Local blogger John Masters reports on seeing Palm Bay on the front page of the Drudge Report. He also reports hearing mayor John Mazziotti on the Jerry Doyle radio station. Both incidents were on account of the Mayor’s recommendations that City of Palm Bay not engage in the purchasing of imported Chinese products. Matt Drudge pointed to the Oct 24 ABC Story which broke the story into national news and which as if this writing has 117 comments. According to ABC, Palm Bay would be the first city ever to have banned purchases from a particular country. The Jerry Doyle website has a poll on its home page which so far has been running 88% in favor of the ban.

Even though this could cause a slight increase in the City’s budget (probably very slight), do you think Mayor Mazziotti is leaning in the right direction? Do you think other Brevard County cities, including the county government should follow suit? Should Brevard County be working to set a higher standard.

While there are exceptions and possibly extra paperwork to the ordinance (should it pass), it would be interesting to know if any study has been done by any city or county governments as to how much money is already spent on “chinese” goods. The Palm Bay ordinance would make exceptions for anything under $50, less than 50% chinese parts, or for chinese items which have no other competitive equivalent.