A new Miami Beach political action committee formed by Commissioner Jonah “Pottymouth” Wolfson, who is 
termed out in November, collected more than half a million dollars last month alone — some of it from vendors or entities doing business or wanting to do business with the city.
And that has raised some eyebrows.
Commissioner Deede Weithorn, in fact, wanted to talk about it at Wednesday’s meeting. She pulled all four of the procurement items from the consent agenda and intended to ask each vendor if they had been solicited for PAC donations.
“It’s come to my attention that certain vendors have been asked to contribute to ECOs or PACs or other political organizations. I think its incumbent upon us for transparency that we ask each and every one that we are giving a bid to whether they, in fact, have been solicited and if so who has asked them and who they bring the check to,” Weithorn said at the meeting, threatening to ask vendors at every new bid or contract if they’ve been solicited for funds.
“We should not be a pa- for-play society and I, for one, for the rest of my term will sit here and make sure that doesn’t happen,” Weithorn said. “That’s the word on the street. I don’t like hearing that about myself. I’ve built my reputatio on not allowing that.
“It did not take me more than five minutes to find out that there have been vendors that have, in fact, contributed money that have gotten contracts that have been controversial up here,” she said.
“The fact that I am saying that frankly makes me nauseous and I am going to do everything I can so that I don’t see it anymore.”
She even threatened to start a blog (What am I? Chopped liver?) to disclose the information in a public forum.
Wolfson didn’t even try to deny any pay-for-play at the meeting. And he seemed sorta scared — like a little boy caught with his hand in the cookie jar — as he succeeded in stopping Weithorn from asking the vendors any questions.
“Can we do that? Can we ask a vendor about a free speech contribution to a political entity,” he asked City Attorney Raul Aguila. Aguila never really answered the question but maybe Wolfson didn’t give him time to because he then he turned the tables on Weithorn, which is a classic tactic when you are guilty of what you’ve been accused.
“Are you saying, Commissioner Weithorn, that you have never solicited a contribution or been part of a situation where a political committee or state organization has solicited money for a political entity? You’ve never done that,” Wolfson asked.
Said Weithorn: “I just think the public has a right to see the money trail. Whether I’ve done it or not is irrelevant. Whether you’ve done it or not is irrelevant. I think the public has a right to know.”
Wait a minute, though. Didn’t Commissioner Pottymouth just admit that he solicited these contributions?
Then Mayor Philip Levine struck at her: “What we should do is we should make sure that applies to spouses of commissioners who are running for office as well,” he said, referring, Ladra is certain, to Mark Weithorn, who is running for one of the three open commission seats this November.
Meow!
But Commissioner Ed Tobin came to Weithorn’s defense and agreed with her premise. 
City law, he mentioned, prohibits vendors and city contractors or lobbyists to contribute to candidate’s campaigns. But he also said PACs are used as loopholes and argued for disclosure.
“The thing about PACs is the donation is unlimited,” Tobin said. “So conceivably you could have vendors or people bidding on contarcts getting phone calls from commissioners saying ‘I’d like 100,000 bucks.’ And there’d be no prohibition on that… what you’re saying is you’d like it to be disclosed.”
Wolfson was adamant that this be left alone.
“These things are already publicly listed,” Wolfson said. “The information is out there and its public for everybody. It’s a transparent process. These are
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