An editorial in the Key West Citizen two weeks ago, headlined “Ignoring AICUZ puts Keys Citizens in Peril,” criticized the County Commission for dragging its feet in adopting the Navy’s new plan that determines whose house the super-loud Navy jets fly over as they land and take off at the Boca Chica airfield. That plan is known as AICUZ— Air Installation Compatible Use Zone. The new Navy flight path maps, proposed last year, update 30-year-old 1977 maps. But there’s a reason that the County Commission may be dragging its feet on codification of the newest plan. There may have been some funny business going on when the new plan was developed and implemented— possibly an elaborate conspiracy to divert the path of the jets away from the upscale Key Haven area to a poorer neighborhood on Stock Island. Critics of the new plan— who a re, in many cases, residents of Stock Island and Geiger Key communities who are now suffering the wall-rattling thunder of dozens, if not hundreds of low-flying jets every day— allege that the mastermind of the alleged conspiracy was prominent Key West Attorney David Paul Horan. They say that Horan allegedly conceived and coordinated a scheme to finance a possibly illegal lobbying effort by retired Navy Admiral Robert Natter.

There are also allegations that former Key West Naval Air Station commander Jim Scholl played a key role in the conspiracy— in return for a promise from Horan and others to help him get the Key West City Manager job when he retired. Subsequently, the proposed AICUZ maps were changed to divert the flight path away from Key Haven and Jim Scholl was named Key West City Manager. Go figure. Critics say that Scholl not only recommended that the flight path be changed without any input from his Top Gun trainer but, also, without an environmental assessment that took the impact of increased noise from the new Super Hornet jets into consideration. Such an environmental assessment is required by law as part of the AICUZ process.

Apparently, there are enough questions about possible impropriety— or even downright illegal activity— that, reportedly, the Department of Defense Inspector General, the General Accounting Office and the Environmental Protection Agency are all conducting investigations.

Are these conspiracy allegations true? Maybe. Maybe not. But we, too, think there may be enough unanswered questions that the County Commission is justified in holding off on codification of the proposed new AICUZ maps. At the very least, Commissioners should demand that the Navy conduct a valid environmental assessment.

Attorney Horan told Key West The Newspaper this week that the “conspiracy theory” is bunk. “First of all,” he said, “Scholl would not have had the authority to change the flight path. And in any event, the flight path has not been changed since 1983!” But Geiger Key resident Paul Caruso disagrees. “Before the 2007 AICUZ went into effect, our house was hardly affected at all by jet noise.,” he said. “But now, those big jets are flying over our home at only 200 feet. Sometimes our house shakes like there is an earthquake! We even get sprayed by jet fuel!”

Even Navy documents, one of the NASKW’s AICUZ updates, provided by Attorney Horan address the curerent flight path as a change: “This change has a negative impact on air operations but was modified due to several factors including the majority of operations are by tactical military aircraft capable of tighter turns . . . .” Caruso and other critics say that the purpose of the “change” and the tight turn now required by pilots is to avoid flying over Key Haven. But that maneuver now takes the jets right over Harbor Shores, Safe Harbor and20the surrounding working class neighborhoods around Maloney and 5th Avenue on Stock Island— areas never seriously affected by jet noise before the 2007 AICUZ “update.” “Now, tell me again that the flight path has not been changed since 1983,” Caruso said.

NOTE: As part of a longrunning effort to protest the recent changes in the Navy jet flight path, Caruso has set up a website: www.stoptheplanes.com.

HISTORY

Let’s look at the history of this bizarre situation. In the early 1970s, the Department of Defense (DOD) established the AICUZ program to try to balance the need for military aircraft operations with community relations. Here in the Keys, the 1977 AICUZ, as well as the APZ, the Accident Potential Zone— were incorporated into Monroe County’s land use regulations in 1986. Updating began in 2004 and a first version of a new AICUZ was sent to Monroe County and the City of Key West in January 2005. This updated plan would have taken the loud Navy jets— thousands and thousands a year— right over Key Haven!

Well, as you might imagine, this was totally unacceptable to Key Haven residents, many of whom were and are the people, elected and unelected, who run this end of the Florida Keys. So, reportedly, a plan was conceived to change the proposed AICUZ— to get the flight path moved away from Key Haven. Attorney Horan said this week that he had seen a draft of the new AICUZ as early as 200 3 and that he had immediately contacted Navy officials to question the proposed changes.

A critical part of the alleged campaign to get the flight path moved away from Key Haven was to hire an influential lobbyist to try to convince top Navy brass in Washington to revise the updated AICUZ plan then being proposed. But that was going to be expensive. Who would pay for that? Well, as it turned out, they got the State of Florida to pay for it. You see, there was something called the Florida Defense Alliance, established by the governor to help lobby to protect Florida military bases from realignment or closure. State money was funneled to local “defense alliance” committees through Enterprise Florida.

So, in 2004, Attorney Horan— a Key Haven resident— was instrumental in setting up the Florida Keys Defense Alliance (FKDA). Horan also volunteered to act as president of the FKDA. The stated purpose of the FKDA was to lobby those in Washington responsible for the realignment and closure of military bases to keep the Key West Naval Air Station (NASKW) from being closed or realigned. But that was not the real purpose. According to Paul Caruso and others, the real purpose was to use the FKDA to get grant money from Enterprise Florida to pay Natter to lobby Navy officials in Washington to divert the flight path away from Key Haven.

Even before the FKDA had been incorporated, Horan submitted an application to Enterprise Florida for a $90,00 0 grant. In his application, Horan stated that the City of Key West had committed to provide local matching funds totaling $29,700— although, at the time of Horan’s grant application, the City Commission had made no such commitment. Later, when then-City Manager Julio Avael brought the request for the matching funds to the Commission, he attempted to sneak it through on the consent agenda. But Last Stand protested, pointing out that “the description of the project is vague and lacks any specificity of measurable performance standards . . . In the past, the City has retained an experienced consultant when faced with base closure issues. However, the upcoming 2005 round of base closures are already announced and the entire State of Florida has no threatened closures by any branch of the military. The request for matching funds and the grant itself appears totally unwarranted and its inclusion on the consent agenda without an executive summary is disturbing.”

Well, yeah, but what the Last Stand people didn’t understand is that there was no intention to use the money to lobby to protect NASKW. The grant had allegedly been requested under false pretenses. Horan and his cronies needed the money to pay Admiral Natter to lobby in Washington to get the proposed flight path of the big Navy jets moved away from Key Haven! And the Last Stand people also didn’t know that logical argument was futile. The fix was in. Attorney Horan disputes L ast Stand’s argument. He says that NASKW was in potential danger of realignment and closure until late 2005.

City Manager Avael argued that the City’s promised match was not going to be in real money— it was going to be “in kind” funds. But the match commitment was needed to get the cash from Enterprise Florida to pay Natter. Whether the Mayor and the Commissioners knew or didn’t know that the whole exercise may have simply been a scam to fraudulently get a State grant, the commitment for the matching funds was approved at the Commission meeting on January 4, 2005. To try to bill as many in-kind hours as possible in order to reach the City’s $29,700 commitment, Avael formed a 13-member “Defense Alliance Committee”— City employees and members of the FKDA. Although they didn’t really have anything to do, committee members vowed to have as many meetings as possible so that every member attending could bill their time at $45 per hour, the maximum allowed by the terms of the grant.

CLARIFICATION: The members of the FKDA were volunteers— although City employees were getting paid by the City while they were sitting in the FKDA meetings. The term “billing” here means that they were reporting the number of hours they were sitting in those meetings to build up credit for the City to report to Enterprise Florida toward the grant match. The first meeting was held on January 21 , 2005. The majority of the meeting was taken up with passing out time sheets and emphasizing that as many hours as possible should be billed. But by the end of June 2005, committee members had been able to account for only about $8000 in time. They could only fake it to a certain point.

City Port Director Raymond Archer had been assigned to keep track of all the hours that had been spent on the project. He sent a memo to Avael warning him, “Pending a drastic increase in staff or Florida Keys Defense Alliance time, the City will be required to make up the match with cash.” In the meantime, Admiral Natter wasn’t having any trouble at all spending the $90,000 in real money from Enterprise Florida. And when Natter needed more money, Horan just applied for another $90,000 grant— to lobby to protect NASKW. Wink, wink, nod, nod. Attorney Horan said this week that most of the $90,000 was never requested by the FKDA, nor spent by Natter. But he didn’t say how much was requested and spent. But, allegedly, Natter may have been violating federal law by doing any lobbying at all. Federal law prohibits government officials, including senior military officers, from registering as lobbyists within the first two years after retiring. Natter retired from the Navy in October 2003— but he registered as a lobbyist in March 2004 and almost immediately began to do lobbying work for the State of Florida and the FKDA.

Meanwhile her e at home, Attorney Horan— according to his time sheets as president of the Florida Keys Defense Alliance— was spending a lot of time meeting with Jim Scholl, the NASKW commander at that time. Allegedly, between 2004 and 2006, when Scholl retired from the Navy, there may have been a deal cut with him to change the flight path to divert it away from Key Haven. In return, Scholl may have received a commitment from Horan and others to try to get him hired as Key West City Manager when Avael either retired or was pushed out of the job. When we asked Scholl this week to tell us what really happened, he refused comment except to call the job fix allegations an “elaborate fabrication” and refer us to the Navy for details about AICUZ. Horan also argued this week that Scholl didn’t have the authority to change the flight path. That decision would have been made by the Secretary of the Navy, he said. And he again argued that the 2007 version of AICUZ did not result in a flight path change for Navy jets. Gee, Mr. Horan. Does that mean that all those folks out on Stock Island and Geiger Key are just imagining that those jets are now flying over their houses? Of course, if there ever was such a deal offered to Scholl, nobody involved could ever admit it. But here is what we know subsequently happened:

• While Natter was smoothing the way in Washington, Scholl, as commander of NASKW, allegedly, almost un ilaterally, modified the 2005 AICUZ plan to divert the flight path away from Key Haven over to a poorer neighborhood on Stock Island. At a community meeting on Stock Island in May 2007, Navy Capt. Dewalt, who was the Top Gun tactical trainer when Scholl and/or others changed the flight path, was asked if he had been consulted about the change. His answer was, “No.” Got it? The Top Gun trainer says he was not consulted on a flight path change— even though that change required incoming pilots to start making a very tight turn to avoid Key Haven.

• When the City Commission appointed a City Manager Screening Committee, Attorney Horan was named to that committee.

• One of the first acts of that committee was to “dumb down” the criteria for applicants so that Scholl could qualify. For example, any criteria that required applicants to have city or county management experience was eliminated. Got it? The criteria developed to attract applicants to be the next Key West City Manager did not require them to have any city or county management experience! Most of those who applied did have city or county management experience, of course. Some had extensive education and experience in munipipal management. So why would the Key West City Commission even look twice at any applicant for City Manager who didn’t have at least some city or county management experience— unless the fix was in?

• In any event, Scholl didn’t qualify, anyway, according to the advertised criteria for the job. That criteria stated: “Potential candidates must possess a bachelor’s degree with major course work in public/business administration, finance or a related field.” Scholl has a degree in zoology. By any stretch of the imagination, a degree in the study of animals is hardly a field related to public/business administration or finance. Do you think, just maybe, that the fix was in?

• Also, when Scholl applied for the job, he neglected to mention that he would have to recuse himself from any matter that might come before the City Commission that involves the Navy— such as AICUZ, the claim by the members of the Truman Annex Master Property Owners (TAMPOA) that they own Southard Street (former Navy property) west of Thomas Street, possible joint use by the City of the Navy’s Boca Chica airfield, any conflicts involving Navy easements anywhere in the City and basically anything else that relates to the Navy. Only after landing the job, did he reveal the existence of a four-page “ethics letter” from the Department of the Navy that imposes upon him a lifetime ban on representing the City in virtually any matter that involves the Navy.

Question: Would the majority of the members of the City Commission have voted for Scholl to become City Manager if they had known about how restricted he would be in the job? After all, this is a Navy town.< br> Answer: Sure, if the fix was in.

- Dennis Reeves Cooper answers email at thebluepaper@ kwtn.com.