Best Gadfly Fort Lauderdale and Palm Beach 2010 - Chaz Stevens If you embark on a journey through Deerfield Beachs political jungle, you will arrive eventually at what appears a savage habitation, where the corpses of the citys past political rulers hang from trees like trophies. This is myactsofsedition, a domain ruled by a man whose myth strikes dread into the hearts of his enemies. They never see Chaz Stevens, but he sees them. His methods may sometimes be unsound — Stevens taunts his political targets for months, even years, before going in for the kill. But theres no doubting his effectiveness. In 2008, Stevens alerted prosecutors to corruption by Mayor Al Capellini and Commissioner Steve Gonot, both of whom were subsequently indicted and forced to resign. Both now face felony trials. In that endeavor, Stevens relied on Bob Normans reporting in New Times, but this past year, Stevens has earned a much larger portion of the muckraking credit, having investigated a slew of nonprofit agencies that were loosely linked to Commissioner Sylvia Poitier, the former Broward County commissioner with a political career that spans three decades. Stevens has always had contempt for Poitier, whose photograph he once posted next to a shot of Jabba the Hut, noting the resemblance. But Stevens investigation into Poitiers business dealings played a prominent role in convincing city commissioners that City Manager Mike Mahaney was not monitoring city spending as closely as he should have. In January, Mahaney was dismissed. Then an investigation by the new city manager, Burgess Hanson, into the citys Community Housing Division led straight to Poitier. browardpalmbeach/bestof/2010/award/best-gadfly-1148870/
Posted on: Thu, 23 Oct 2014 13:46:50 +0000
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