About that Sunshine Law, Your Honor...
Mayor, councilman caught on tape in off-the-record phone conversation
Mayor Ed Martin apparently unaware of city hall phone recording system; Councilman John Simmonds apparently unaware of where he left his hearing aid
-- John Patten, 04/01/08
-- jpatten@veniceflorida.com

UPDATE, 04/02/08: THIS IS AN APRIL FOOLS STORY
There is only one tidbit of factual information in the story below... READ MORE

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Hello, I'm Ed...
Mayor Ed Martin and Councilman John Simmonds have been communicating privately by phone, this in probable violation of Florida's Government in the Sunshine Law. That's according to a recorded phone conversation captured by city hall's automatic recording system. The recording was released by the city clerk last Friday after a public records request was made by this web site after reviewing city hall's phone logs.

By Sunday, we had verified the authenticity of the recording.

The call, initiated by Hizzoner from the phone in his office, was made to Simmonds' home phone in mid-February. The recorded conversation lasts just over two and a half minutes.

The call is remarkable in that the mayor was apparently unaware that all phone calls in and out of city hall are recorded and archived as a matter of public record. The last time that these recordings were in the news was in 2003 when former mayor Dean Calamaras was caught on tape making 1-900 calls to a dog fancier hot-line. Calamaras' "wag your tail, wag your tail, aw, you're so cute" quote from the recording became an embarrassing in-house joke in city hall after the recording was posted to the web, although one that Calamaras was eventually able to live down. Calamaras was also recorded ordering two designer dog collars and a dog sweater, the cost of which was tagged on to the city's phone bill.

"It was consensual and the dog was clearly of adult age," Calamaras joked when confronted by the media. He later reimbursed the city for the costs of the 1-900 calls after the calls were made public.

City hall's phone recording system was installed in early 2002 at the behest of then- city manager George Hunt. While Hunt was not successful at securing permission to carry a concealed firearm in city hall, Hunt received approval from council to have the recording system installed in the wake of Venice's involvement in the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Long forgotten by most city employees and the media, nobody has since given the order to shut the system down. The phone in the city manager's office was (and still is) the only phone in city hall excluded from the recording system.

Who are you?
The recorded Ed Martin/John Simmonds conversation is also remarkable for one other reason -- the two elected officials never get around to talking about the purpose of the call. The conversation is dominated by the mayor repeating his own name while Simmonds tries hopelessly to figure out who is calling him. Ed Martin identifies himself over and over, while Simmonds, apparently without his hearing aid, repeatedly fails to understand the mayor's greeting.

We spent yesterday reviewing the call with our attorney: "While this clearly shows intent to violate the Sunshine Law, it may fall just short of an actual violation as it appears that Simmonds can never quite grasp the fact that it is the mayor who is calling him," our attorney wrote in an email after reviewing the conversation. "As a result, the two never get around to engaging in any substantive conversation about anything that might be coming before council. The fact that the mayor made the call clearly shows intent and that may be enough to trigger a violation in this case. These two elected officials should know better than to even try this."

We also spent yesterday adding pics to the conversation so that it could be submitted to YouTube, as YouTube does not accept audio-only files.

Here ya go -- judge for yourself.

John Patten is the head of Web Operations for Creative Pages, and has worked in broadcasting for over 12 years. He can also be incredibly rude at times.