Mayor Norris of Palm Coast’s self-lauded, well-attended, and unremarkableMayoral Town Hall at the VFW hall on Old Kings Road on Monday night was nearly the same as a grousing public comment portion at a City Council meeting, except it lasted two hours and had a larger audience that was primed on the mayor’s personal generosity with pizza, beer, and wine.
Based on a head count shortly before the midway point, 154 persons attended the two-hour event. At that rate, Norris might claim that his town hall attracted more people than all of his colleagues’ combined attendance, as the other council members’ town halls this summer have been drawing roughly thirty each.
The town hall erased any doubt that Norris could still rely on a core of supporters, many of whom expressed their heartfelt support. It is impossible to predict whether that core will convert into long-lasting support outside of it. Despite his personal reservations, Norris stated, “I got three years if they don’t kick me out,” which wasn’t the most certain endorsement of his term.
According to what he said, he had been both anxious and relieved by the turnout. Despite his sciatica, he sat alone on a raised barstool on stage the entire time, wrapping the microphone wire over his hand repeatedly. At the end of the event, he said, “It does my heart good to know that I have people supporting me, because I’ve been beat down.” All I’ve been doing since May is trying to do the right thing, and I’ll continue to do so.
His impromptu and unprepared talk flew from grievance to specific issue and back to grievance, his go-to theme whenever he wanted to avoid dead air. He was uncomfortably comfortable. Before I let you all go ask questions, let’s see what else I can briefly discuss.
His lack of understanding of city issues beyond broad generalizations highlighted how much his reign has been a mayoralty of rhetoric rather than substance, a void that he has had to fill by filling it with populist rants, fulminations, and denunciations in place of leadership. But on Monday night, in front of his pals, he did it all without resentment or rage, but rather with a confused, occasionally melancholy defensiveness that hasn’t quite figured it all out: “I’ve been brutalized on the dais and the media,” he remarked, shaking hands with the journalists. In this tale, I am not the antagonist. It appeared that he had no idea, or at least no self-awareness.
A few rounds of applause were heard. However, it is clear that Norris was not there to provoke or rabble-rouse. Although he prohibited video, he showed consideration for the six media representatives there. In spite of the council’s complete self-imposed seclusion, he wanted to comfort himself that he was important in public and at City Hall, even if the VFW post’s congregation only formed a physical echo chamber.
He was clear in his plea: while another supporter, Jeani Duarte, who is running for a council seat, used the town hall to gather a recall petition against Gambaro, he had people distribute a letter or petition in support of Mike Norris, with signatures to be sent to the governor as a counterpoint to the council’s letter requesting his removal.
It was an official city event where politicking, like distributing a recall petition or campaigning, could raise legal questions, just as if he were doing so from the dais, or allowing a constituent to distribute a recall petition at a council meeting. Norris was hosting the event in his capacity as mayor, whether it was held in a private venue or not, at his expense or not. He was also explicitly advertising its purpose as a mayoral town hall.
When he attempted to defend his decision to skip the July 4 celebration at the county airport, when more than a dozen local elected leaders read the Declaration of Independence, Norris’ justifications fell flat or came across as childish. I am completely dissatisfied with that airport’s administrator. Norris remarked, “I don’t think you should be in that position.” And there’s no reason why I’ll be at that airport. He then suggested a potential exception for the Declaration’s sestercentennial the following year.
He brushed up against the sheriff’s coattails, as he frequently does when he needs a boost of legitimacy, but he never gave an explanation for why he had abandoned his responsibilities on advisory committees or the city’s senior administration: He made frequent references to his conversations with Mark Strobridge, the sheriff’s chief of staff, whom Lauren Johnston, the interim city manager, temporarily hired as her assistant.
Norris started the discussion with what was intended to be an introduction before handing the microphone over to audience questions after allowing Palm Coast Historical Society President Raesa Pabst to speak for a few minutes. He had certain things he wanted to clarify. Because it accentuates their own, his supporters adore the unpretentious undiscipline that was represented in the whiplashing stream-of-consciousness story, “The Few Things became Norris as Ulysses against the world.”
He began by claiming that there was a misunderstanding over the spies at City Hall. It should be noted that Norris has accused city employees of wiretapping his office and spying on him. He shifted the focus onto a document he d received from an employee in the Building Department months ago that he said, holding up the document, led to the firing of an employee and the suspension of one or two others over time-stealing, then jumped to a brief jeremiad about how he s been mistreated, then to the city needing industry and pad-ready sites, to the $360,000 median cost of houses, to the 19,000 entitled houses in the cue for 10 years, to Charles Gambaro s presence on the City Council ( I don t think it was right ) to former Council member Ed Danko s texts to someone in the audience about how Gambaro was going to put me in my place, to his lost lawsuit against the city to kick Gambaro off the council and his surprise declaration that he won t appeal ( I have people in this city, multi millionaires, that have said I will appeal that case and take it as far as I can, but I don t want to cost the city money, he said, though earlier this month he said he didn t care if he cost the city $1 million), to the ethics complaint the council filed against him and itsapparent legal insufficiency, back to a little self-pity ( this has been quite a struggle. I didn’t think people would treat me this way), how he’s just one person but will prevent Gambaro and others from ever being elected again, and then an unexpected compliment for Johnston, the city manager, about how the city has been behind on water infrastructure, how we should conserve, how the Loop Road from Matanzas Woods Parkway to Palm Coast Parkway will eventually connect to a major highway connecting Orlando and Jacksonville, how we just can’t keep building houses and how this isn’t a retirement community anymore, how the former private owner of the water utility continued to charge the city $1,000 per hookup long after the utility was sold, how the chamber of commerce should bring in high-paying jobs, how the county lacks the funds to construct an expensive sports complex on the west side of the city, and how he doesn’t see his two sons returning to Palm Coast to work because there aren’t any jobs for them.
Like an uncle catching up with pals at the Thanksgiving table about the year’s conflicts after they returned from Troy, Norris delivered it all in the same unassuming tone. When the streams of consciousness, many of which were full of imaginative fiction, started coming in from the floor, he handed the microphone over to one of his kids to address the audience. Pledges of loyalty were occasionally used to introduce them. For example, the first speaker, a man named Scott, stated, “I want to start off by saying I support you 100%.” He had nothing to ask. He spoke for a few minutes about the small outhouses, known as houses, that are being built in the city and how you and I, that is, Scott and Norris, have the same ailment—we are both allergic to buttholes.
Norris briefly discussed the city’s comprehensive plan and how council members may have broken the ice by working together to write a letter to the governor requesting that Norris be removed from office. The next speaker, who also had no questions, complained about the skyrocketing utility bills.Generally speaking, the comments were lengthy, convoluted, inconsistent, and full of the kind of conspiracy theories that the same commentators bring up during council sessions regarding corruption in the city.
There were a few questions, but they were so infrequent that he quipped, “It’s actually going to be a question,” just as someone was about to offer one. The city’s drainage advisory committee chairwoman inquired as to whether well drilling was prohibited in the city. According to Norris, he didn’t believe there was. (There isn’t.)
Back to the floor remarks, where Council member Theresa Pontieri was frequently criticized, the judge’s incorrect decision against Norris, a direct query about what incentives the city is providing to new industry (Norris stated that the city must first attract industry before it can offer incentives), and other issues. Misinformation was frequent, as when the man who s been crusading for a forensic audit for years claimed every city is required to have a forensic audit every five years (he is wrong: no city is ever required to have a forensic audit absent direct and provable evidence of wrongdoing.)
For the most part, the people who spoke were the same people who addressed the council in a recurring cast of Norris-supporting characters. One familiar commenter who claims to have had 26 years experience in government accounts, her calling card every time she addresses the council, said almost in the same phrase that the city was bankrupt even though we have a $200 million reserve. (The city is neither bankrupt nor has such a reserve.) She said consultants and city attorneys are raping the city, and said city employees are overpaid and underqualified grossly.
And Mike, I m available to you at any time. I ve been watching everything. I got it all up here, she said to applause. Another woman said her husband is a very good certified public accountant and has volunteered his services, gratis, to conduct a forensic audit. (Forensic accounting skills are as specific as surgical skills: just having an M.D. doesn t make any doctor a neurosurgeon.)
One person turned up at the town hall because, she told Norris, you seem to be pissing off a lot of people. I wanted to know why. She said she got her answer from his opening introduction.
The audience all white, with a few Latinos, almost all on the older side, as one member of the public commented to groans from the audience thinned significantly after the halfway point as grievances turned repetitive and Norris, who purposefully refused to appear with city staff at his side, could not answer most of the few questions posed about specific city issues.
Thank you for coming out, Norris told what remained of the audience at 8 p.m. If you need me, call me, email me or hit me up on Facebook, assuming you re not blocked. There was a smattering of applause, and it was over.
