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Brooksville employees dressing up

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By STEVE OTTO Steve Otto

sotto@tampatrib.com sotto@tampatrib.com

Published: June 21, 2009

Poor us. Tampa politicians and boosters spent all week and I don't want to know how much money trying to convince the world we are an All-America City.

Now along comes Brooksville, which steals our thunder by proclaiming it is as wacky a Florida town as, say, Waldo.

There was a time that Brooksville, in Hernando County, was on the main drag. Unfortunately, that was back when U.S. 41 was one of the main arteries into Florida. You could come down U.S. 41 from Michigan or Ohio, get a motel room in Brooksville, drive over to Weeki Wachee for the mermaid show and the next day head to the beaches.

It was the coming of Interstate 75 that determined the small town would remain just that, a sleepy crossroads best known for Rogers Christmas House, "Open every day except Christmas."

That great American

The town is named after Preston Brooks, a member of the U.S. House from South Carolina. He gained his place in history in 1856 when he grabbed a cane from Sen. Charles Sumner, who had just made a speech in Congress denouncing slavery, and apparently beat the daylights out of him.

Nobody pays much attention to Brooksville these days, unless they are lost trying to find the Suncoast Parkway a few miles out of town.

Or at least they didn't until last week, when the city council came up with a new dress code for employees.

Dress codes aren't new. We more or less have one here at Mother Trib, where reporters are asked to at least wear shoes, even if they don't bother with the socks. It used to be that if you wanted to get anywhere in the company it helped to wear a bow tie, but they just don't go that well with Hawaiian shirts.

I don't know what it was like down at Brooksville City Hall, but apparently things were getting out of hand, not to mention a little ripe.

'Strict personal hygiene'

The council adopted a three-page code to upgrade its employees. Included in the new policy is the requirement that employees observe "strict personal hygiene," including the use of deodorant. Sexually provocative clothes are prohibited.

There is also a requirement that employees not have "exposed undergarments" or "the observable lack of undergarments."

Brooksville Mayor Joe Bernadini was the lone dissenting vote. I called his office to see if there was to be any distinction made between the briefs crowd and boxer shorts men, but he wasn't in.

The new rules require employees to cover up any tattoos during work hours. If they did that here in the newsroom, people would sit around covered with paper bags.

Personally, I think the new policy is going to make life more interesting in Brooksville, especially if you are the person assigned to be the observer of undergarments or the sniffer of armpits.

Keyword: Otto Graphs, for more of Steve Otto's musings.

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