BRADENTON BEACH – Mayor John Chappie, city commissioners and Police Chief John Cosby responded to criticism of post-hurricane invoices submitted by City Attorney Ricinda Perry at an Aug. 21 commission meeting, defending both the expenditures and Perry herself.
Cosby, serving as director of public works after Hurricane Helene hit the city in September 2024, asked Perry to assist with emergency operations at a FEMA-reimbursable rate of $150 per hour in addition to Perry’s FEMA-reimbursable hurricane-related legal rate of $220 per hour.
The city was flooded with up to 4 feet o f water after Helene swept past Anna Maria Island in the Gulf of Mexico. Damage included Gulf Drive being left covered in sand and impassable, with many ground-floor buildings filled with several feet of sand, no electricity and debris preventing access to many structures.
“I’m sure you’re aware of the recent media concerns and issues that had been brought forward,” Mayor John Chappie said, referring to an editorial in the Aug. 20 issue of The Islander newspaper criticizing Perry’s invoices for November and December 2024 totaling $91,050 for post-hurricane work.
Perry said her obligation is to the city.
“You (the city) are my client. I answer to you. I don’t answer to anybody else,” she said. “You hold me accountable. I have nothing to hide and I’m proud of the work that we did and I stand behind everything I’ve billed to the city.”
Perry said she did what Cosby asked her to do and fully documented her invoices.
“I worked with our contractor that submits these costs to FEMA,” Perry said. “Hopefully FEMA will approve all but 12.5% of these charges that are in front of you for my hurricane work, so the taxpayers are not exposed to this bill.”
Perry said there are many layers of oversight to the FEMA-related billing.
“It goes through the FEMA review process, and I think even the county or state has some review and oversight for our expenditures that go in for FEMA reimbursement,” Perry said. “Then on top of that it goes on a public agenda to be vetted by the public and vetted by you, the client, the elected officials. Staff looks at all of this.
“You were operating under a state of emergency and in a lot of respects the media has come out and said they have a vote of no confidence in the services that were rendered on behalf of the city by me,” she said.
“You can see the detail I put in my invoices. I don’t simply say ‘showed up at work.’ ” Perry said. “There were days I slept in my car at the police department to keep things going. Chief was charged in this instance with assembling a team to respond and get the community back in working order. And the question that largely needs to be answered is, did we succeed? Did Chief succeed in getting the city back open and running? You got the results that were needed.”
Perry’s invoice runs from Nov. 1 through Dec. 19 2024 and covers such items as attending daily briefings; meetings with staff, neighborhood and business owners and fire district personnel; conducting site visits to affected infrastructure; meeting with building owners regarding rebuilding requirements and FEMA compliance; drafting contracts for debris removal; building department reorganization and managing public outreach, to name a few.
Chappie said all contract invoices over $2,000 must be submitted to the commission for review and are public record.
“As you are aware, I lost my right-hand man,” Cosby said. “With him being gone and not having another public works director to assist in this I reached out to Ricinda. I needed somebody that quick on their feet, educated, able to read contracts, RFPs, everything else that I knew was going to have to be put together to move this forward.”
Cosby said he was left with two choices – to ask Perry to help or hire a consulting firm at the cost of roughly $350 per hour per person for up to five people.
“The average consultant fee for what I was going to have her do for FEMA guidelines is $150,” Cosby said. “That’s why I came to the commission and said whatever she’s doing that’s not attorney-related I need you to approve the cost of $150 an hour. We ran that through FEMA, and they were comfortable with that and that is still moving forward.”
Cosby noted that Bradenton Beach was the hardest-hit government entity in Manatee County after Hurricane Helene.
“We had not just damage to our buildings, we have infrastructure damage that’s being repaired, there was no other way to do it, there was no one else to do it,” Cosby said. “There’s two of us, myself and Terri (City Clerk Terri Sanclemente.) She was handling all the insurance issues, and you have to remember we still had to do our regular jobs. I still had to do payroll; scheduling and I had to guide the public works department.”
Cosby said he was working 16-18 hour days after the hurricane, sometimes being called back in the middle of the night for emergencies such as a diesel fuel spill.
“It’s individuals mouthing off that are not residents of Bradenton Beach that are not here and did not go through this,” Cosby said. “They have no clue what they’re talking about.”
“Things were happening so fast, and our team was on top of it and I think you’re going to see the result of the expertise that our team has had when our FEMA reimbursement checks start coming back in and how well we have done our job,” Chappie said, adding the editorial was uncalled for.
Commissioner Ralph Cole said, “When we were under emergency management, they needed their space to do what they needed to do, and we got it done a lot cheaper and a lot faster than the other communities.”
“I just marvel at Ricinda’s ability and we’re so lucky to have her,” Commissioner Jan Vosburgh said.
Vice-Mayor Deborah Scaccianoce addressed criticism of city oversight and Perry’s invoices.
“We pass our audits with flying colors. There is so much oversight in our spending,” she said. “The lawyers for the other cities weren’t slinging mud, wearing boots, carrying cases of water and going out in the public. Not one of those attorneys took the time that Ms. Perry did to shlep around in mud and muck in that disaster that we lived through. But this attorney did do that. She is a member of this community, and she is not replaceable as a result of that.”
Scaccianoce said the city suffered 95% damage, according to Gov. Ron DeSantis.
“Anna Maria was marginal, Holmes Beach by comparison was marginal,” Scaccianoce said. “She (Perry) was here every day during recovery. The Chief was wearing a lot of hats, he had other stuff to do. Ricinda took responsibilities away from him so he could concentrate on getting done what he needed to do. What Ricinda contributed went above and beyond.”
“Bridge Street brought a sense of normalcy and hope back to this city and it was Ricinda who made sure that happened,” Scaccianoce said. “The idea that any of this is inappropriate or not acceptable is outrageous. I challenge anyone to have put as much time and effort that Ms. Perry did as our city attorney during this catastrophe. And questioning her billing or our auditing processes or any of that is absolute nonsense. And I challenge any of those people – the writer of the editorial – where were you? I know where Ricinda was because I was on this Island and I watched her do it. She was bringing boots for people so they could navigate through the muck and mud. It’s really easy to sling mud at people when you’re sitting behind your computer. If you’re not boots on the ground, you have no right to open your mouth to discredit anyone. I am furious this is even put in question.”
Commissioner Scott Bear said he was disappointed that the Islander editorial made it personal about Perry.
“They didn’t come in and ask us why she was doing the work,” Bear said. “We were short-staffed, that’s why. To say the attorneys in those two cities (Anna Maria and Holmes Beach) didn’t charge anything, well, I can guarantee you, if they had been asked to do it, it wouldn’t have been done under their flat rate. To make a statement in a paper that they didn’t have additional cost, well no kidding, they also didn’t have 95% damage.”
“This malfeasance and fraud that are supposedly going on in the city, not just us, but the other two cities, were stripped naked by OPPAGA,” Cosby said, referring to a recent study by the Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability. “They went through everything. If there were issues, we would have known about it and we came out of this well. It’s people that don’t know running their mouth. After what we went through it’s disheartening to have to deal with this.”
