When the Guardian surveyed Pinellas County government agencies, all 12 agencies incorrectly claimed that an Emergency Access Permit (EAP) is required for reentry after a hurricane. The EAP program has been in place for 15 months,…
When the Tampa Bay Times purchased and closed the Tampa Tribune on May 3rd, the Times gave different statements of facts to government agencies in required filings. The statements made to government agencies also differed from…
From 2009 to 2016, St. Petersburg residents made 122 calls to St. Petersburg Police complaining about noise coming from the Flamingo Resort. 45% of the calls during the last four years led to police asking or telling…
Pinellas County government spends tax dollars with a vendor to send e-mails to undeliverable county government e-mail addresses, a Guardian review shows. One of the e-mail addresses belonged to Steve Spratt, the county administrator who resigned…
A review of the Pinellas Sheriff’s program for post-hurricane reentry found multiple security weaknesses, including allowing entry of people with arrest warrants while denying entry to most law-abiding Pinellas County residents. The sheriff also contradicted his own agency’s…
Pinellas Circuit Judge Cynthia Newton yesterday denied two defense motions to dismiss the main counts in former county commissioner Norm Roche’s labor lawsuit against Pinellas County. The case involves Roche’s sudden “unhiring” by County Administrator Mark Woodard after he had…
At today’s PSTA board meeting, Oldsmar mayor and PSTA Board member Doug Bevis said that reallocating miles from some bus routes to other routes means “we are cutting”, even when the total number of miles remain the same. However, Bevis began his…
When a Guardian reporter probed how public agencies respond to citizens reporting a crime, a St. Petersburg Police Department (SPPD) employee erroneously told the reporter that you have to live in the city in order to report a…
In an official filing with the State of Florida, the Hillsborough-based transit advocacy group Connect Tampa Bay, Inc. (CTB) voluntarily dissolved itself on April 26th. This came 11 days after a Guardian reporter wrote Hillsborough county…
At the annual Hands Across The Sand event in Treasure Island, FL, the Suncoast Sierra Club used a helicopter to take aerial photographs. However, helicopters are powered by aviation fuel, which the Sierra Club labels a “dirty fuel”. A battery-powered aerial…
Let’s say you apply for a job, and the employer offers you that job. You accept, are fingerprinted and photographed, are assigned an employee number, sent a welcome package and told to show up for work. Would…
PSTA has not cut bus service since the defeat of Greenlight Pinellas, despite a written promise to do so. PSTA’s top leadership did not respond to multiple requests for comment on these findings.
— by Tom Rask The Tampa Bay Guardian’s first ever article (on the Times / Tribune) has been viewed by over 2,500 people in less than 20 hours. Many people contacted us offering supplemental information, which…
— by Tom Rask and Jim Bleyer– By firing more than 100 workers with no notice Tuesday in its acquisition of the Tampa Tribune, the Tampa Bay Times violated federal law. The Times could be…