SMOOTH TRAVEL

Fdot Project Aims To Improve Safety And Traffic Flow

KELLIE BUTLER FARRELL www.keysweekly.com

Along a 112-mile stretch, from Key Largo to Key West, contractors with the Florida Department of Transportation have been busy installing a combination of 51 road side unit sensors and cameras.

The work is part of a $5-million pilot project that started in 2021 called the Florida Keys Connecting Overseas to Advance Safe Travel –or Keys COAST for short.

If all goes as planned, by the end of the year, information collected in real time will be shared among 250 vehicles countywide equipped with on-board units. These vehicles will be emergency response vehicles and volunteer agency fleets.

“We have vehicles from the Department (FDOT), Monroe County, City of Key West, City of Marathon, Islamorada and Florida Highway Patrol too,” said Carmen Negron, engineer and project manager for Keys COAST.

“They are going to receive messages like potential red light, you are going to approach a school or work zone, excessive speed, pedestrian in the roadway and also potential vehicle collisions,” added Negron.

FDOT will monitor the success of the Keys COAST project with the ultimate goal being to develop a smartphone application that would be accessible to the general public, including motorists, cyclists and pedestrians.

A representative for FDOT said the program is still a few years away from being offered to the general public.

“The pilot project is going to last about two years. We’ll go back and see what the results were and move forward from there,” said FDOT spokeswoman Cynthia Turcios.

The new cameras and sensors will be used to gather information about conditions on the road, not for traffic enforcement purposes.

“So we’re hoping that helps with traffic flow, so if you know certain areas are clogged up you maybe want to wait a few minutes before heading out,” said Turcios.

Negron said similar pilot programs are underway in Tallahassee, Gainesville and Ocala.

“We’re excited to try this new technology down in the Keys. We think it’s going to be very beneficial for the Keys, for the residents and tourists alike,” added Turcios.

continued from page 4 about proper procedures and oversight, according to the audit report.

The same report criticizes the “sloppiness of MCFR’s inventory and patient care records” and finds that “County Administration (did) not have effective preventive or detection measures to ensure … that controlled substances are secure from drug diversion.”

The report describes “significant breach of controls,” as staff responsible for managing the narcotics inventory at the Trauma Star supply room were the same individuals managing inventory counts on each helicopter.

“When personnel are destroying drugs, there’s supposed to be a witness present to affirm that they’re properly destroyed,” Ramsay told the Keys Weekly. “But in this case, (Lynda Rusinowski) would say she destroyed the drugs, then get someone to sign off that they had witnessed it.”

The audit further cites a lack of oversight that failed to catch an “extraordinary” amount of wasted narcotics. Of 88,143 micrograms of fentanyl recorded as dispensed during the audit period, 43,734 (49.6%) were recorded as wasted. The report cites a 2013 National Institutes of Health study showing that, on average, 22.2% of drugs dispensed become waste.

The audit states that interviews with MCFR employees conducted by Sheriff’s Office investigators “clearly revealed” the absence of a support structure within county government that employees could use to safely report their suspicions.

“The interviews … revealed that the chief flight nurse had for months exhibited warning signs that she could be diverting drugs and possibly experiencing a substance abuse disorder,” the report stated. “Had County Administration … implement(ed) basic drug diversion preventive and detective measures, they likely would have been alerted years ago that they should have kept a close eye on the activities of the chief flight nurse.”

One such example: in the calendar year 2021, Rusinowski’s base pay was $71,386. Working more than 2,100 hours of “overtime” and “premium overtime” throughout the year, with zero vacation or sick days, her gross pay for the year totaled $180,967 –253.5% of her base pay.

“There were so many red flags and checks and balances that were overlooked,” Sheriff Ramsay said. “This was a complete failure and breakdown of oversight. Supervisors should have been looking at the amount of drugs being used by each flight nurse on duty. Almost all of the nurses had a basic mean average of drugs they used for patients, while the chief flight nurse was using 10 times that norm. There were so many procedural violations, and then there were orchestrated efforts to derail our investigation. But we’re the ones that put a stop to it.”

Ramsay reiterated, and the audit report verifies, that there was no wrongdoing found on the part of the sheriff’s office.

County Responds To Audit

“We always welcome audits,” County Administrator Roman Gastesi told the Keys Weekly on Tuesday, June 13. “In this case, the previous fire chief, Steve Hudson, requested it. The good thing about audits is you get somebody to take an independent look at the organization and the functions, in this case it was controlled substances.

“What we enjoyed about the audit was the corrective actions taken from the recommendations are something we’re already doing,” Gastesi said. “For example, with inventory control, we have an electronic system. That in and of itself will resolve the issue.

“In this case, it was just one person that was unfortunately ill. I’m glad to report she’s been rehabbed,” Gastesi said. “It got out of control. We still had enough controls to catch it. There’s always room for improvement with any operation. Anybody can always improve. I’m glad to say we improved our operation.”

Monroe County Fire Chief James Callahan said everything recommended in the clerk’s audit report was implemented before its May release.

“We’ve improved the whole process of drug delivery, monitoring and accountability. We went to a new system for accountability that’s much stronger and better so it can be counted and measured more timely. We’ve done a number of things to make the system safer and stronger.”

Ongoing Legal Proceedings

Rusinowski, who pleaded not guilty last September, has a pretrial hearing on June 29 in Marathon. She faces two counts of grand theft of a controlled substance, two counts of obtaining a controlled substance by fraud and two counts of official misconduct.

Perez had a hearing scheduled this week, on Wednesday, June 14 in Marathon before Judge James Morgan. Suarez is set to be in court on Thursday, June 29 for a hearing in Marathon before Morgan. Both were charged with obstructing justice and destroying evidence, both third-degree felonies. Both pleaded not guilty.

Their charges stem from text messages they allegedly deleted from a group chat that described their concerns and suspicions about Rusinowski’s drug theft. Both reportedly lied to investigators at first, saying they had no idea about the charges against Rusinowski and knew noth-