Opinion
By George Miller, 7-26-24, updated 8-15-24
It’s a big election year, with candidates on Nassau County ballots ranging from President down to clerks. We’ve had numerous requests to make voting recommendations and mail-in ballots are already out. We won’t try to tell you how to vote, but instead will just tell you how we’ll vote. Feel free to add your own reader comments to the article.
Do NOT wait for the general election, as the August 20 election is the only time some of these positions can be voted on! (Early voting August 7-17, 9 AM to 6 PM including Saturday and Sunday). Calendar.
Numerous positions are uncontested- look at the list of all county candidates , list of all state candidates to see which offices, beyond the ones already mentioned here.
The presidential primary was held months ago and Trump won hands-down. We’ll be voting for him again in November.
For U.S. Senator representing Florida, we have three Republican candidates, none very attractive to us, but Rick Scott is our choice.
No need to vote for our District 4 U.S. Rep. in Congress, because incumbent Aaron Bean has no opponent, as does the dem. candidate, and therefore both win party primaries by default. Bean was rated 90% (unusually high) in the Freedom Index survey, which measures candidates’ extent of Conservative votes on representative bills.
Our State Assembly Representative Dean Black also has no opponent and wins by default. Same with Dem candidate.
We haven’t made up our mind for the Clerk of Court/Comptroller race yet (Mitch Keiter vs. Allan Reynolds). Both have strengths- Reynolds being a strong financial guy and Keiter already #2 in the department he is competing to head up.
For School Superintendent, we see that the candidates agree on most issues. The state “report card” scores look very good under incumbent and long time Supt. Kathy Burns. But, transparency, spending, morale, teacher retention and discipline all figure as significant issues, which underdog candidate Curtis Gaus has mentioned and claims he can improve (he’s an incumbent school board member and has worked in positions from Principal, director, administrator and teacher, resigning to run for Supt.) It wouldn’t be the end of the world if either qualified candidate won, since no alternative to the status quo has emerged. We’re voting for at least some change- Gaus.
We are going with Janet Adkins for Supervisor of Elections. She has done a very good job, is fairly responsive, so there is no good reason to change horses.
For County Board of Commissioners, you get to vote for candidates for two districts up for election. The county is growing fast and has been a very good place to live, but it is outgrowing its infrastructure, especially roads and is taking on an increasing sameness of rows of similar houses and endless strip malls- and then there is that worsening traffic. Many residents are upset about this, but developmental rules aren’t being changed that much. The board is playing catch-up, trying to work with inadequate policies/decisions made long ago.
We favor incumbent Jeff Gray for District 3, I did tell him we’d like to see new development look less like Levittown and more like Boca and some serious arterial road infrastructure expansion is needed. His opponent was unimpressive in three events I saw her at and her bio is not particularly compelling for this position.
Klynt Farmer for District 5. Not much of a paper trail or showing up from his opponent- is he a serious candidate?
John Martin‘s opponent bit the dust (disqualified), so he’s a shoo-in. He probably won’t even appear on the ballot, if they stopped the presses in time.
Haven’t made up our mind on the Ocean Highway and Port Authority Commissioner race yet. I can’t say I like what they have done and wonder if the port is even viable and has adequate economies of scale, so I haven’t spent much time on it. In District 1, incumbent Danny Fullwood is running against incumbent Miriam Hill. In District 2 Jimmy Dubberly is opposing Scott Moore. A few knowledgeable people I talked to favor Hill and Moore for the jobs. None are happy with how it is being done now.
Circuit Judge 4th Judicial Circuit Group 34. It’s hard to find info on candidates for such offices and hard to get them to commit on issues. I spoke to two retired judges. Only one would talk and he says he hears good things about Ashley Wells Cox. (Update: One of the judges and multiple local attorneys I have talked to recommend Cleaveland.) I met both candidates recently, studied their bios and sites, listened to them answer some very tough questions at a candidate forum and concluded as well as a non-legal person could that we would be lucky to have either one on the bench. Although registered Democrat Cox is more qualified on paper, I would prefer to see Nancy Cleaveland there- thinks more like we do. Read our article on the candidate forum and Jack Knocke’s article and see what you think, which is the only thing that counts when it comes to YOUR vote.
School Board: The district has: a lack of accountability, lack of transparency, soaring budgets, high teacher turnover, alleged poor morale (we have only anecdotal examples and impressions of the latter). So, we are leaning toward former local Principal Roody Joinville to oust longtime status quo member Gail Cooke in District 2. Joinville was greatly admired and provided excellent results, but became a sacrificial lamb when he refused politically correct discipline for the kids who made an infamous, repugnant racist video- off school grounds (yeah, lots of us did stupid things when we were younger, too). For the record, he’s black, originally from Haiti and says he wouldn’t be a “rubberstamp board member.” unfortunately, he refuses to answer the CDF questionnaire and has missed candidate forums I have attended. See our recent article by Deb Boelkes of We The People about him. We would also try something new with Kristi Simpkins to replace status quo Cindy Grooms in District 4. Simpkins has worked in the district before and is currently a principal in nearby Georgia. She is even qualified to be Supt, but doesn’t have family buy-in for that level of commitment. Grooms and Joinville refused to answer the questionnaire, Burns and Cook wrote their own responses, which we are told were not responsive to the questions. So much for “transparency.” The recent 5-0 vote to return obscene books to school libraries was the last straw for me. See our article on that. Throw them all out.
City of Fernandina Beach Board of Commissioners
City elections aren’t until November, so we’ll come back at you closer to then.
Here are some other opinions in various voter guides, from https://www.clickorlando.com/ (check out that site!):
Voting guides and scorecards by interest group
You can also check out the various organizations that operate in Florida. While not all of them do candidate endorsements, some of them offer legislative scorecards. These are ratings of how state lawmakers handle issues these groups care about.
Here’s a list of organizations with legislative scorecards and/or endorsements.
Florida Education Association: This is the state teachers union.
Equality Florida: One of the leading LGBTQ advocacy groups in the state.
National Rifle Association – The leading firearm interest group.
Florida Chamber of Commerce: This is the state’s leading business group.
Sierra Club: One of the top environmental groups in the country.
Americans for Prosperity: A small-government advocacy group with ties to the conservative Charles Koch.
Florida Family Action: This is a faith-based political group.
Heritage Action For America: A conservative group that has a scorecard for federal officials.
AARP: The leading group for seniors has an election guide that includes a legislative voting record.
George Miller is Publisher and Co-Founder of Citizens Journal Florida, based in Fernandina Beach. He is a “retired” operations management consultant, software and publishing executive (10 years) and manufacturing management professional.
The views expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official position of Citizens Journal Florida
