Dale Brill - a proven liar and a Tallahassee insider
 
Please allow me prove to you that Dale Brill is a liar, a resume falsifier, and a business huckster with no moral compass. Dale Brill worked directly for Governor Crist of Florida, and was until quite recently one of the top 3 leaders at the Florida Chamber. Let me tell you his history because he is a poster child for what is wrong in Tallahassee today.

Let's look at some aspects of Dale Brill's career and outright lies:

  • Wake Forest University (Winston-Salem, NC) - in his on-line resume, Brill claimed that he attended Wake Forest University 1989-1991 and obtained an MBA. Actually, he attended from the fall of 1990 to the spring on 1992 and did not graduate, which the registrar's office at the School of Business at Wake Forest University has confirmed.

    One might understand why he would lie about having earned an MBA, but why would he alter the dates of his enrollment at Wake Forest? Because Dale Brill has something to hide, as you will see.

  • University of Tennessee (Knoxville, TN) - in his on-line resume, Dale Brill claims that he attended the U of T from 1991 to 1995. This is also factually incorrect: a call to the U of T's registrars office revealed that Dale Brill attended from "August 1992 to August 1996". Again, he is off by one year. Why? Well, because Dale Brill is a liar and has something to hide.
     
    Take note: Dale Brill is trying to create the impression that he was busy, busy, busy with graduate studies from 1989 to 1995. As you will see, Brill wasn't actually that busy studying from late 1989 to mid-1992. Next, we'll explore what Dale Brill is hiding from those years.

  • Advertising Associates, Inc. (Hickory, NC) - according to official state records, Dale Brill was the president of this company from 12/7/1989 to 7/8/1992.....yet he chooses to not mention these two and a half years at Advertising Associates, Inc. (AAI for short) in his on-line resume . Why not? Because there is a lot for Mr. Brill to be ashamed of during these two years. I would not speak of this tawdry time in his life if it were not for the fact that has Mr. Brill continued to behave in the same duplicitous way to this very day. His resume falsification is exhibit A in establishing his duplicity.

    The Catawba Medical Foundation, a non-profit organization and the fund-raising arm of Catawba Memorial Hospital, got into the for-profit ad agency business. Yes, you heard right: a non-profit entity funding and owning a for-profit company, with Dale Brill as President. Mr. Brill claims that this was not his idea, that he was simply asked to serve as president. Others with knowledge of the situation at AAI dispute that and claim that Dale Brill talked the hospital into this. That AAI was his idea and dream.

    Here are just a few articles, in chronological order, that the Charlotte Observer newspaper and other papers wrote at that time about AAI, Mr. Brill's "business venture":

    + "Hospital is using its nonprofit status....to build the agency into a profit-generator"
    Read the article - Dale Brill demonstrated a lack of basic understanding of what is appropriate and ethical in business, and what is not.

    + "Hospital loses non-profit mail rate for its moneymaking magazine"
    The US Postal Service ordered the public hospital to stop using its nonprofit mailing stamp on its money-making magazine, which was published by AAI. Just four months earlier, Mr. Brill had responded to concerns about the blurring of lines between for-profit and non-profit by saying "it's like I'm responding to something I shouldn't have to respond to because it's so ridiculous". Dale Brill had a blind spot for improprieties back then, and he still does today.

    + AAI makes no money for its owner (the non-profit).....even when there was a profit
    In 2.5 years, AAI fails to make a dime for the hospital. Well, it did make a $116,000 profit in 1991, but "none of the money reached the hospital", according to this article. Why? Because when you blow money on things that the IRS won't let you deduct, then you show a profit....but you have none of that money left!

    Suffice it say that Dale Brill was living the high life using AAI money, with expensive 3-hour lunches for himself and certain female staffers being the norm. One person who was employed at AAI at the time commented that "Dale is very good at using other people's money to have a good time".

    + Contract extension with county hospital was kept secret
    In January 1992, even when it was quite clear that Dale Brill and AAI were trouble (see above), hospital president David Rice extended the contract with AAI to a total of five years. The end date of the contract just happened to coincide with the length with a 5-year loan that AAI had received from Southern National Bank. Mr. Rice did so without obtaining permission from the hospital trustees, who in turn were not amused.

    However, in fairness, one trustee (Ron Lindler) called the dovetailing of the contract and loan dates a "coincidence". But Mr. Lindler was not just a hospital trustee, he was also the president of Southern National Bank, the bank that gave the loan to AAI. The bank thus had every reason to protect its interests once it became clear that Mr. Brill was a loser in business. Therefore, you can take Mr. Lindler's claim of a mere "coincidence" with a huge pile of salt.

    What I detail above is just the tip of the iceberg. Multiple sources have told me that Mr. Brill did not do his own assignments as part of his MBA studies at Wake Forest - he had AAI employees do them. AAI's accounting was certainly not GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles), and a CPA firm wrote a management letter to AAI's board about this and other issues. There is much more, but you probably get the picture: Brill is a liar, a cheat, a greedy and unprincipled wastrel who leeches off of others. He thinks that the key to success in life and business is manipulation. The above documented resume falsification proves that he still is that way today.

    As a businessman, Dale Brill perhaps thought he was a visionary. He had a vision, all right, he was delusional. Brill operated AAI the way a sociopath would operate it.

    You might object that "this happened so long ago, Dale Brill might have changed". But as you read on, you will see that nothing in Dale Brill's career to this day demonstrates that he has any moral compass today either. That is why his history at Advertising Associates, Inc. (AAI) is just as relevant today as when Dale Brill lived high on the hog off of the residents of Catawba County, NC some 20+ years ago.

    By May 1992, the hospital trustees were trying to find a buyer for AAI. Given that AAI was a mess in so many ways, it was no surprise that Catawba Hospital failed to find a buyer for AAI, and simply filed articles of dissolution with the State of North Carolina on 7/8/1992, five weeks after the secret contract mentioned above had surfaced.

    Note that as a direct result the website you are reading right now, Mr. Brill updated his on-line resume to include his shameful time at AAI, two and a half sordid years that he did not include before. He has also changed his claim of having an MBA to "non-degree earning" MBA, corrected the incorrect dates that so conveniently hid his time at AAI and generally been forced to fess up. The truth does not come naturally to Mr. Brill, it has to be forced upon him.

  • Florida State University (FSU) - 1997 to 2000. At FSU, Dale Brill was the head of a multimedia lab and a professor. During his time at FSU, Mr. Brill also founded sunsavers.com, a venture that lasted only a year according to official State of Florida records for Sun Savers, Inc. It is not a crime to fail at business, but once again Mr. Brill showed that he lacks the ability operate a going concern.

    Did Mr. Brill fail to make tenure at FSU? I can't know for sure, but knowing a bit about academia, I would guess the answer is "yes". Many people fail to make tenure, and there is no shame in that. However, failure to make tenure meant that Dale Brill had to find a new job. So....if you keep failing at business, what is a young man to do? Why of course: go work for a failing business!! Next stop: General Motors.

  • General Motors - an organization with suspect management for many years, and I know little of what Dale Brill did there except what he tells the world: he reached the title of "Dean of E-Commerce and Global Solutions Leader". Seriously?!? Titles like that strain credulity. In any event, taxpayers dollars were used to pay for what Dale Brill and many other Deans, Senior Geniuses, and CEO's at GM did.

    Picture on right: this picture is from Dale Brill's LinkedIn profile (Dale Brill is a baseball fan). One thing is for sure: he knows how to play the inside game, repleat with spitballs and beaners.

    As we now turn to his career in "public service", the facts will show you that the accusation that Brill plays the inside game is true. Facts and fairness don't matter to Dale Brill. But pleasing corrupt powerful people for personal gain does seem to matter a lot to Dale Brill.

  • Visit Florida - the State of Florida's tourism marketing arm. They will tell you that they are a "public private partnership", but then why are they headquartered in Tallahassee and not in e.g. Orlando where the tourism action is? If they are not really "government, then why does government entity OTTED (see below) serve as their "regulator" under state law? Visit Florida walks, talks and behaves like a government office, and so it is no surprise that actual results are secondary to their mission. In other words: the perfect employer for Dale Brill !

    In 2006 while at Visit Florida, Dale Brill claimed that the evidence of Visit Florida's success could be found in the fact that tourism had increased over the last ten years. He made this claim without a shred of evidence to establish cause and effect (see article). Look for the verbal sleights of hand like "we are only one spoke in the wheel the drives the tourism industry".....this without first demonstrating that they even are a spoke in the wheel.

    Next, Dale Brill claims that "visitation has increased 92%" over 10 years....without mentioning that their method of counting changed during that period and that their new method results in higher numbers. It's exactly the kind of self-promoting half-truths or lies that Dale Brill is a master at. However, this kind of duplicitous behavior is not unique to Dale Brill or Visit Florida, you will find that these tax-dollar funded organizations always make "misstatements" (a.k.a. lies) that make them look good. I challenge you to find a half-truth or "misstatement" from them that puts them in a less favorable light.

    When the Florida tourism industry takes a turn for the worse (which happens at time), would Dale Brill then conclude that Visit Florida is doing a really lousy job of marketing Florida? Of course not, Mr. Brill would never conclude that. Dale Brill would simply tell more fables to please the powerful.

    The stint at Visit Florida gave Dale Brill an opportunity to further ingratiate himself with Bud Nocera (mentioned above). Bud was fired in May, 2009 for Visit Florida's rank failures, but not before making sure Dale Brill was his regulator. See below.

    Above, from left to right: Dale Brill in 2008 with his then boss Governor Charlie Crist, his future boss Mark Wilson of the Florida Chamber, and an unknown individual.

  • Director of the Governor's OTTED - that's short for Office of Tourism, Trade and Economic Development. Landing this plum job, in which he reported directly to Gov. Crist, would have been an excellent opportunity for Mr. Brill to change his ways. Instead, he carried on with his same womanizing, sexual harassment ways that he had engaged in while at AAI. Mr. Brill held numerous "book club meetings" at work with female subordinates, meetings that lasted for hours. Maybe it was not possible for Mr. Brill to change his ways in this job? Maybe you have to be a jerk to work at higher levels of government?

    Should Mr. Brill want to sue me for libel, he would lose because the truth is an absolute defense against charges of libel. However, a lawsuit would be an excellent opportunity to call witnesses and explore in open court which of his OTTED subordinate(s) he was sleeping with, and when. I don't care about anybody's personal life, but I do care if it impacts work paid for using public funds.

    One of OTTED's jobs was to oversee Visit Florida, where Dale Brill had just worked. I have the documents to show that OTTED never cared much about accountability....or the law. Therefore, that Dale Brill would head up that organization and NOT do what Florida Statutes requires it to do....well, that is consistent with Brill's unctuous career and history of lies.

    Dale Brill failed to find fault with Visit Florida and his former boss Bud Nocera throughout the scandals that led to Bud's firing. It showed what a useful tool Dale Brill is in the right hands. He does not care about tax dollars well spent. He does not care about accountability. Dale Brill only cares about pleasing his superiors. That kind of power-loving devotion does not go unnoticed in Tallahassee.

    Dale Brill managed to land this plum desk-driving position at OTTED in September 2007 before the scandals broke over at Visit Florida.

  • President, Florida Chamber Foundation - Brill was in this suck-up "job" from January 2010 until November 2012. Don't let the word "foundation" fool you, these guys are lobbyists, plain and simple. That is why they are located a mere 200 yard walk from the State Capitol office building. The Florida Chamber of Commerce is not a friend of free market enterprise, or a friend of competition. They represent large companies who prefer no-bid contracts, protection of monopolies and the continuous fleecing of the middle class.

    The foundation says that they are a "think tank". I beg to differ - they are simply lobbyists by a different name. They hired Dale Brill for his political connections, developed during 6+ years of government employment. People like Dale Brill are simply a plague upon the land.

    Dale Brill produced podcasts for the Florida Chamber Foundation, videos that get a pathetic 15-30 views each. Waste of funds, waste of space and waste of time. Listen to Dale Brill and his guests speak drivel and drone on about nonsense that no audience should be subjected to.

    On November 15, 2011, Dale Brill served as a a session moderator at the Florida Japan Summit, where a delegation from Wakeyama Prefecture in Japan was attending. Wakeyama Prefecture (pop. 1.0 million) is the Official Sister State of Florida, but it is also where the town of Taiji is located, the home of the gruesome annual dolphin slaughter. As you can see from the official material of the Florida Japan Summit, the Florida Chamber was a "supporter" of this event.

    Picture on the right: dolphin sashimi (raw dolphin meat).

    2011 was a year in which "Dolphin Tale" (featuring Winter the Dolphin) was good advertising for Florida. But when given the chance to bring up this disgusting slaughter in which the water runs bright red with dolphin blood, the Florida Chamber of Commerce and Mr. Brill chose to punt. Money is apparently the only value these "business leaders" have.




    In November 2012, it was announced that Dale Brill was leaving the Florida Chamber of Commerce as of January 2013 in order to form Thinkspot, a "consulting firm" which does work in "supporting your economic development initiatives or transforming your community’s approach to economic progress". As if Dale Brill knows anything about economic progress for anybody except himself.

    Thinkspot is headquartered at 113 Monroe Street in Tallahassee, which is a three minute walk from the State Capitol. Locating his business next to a center of government power betrays Brill's continued belief that economic progress emanates and radiates from government.

    I have no evidence whether this website, published and updated since 2010, caused the Florida Chamber of Commerce to fire Brill. However, I do know that the number of visitors to this website increased sharply one week before the announcement of Mr. Brill's departure came. Maybe his debauched past caught up with him? I also know that Brill´s departure was announced on a Friday, which is what one typically does if one wants to not draw attention to something.

    I sure hope this website helped get Mr. Brill's lying, unrepentant, sorry self fired. I made it quite clear to the Chamber's general counsel that my website was here to stay and that I would keep up the heat. Maybe they decided that the embarrassment just wasn't worth it anymore?




    Before leaving OTTED, Dale Brill had the unmitigated gall to say the following upon being hired by the Florida Chamber Foundation:

    "Government can only do so much. It's time for the business community to do some heavy lifting to come up with solutions. Government doesn't create jobs. Businesses create jobs. But the two can work together to accomplish a lot."

    This is rather rich coming from somebody who just drew a government paycheck for seven years. Also, the record shows that "heavy lifting" is a term Dale Brill uses a lot. He believes in heavy lifting, and believes that you should do it. For his benefit, and at your expense.

    Look over the fact and Dale Brill's lies. Consider his lack of basic decency and his spineless, shameless worship of money and power. Then make up your own mind about Dale Brill.

    In my view, the citizens of Florida deserve to know what kind of swamp creatures are in charge in Tallahassee. Hence this website.




    Email relevant facts about Dale Brill to rask [at] dalebrill.com
    Please include supporting documentation (articles, documents, etc.).

    More to follow....




    This site published by Tom Rask, business owner and resident of Pinellas County (pop. 900,000). I am proud to be active in pushing the failed Florida establishment around. I have helped create real change in my own county, and will continue to work towards what I believe in....and history shows that faux / ersatz / crony capitalism can not and does not produce good outcomes.