To the editor:

The City Council made the right decision in not renewing the City Manager’s contract. Rob Hernandez’s tenure as city manager has been anything but stellar. To even describe it as “average,” per the performance review of the PREVIOUS City Council (it should be note that there is a new Council with two new members, both of whom voted not to renew the City Manager’s contract) is perhaps an overstatement.

Over the past three years, under Rob Hernandez’s “leadership,” Waste Pro entered into a lawsuit with us, millions of taxpayer dollars were appropriated to big business (during a period of inflation), parks have been delayed and the Yacht Club is far over-budget and unrecognizable to the original plan.

According to Council discussion at the special meeting at which the vote was taken to not renew his contract, Hernandez failed to apply for state funding for a burrowing owl sanctuary, a priority for Cape Coral Friends of Wildlife. The funding, mind you, was for burrowing owl sanctuaries, and was created with Cape Coral in mind.

Even worse, according to one Councilmember, he failed to apply for state and federal funding for the UEP. As this wonderful paper recently reported, homeowners, UEP North 1 could be paying $34,000 per lot, or finance it with the city the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Most problematic though, was Hernandez continuously trying to steer the agenda, instead of allowing Council to steer it. Mayor Gunter said it best when he asked if the dog (Council) was wagging the tail or the tail (Hernandez) was wagging the dog. According to one Councilmember I spoke with, Hernandez would often meet individually with Councilmembers who were opposed or on the fence to his particularly policy goals. This was because Sunshine Laws prevent Councilmembers from meeting and coordinating privately, allowing him to use divide-and-conquer tactics.

Multiple City Councilmembers have complained that Rob Hernandez would withhold information from the Council in presentations if that information would harm his policy goals with three Councilmembers stating he lied to them privately during the Special Meeting where they voted not to renew his contract.

At the end of the day it comes down to Rob not really knowing our city. We do not want to be like Broward County, or Miami, or Orlando, or Tampa. We are Cape Coral and we want to REMAIN Cape Coral. “Broward Bob” was trying to make us into something we aren’t… to reinvent Cape Coral in his own image. He needs to go, and we need a City Manager who knows and loves this city.

Sean Hartman

Cape Coral