Sam Kaufman, city commissioner for the city of Key West, joined Good Morning Keys on KeysTalk 96.9/102.5FM this morning to talk about what’s going on in the city.
The rumor mill went a little crazy about the Key West chickens recently, claiming the council was going to round up the chickens and do away with them. The could NOT have been farther from the truth.
Kaufman said, “I mean, first of all, your listeners should know that we in the city have a great resource and partnership with the Wildlife Center over near Higgs beach and Indigenous Park. They do a wonderful job, and the city has a partnership with the Wildlife Center for many years, and I’ve been a huge supporter of them, especially during budget time, because they save the city a lot of money by having their chicken program. There’s no harm to chickens. In fact, they’ll treat chickens that are injured, and chickens are relocated that are captured in a very humane way and beautiful way. And in fact, if any of your listeners have not visited the Wildlife Center, you should. They have a great facility, and chickens are taken to a farm, and they can run free and live a wonderful life. That’s the program. There’s no other program. I think that the misconceptions and fears for some people, that there was some harm to chickens being done was a result of some memorandum internally from one city commissioner, I think, that was asking questions about having a different type of program, and that in no way reflects on what city policy is, or what the program is. So check out the Wildlife Center and get the facts and talk to those folks who do a fantastic job.”
Another rumor that has been going around social media is that the US Immigration and Customs Enforcment (ICE) has been making roundups in the city of Key West.
Kaufman said, “Without effective communication and transparency, rumors can flourish, and no one wants that. I think it’s fair to say that the silence from City Hall has been part of part of that issue, for me at least, and I think that it is really important for the business community, our local clergy and churches, our good citizens, everyone who is concerned about this come together and speak out about our concern about human rights and due process and the rule of law, and we want every one of us in our community to have those rights abided by. So what that means to me is that we don’t want people to have to live in fear, especially people who have legal status and people who have work permits. We are hearing reports that people who have valid work permits and valid immigration status are in fear of going to work, and we have our local clergy reporting to us that they’re bringing food directly to families in their homes because they’re afraid to go to the grocery store. This is no way to live, and this is not consistent with our one human family philosophy. So I am bringing together a coalition of business people and clergy and immigrant advocates and just good people, and we need to raise our voices just so that we’re clear that human rights and due process should be abided for all people.”
There has also been a statement from the sheriff’s office that they are not actively conducting roundups of immigrants. They will assist ICE officials if called to do so when an emergency arises or when someone is violating the law.
Kaufman said, “That is what every law enforcement agency in the state of Florida is obligated to do, and that’s fair and that’s reasonable and I don’t believe anyone who is reasonable would argue that our police department or our sheriff’s office is doing something that they ought not be doing. I don’t think that’s really the issue. For me, the issue is that if people are living in fear that ought not to be living in fear, we should be clear about that and get the word out and be clear that people who have valid status and have work permits and even if they don’t, we need to make sure that people have food and that people have due process. This is what I think we can be working on in a positive way as a city. I think that city hall has an obligation to do some of this, especially with regard to whatever obligations our police department have to participate in this and and that’s where I see the silence from City Hall as not showing leadership and I want to see our city manager and our mayor speak openly about this, and I will be encouraging them to do so.”
What is happening with the water quality program?
Kaufman said it was “quite a difficult process that turned out to be for City Hall. I think a real learning experience for our procurement manager, who is really a great employee, by the way, we should all support our finance department, especially newer, younger employees such as our procurement manager, who I think did a really good job overall. But it turns out, as as some of us we’re saying back in November and January that the competitive bidding process, also known as request for proposals, is not always as easy as one might think it might be to obtain a valid contract for water quality and and the problem is that there were some things probably missing from the RFP process and and there are real concerns out there about conflicts of interest, especially in these days when we’re trying to restore public trust in City Hall, the optics are not very good when the recommendation from some city commissioners is to provide a contract in a way that looks like there are conflicts of interest. We should avoid that at all costs, especially now and so I really don’t know what some of my colleagues are thinking. I can tell you, from my perspective, we should start the process over again, clean it up. There’s plenty of time. Our next City Commission meeting is not until August anyway, so why not go out, fix the RFP, do it the right way, get a good organization that’s clear, clearly disclosing any potential conflicts of interest. Also focusing on our ordinance. Remember the whole purpose, and by the way, I was the sponsor of the original ordinance requiring water quality programs for the city of Key West. In that ordinance, it requires whether, whether people like it or not, it requires the study of turbidity and the shipping channel where the cruise ships are. That’s the requirement, and the RFP needs to focus on that, and that was lacking. I just think we have an opportunity. We have time. Let’s go back and get this right so it’s done the right way.”
A review of previously issued building permits passed at the last meeting.
Kaufman said, “Some of us have been asking for these reviews for that for the last 15 months and only last month in May, unbelievably, the entire Commission decided not to even look at these permits when I put that on the agenda in May. Then the grand jury report comes out, and now, thankfully, the City Commission finally decides to act on this. But my goodness, everything from, public safety issues with regard to fraudulent permitting, all of the different lawsuits that are being generated from this, and the liability to the city, the allegations of self dealing and really bad things happening in the building department, we need to address these things, and the sooner, the better. So I’m thankful for the City Commission finally moving forward with this. As your listeners may know, my resolution was approved unanimously on June 4, and that requires the city to hire an independent planning firm, an engineering firm, to review all these permits from the year 2020 to the present.”
A special meeting to discuss the grand jury report and its recommendations will be held on June 25 at 5 p.m. City Hall.
Kaufman said, “Thankfully, Commissioner Haskell seconded my request for the special meeting. As far as I know, the rest of the commission were happy to wait until our next meeting in August to address this. So first of all, I’m very happy that we will have a meeting in June. This should not be waiting any any longer, because it’s going to take a process. This is not going to be something we can achieve overnight to implement the reforms that are needed, the anti-corruption reforms, the reforms to be sure that we have a fair and reasonable Planning and Development eview process so these types of abuses are not repeated in the future, and we need to address some of our human resources issues. If you read the grand jury report, we have statements of a toxic employee culture, a culture where employees are feeling threatened. The city doesn’t have a whistleblower ordinance. We have to get on that right away, and we have to address all of these things. Your listeners should keep in mind also that city government had information going all the way back to 2021 in exit interviews, that some of these abuses and fraudulent practices were taking place starting in 2021 and no action was taken from 2021, 2022, 2023 and then when Mr. Childress was the city manager and he procured the Corradino report, and it became more clear what was going on, we all know what happened at that point. We need to get to the bottom of these things, but we also have to protect our employees and make sure that employees who are doing the right thing are supported and that the City Commission and the public have access to all of this information, from exit interviews to resignations. For example, I understand that I don’t know three or four manager level employees have resigned in May, and the City Commission is not advised of this and exit interviews are not made available. If the City Commission knew about those exit interviews from 2021, and if the City Commission had all this information, these types of abuses, some of them, at least, would have been prevented.”
What does the future look like?
Kaufman said, “As your listeners, many of them know I’m not sitting on my hands. I am placing items on the agenda, just as the city manager might be doing, and my name is prominently displayed on those agendas, and will be on June 25. I’m working diligently on this. By the way, I don’t have a staff. It’s just me. It is a daunting thing, if you think about it, plus having a full time job. But I am committed to this, and I am concerned, just like many people who are listening are about the lack of transparency, the lack of communication across the board. So I have to tell you that we have a long way to go. We’re not doing enough to restore public trust, and that has to be the focus on everything we do, every single decision and if it’s the chickens or the water quality program, we’re only hurting ourselves as a city if we’re not doing things that are truly transparent, truly addressing conflicts of interest, and truly doing what’s in the best interest of our community. Those who want to protect the bad acts and misconduct, well, there’s a price to be paid for that, and that’s an election, and that’s coming up in a year, so we’ll see what the public really thinks. But I have to tell you that we have a lot more work to do, and I am not satisfied, and I don’t think a lot of the public satisfied yet by what they’re seeing, as far as responses from city government.”
The Lower Keys Hospital is also a topic of interest.
Kaufman said, “Another really important meeting of the Lower Keys Hospital District board, I have not missed a meeting since 2023. I will not miss any meetings. I speak at every meeting, if I’m allowed to, and today is there is their next meeting at 2:30 and it’s at the Grand Key hotel, in their meeting room over in Newtown. So those of you who are interested, please continue to be involved and pay attention. It’s really important that the competitive bidding process captures to the greatest extent our needs in our community, in the vast array of different medical fields and equipment, and we need a new facility. So stay involved and pay attention. It’s really important because we all, at one point or another, are going to have to rely on our medical infrastructure here at the hospital. Our task force started in January of 2024. I was involved with these issues in 2016 and realized at that time that the end of the lease, the last five year period was really important and that started in January of 2024. We have 36 members of our community that are associated with our task force, I mean real professionals in the medical areas and so many really talented people in our community. We want to support our Lower Keys Hospital District board in making the right decisions. We’ve been in touch with the Kennedy Drive investment leadership, and I’m feeling really optimistic for the future. It’s going to take some work, and might be difficult in the short run, but this is too important not to get right. We have to get our hospital in shape so that it can take care of us.”
The lease expires in April 2029.
Kaufman noted, “To get a contract in place and a transition to a potentially new operator can take years. So that’s why we started in January 2024 with our group, and thankfully, the Lower Keys Hospital District Board has some good new appointees from the governor and they’re taking action. It’s a little slower than I think a lot of us would like, but government is slow sometimes, but we have to keep pushing them and supporting them to do the right thing, which so far it looks positive.”