Are Diamonds Really Forever?

Right now, the “recommended” amount you should spend on an engagement ring is two months’ salary.

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St. Petersburg, Fl
Opinion by: E. Eugene Webb PhD
Author: In Search of Robin, So You Want to Blog.

Reposted from April 2018

It is that time of the year when relationships bloom, heart's flutter and bride to be eyes light up with vision's of things, that sparkle.

In the print media, electronic media, the Internet and just about everywhere else you look, there are ads promising the best deal on that much needed and desired engagement ring.

Before you plunk down a significant portion of your annual salary for an engagement ring here are a few things to check out.

First take a look at the number of engagement rings for sale on line.

I am not suggesting you buy one on line, although what she does not know probably won’t hurt her, but the real question is: where did all those rings come from? The answer is they were bought by idiots who got caught up in the "Diamonds are forever" marketing ploy, and things did not go well. They are now for sale and usually NOT by the original buyer.

As one who has had a number of engagement and wedding rings end up in a pawn shop case, the return on your investment is really poor. Example: a lovely blonde who pawned her(our) engagement rings (worth several thousand dollars) to make a $200 car payment. I know she was upset the wedding was off, but if she had called I would have probably made the car payment for her.

The whole engagement ring thing started in the late 1930’s as a marketing effort to kick start diamond sales. Since nothing says "I love you like a diamond" and "diamonds are forever" resonate, guys have been on the hook for ever larger upfront investments in their matrimonial future.

That is kind of interesting given that fact that according to the American Psychological Association 50% of marriages end up in divorce, and subsequent marriages are more likely to fail even if the engagement ring is bigger.
  
So, if she is sending you all those signals about getting married and suggesting an engagement (read that I want a ring) set down and have a long serious talk.

Right now, the “recommended” amount you should spend on an engagement ring is two months’ salary.

If you make $60,000 dollars per year that’s $5,000/per month or about $10,000 for a ring.

If you make $100,000 per year that is about $8333/month or about $16,700 for the ring.

These days you can finance that amount for up to eight years, and that number is interesting because the average marriage in the United States lasts about 8.2 years.

Think about your student loan. If that upsets you, think about how you will feel five or six years into a marriage that is slipping away, and you still have few years to go pay off what got you into all of this.

So, remember all this engagement and to some degree wedding ring stuff is a marketing creation of people who dig crap up out of the ground, polish it up, claim it is their own, establish outlandish prices in a closed market and take advantage of your situation.

The bottom line on all of this engagement ring hoopla, is it gives your beloved a symbol to wave about in the faces of her less fortunate friends who are still looking forward to reeling in a “ring” of their own.

See From BRIDES by Elizabeth Mitchel, 18 Things to Do as Soon as You Get Engaged

If a ring costing 20% or more of your annual salary is a required pre-commitment of endearing love do a little research, have a serious conversation with your partner and remember this: diamonds are not forever: they're just expensive.

E-mail Doc at mail to: dr.gwebb@yahoo.com or send me a Facebook (E. Eugene Webb) Friend request. Like or share on Facebook and follow me on TWITTER  @DOC ON THE BAY.
See Doc's Photo Gallery at Bay Post Photos.

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With 2 of 3 Municipalities Opposed to PSTA's Proposed BRT, Feds Must Reject Grant Request

Tampa, Fl
From: Eye On Tampa Bay
Posted by: Sharon Calvert

PSTA, Pinellas County's transit agency, submitted a request in 2017 for a Federal Transit Administration (FTA) grant to fund their proposed Central Avenue Bus Rapid Transit Project (CA BRT). PSTA has requested about $22 million of federal tax dollars to fund this proposed$45 million BRT.

But it is time for PSTA's federal grant request to be dead in the water and the FTA reject their grant.

Two of the three municipalities along the CA BRT route oppose the BRT project. S. Pasadena and St. Pete Beach passed formal Resolutions earlier this year opposing the CA BRT 

S Pasadena city commissionResolution
(click to enlarge)

We understand these Resolutions were sent to the FTA and to the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT). The Resolution passed by St. Pete Beach requests the FTA take no further action on PSTA's grant request.

Those Resolutions, in addition to Resolutions passed by condo associations and homeowner associations in S. Pasadena and St. Pete Beach, can be found here.

Such strong opposition to the CA BRT should sink PSTA from receiving any federal grant for this project.

PSTA enabled this mess because they failed to properly engage those who reside or have businesses in S. Pasadena and St. Pete Beach and properly engage those who will be impacted daily by the BRT. PSTA submitted their grant request to the FTA in September 2017 without ever holding one public meeting about the BRT project in S. Pasadena or St. Pete Beach. 

PSTA never properly informed the public, especially those most impacted, what this project was actually doing. The proposed CA BRT project uses road diets to remove valuable parking and valuable general lanes of vehicle traffic for bus only lanes. The proposed CA BRT project uses the road diets to force bus only lanes on 1st Avenue North and 1st Avenue South in St. Petersburg and road diets on Pasadena Avenue in S. Pasadena.

St. Pete Beach city commission
Resolution (click to enlarge)

First Avenues North and South are local roads under the jurisdiction of St. Petersburg. But Pasadena Avenue is State Road 693 under the jurisdiction of FDOT.

FDOT requires proposed road diets on any State road to go through their "lane elimination" process. PSTA found out very late in February 2019 they must go through FDOT's lane elimination process regarding removing a general lane of traffic from SR 693 aka Pasadena Avenue.

PSTA decided their proposed CA BRT route was from downtown St. Petersburg to St. Pete Beach in 2017. But they made such decision with only holding public meetings about the proposed BRT project in St. Petersburg, only one of the three municipalities along the route.

When PSTA finally held an "Open House" meeting on September 11, 2019 in S. Pasadena where they plan to put Pasadena Avenue on a road diet, the Eye was there. We posted interviews we captured here. We now have the Comment Forms submitted from that meeting. They are overwhelmingly (80%) in opposition to the CA BRT project, especially from any resident who lives in S. Pasadena.

And as we previously posted here, in January 2017 the PSTA Board only approved a route from downtown St. Petersburg to 75th Avenue in St. Pete Beach. The route to continue from 75th Avenue in St. Pete Beach down Gulf Blvd was only an option that required St. Pete Beach to both support and help fund the BRT.

PSTA misled the FTA when they submitted their federal transit grant request in 2017. Not only did PSTA include in their FTA grant request the optional route down Gulf Blvd in St. Pete Beach, PSTA falsely included St. Pete Beach as a funding partner.

None of that was ever true because St. Pete Beach never agreed to fund or support the project. A Times reporter did initially cover that story but then she disappeared never to be heard from again.

PSTA received a $500K grant from FDOT in December 2015 to study a BRT project that was originally estimated to cost $16.5 million. In 5 years, the cost of the CA BRT has ballooned to over $45 million.

PSTA's overall financial position is questionable. PSTA's Chief Financial Officer has presented many different financial numbers that vary from month to month with little to no explanation for the changes. PSTA's financial information presented at their Board meetings in the public domain is incoherent.

But we do know PSTA's farebox recovery has tanked to 14% and they are using their capital reserves just to keep operating. For years PSTA has ignored their own promises to address their declining financial position.

PSTA will have to use between $8 and 10 million of their Reserves for their "local" capital funding match to receive the FTA transit grant for the CA BRT. This $45 million boondoggle will only speed up PSTA's insolvency.

Below is a chart that PSTA's CFO Debbie Leous presented at the May 29, 2019 PSTA Board meeting.

From May 2019 PSTA Meeting

According to the Minutes  of that May PSTA meeting, PSTA CFO Ms. Leous stated:

She [Leous] said by the end of FY 2021, there will be less than $1 million in available reserves for capital and operating costs. She [Leous] also reviewed what is currently being funded and what capital is not being funded. Ms. Leous noted that within five years, an estimated $18 million of local funding is needed with a total need of up to $26 million over ten years to maintain a state of good repair.

PSTA wants a bailout from the FTA and we doubt a bank would give PSTA a loan.

But what PSTA really wants is to put another transit tax hike on the 2020 or 2022 ballot. PSTA is using the CA BRT project as their ticket to seeking a new funding source for the financial mess they are currently creating.

The FTA transit grant process is competitive. We bet there are other transit projects in the FTA grant funding que with much less controversy, much more support than PSTA's CA BRT and led by transit agencies much more fiscally sound and responsible than PSTA.

The FTA should know PSTA's history of misusing federal funds. In 2014 PSTA was forced to return back to the feds over $300K of a federal transit security grant when they got caught misusing those funds on their Greenlight Pinellas rail tax campaign.

The fact that two of the three municipalities along the route oppose the CA BRT is cause for the FTA to reject PSTA's grant request.

Add in PSTA's use of misleading information about the project, PSTA's lack of honesty about the project, PSTA's lack of proper public engagement about the project and PSTA's vulnerable financial position.

And any federal grant for PSTA's CA BRT should be dead in the water!

Posted by Sharon Calvert at 7:00 AM 

This post is contributed by EYE ON TAMPA BAY. The views expressed in this post are the blog publisher's and do not necessarily reflect those of the publisher of Bay Post Internet.

Cross Posted with permission from: Eye On Tampa Bay

The St. Petersburg Pier

From the old pier deck

Tampa Bay, Fl
Opinion by: E. Eugene Webb PhD
Author: In Search of Robin, So You Want to Blog.

As we draw near to the conclusion of the new St. Pete Pier Project here is a look back almost a decade to when it all started.

Re-posted from: 

Thursday, September 2, 2010
With updates

I like the Pier. I go their a lot. I go by on my boat, I ride by on my motorcycle, I drive out there at night and enjoy the lights. It dawned on me, I never stop.

 

I never go in and buy anything, I just sort of pass by. Take it all in and head out to Treasure Island for one of the Beach hangouts.

 I was upset when the Council brain trust voted to tear it down. How dare they put the old wrecking ball to my one place of mental solitude, the old inverted pyramid? I’ll miss it.

Maybe I am part of the problem. I go, I look, it makes me feel good but I never really support the place by spending any money there. Well, maybe the occasional ice cream cone, but I doubt that counts for much in the great scheme of things. A lot of people are yelling about the Pier but I wonder how many of them are like me. Taken by the structural appearance, comforted by the view but rarely truly supportive. It’s true that the place is primarily a tourist draw, but anyone in the tourist industry will tell you that you need the locals to be really successful.

Whatever they build it just won’t be the same.

I’ll miss the old upside down pyramid and the opportunity to make up some wild story when a tourist asks me, why did they build it that way? 

Flipped over when we were bringing it up the Bay and we just left it that way. They actually buy that!

Maybe I’ll stop by and buy a hat or something.

E-mail Doc at mail to: dr.gwebb@yahoo.com or send me a Facebook (E. Eugene Webb) Friend request. Like or share on Facebook and follow me on TWITTER  @DOC ON THE BAY.

See Doc's Photo Gallery at Bay Post Photos.  

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Will 41 Work?

Will the Tampa Bay Rays plan for a split season work in Tampa Bay?

Tampa Bay, Fl
Opinion by: E. Eugene Webb PhD

It seems like the proclamation of former baseball Commissioner Bud Selig still haunts Tampa Bay.

]At the height of St. Petersburg’s struggle to acquire a major-league  baseball franchise in the late 1980s Selig notably said, “St. Petersburg is not a major-league  baseball market.”

Selig’s prediction was more accurate than he every could have imagined. Even now, decades later, the argument about whether Tampa or St. Petersburg can support the Rays continues.

Check out the Tampa Bay Times By Charlie Frago St. Pete and Tampa City Council chairmen have different vision for Tampa Bay Rays.

The Bucs do ok; USF football is thriving, and the Lightning has an energized fan base, but the Rays have never been able to get a foot hold.

Quoting from Frago’s article: Gerdes (St. Petersburg City Council Chairman) said the attendance woes in St. Petersburg—"a track record that stinks"—aren’t likely to change if the team relocates across the bay.

Gerdes counterpart Tampa City Council Chair Luis Viera disagrees, but as we have seen politician’s politician's ability to predict sporting teams success is dismal at best.

Also, on the table is the Rays proposal to split the season with Montreal, but neither City seems taken by that idea.

In the meantime, the big dollar players in Tampa are starting to have some second thoughts about plunking down a gazillion dollars for a new stadium that may only end up with 41 games.

While I appreciate Stu Sternberg’s concept that local attendance per game will increase if there are only 41, I think it is flawed logic.  My prediction is there will just be 41 games in St. Pete with mediocre attendance rather than 82.

Would 41 games in Tampa do any better? Hard to say but would you put any money into a new stadium on that gamble?

How about this. St. Pete agrees to allow the Rays to play 41 games at George Steinbrenner field and let’s see if the Tampa baseball fans can outscore the St. Pete Fans in attendance.

Then we will finally know if Bud Selig was right.

E-mail Doc at mail to: dr.gwebb@yahoo.com or send me a Facebook (E. Eugene Webb) Friend request. Like or share on Facebook and follow me on TWITTER  @DOC ON THE BAY.
See Doc's Photo Gallery at Bay Post Photos.  

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Dems Open 2021 Door for GOP Mayor in St. Pete

Tampa, Fl
Tampa Bay Beat
By: Jim Bleyer

 September 24, 2019 

By Jim Bleyer

An ordinarily innocuous St. Petersburg City Council race has roiled local politics and become a key bellwether as to who will be the next mayor of Florida’s fifth largest city.

The race to succeed term-limited Rick Kriseman as St. Petersburg mayor is two years away but political machinations suddenly opened the door for a Republican to capture the mayoralty in this Democratic stronghold in 2021.

John Hornbeck

Robert Blackburn

It started July 1 with a monumental gaffe by a political pro who should know better.

City Council member Darden Rice, an historic progressive who has made no secret of her mayoral aspirations, endorsed Republican Robert Blackmon over Democrat John Hornbeck in this fall’s District 1 council race.

Rice’s action turned off many local Democrats.  Though the city races are technically “non-partisan,” party politics always comes into play here.

Shortly after the endorsement, a Rice confidante told Tampa Bay Beat her action was “a no-brainer.”  As it turns out, supporting Blackmon, who can be described as more than a nominal Republican, over Hornbeck has thrust Rice into a controversy of her own making.

Until Rice’s endorsement, the most controversial issue in the council race was the question of Blackmon’s residency.  Hornbeck and others claimed he did not reside within District 1. Blackmon declared the matter closed with a home sale and his subsequent address.  The point remains murky.

Rice was the early favorite to succeed Kriseman but no more. She alienated a significant portion of the Democratic base regardless of the District 1 result on November 5.  The more astute move: no endorsement whatsoever.  Inarguable.  

Darden Rice

 Blackmon told Sunshine State News unequivocally there was no quid pro for the endorsement. 

“There was absolutely no deals made. And, importantly, we do not know who will be running for mayor in 2021,” Blackmon asserted. 

Then why would Rice take the risk? 
Read the rest of the Post here: 

Dems Open 2021 Door for GOP Mayor in St. Pete

Cross Posted with permission from: Tampa Bay Beat

 This post is contributed by Tampa Bay Beat. The views and opinions expressed in this post are the author's and do not necessarily reflect those of Bay Post Internet or the publisher.