Reives Is Crying Crocodile Tears

No single person in Lee County is as responsible for the defeat of the sales tax at the polls as Robert Rieves. It was on February 14 that Commissioner Rieves insisted that the resolution on the uses of the sales tax proceeds be stripped from mentioning Lee County High School. He commented that we don't want to get into specific projects now. Well, according to all the experience of successful campaigns, it was exactly the time to get into very specific projects. That was based on the the first round of votes - and the second round of votes confirmed the same thing.

Now remember, this was February. The commissioners, if they had questions about the plan for Lee County High School, could have started addressing them immediately. If fell to the Board of Education to request a joint meeting with the commissioners and it was only after that joint meeting that the Chamber of Commerce was asked to become involved and started its effort on April 2. The county commission leadership was, therefore, asleep at the wheel when it came to the need to launch an educational campaign from February14 until April. That leadership let the matter stand on paper in very general terms with no specific mention of projects.

The suspicion is that Commissioner Rieves--who Bill Horner3's blog now also recognizes as the defacto leader of the board--has never been in favor of the renovations at the high school.

The failure of the tax was a failure of the Board of Commissioners. It's chairman was taken out in the primary. The question is when will this or another board remove Mr. Rieves as it defacto chair.