Always an inside player, Mayor Rich Crotty dealt himself into a real hole this time.
We reported last week that Crotty voted to rezone land in West Orange for one of the area's biggest real estate brokers -- Daryl Carter of Maury L. Carter & Associates.
This 2002 vote cleared the way for a $20 million sale, from which we can assume Carter profited handsomely.
Two weeks later, Carter cut Crotty in on a Palm Beach land deal that more than doubled Crotty's investment in a year, netting him $112,000.
And then two weeks after that, Crotty voted to approve a development agreement on the West Orange tract.
Does this smell? Yup, like five-day-old mullet heads in the summer sun.
Not helping that odor are Crotty's explanations.
He said he didn't know Carter had an interest in the West Orange rezoning. It seems the mayor didn't have his reading glasses on at the commission meeting, because Carter's name was on the agenda.
Crotty said he told a staff member, whose name he can't remember, to alert him whenever a commission vote concerning Carter came up. Crotty initially blamed this mysterious staff member for not giving him a heads-up on the second vote.
Is Oliver Stone writing Crotty's script now?
Maybe Hal Holbrook skipped a midnight rendezvous with Crotty in a county parking garage.
I guarantee you that if Crotty gave a staff member such an order, he darn well knows the name. The list of people who would get that assignment would be a very short one.
If I don't believe him on this, then when do I start believing him?
Public officials are not allowed to vote on matters that they know would ffect their business partners.
And so Crotty points out that he and Carter were two weeks away from officially becoming business partners when Crotty voted to rezone the West Orange land. That's when Crotty gave him a $100,000 check.
This is what is known as a technicality. A more relevant question is: When did they first begin discussing the deal? I suppose it's possible Crotty really did invest that much cash with less than two weeks notice to look into the deal.
Even if he did, he admits that he had asked Carter before this to keep him in mind for investment opportunities. So we are talking about quite the blurred line here.
Do you become business partners only when money changes hands?
Or does the process start when one person approaches the other about doing business together?
We have the guy who runs the county asking a guy who often does business in the county to put money in his pocket.
Ask yourself the following:
Would Crotty bite the hand he asked to feed him? No, Daryl, I won't rezone your property. But please, keep me posted on any sure things in South Florida real estate.
Carter didn't need Crotty's money for this deal. It looks like he did Crotty a favor -- a $112,000 favor.
Carter says he is Crotty's friend. And, yes, it is OK for friends to bring in friends on deals.
But it ceases being OK when one of the friends is the county mayor and the other is one of the biggest land dealers in town. And if anyone knows this, it is Rich Crotty.
Mike Thomas can be reached at 407-420-5525 or mthomas@orlandosentinel.com
|
