Palm Beach County Guide to Non-Partisan County, School Board, and Special District Elections.

Remember to vote early. Here is a list of all Early Voting Sites in Palm Beach County.

Thank you for visiting the Adventure Lawyer’s “Palm Beach County Guide to Non-Partisan County, School Board, and Special District Elections.”

This guide is intended to help undecided voters throughout Palm Beach County identify relevant information relating to potentially otherwise unknown candidates when deciding which individual most deserves your vote. It lists all candidates for each contested non-partisan county, school board, and special district board election appearing on the November 4, 2014 ballot. For reasons of thoroughness, It also lists the candidates for the partisan Port of Palm Beach Commission Group Five race.

Using the Guide

Campaign Websites

Directly under each candidate’s name is a link to their campaign website or their campaign Facebook page. If a candidate has both, the link generally attaches to their website which will then contains its own link to their campaign Facebook page, if they have one. If I was unable to find a candidate campaign website or a campaign Facebook page, there will be the statement “No Website Found.”

Campaign Finance Records

Directly under each candidate’s link to their campaign website or Facebook page, or the words “No Website Found,” is, when available, a link to each candidate’s most recent campaign finance report as of October 10, 2014. This link is titled “Latest Campaign Finance Report.” If I was unable to find a posting of their most recent (or any) posting of the candidate’s campaign finance report, instead of a link, you will find the statement “No Campaign Finance Information Found.”

Because whether or not their campaign finance reports are published timely by third parties is beyond the reasonable scope of responsibility of the candidate, it may be appropriate not to hold their status of “No Campaign Finance Information Found” against them.

Political Affiliation

Except for judicial races, the political affiliation of each candidate, as recorded by the Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections, is stated next to the name of each non-judicial candidate. Though these are non-partisan races this information is provided for voters who are strongly affiliated with a particular political party and wish to vote for members of that party in local non-judicial offices.

In a very few instances I was unable to confirm a candidate’s voter registration status, and therefore, their party affiliation (if any). For those few candidates the words “Could Not Confirm Voter Registration” appear in place of their party affiliation. In almost every case they are probably registered, they just may not have updated a name change or they may have a name submitted for the ballot that is different from their legal name–such as when someone gets married, takes her spouse’s last name, but keeps her maiden name for election purposes due to its familiarity with voters. Also, sometimes, their name has simply been misspelled in the database.

In other words, consider not penalizing the candidate just because we couldn’t divine the universe of possibilities when looking up candidate names through the database.

For those candidates stated as “NPA,” that simply means that their voter registration states that they have “No Party Affiliation.”

Incumbency

Some voters believe that incumbents should be retained if they perceive that the current Commission or Board is doing a good job as a whole. Conversely, dissatisfied voters may wish to “vote the bums out” (though please consider first making sure that the incumbent on the ballot hasn’t been the one trying to solve the problem.) Therefore, if a candidate is an incumbent, it is so stated next to their names.

Outlier Candidates

For the vast majority of candidates, the only information the Guide provides are their names, party affiliation, and, when available, links to their campaign websites or, as of October 10, 2014, their latest campaign finance reports. Occasionally, however, there is an outlier candidate worthy of special attention.

Sometimes, it’s a positive highlight members of the general public may not commonly know: For example, Port of Palm Beach Group 5 Candidate Peyton McArthur, endorsed by the Palm Beach Post, has spent years as the Port’s HR Director and is currently Chief Assistant to Palm Beach County Vice Mayor Paulette Burdick.

Unfortunately, other times, a candidate may have a noteworthy unorthodox past or demeanor, that those who do not often pay close attention to local politics may not be aware: For example, Palm Beach Soil & Water Conservation District Group Five Candidate Karl Dickey is a registered Libertarian. While Libertarians, who generally deny the scientific fact of global climate change, have a place in the American political discussion, you probably don’t want to charge them with keeping the public up-to-date on a problem they don’t believe exists. Which is, after all, one of the key responsibilities of the Palm Beach Soil & Water Conservation District.

Media Coverage

When available, I offer a link to media analysis of each race. This is a list of the Palm Beach Post’s endorsements.

Adventuring at Palm Beach’s Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens. If you have never been, be sure to hit up the cafe–it is very cheap, and the food is authentically great!

Palm Beach County School Board

District 4:

Tom Sutterfield REPUBLICAN
Website
Latest Campaign Finance Report
Endorsed by the Palm Beach Post

Erica Whitfield DEMOCRAT
Website
Latest Campaign Finance Report

Port of Palm Beach

Group 5 (Partisan):

Peyton McArthur DEMOCRAT
Website
Latest Campaign Finance Report
Particularly High Qualified Candidate: Served 6 years as the Port Authority HR Director and is currently Chief Assistant to Palm Beach County Vice Mayor Paulette Burdick.

Kesnel Theus Jr REPUBLICAN
Website
Latest Campaign Finance Report

Palm Beach Soil & Water Conservation District

Group 5:

Karl Dickey LIBERTARIAN
Website
Latest Campaign Finance Report
Note; The Candidate contacted me concerning the “caution” below and responded that his intentions for the PBSWCD are not represented by the official Libertarian Party of Florida’s platform. He offered a link to a post stating his goals for the PBSWCD. Therefore, in addition to the link to his campaign Facebook page, above, you can find out more about his specific ideas for the PBSWCD here.
Caution: The Environmental Platform of the Libertarian Party of Florida is incongruous with the purpose of the Palm Beach Soil and Water Conservation District and states as follows:

X. ENVIRONMENT 1. Aside from public safety, there is no greater concern for the people of Florida than having a safe, healthy environment. We look forward to the day when all property not required for police and court functions are returned to private ownership and control. 2. We call for the restoration of every individual’s ancient, common law standing to sue for trespass any individual, business, government or other group that pollutes his or her property. 3. We oppose creation of new government parks or wilderness and recreation areas. Such parks and areas that already exist should be transferred to non-government ownership. Pending such transfer, their operating costs should be borne by their users rather than by taxpayers. 4. We support efforts to hold all individuals, businesses and governments accountable for the pollution they cause.