Ken Russell
speaker
139 appearances
2 recordings
1 series
first heard Mar 2025
last heard 26 Sep
Ken Russell’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
But the only moment I stepped off the dais was when Francis kept saying, bro, talk to me for a second. I need to talk to you. And I hadn't talked to him in that moment. Since the time I was at his house and he kicked me out of it.
So for at that point, what was it, four years that they had been working on this thing? No, I would only meet with them in my office with my staff. And we had long, hard meetings on in terms of the negotiation. But I never went out for drinks, no cigars, no coffees, no breakfast. And it was important to me. So when the mayor said to me one day, hey, this is just a few days before the vote.
Meet me in my house. I never expected I would see the Moss brothers sitting in his living room. And that really pissed me off.
So, theoretically, all of them are getting met until I find out this last month they are voting to undo them at the City Commission through an illegal vote. And that's what brought me back to City Hall.
And it was with whom and where and when. So we have a thing called government in the sunshine that says no two people that vote on anything together can meet and discuss those votes outside of the public light, right? The sunshine. The mayor is not subject to that because he doesn't have a vote. So when he invited me over to his house that weekend, which doesn't happen.
I'd been to his house one time before. I said, OK, I pretty much knew what it was about because it was the weekend before the vote. But when I got there and the Moss brothers are there and they started leaning on me hard about the public benefits I was trying to require. The mayor had not told you that the Moss brothers were there? No. OK. No. And that was a surprise.
And I wouldn't have gone because that's what I was able to say up to that point. You were sandbagged. I have not met with them outside my office without my staff present and all of that. But when I got there, it wasn't. So this was on purpose. The mayor obviously invited you there. Of course. And they were doing the rounds.
And I believe I was the last stop because I from what Alex had said on the day as he had had private meetings in living rooms with the masses and with the mayor and during which he was promised certain things. And then they wanted to see that I would agree to those things. That's a sunshine violation.
He's allowed to whip votes. He's allowed to call up a commissioner and say, vote this way if this is what I really care about. He's allowed to do that. But he's not allowed to say, Alex is going to vote this way, and you need to vote this way, too. And what they said to me was, well, this has already been promised to Alex.
The full $20 million public benefit for green space has already been given to that commissioner, so you can't demand that it be taken away. The votes aren't there for it. And they thought Alex wouldn't budge. And so I already knew at that point I'm on a collision course with the public benefits I'm demanding and what Alex wanted with that money. But I already knew where I stood.
So when he said at that point, get the fuck out of my house because I wouldn't agree. Who said that? Francis did. I happily got up and the Moss's faces went white because they knew they needed my vote. Francis couldn't control his anger because he was losing grip on it. They had really said, Francis, I need you to help go around and whip these votes. And when they got to me, I wasn't agreeing.
And so he kicks me out of his house. But inside, I was happy because now I realize he had given me the ability to send a message to him that I don't care. I will walk out of your house. I'll walk out of this vote and I'll vote no on the dais. And I thought that that was enough for them to then realize that I need to get these benefits for the public or I'm a no vote.
But you didn't get the benefit. But I did get the vote. I got the vote. I got the vote. And here's where we get to the reality where you're right and I'm wrong. Because I really stood my ground. And what happens after that tape is not Ken waves the white flag. It's that Ken got every single one to a letter of that list of public benefits.
And Francis stops the meeting because they were about to vote. He says, I want to know that the mover. And the seconder, Joe Carollo and Alex Díaz-Bordilla, agree with Russell's amendments. I want it captured on the record. He said it twice. They did it. We voted. And so those things must happen, and they're not. Here's where you are right.
Yes, the mayor signs the legislation after we make it. But they took out— Those amendments, yes.
Right. But it doesn't matter because the vote happened and it's memorialized in the minutes and the That is what prevails over whatever he signed. I mean, that was a bad document. And I filed a bar complaint against the city attorney and him.
Well, they didn't literally violate it until this last month. They were keeping, as far as I know, with the spirit of those public benefits until this month when they, for some reason, brought legislation to undo what I had forced them to promise.
Let's not go there yet because I was effective in my role and job in getting those amendments passed. It's not my job then to see that the attorney doesn't write illegal legislation, that the mayor doesn't sign illegal legislation.
That's because if we can rely on our system of justice, they should not be able to undo the votes of a commission. So is that not a concern for people? They are violating. Right now, they are in violation. They're putting the entire lease itself in jeopardy.
If you want to really have your fun, you can say, anyone can bring a lawsuit right now to say that the lease that is being enacted right now, what they are doing right now, and the votes that the commission are doing are completely in violation of the ballot that brought that lease, of the vote of the commission. And they are. So they're putting themselves in jeopardy.
Showing 41–60 of 139 · page 3 of 7
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