Venice on the web
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In attendance were five of the seven city council members: Fred Hammett, John Moore, Jim Myers, John Simmonds, and Vicki Taylor. Mayor Dean Calamaras and Vice-Mayor Rick Tacy did not attend.

Additionally, a number of local powerbrokers attended, including Jack Meyerhoff, Steve Harner and, of course, E.G. (Dan) Boone.

CQG leader Dan Boone had organized the meeting. He opened the meeting up and then deferred to Hunt to lay out the PAC's upcoming election strategy.

Accounts vary as to how long Hunt spoke. When questioned, John Simmonds stated Hunt spoke for only about five minutes. Fred Hammett stated Hunt spoke for about ten minutes. Other accounts given to Venice Florida! dot com indicate that Hunt spoke for much longer, that he did indeed dominate the meeting and that he laid out the political map for getting a Boone-and-Hunt favorable council elected: "When was the last time you ever heard Hunt shut up after only ten minutes? That's just not gonna happen," one political insider noted.

Hunt's theories and strategies focused primarily on the mayoral election. According to our sources, Hunt laid out a wide range of options. Hunt stated that Calamaras might resign early to give Tacy the mayor's seat early, thus setting Tacy up for a mayoral run. Tacy would, of course, have to resign from his council seat a year early in order to qualify under Florida's "Resign to Run" law. If Calamaras didn't resign early but decided not to seek reelection, Tacy would continue on as Vice-Mayor and former council member David Farley would be given the CQG nod to run. Then of course Calamaras might run after all, in which case the CQG would be forced to back him. Hunt's preferred scenario was a Farley run for the mayoral seat.

While it is unclear if the five members of council broke Florida's Sunshine Laws by attending, they certainly gave the appearance of stretching the law to its limits. Simmonds admitted to Venice Florida! dot com that he participated in the discussion. It is not known if any other sitting council member spoke out during the meeting. If a second council member did speak, it is our understanding that a violation of the law would have occurred.

Even odder, though, is that the council members didn't get up and walk out en masse when Hunt started his pontificating. That Hunt and current city manager Marty Black  do not see eye to eye would be a gross understatement. Council has made public statements giving full support to Black. For five members of council to give the political nod to Hunt's strategies (especially since Hunt is perceived as being a destructive and malevolent force that the Black administration would rather not deal with) is mind-boggling and mystifying. An obvious question emerges: what were they thinking? Were they thinking?

Odder yet: nobody is fessing up to supporting a Farley run except for Hunt and possibly Dan Boone. For everyone else that we asked, a Farley mayoralty is considered an unthinkable horrorshow. CQG members have reportedly scrambled to convince Calamaras to seek reelection if only to avoid the possibility of Farley's name sharing the same name plaque with the word 'Mayor.'

Reaction from CQG members to this web site have been decidedly ugly as it became apparent that it was Venice Florida! dot com's intention to publish the story. "It does make us look bad," one insider stated. Another, in an apparent attempt to try to squelch the story, said "Look, it was an ugly affair, but the CQG is capable of doing a lot of good; we need to look past this."

John Patten is the head of Web Operations for Creative Pages, and has worked in broadcasting for over 12 years. He can also be incredibly rude at times.