Tuesday nights St. Pete election debate at NOVA on
MLK Street featured all of the candidates. The first section was allotted to
the City Council candidates, the Mayoral candidates last.
Mitch Perry, of Creative
Loafing, did an outstanding job of moderating both the Council candidates
debate and the Mayoral debate.
By now, all of the candidates, except one, seem to
have their issues, stump answers and talking points pretty well in hand.
The exception Tuesday was Jim Kennedy the City
Council incumbent for District 2.
In a rumpled suit Kennedy looked like a throwback
to Colombo of the long past television detective series and at times almost
sounded like the often rambling detective.
Kennedy got up and walked out front to present
every answer. Maybe
he was trying to stay awake. No
other candidate did.
He wondered way off point on many of the
questions. It was almost like he couldn't remember the question once he started
talking. It was late so maybe we were
keeping him up.
When addressing a question about his
accomplishments, he mumbled through a long list of committees he has served on
but included no major contribution he had made to any of them. Perhaps he slept
through most of those meetings.
I can help here a bit. Kennedy voted in favor of
the LENS on every vote, has been a strong supporter of Red Light cameras(they
kicked in $1000 to his campaign), ignoring the Police Chief's concerns was
the most vehement supporter of keeping the downtown bars open until three AM,
was supportive of keeping food trucks out of St. Pete and has backed Bill
Foster on every issue.
After 6 years on City Council, Kennedy should be
better prepared to indicate where has been and where he thinks the City should
be headed. Kennedy's theme seems to be support for the transportation tax
initiative which isn't even on the ballot until next year.
High light of the evening was Bill Foster walking over
to Kennedy and congratulating him for a fine job on the debate panel.
Kennedy's performance Tuesday evening was not only
an embarrassment for the candidate, in many ways it was an embarrassment for
the City.
Kennedy has a chance to answer many of these
questions in our It's Time
To Go On the Record Questions. He has yet to respond and did not respond to
our primary questions.
It is time for change.
Be sure to comment below or you can e-mail
Doc at: dr.webb@verizon.net, or send me a Facebook Friend request.
Campaign Disclosures: Contributor to
Kathleen Ford Campaign, Darden Rice Campaign, Concern Citizens of St.
Petersburg, Rick Kriseman for Mayor
See More of Doc at Bay Post
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