Mark Howell's - "Soundings"
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Soundings

How's this for a loop from which there is no exit?

As of this year, Floridians require photo ID in order to get a Social Security card. But you'll need a Social Security card in order to get a Florida photo ID.

And if you haven't held a Florida ID in the past year or so, you'll now need a birth certificate to get one. But you'll need photo ID to get a birth certificate.

The state's Dept. of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles has "restricted its standards" for residents to obtain driver licenses and ID cards in order to provide "an even more secure identification card."

To meet compliance standards set forth by Homeland Security in May 2008, residents needing Florida ID are now required to present proof of identity, proof of social security number and two proofs of residential address (post-office boxes are no longer valid).

Father Steve Braddock of the Florida Keys Outreach Coalition (FKOC) has responded to Soundings' questions about how this situation affects the ever-growing numbers of homeless. His response:

"Homeless persons in a shelter can present a letter from the organization as one form of ID. The local motor vehicle office has provided FKOC with a form that my case managers complete and attach to a cover letter with their business card. That's fine for homeless who are sheltered but it doesn't do much for those who are unsheltered, many of them living in their cars."

It is often impossible for a person to get a job or to access services without state-issued ID, adds Braddock. "Poor and homeless people often find themselves without ID for a number of reasons. They may lose it moving from place to place or it gets stolen. And you need money to get a state ID or a birth certificate."

Solares Hill is not alone in wondering how the homeless are supposed to cope with finding documents that in the majority of cases are not among their usual possessions; the state attorney, Dennis Ward, also has asked Fr. Braddock about the real effect of these new restrictions.

Meanwhile, residents needing passports can still list General Delivery as an address, and that passport can then be one of the proofs of ID to get a state driver's license.

The Florida Council on Homelessness, appointed by the governor, is discussing the issue and is about to draft recommendations to be submitted to Tom Pierce, executive director of the Florida State Office on Homelessness.

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An armadillo was found on Big Pine Key earlier this month. It is thought the "little armored one" (its name translated) must have hitchhiked here aboard a vehicle from the Texas direction.

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Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen has introduced and passed a bill to rename the federal courthouse in Key West after Sidney M. Aronovitz.

Tomorrow, Feb. 22, Ros-Lehtinen joins local officials plus former and current federal judges at a renaming ceremony at the courthouse before her visit to the Coast Guard cutter, Mohawk.

Judge Aronovitz was born in Key West in 1920 and graduated valedictorian and president of the senior class at Key West High School in 1937.

His grandfather, who'd come to Key West in 1880, owned a general store on Duval Street and founded the oldest conservative synagogue in Florida; he had six sons. Sidney's parents were born in Key West and owned a fabric store on Duval. Aronovitz Lane is named after them.

Sidney served 20 years as a District Court judge (ruling in favor of Mel Fisher in the Atocha case) and briefly served as a City of Miami commissioner and vice-mayor in the mid 1960s.

His widow and the rest of the family continue to live in South Florida.

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An Austrian millionaire is giving away his fortune because it's making him miserable.

Karl Rabeder, 47, is selling his luxury villa with lake, sauna and spectacular Alpine views, valued at $2.5 million. Already gone is his collection of six gliders valued at $600,000 and a luxury Audi A8 worth about $70,000.

"My idea is to have nothing left, absolutely nothing," he told London's Daily Telegraph. "Money is counterproductive, it prevents happiness to come."

After giving away all his dough to charities set up in Central and Latin America, Rabeder and his wife plan to move into a small wooden hut in the mountains. "I had the feeling I was working as a slave for things that I did not wish for or need," he explained. On a three-week holiday to Hawaii, he said, "We spent all the money you could possibly spend but had the feeling we hadn't met a single real person -- that we were all just actors. Nobody was real."

Since selling his stuff, he says he feels "the opposite of heavy."

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Colleen Needham is hosting a benefit at A&B today, Feb. 21, at 11:30 a.m. The downtown lobster house has 15 employees with families in Haiti who have either lost family members or family members have been injured or yet to be heard from. Almost all have lost their homes.

Colleen and the staff at A&B, Alonzo's and White Tarpon are raising money directly for each of the families to help them rebuild lives and to support family back home in Haiti.

Carmen Rodriguez and Gordy Michael will entertain; there's food by the chefs from all three restaurants. Cost is $39 per person for a brunch buffet, raw bar, mimosas and bloody marys, plus a raffle.

"We hope you can stop by," said Greg Needham. "And thanks so much."

• • • • •

A reporter for the New York World interviewed Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy for the Lincoln centennial in 1909. This is what the Russian novelist said:

"Of all the great national heroes and statesmen of history, Lincoln is the only real giant. Alexander, Frederick the Great, Caesar, Napoleon, Gladstone and even Washington stand in greatness of character, in depth of feeling and in a certain moral power far behind Lincoln.

"Lincoln was a Christ in miniature, a saint of humanity, whose name will live thousands of years in the legends of future generations. We are still too near to his greatness and so can hardly appreciate his divine power; but after a few centuries more our posterity will find him considerably bigger than we do."

• • • • •

The 10th annual Schooner Wharf Bar Open Air Art and Music Affair is slated for Saturday, March 6. Open to artists in all media, including but not limited to painting, print making, sculpture, drawing, carving and photography, the show will run from 10 a.m. to sunset with music by local and national acts from 10 a.m. to 1 a.m.

Space is limited. Go to schoonerwharf.com and click on special events for more info. For applications, e-mail swartaffair@yahoo.com or call Capt. Carl at 304-2275.

• • • • •

The material surrounding sidewalk trees in Old Town these days is called flexipave, installed by the city to reduce or eliminate pedestrian liability issues.

• • • • •

The season at Tennessee Williams Theatre on College Road is in full swing. Today and tomorrow, Monday, Feb. 22, "Bobby in the Lobby" returns with Bobby Nesbitt, Susan Powell and Bruce Moore and the music of Frank Loesser (think "Guys and Dolls"). A few general admission seats are still available for Monday.

On Wednesday, Feb. 24 at 8 p.m., Kathleen Peace takes the cabaret stage with Larry Smith, Skipper Kripitz, Joe Dallas and Gordy Michaels in "Let's Do It . . . Let's Fall In Love," featuring the works and styles of yesteryear's heavenly divas Sarah Vaughn, Anita O'Day, Carmen Mc Rae, Nina Simone, Dinah Washington, Peggy Lee, Helen Humes and Shirley Horn. "Kathleen rekindles the fire!" promises the theater's artistic director, Frank Wood, "taking you back to that smoky bar room of long ago...."

Tickets are $20 and $35, available at keystix.com or 295-7676.

• • • • •

The city's tree commission is permitting the transplanting of a Key lime tree, to a location not yet known, that the city's urban forestry program manager, Cynthia Domenech-Coogle, describes as "the largest I've ever seen on the island with the biggest fruit I've ever seen."

The tree was competing with an architect's design for a renovation on Elizabeth Street.

• • • • •

Tim Gratz, our fellow researcher into the Keys connection to the Kennedy assassination, reports that Gerald Posner, author of a book called "Case Closed" claiming that all conspiracy theories about the assassination are wrong, has resigned from the Miami Herald due to accusations of plagiarism.

Case closed, to plagiarize a plagiarist.

• • • • •

Thanks for that one-liner, Shirrel.

• • • • •

Quote for the Week:

"I want executives to create shareholder value and I want them to earn a lot of money when they are successful. But I do not want them to be paid a lot of money when they fail. Pay that is disconnected from performance is a critical element in the bad decisions that lead to economic catastrophe ... These guys are doing more to destroy capitalism than Marx."

-- Nell Monow,

Investment expert

and movie reviewer,

in The New Yorker