Fort Lauderdale, Fla. – With only one week after the election, uncertainty continues to reign in Fort Lauderdale after the city suddenly decided not to swear in new commissioners’ that voters chose.
Questions still remain after the city’s former longtime auditor John Herbst, who says he was blind-sighted by his abrupt termination months ago.
Fort Lauderdale’s former longtime city auditor, controversially fired earlier this year, won a seat on the city commission.
Commissioners voted to fire John Herbst in February after conducting a probe into former police Chief Larry Scirotto’s work hours, on and off duty, relating to his second job as a National Collegiate Athletic Association basketball referee.
Fort Lauderdale Mayor Dean Trantalis argued that Herbst worked on behalf of the commission and is not supposed to be conducting independent investigations.
Now, with nearly 40% of the vote against three challengers in the District 1 race, he’ll be working on the commission.
After his controversial firing, Herbst is now being hit with a late-hour challenge to the commission seat he won in last week’s election - a feeling of political whiplash.
Herbst won District 1 in a landslide but then on Monday, two candidates who lost that race said they don’t think he meets the residency criteria to qualify.
“I am baffled, I am amazed, I am disappointed,” said Herbst.
Fort Lauderdale could have chosen three new commissioners on Election Day, but they weren’t sworn into office Tuesday as originally planned.
In the case of Dr. Warren Sturman, whose family came from Orlando, Boca, and D.C. for the ceremony, Fort Lauderdale’s city attorney advised in a memo that he’d rather wait until Broward’s supervisor of elections officially certifies the tight race.
“I am confident at the end of the day, I will have an opportunity to serve the district,” said Sturman.
Herbst, in his Fort Lauderdale apartment, spoke to Local 10 News’ Christina Vazquez to show that there’s never been a single doubt about his residency.
“You see soup, coffee pots -- I live here, there’s never been a doubt that I live here,” he said.
Herbst even showed Local 10 the lease he signed when moving to Fort Lauderdale.
Herbst also says he meets the city charter’s requisite for residing in the city six months prior to the election date.
“The voters have spoken, they want me in office, and unfortunately there is an attempt, basically, nothing less than a coup, to try to prevent me from taking office. It’s despicable,” he said.
With only two left on the dais, Fort Lauderdale Dean Tantalis and Commissioner Steven Glassman, who led the charge on that late February night to terminate him, will play a major role in determining his fate.
“What the city charter says is that the city will be the judge of the validity of the election, which means they sit in a quasi-judicial role,” said Herbst.
The attorney representing John Herbst says in a letter that the affidavits regarding residency qualification that his election rivals submitted to the city one day before he was to be sworn-in as Commissioner “contain false and inaccurate information rendering the challenge fraudulent.”
The letter demands they “immediately withdraw their challenge (to) the election.”
Local 10 News has reached out to Coleman Prewitt, the attorney representing Kenneth Keechl and Christopher Williams. Election results show both men lost the District 1 election by a landslide.
Read the letter below: