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Only Popcorn Could Make This Better

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By STEVE OTTO

sotto@tampatrib.com

Published: December 19, 2008

It wasn't many weeks ago that he was everywhere, or at least his name and face were everywhere.

Buddy Johnson's face constantly was on television as part of a get-out-the-vote campaign. It was on sample ballots and envelopes, and accompanied any mention of voting in Hillsborough County.

It was on so much political literature that it rightfully rankled Phyllis Busansky, who was running against Johnson to replace him as Hillsborough County's supervisor of elections.

Johnson's name also was in Mother Trib a lot, particularly when there were problems - and there were plenty of those - with getting the ballots counted while the rest of the country moved on.

When the election finally was over and Johnson had lost by a substantial margin to Busansky, I think most of us figured that was about it; we had seen the last of Buddy Johnson.

We were half right. He would be heard from, only we wouldn't get to see him.

Earlier this week his office notified county commissioners it needed an additional $2.3 million to cover an unanticipated budget shortfall. The request was put on the agenda for the commission's Wednesday meeting.

The Buddy System

I wasn't about to miss this one. With the economy slipping deeper into recession and the dreaded "D" word not that far off, the idea that the election supervisor's office had the gall to ask for a couple of million bucks more wasn't something I wanted to skip. I even thought about making some popcorn to eat while watching the show.

When the item finally came up late in the afternoon, there was no Johnson. Instead, Kathy Harris, the attorney for the elections office - yeah, they've got their own general counsel - stood up to ask for the money.

You almost could see the steam rising from the commissioners, who must have been anticipating fresh meat since lunch.

It wasn't just the two million bucks that fired them up. It also was the chutzpah of Johnson, making one last showing of the arrogance that has marked his tenure by sending someone else to face the wrath of the commissioners.

A Way With Words

It was Rose Ferlita who led the verbal barrage.

"His disrespect is inexcusable," the commissioner opened up, pointing out that the board had set a time for the supervisor's office to appear. "It's unbelievable that he would put us between the rock and a hard place at the eleventh hour."

She also threw in "ridiculous" and "pitiful" in remarks, which included questioning why the office spent nearly $5,000 on pins for the poll workers to wear.

Harris told commissioners the money was needed to cover unexpected costs for the purchase of more privacy booths for voting, extra ballot boxes, overtime for workers and $300,000 in "transition costs."

When she was pressed about what those possibly could be, she said it was mostly in replacing all those forms and envelopes that have Johnson's name with those of the new supervisor.

Not surprisingly, the commissioners voted to send their own financial troops into the office Thursday to go over the books just to make sure there aren't any more surprises waiting for the new supervisor, not to mention the rest of us, come January. Who knows, they might get lucky and find Johnson hiding in one of the closets.

Keyword: Otto Graphs, to read and comment on Steve Otto's blog. Keyword: Otto Graphs, to read and comment on Steve Otto's blog.

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