Did Plantation’s Petrocelli Blow Chance To Win?
BY BUDDY NEVINS
Defeated Plantation Commissioner Rico Petrocelli ended his unsuccessful March campaign with more than $6,000 unspend almost 14 percent of his total $44,300 contributions.
Petrocelli’s poor decision to end his campaign with that much money is recorded in his final campaign report filed June 6.
Just to refresh your memory:
Petrocelli was in a tough race with Pete Tingom, a former Plantation High School principal who eventually won.
Going into the final days of the campaign, Petrocelli was fighting ethics investigation, which is still underway. He was alleged to have funneled Plantation Athletics League money to his own use.
Facing that, why didn’t he spend that remaining money for a last-minute ad blitz? Or to get out his vote?
What idiot was advising him?
Petrocelli will never know if the money would have made a difference.
Some other interesting tidbits in the last report:
• Petrocelli paid a $500 elections law violation fine from his campaign, which I always thought was a no-no under the law. State law indicates that a candidate must pay his campaign law violations, not the campaign. But I’m not a lawyer. The fine was for not putting the proper disclosure on his advertising.
• Petrocelli paid two members of his family $250 apiece for “campaign work.
• Petrocelli gave a $1,000 donation each to the Soref Jewish Community Center and the PAL Dynamites from his left-over campaign money. He donated another $350 to the Broward Republican Party and $500 to the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge in Plantation.
June 15th, 2009 at 8:22 am
Petrocelli is a fool. He wouldn’t have won any way. Pete is an intelligent man with experience. He deserved to win.
June 15th, 2009 at 9:05 am
But what has Tingom done so far????
Seems to go with the flow
With the budget meetings coming up, well really see his mettle.
June 15th, 2009 at 2:46 pm
By the way Buddy……
You are so out for this man…..
He lost…and gracefully at that…Key word was dignified and gracefully…not like some of his “colleauges” on the dias who didnt even have the decency to afford him the respect that it was his last meeting. Most of them hardly even mentioned anything about it…but they sure did ooze niceness stating…”We so welcome Mr Tingom and look foward to working with him…blah blah blah”
Did you pour over everyone elses Fiance Reports….probably not
Three words buddy….LET IT GO…move on already
June 15th, 2009 at 5:21 pm
Plantation Truth – That’s 6 words. You’re like Joe Biden, 3-letter word, J-O-B-S!
I have to hand it to you. You actually go to the meetings.
June 16th, 2009 at 4:19 am
PAL Friend
Very funny…..it was 3 words…LET IT GO..the “move on already” was more of an emphasis
June 16th, 2009 at 2:22 pm
Buddy
Im still waiting to see your response….or better yet….your reports on the Campaign Finance Reports for the other candidates that were running, Jim Davis, Diane Bendekovic, Pete Tingom…the last 2 more so!!!!
Lets be fair Buddy!
THE SILENCE IS DEAFENING
June 17th, 2009 at 5:07 am
Buddy, I think you are right. Election law violations have to be paid from personal funds, not campaign funds.
Donations are allowed to 501c3 charities and probably to a political party, but FOP isn’t either of these, so they probably don’t qualify to receive funds.
I also think you can give the money to the entity you were running for.
Campaign workers can be paid, subject to income/social security, but it looks real bad when it is your family. It also comes close to the law that says you can’t pay yourself for personal expenses.
It sounds like he has opened himself up for another campaign violation claim, and we the voters, after all this, had previously elected him to watch over their city affairs.
Wow, we can surely pick them.