The California developers initially claimed that Port of Tampa needed this facility but then the Port said thanks but no thanks. Now, with a shitty economy proponents are claiming the project will bring jobs to the area. That is great but we can’t afford to breach the rural area with more sprawl so I respectfully suggest they find an appropriate site for this warehouse inside the Urban Service Area. The Ruskin Chamber of Commerce is pushing this project very heavily. Recall: your tax dollars help support the Chamber. Read the rest of this entry »

Angela Rouson stepped into the Creative Loafing recording studio this week to discuss her campaign for St. Petersburg City Council in District 5, against fellow newcomers Steve Kornell and retired police officer Joe Smith. Yes, she’s the wife of powerhouse (and controversial) African American politician Darryl Rouson; but she came off as her own person — bright, articulate, well-informed and passionate — in her recent Suncoast Tiger Bay Club event, and she likewise was engaging in this interview.

I asked her if she felt that St. Pete cops were being “reined in” and not fighting crime to the fullest of their ability, and she said:

I’ve talked with the sheriff, Sheriff Coats, I’ve talked with Chief Harmon (and done ride-alongs with both agencies), and the general consensus is there is some of that. And there is also a lack of resources to be able to address issues, because if you are going to take down, for example, a drug house, you need more than one officer on the beat. I think they are being held back to some extent, but I think resources play into that as well.

Is there a racial political component to the police being held back?

I can’t really answer that question. But what I can say is there is no rational reason for not addressing the crime. …As a member of City Council I’m going to work to make sure that the mayor works with the chief of police to be more aggressive in addressing the issues.

I also asked her — given her husband’s controversial anti-gay statement that being gay was “morally wrong” (he later apologized for saying it) — if she would participate in St. Pete Pride and about her stance on domestic partner benefits. Hear her answers after the jump in the full podcast:

Read the rest of this entry »

For the second time this year the St. Petersburg Times editorial board has given a backhanded approval to a candidate with an anti-gay record. This time it’s Darryl Rouson, an incumbent Republican-turned-Democrat House member who has often enjoyed the newspaper’s largess.

As I wrote last week, Rouson is on record in a 2006 TV appearance as saying that being gay is “morally wrong” and opposing gay adoption. After taking some heat from gay rights activists last week, Rouson explained that he has changed his position, an evolution of thought in his mind.

In fact, the editorial recommendation didn’t seem to have much good to say about him:

As a member of the Taxation and Budget Reform Commission, Rouson was a leader in placing Amendment 5 on the November ballot. It would reduce school-related property taxes and open the door for a sales tax increase and the elimination of many sales tax exemptions. Other votes are more difficult to defend. On the commission, Rouson supported an amendment that would remove a constitutional ban on public money going to churches and religious organizations but opposed one to allow public money for private tuition vouchers. Curiously, he does not see the inconsistency.

The Times has always come to the aid of gays under attack, so it is surprising that Rouson’s editorial recommendation wasn’t the slightest bit tempered by a mention of his “evolving” stance on gay rights. Then again, neither was the recommendation for St. Pete City Council candidate Gershom Faulkner, who lost the race to Wengay Newton. While the newsside wrote about the gay controversy with Faulkner like this:

 Two state legislators have pulled their endorsement of City Council candidate Gershom Faulkner after he told a group of local gay and lesbian political activists that people choose to be gay.

Faulkner, a Democrat running for the nonpartisan council in District 7, said he could not support what he called a gay lifestyle because of his religious beliefs, according to those who attended the August meeting of the Pinellas Stonewall Democrats.

… it still didn’t mention the issue in its editorial recommendation.

When President Bush is anti-gay, the Times rebukes him editorially.  Hillsborough parents who want gay clubs pushed off campus get a smack. But establishment candidates in St. Pete who are anti-gay? Not so much.

Now, I played the race card in the title, and to be fair, you can be white and anti-gay and get a pass from the Times if the gay issue is not central to the campaign. Like the recent endorsement of the wildly anti-gay Brian Blair.  Yet I seem to recall at some point Blair being spanked for his anti-gayness editorially, even if I haven’t found a link yet for it. It seems much more acceptable for the politically correct Times to accept a bit of anti-gayness from black candidates, who play to an audience that is much more socially conservative than the MSM every acknowledges.

Bonus cut: The only mention on the editorial pages about Rouson’s stance(s) on gay rights is an op-ed piece by Bill Maxwell.

Faced with growing attention from human rights groups that had been circulating a video of him calling homosexuality “morally wrong,” state Rep. Darryl Rouson last night apologized for his earlier stance, taken when he was a Republican lawyer and not an incumbent Democratic state representative in a primary fight to keep his job.

According to tampabay.com:

“Sometimes we become educated and evolve,” he said during a St. Petersburg NAACP candidate forum. “I have evolved.”