Sometimes when you get into an investigation you find yourself ending up with a very different story than what you thought you’d find.
The investigation into The Zimmerman Agency and its million-dollar branding of the city of Pensacola is such a story.
Instead of a simple story of mismanagement, this investigation found cover-ups, hiding of public documents and manipulation by a council member to further his personal agenda.
With the Florida Legislature tackling ethics this session, this article is bigger than Pensacola and could have implications on a statewide and national basis. Publications have already expressed interest in it.
For the past month, the Independent News has poured through hundreds of emails, read volumes of reports and watched a week’s worth of council meetings videos to find the truth behind the city’s botched marketing effort that cost the the taxpayers nearly a million dollars.
Today at 4 p.m. our cover story will go live on inweekly.net. To receive our newsletter with a pdf version of the entire paper, subscribe here.