South Florida Sun Sentinel from Fort Lauderdale, Florida • Page 18

FY UUU I1 LZ3 PALM BEACH Sun-Sentinel, Friday, August 18, 1989 Section PB i ROBIN BRANCH Start Columnist Older boys goad pair, 7 and 10, into burglaries 4 i J' Stetfe looks atjBSt-SFrt gatar Ikwmi Second annual season would be a smaller one $40,000 question: a study in futility? File photo Legal alligator hunting in Florida resumed last year after a 25-year hiatus. "1 wo things the taxpayers never the allegedly useless $40,000 pay-plan study purchased from Dallas-based consultants by Delray The average gator is worth about $500 based on current hide and meat prices, according to the game commission. By T.L. STANLEY Staff Writer The to children knew better. They had been taught differently.

But amid taunts and name-calling, they broke down and broke into a neighbor's home west of Lantana, deputies said. And on Wednesday, the boys ages 7 and 10 were arrested. So were the ringleaders, two 12-year-old boys who goaded the younger ones by calling them "chickens" and masterminded three break-ins in the Hypoluxo Village neighborhood, Palm Beach County sheriff's detectives said. "They knew they were doing wrong even at the time," Detective Dave Hoyt said of the younger burglars. "But the peer pressure got them." And in this day of 11-year-old car thieves, investigators were not surprised at the age of the offenders.

"I did have to try not to laugh," Hoyt said with a grin. "I didn't want to minimize what they'd done. But their faces filled with fear when they saw me." The foursome broke into Angela Howe's home on Palomino Drive twice within a recent week. The first time, they swiped her gold watch, a small digital clock and $28 in coins, officials said. "I feel terrible because they're basically good kids," Howe said.

"They're just mischievous." The money was stolen from 7-year-old Derek Howe's room. He had been running errands and saving the change to buy a pet myna bird, his mother said. "He was pretty distraught about it," she said. "He couldn't understand why it happened." The second time, the children apparently did not SEE JUVENILES 4B By NEIL SANTANIELLO Staff Writer Florida wildlife officials are considering holding a second alligator-hunting season annually that would be smaller in scale and geared toward people who want to trap gators more for sport than as a money-making venture. As envisioned, the second gator season would precede the state's commercial hunt in September and allow hunters to snare only two or three gators apiece in less than a week's time for personal consumption, somewhat like Florida's two-day mini-lobster season, said Mike Jennings, a biologist with the Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission's alligator-hunt program.

Details of the proposed minihunt have not been worked out. A second yearly hunt would have to be approved by the game commission's governing board. "We are weighing the idea," Jennings said. "We are not sure if it has merits or not." Legal alligator hunting in Florida resumed last year after a 25-year hiatus when the game commission launched its first commercial hunt during September. A computer lottery selected 229 people to participate in this year's event and kill 15 alligators apiece, except in experimental harvest areas where per-person hunt quotas are lower.

The average gator is worth about $500 based on current hide and meat prices, according to the game com- mission. That monetary incentive helped draw, during last year's hunt, the involvement of commercial interests: state-licensed nuisance-gator trappers and processors. The game commission also is considering making the hunt lottery more equitable by making it more difficult for applicants to send in multiple lottery entry forms using other people's names. More than 20,000 applications flooded the game commission for this year's hunt three times the number that came in last year and caused a "burdensome" processing task, Jennings said. Hunt organizers have attributed the increase in part to people beating the system by using friends to send in several SEE HUNT 4B EAHLY MSB FLOCK "Sri.

$1 V-A. i i Beach makes a good case for ending that tradition. For one thing, if the study is simply a compilation of the answers that came from city employees who were asked how much their jobs are worth, as city Personnel Director Marty Ritchason says it is, why did it cost And if the plan is as hopelessly flawed and unworkable as it has been described by interim City Manager Malcolm Bird, why pay for it at all? If either question has occurred to the city's elected officials, they haven't said so. Instead, they say they "suspected there were problems" with the study, which was initiated last year by former City Manager Walter Barry; that they are "surprised and angry" to learn they spent so much money for nothing; and that, by golly, it's too bad we've already paid for it because now there's no hope of recovering the money. It could happen to anybody Oh, sure.

That's a lot like real life, isn't it? Sears? Your crew just delivered that kitchen sink we talked about, but it's twice the width of the space available." ha. Too bad you've already paid for it. No way you're getting your money back As for what's wrong with the study, it's hard to say. Assistant City Manager John Elliott says "it looks good on paper, but when you sit down and try to apply it, that's when the problems come in. It's just inadequate and not effective for us." Oh.

Just inadequate and not effective for us, huh? So why not send it back for a refund? Well, no, that isn't it, says Bird, who, in addition to describing the study as hopelessly flawed and unworkable, also says the consultants did what they were paid to do, but that problems surfaced when the study hit City Hall. "Various agencies made input in it and it got out of kilter," he says. Oh. So the study was delivered from the consultants in good shape, but then it was made flawed and unworkable by city personnel messing with it, huh? No, that isn't it, says Barry. The consultant gave the city what it paid for, and the adjustments needed were only those that were to be expected.

The problem is that those necessary refinements were not made by city staff. Oh. So it was an adequate and workable study that was simply in need of some fine-tuning that it didn't get, huh? It was bad, then got worse No, Ritchason says that's not right either. It was an inadequate and ineffective study due to the consultants asking employees to evaluate their own worth, but then it was made further inadequate and ineffective due to Barry changing some of the pay grades to reward those who supported him and to punish those who didn't. "All credibility has been removed from it," says Ritchason.

"It's not usable. It will never be usable. It's a joke." Oh. So the study was rendered laughable by Barry, but there would be no point in reverting to its original form because the study whence it came was flawed, causing the report to be inadequate and ineffective, huh? Yes, I think we've got it now: The $40,000 pay-plan study is hopelessly unworkable and flawed (Bird) As well as inadequate and not effective for us (Elliott) But it's also what the city paid the consultants to do (Bird, Barry) If only it hadn't been thrown out of kilter by the quirky input of the city staff (Bird) Who failed to pick up where the consultants left off to fine-tune the study for the city's use (Barry) Which wouldn't do any good because it was already flawed and unworkable before Barry destroyed its credibility and turned it into a joke (Ritchason). Right.

INSIDE LOCAL Resignation of West Palm Beach vice mayor raises questions throughout the county of potential conflicts of interest. 33 i Staff photoPHIL SKINNER Left to right, Paula Polyanski, Eric Cullen, Glen Mathews and Mick Monforte wait to buy Rolling Stones tickets near Boca Raton. Fans line up days in advance to purchase Rolling Stones concert tickets. ater in West Palm Beach, waiting to get tickets. "I have three of their albums.

I like them 'cause I love the '60s music," Haber said. "I've seen Pink Floyd, The Who and The Grateful Dead. When the Stones come down, I have to see the Stones," he said. "It's like I'm seeing Woodstock in pieces," said Haber, a Palm Beach Community College student. "I wrote SEE STONES 4B Thursday.

Tickets costing $29.50 plus service charge will go on sale at 9 a.m. on Saturday for the Nov. 16 concert, to be held at the Orange Bowl in Miami. Some of the buyers, like college student Sam Haber, were born after the band formed in the early 1960's. But Haber says he is 21 going on 41 when it comes to his tastes in music.

Late Thursday afternoon he and his girlfriend, April Trent, 16, were stretched out on yellow and green lawn chairs outside the Carefree The Deborah Wilker's complete concert rundown. SHOWTIME! "I've been waiting nine years to see these guys," said Monforte, 20, who began his vigil on Tuesday. "I was only 12 when the Stones were here last," he said. "I used to pray. Seriously, I'd go to bed and say, 'Bless grandma, let the Stones Montforte was one of about a dozen lined up outside the store by late By AMY DePAUL and STEVE NICHOL Stiff Writers The fans camping out to buy tickets for the upcoming Rolling Stones concert might have been humming the refrain of a song made famous by their favorite band: "I know it's only rock and roll but I like it" Mick Monforte likes it enough to sleep in a lawn chair outside an Eck-erd drugstore west of Boca Raton for four days.

Coiiisty recrMter under indictment quit kickbacks, authorities said. Merriman said Thomas, who was hired in February 1988, was responsible for coordinating advertisements for jobs and representing the county at job fairs. "The type of things Mr. Thomas is accused of involved search firms and things like that that he was not involved with in his job with the county," Merriman said. Thomas has been on leave from his job because of a back injury and has been collecting workers' compensation insurance of $362 a week since Aug.

3, regularities involving Thomas' employment with the county similar to the federal charges against him in connection with his job with Martin-Marietta Electronics and Missiles Group in Orlando. 1 Thomas could not be reached for comment on Thursday. Last Wednesday, a federal grand jury indicted Thomas and two others on charges of defrauding the federal government of more than $55,000 in a kickback scheme that operated out of the defense contracting firm from 1985 to 1987. A 28-count indictment returned against Thomas alleges that while he worked as a recruiter for Martin-Marietta, Thomas funneled resumes he received to employment agencies in New York City and Phoenix, Ariz. The agencies resubmitted the resumes to the defense contractor as if they had originally recruited the job candidates.

Upon Thomas' recommendation, some candidates were hired, and Martin-Marietta paid the agencies' fees based on the new employees' salaries. Then the agencies paid Thomas a percentage, according to the indictment. Thomas eventually received $12,000 in By STEPHANIE SMITH Staff Writer Palm Beach County's employee recruiter, who was indicted last week on charges of taking kickbacks from employment agencies while working for an Orlando defense contractor, resigned on Thursday. Frederick D. Thomas, 41, of Riveria Beach quit his $31,058 county position to pursue another job offer, county personnel director Brad Merriman said.

Merriman said that despite Thomas' resignation, the county will continue to investigate whether there were any ir County planners refuse to approve attempt to delay widening of two roads. 43 SEE RECRUITER MB.