St. Cloud marina fix

We agree with St. Cloud Council Member Jarom Fertic that a bill of $107,448 to fix issues at the marina is a big cost to have “fall through the cracks” of city government. However, let’s just fix the problem and not point fingers.

Yes, certain state requirements at the marina should have been implemented when improvements were made there five years ago. The reason city officials gave for the oversight was staff turnover both within the city and at consulting firms.

The city has already begun fulfilling part of the previously unmet state requirements, and we compliment officials and staff for working “very hard” to fix the problem in order to avoid additional penalties.

However, we disagree with Councilwoman Mickey Hopper that the city now is “taking a $100,000 hit for something that might not have been the city’s fault.” The bottom line is that the city would have had to pay for the improvements anyway you cut it. The real question is whether the fix now will cost more than had the features been included originally.

The council took the right action by having city staff look into the documentation of the project to see if they can identify how the oversight occurred and to prevent a similar situation in the future.

On KUA board changes

We don’t disagree with Kissimmee commissioners Art Otero that perhaps a change is needed in the way appointments are made to the Kissimmee Utility Authority’s board of directors. While that change to the utility’s charter was rejected by a 3-2 vote of the commission Tuesday, we have to applaud Otero for bringing the issue forward and for Commissioner Jerry Gemskie for voting for a change.

Otero said he wants city commissioners to interview KUA board applicants and choose board members directly rather than have the KUA board interview candidates and then make a recommendation to the commission for approval. To him – and to us – it now looks too much like the commission is just rubber-stamping the person hand-picked by the board. Maybe it’s just that the KUA board does such a good job of picking potential appointees. We hope that is the case.

The commission did, however, agree to consider a change allowing more board members to be chosen from among those residents living outside city limits. We see that as a positive move.