Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons: North Port after Hurricane Ian.

It’s amazing how even when government operates in the sunshine, certain items can fly under the radar, such as what happened with federal funding from Hurricane Ian.

If you remember back to September 2022 when Hurricane Ian hit our beautiful community, it was a South County event. North Port was hit with horrific flooding. As with all disasters, the Federal, State and Local Government worked together to bring resources to the area to mitigate damage and help rebuild.  Sarasota County was awarded $201.5 million and divided the money into different areas.

An allocation of $15 million to Workforce Development and Training was an interesting addition by Commissioner Mike Moran.  It caused you to scratch your head because two years after the storm, you would expect those displaced had gone back to work in their previous position or in a new job.

Fast forward and suddenly we understand Commissioner Moran’s motivation.  The same Commissioner Moran who runs the PACE program and spent wildly on perks for himself and his cronies, including Jon Mast, Executive Director of the Suncoast Builders Association.  The Herald-Tribune reported on these exploits. Mast serves on the PACE Program board and Moran’s PACE office is located at the Suncoast Builders Association offices.  This cozy relationship is most likely where the idea to have money for workforce training included in hurricane recovery was hatched.

For a while, the Suncoast Builders wanted Sarasota County and the School Board to gift them Florida House to utilize for office space.  When that plan was thwarted, the Suncoast Builders formed a charitable arm so they qualified to submit for these County funds. 

When the proposals for using $15 million in workforce dollars came before County Commissioners, there were three submissions.  The submission ranked #1 was barely discussed and didn’t stand a chance.  The #2 submission was from the Sarasota County School Board for $7.5 million to support ongoing training at the Technical College. The proposal ranked #3 out of 3 was from the Building Industry Institute, a.k.a. Suncoast Builders Association, for $13.1 million.  Right out of the gate, Commissioners Moran and Neil Rainford wanted to award the builders their full request. Fortunately, the School Board was awarded its requested $7.5 million and the Home Builders received the remaining $7.5 million (in a 3 -2 vote with Commissioners Joe Neunder and Ron Cutsinger doing the right thing by saying NO).  Now hurricane relief money is going to build the Home Builders new offices in Sarasota and give its Executive Director a $200,000 salary. Somewhere in there, they propose some training for members’ businesses at taxpayer expense.

The School District only submitted for $7.5 million after being told funds needed to be shared with other entities.  The project to expand the North Port Technical College to help with workforce training is approximately $21 million, so the District certainly can put the entire $15 million to good use quickly.

Sarasota County Commissioners will meet on Oct. 22 and 23, when the Suncoast Builders will ask the county to “hold” the $7.5 million until February 2026 to give them a chance to raise additional funds.  Granting this money was egregious enough, but keeping that money from the community for another year and a half is outrageous.

This decision needs to be reconsidered. The original $7.5 million given to the Home Builders needs to be awarded to the School District to support efforts at the Technical College in North Port, where the storm hit and most of the damage occurred.  Let’s be honest with these funds and not continue to support the cronyism, syphoning dollars away from impacted citizens.

Jane Goodwin is a Venice resident and retired Sarasota County School Board member.

Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons: North Port after Hurricane Ian.