The voice you’ll is that of Bakari F. Burns, Chief Executive Officer, Health Care Center for the Homeless commenting on the steps necessary to achieve quality and affordable health care services for the homeless. Length — 03:34

Central Florida Matters encourages you to post your own reaction to this commentary. Visit the “commentary” segment on-line at cmfmedia.org. While there you’ll find useful links related to the commentary, including a transcript, biographical information and related pictures.

Should you wish to be considered for a commentary segment on Central Florida Matters, please click on the “contact” link to send us an email which should include adequate information for us to understand your issue. And please include a daytime telephone number where we may reach you.

Extended Interview & Pictures

Additional Feature Information

• Commentary Transcript
• Bakari F. Burns bio
• Health Care Center for the Homeless

Heard in Central Florida — On Friday, January 1, 2010 you will hear CMF’s Website growing in its purpose as a portal to a variety of spoken-word events heard in Central Florida. CMF’s resources will be applied to present audio recordings we produce of local events presenting important – and often little publicized – issues about which you and other listeners may benefit from greater awareness.

In this first collaborative initiative, Heard in Central Florida will present a gavel-to-gavel audio recording of five subject matter experts speaking to and answering questions from an audience about youth substance abuse problems in Seminole County. You’ll hear each panelist discuss the various strategies used to deal with Seminole County’s youth who are arrested on drug charges. Hear answers to “jail or rehabilitation — which and why?”

And, as is CMF’s on-line presentation practice, the HCF Web page will also contain useful and additional content information besides just the gavel to gavel program…such as resumes of each speaker, links to content-related Web sites relevant to each speaker’s remarks, pictures of the event, an on-line comment section, and the ability for you or other listeners to email the HCF link anyone who may be interested in the subject matter.

Hear all this starting on Friday, January 1, 2010 at CMFmedia.org. Click on the green and white HCF logo.

The collaboration — While what you’ll hear on this first Heard in Central Florida is a presentation of CMF Public Media, the panel program is a production of the Seminole County League of Women Voters through the League’s Hot Topics luncheon program.

Deana Schott is president of the Seminole County League of Women Voters. It is to her membership which falls the responsibility of regularly producing these informative luncheon events.

In CMF’s search for new on-line strategies to extend our public media commitment to issues and voices that matter in Central Florida, we found Deana Schott and the League to fit that value perfectly.

For you to gain a bit more background on the League and what it does in Seminole County, Stephen McKenney Steck visited Schott on the eve of launching this collaboration.

Hear all of League president Deana Schott’s remarks in the extended interview we have posted on the CMF webpage that accompanies this feature.

And remember to listen from Friday, January 1, 2010 forward to the League’s Hot Topic panel program featuring subject matter experts on youth substance abuse in Seminole County. You may hear it on Heard in Central Florida on-line at CMFmedia.org. Look for and click on the green and white. You may listen to it in the usual ways via on-line streaming, or download the file directly to your computer or mobile digital device or subscribe via RSS to the Heard in Central Florida series with any feed reader or iTunes.

The panelists on this first presentation are — The Honorable Nancy Alley, 18th Circuit Court Judge and juvenile advocate; Investigator Todd A. Moderson of the Seminole County Sheriff’s Office Intelligence Center; Sgt. Danny Camargo of the Seminole County Sheriff’s Gang Supression Unit; Assistant State Attorney Dawn Courtright from the 18th Circuit Juvenile Division; and Steve Barnes, once a troubled teen in Seminole County and now, as an adult, vice chair of the Seminole Soil and Water Conservation District.

This Heard in Central Florida portal and CMF’s collaboration with the League of Women Voters of Seminole County is another step in CMF’s mission to reflect local issues and voices that matter, and to do so in a manner that may not otherwise be available from local mainstream electronic media in a sustained or substantial form.

We’d like to learn what you think about Heard in Central Florida and encourage you to leave a comment on the Website.

Extended Interview & Pictures

Deana Schott and Stephen McKenney Steck Extended interview (42:19)

Additional Feature Information

• Seminole County League of Women Voters
• The League of Women Voters of Florida

Bob Dallari, Chairman of the Seminole County, Florida, Board of County Commissioners – sat for a one on one 60-minute interview with Stephen McKenney Steck on Thursday, December 3, 2009, a bit less than 30-days into the start of his second term as chairman.

(You may hear part-1 of this interview filed in the program archive section. Click on the category labeled “government.” Part-1 includes Dallari’s remarks about 7 key subjects – groundwater withdrawal, budget cuts, staff reductions, level of service to residents, the School Board’s one cent sales tax extension, commuter rail and consideration of a strong mayor form of county government.)

In Part -2 of “Dallari: One on One,” you’ll hear the chairman address issues the commission confronted last year or will confront in 2010. Dallari will talk abut the relationship status between the other 4 commissioners and himself as well as with Orange County, and his relationship with the 7 cities in Seminole County, the state legislative delegation and the school board. He’ll also respond to questions about why he and the commission are opposed to Amendment 4 to the State Constitution – known as “Home Town Democracy.” And he’ll talk a bit about what he has done for his own district.

Part 2 of this interview starts by asking Dallari about the firing of County Manger Cynthia Coto and the qualities of experience the commission is hoping to find in the candidates for that position.

(See additional information below about Seminole County Government)

Extended Interviews & Pictures

	Bob Dallari and Stephen McKenney Steck Extended interview part 2 (20:10)
	Bob Dallari and Stephen McKenney Steck Extended interview full (50:22)

Context: Seminole County Board of County Commissioners

The government of Seminole County, Florida is led by a 5-person elected board of commissioners. Each commissioner is elected county-wide but must reside in and serve a particular district of the county.

Each commissioner serves a 4 year term in office and may be reelected as often as they continue to qualify for office and the electors vote them into office.

In 2010, each commissioner is paid an annual salary of 80,358. This salary has essentially remained at that level for the previous two years. The county considers the position of commissioner a full time job. Each commissioner has one full time executive assistant.

The board sets and controls an annual budget for the expenses necessary to run county government. For 2010 – the current budget year, they approved expenses totaling $466.2 million dollars. In the previous year, that budget was $490.4 million dollars, and in the year prior to that, it was $485.1 million dollars.

The county currently employs1,354 staff members. Last year that total was 1,459, and the year prior they employed 1,515

Each November – from among the 5 commissioners – they select a chair to serve a 1 year term. The chair — other than facilitating the commission meetings, signing official documents and externally representing county government to its residents — has no greater authority than any of the other 4 commissioners.

This is known as a “commission-manager” form of government in that the commission hires a county manager to administer the activities of the county as established by the resident-elected commission. The board also hires the county attorney. Both the manager and the attorney report to the commission. All other staff report to the county manager.

Additional Feature Information

• Chairman Bob Dallari bio
• Map of Bob Dallari’s district 1
• Seminole County Trails and Greenways
• Seminole County Government
• Duties – Chair & Vice Chair, Seminole County Board of County Commissioners
• Seminole County Government charter document
• State of Florida proposed constitutional amendment # 4 (“Home Town Democracy”)
• State of Florida, Department of Community Affairs
• Seminole Chronicle articles – termination of County Manger Cynthia Coto
• County manager fired in 4-1 vote
• St. John’s River Water Management District
• Seminole County Public Schools
• University of Central Florida – Business Incubation Program