Jeani Duarte, a candidate for a Palm Coast City Council seat who last month claimed the city’s utility system was pushing residents toward cannibalism, today made baseless claims about the city’s Charter Review Committee, its members and its moderator as she addressed the City Council. She was not challenged.
The City Council in mid-July appointed five residents to the Charter Review Committee, tasking it with drafting recommended amendments to the city charter. The charter is like a municipal constitution. The current charter requires the council to go through a charter review at least once every 10 years. The committee met just once, on Aug. 25, to name a chair and get an overview of the process ahead from its moderator, Georgette Dumont. The first community-input meeting is scheduled for Sept. 29 at the Southern Recreation Center.
During the opening segment of public participation at Tuesday’s council meetings, when members of the public may speak on any matters not on the agenda (they get to speak on agenda matters when the items are discussed), Duarte started her three-minute comment by claiming, incorrectly, that “the charter is not due for review till 2028.” The charter gives the council authority to call a review sooner than at the decennial mark. Duarte herself had applied to be a member of the committee, without objections to its timing. She claimed in her application that she is “the admin for the ‘Palm Coast Citizens Charter Review on f.b.,” meaning Facebook.
Duarte said the moderator “appears to be overriding the committee.” While Dumont was surprisingly and unnecessarily emphatic about how the process would go on her watch at the orientation meeting, she did not get pushback from the committee members, who could have stopped her at any point. It isn’t clear whether the committee members even knew that they would have a moderator, since they are stocked with a majority of members who have either served on public boards or chaired them. Two of them still do. One of the members, Michael Martin, then appeared before the council to request that the timetable of meetings be moved up. The council agreed.
Duarte then accused “a rogue charter review member who is actively suppressing citizen voices, along with others.” She did not name either the “rogue” member or “others.” She said those others are “using intimidation, fear tactics, threatening consequences against residents who speak up.” She did not say where or how those tactics were being carried out. There had been no intimidation or “rogue” behavior either in the one meeting of the review committee or in Martin’s appearance before the council. That appearance had not been agreed to by the review committee: he had not been delegated to make such an appearance. But he didn’t have to be: advisory board members remain free to act in their individual capacities.
It’s possible that individuals have attacked Duarte on her Facebook page. But a look at the page reveals little activity other than her own, and one comment by a Charter Review member, Perry Mitrano, who was respectfully suggesting that a question Duarte was posing could be answered by the City Council. (The examination of the page was not exhaustive, as Duarte’s non sequiturs can be exhausting.)
She also spoke of “compound suppressions of public input,” though the floor was opened to what little public there was at the first committee meeting. Duarte did not respond to a text or an email asking her to elaborate on her accusations.
She went on to ask the council to shelve the review until 2028 then made further baseless claims on other topics (” Please explain why wastewater treatment plant two was expanded without public input,” for example) and said “some residents are confused as to which direction their swales should drain.” The candidate is running for the District 2 seat of the Council, the seat currently held by Theresa Pontieri. Pontieri will step down at the end of her first term. She is running for the County Commission seat Greg Hansen has elected not to contest again.
Duarte claimed that what she was describing “poses great concerns and undermines public trust.” It was difficult to see how, other than Duarte’s own baseless accusations and wild claims, the committee’s trust was being undermined.
Call me Disappointed says
Must have been a slow news day.
Why is Flaglerlive even giving print space to an insignificant individual?
Her content is not worth our time.
MJH says
We moved to Palm Coast nearly 12 years ago. I cannot believe the conspiracies; ignorance; and politics by candidates and those who were elected. It is horrifying that any elected official bases almost every word or action on political adherence rather than following the sworn oath to serve the citizens electors without external beliefs. Distressing.
The Obelisk says
She is nuts!
Makes stuff up all the time. She is dumb, can comprehend things in a sentence.
Her lies are just a waste of time and more so when she waste our time at the podium.
It’s essentially 3 minutes of my life i’ll never get back.
jnlocal says
Well, at least I know now who NOT to vote for.
MM says
I think she will fit right in with all the ‘crazies’ in Palm Coast. They will love her. Bring on those lies, conspiracies and propaganda, the more the merrier! She’ll be a great asset to our Mayor Norris, for sure, two peas in a pod, as they say. The town is going down the tubes as it is, with chickens, painted houses, trucks everywhere, ebike terrorizing us, yup, she’ll fit in just fine.
thatstoobad says
Sounds like maybe she needs Baker Acted, seems to be having mental health problems. I will grab her address from voter records and forward it to the authorities so they can go check on the poor thing.
Tired of it says
Why do we seem to get nothing but crazies running for office in this county? No matter how absurd, how baseless her comments, all she has to do is put an “R” by her name and she will get elected.Tired of it
JimboXYZ says
Just me, but all the charter review is going to accomplish will be to to shuffle the ordinances to a lowering of the bar for standards throughout the city of Palm Coast. There will be attempts to relax ordinances that were established to protect the City from becoming the mess that it’s become. Relaxing residential ordinances for commercial vehicle parking and anything else that benefits a few, while the rest of us become those victims that have to be run over by some fly by night trade business that fails ? We’ll end up with the neighbor that is color blind to the color palette of paint. Alfinville is already a duplex rental community of transient tax base. The duplex next to my residential, going back on the market for, what will become the 3rd resell in 4 years. Even those landlords can’t turn a profit for the economics of it all.
FlaglerLive says
@ Call, we would not be doing so were she not a candidate for public office.
CK says
She’s the one and only member of her very own fan club!
If I were her I wouldn’t even vote for myself. 📉 ⬇️👎
Joe D says
As typical in these public meetings, Ms Jeani Duarte has her own take on local government processes ( complete with unsubstantiated conspiracy theories, accusations of government corruption, and baseless claims and allegations…in my opinion). The Charter Review open public forum was just another “Rinse and Repeat,” performance. Rather than just RANTING, there are appropriate channels for reporting suspected violations or corruption… but one has to present at least a small bit of PROOF or EVIDENCE!
As to the fact that her comments went “unchallenged,” I can offer that rather than initiate a LONG debate in a Public Forum, it is less disruptive to just give Ms. Duarte her legislative FREE SPEECH RIGHTS ( 3 minutes in this arena), then just MOVE ON to the next part of the meeting…and allow her words and demeanor SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES…which they so CLEARLY DO (REPEATEDLY unfortunately)….
I wish her well in her continued attempts to “Tilt at WINDMILLS,” as the saying goes!
Larry says
Jeani Duarte sounds like current Palm Coast Mayor Mike Norris. Seriously.
If voters were dumb enough to vote for Mike Norris, they might be dumb enough to vote for Duarte. Norris was saying crazy things while he was a candidate and he still got voted in.
Patricia Niles says
The bottom line is Mayor Norris got elected by the people unanimously. He is the only one in office that has any common sense regarding the overbuilding etc and getting infrastructure in place before these builders take over the town and do what they want to do, so consistently the council wants to get rid of him NOT the people!!
FlaglerLive says
@ Patricia Niles, Norris was elected with 63 percent of votes cast in the run-off, a healthy majority but hardly a unanimous one, while the 33,600 votes he garnered were less than half the registered voter total in Palm Coast.