Commissioner Murman mentioned in this Tribune article on organizational BOCC meeting:
Published: November 19, 2012
Hillsborough commission spurns Sharpe, re-elects Hagan as chairman
By Mike Salinero
Hillsborough County commissioners re-elected Ken Hagan as their chairman Tuesday, his fifth turn in the largely ceremonial post.
Hagan, 45, was elected on the second ballot, beating out Commissioner Mark Sharpe. Sandy Murman, who had been nominated and got two votes on the first ballot, took herself out of the running by nominating Hagan on the second go-around, assuring his victory. Murman was re-elected vice-chair.
It was the third time that Sharpe, the second-longest serving commissioner after Hagan, has been nominated but failed to get the necessary four votes. None of the five Republicans on the seven-member commission voted for him. The only vote for Sharpe, besides his own, came from Democrat Kevin Beckner, who nominated him.
Republican Commissioner Al Higginbotham, who first nominated Hagan, said he didn’t vote for Sharpe because Sharpe was not present at the meeting. Sharpe told commissioners last week he had forgotten that the reorganization and swearing-in ceremony were set for Tuesday, and he had scheduled a vacation for this week. He participated in the meeting via conference call.
“Mark has demonstrated skills and abilities in there just like Ken has,” said Higginbotham, who has been chairman twice. “But I think it’s important if you’re going to run for that position that you be present.”
Another Republican, Commissioner Victor Crist, nominated Murman for chairman then voted for Hagan on the second ballot. Crist said he thought Murman, as vice-chair, should ascend to the chairmanship. Crist said he voted for Sharpe last year based on the same principle.
“I think there should be a graduation from vice-chair,” Crist said.
But another theory for Sharpe’s failure to garner Republican votes was advanced by Commissioner Les Miller, a Democrat. Last week, Miller put a measure on the agenda that would have changed the method of choosing a chairman to a rotation.
Under Miller’s proposal, Sharpe would have been the chairman for next year, followed in 2014 by Beckner, because of their length of service on the board. After that, the chairmanship would have gone district by district.
Miller said he pulled the agenda item after Republican friends in the community called him, saying the measure wouldn’t get enough votes to pass. The reason: the Republicans didn’t want Sharpe or Beckner to be chairman.
“I don’t know what it is, but they obviously don’t want (Sharpe) in as chair,” Miller said.
In 2010, Sharpe alienated many members of his party by aggressively supporting a referendum measure that would have raised the sales tax by a penny per dollar to pay for road improvements and a light-rail system.
Still, Sharpe handily defeated Republican Josh Burgin, an opponent of the tax, in the Republican primary that year, then went on to win the general election.
In an email, Sharpe said he couldn’t speak for why the board voted the way it did, but he acknowledged being a moderate Republican might have cost him support of influential members of his own party.
“I don’t walk party lines,” Sharpe said. “My support for the transit tax and increasing impact fees for new school construction put me on the other side of certain power brokers.”
Hagan was first elected as a District 2 commissioner in November 2002 and was re-elected from the north Hillsborough district in 2004 and 2008. He ran and won the countywide District 5 seat in 2010.
During his time on the commission, Hagan has been a proponent of parks and recreation programs.
In September, he successfully won board approval for spending $15 million on a soccer complex with 14 to 20 fields. He also has pushed for talks between the county and the Tampa Bay Rays to keep the team from leaving the area.
