Four members of the Pinellas County Commission were up for re-election this year. But only one drew an opponent.
Charlie Justice, a Democrat who served 10 years in the Legislature before election to the commission four years ago, takes pride in his record as an elected official.
But his opponent, Republican businessman Mike Mikurak, calls him a “career politician” who has not served his constituents well.
Mikurak says Justice and the commission have not done enough to stimulate small business. And he sharply criticizes the commission for a controversial 2013 vote to block a luxury condominium project in Safety Harbor.
The county commissioners unanimously voted to block the Richman Group of Florida’s plan to build the complex against the advice of their county attorney. Richman sued the county for $16.5 million; Justice expects the county to win an appeal against the lawsuit, but the outcome is unclear.
It’s an issue Justice’s opponent touts as bad business. But Justice said he doesn’t regret sticking with the residents who opposed the change.
“I will have no problem sleeping tonight knowing that we stood up for the people of Safety Harbor. They didn’t want that apartment complex,” Justice said.
Justice, 48, is a long-time St. Petersburg resident and a graduate of USF St. Petersburg. He graduated from Boca Ciega High School and earned an associate degree at St. Petersburg College. He received a bachelor’s at USF and his master’s at USFSP.
Justice began working for USFSP as a special assistant to Bill Heller where he oversaw grants and connected students to the community, he said. As USFSP grew, Justice took on an advising role for incoming freshmen and undergraduate students. He said in that role he learned a lot about the state laws that impacted student education.
Justice used that knowledge to run for the House of Representatives. He pursued a seat in Tallahassee because he wanted to be more involved and have direct input over decisions that affected his community. He became a state senator to be closer to decision making.
It wasn’t all success. Being a Democrat in an overwhelmingly Republican Legislature leads to political friction.
“You spend more of your time stopping the bad stuff than you do creating the good,” Justice said. The economic recession in 2008 led to massive spending cuts to government programs and aid, tightening partisan politics.
After a single term in the state Senate, Justice left to challenge longtime incumbent C.W. Bill Young for a Congressional seat in 2010 but lost.
Justice then took a position with a leadership program, where he focused on connecting students with the St. Petersburg community. Through extracurricular activities and volunteer programs, he urged students to get involved.
During his two years with the program, he met Allison Nall, an alumna of the leadership program. Nall is now Justice’s campaign assistant. She said she admired Justice’s concentration on community outreach.
“With Charlie, it feels more community-based than about politics. For me, it’s clear that his loyalty is to his constituency,” Nall said.
This is the first campaign Nall has worked for, and the experience has her excited for the future. Nall, 26, graduated in 2012 with a bachelor’s in environmental studies and a minor in leadership studies.
Nall said that she isn’t worried about Justice’s opponent outspending him.
“Finance isn’t the best measure of this campaign,” said Nall. “Charlie has been heavily involved in the community and has a lot of grassroots support, they know he’s placed a lot of time and passion into his relationship with the community.”
This will be the second term as county commissioner for Justice. When he first ran, Justice considered the county plagued with infighting with a large partisan divide. After his election, Justice voted to restore fluoride to the county’s water system, which had been removed in 2011 by the previous commissioners. Restoring fluoride was a move that increased public health, Justice said.
During a debate at St. Petersburg College’s Seminole campus on Oct. 15, Justice said that one of his biggest achievements as commissioner was establishing a contract between Emergency Medical Services and 18 firefighter providers.
“We brought consensus to an important issue: Who arrives when you call 911,” Justice said.
Justice played a role in a contract settlement after a decades-long dispute over funding to emergency medical services. Voted on in 2014, the three-year contract was unanimously approved by the St. Petersburg City Council and County Commission.
At the debate, Mikurak said that the people of Pinellas County deserve to be treated like customers instead of taxpayers, that they should be given the most benefits for the lowest cost.
The Republican candidate moved to St. Petersburg 16 years ago and serves on a number of county boards, including the board of directors for the BayCare Health System and the Juvenile Welfare Board.
Justice held a fundraiser in the St. Petersburg downtown restaurant Bella Brava on Sept. 28, where he announced that he received support from the city’s fire department. At the event, Justice repeated one of his staple campaign slogans.
“This area is my past,” Justice said. “It’s my present, where I live with my wife and two beautiful daughters. And hopefully, it will be their future, but the only way to make that happen is to work together.”
Moving forward, if elected, Justice wants to continue his efforts in Lealman, an unincorporated area in Pinellas County. He played a large role in designating Lealman a community redevelopment area, which opens it to tax revenue funding opportunities.
Justice recently finished with a farm share project in Lealman, where he and a number of volunteers passed out fresh vegetables, beans and grains to people living in that area.
“It’s virtually a food desert in Lealman,” Justice said. “We have a lot of work to do in that area, right now it’s highly impoverished, and I won’t stop until that needle moves much higher.”
© Photos by Devin Rodriguez | TCN
