Showing posts with label City of Miami. Show all posts
Showing posts with label City of Miami. Show all posts

Thursday, March 26, 2015

South Florida has once again redefined the meaning of "Free Ride." But shouldn't we all realize by now that when it comes to #TransportationPolicy in #SoFL, there's no such thing as a free ride? But #Miami pols, @Tri_Rail & @AllAboardFla can't help themslves when it comes to taking taxpayer dollars and taking credit for something BEFORE the facts are ALL in

South Florida, and NOT to its credit, has once again redefined the meaning of "Free Ride." But shouldn't we all realize by now -after so DOZENS of fatally-flawed transit decisions and an equal number of poorly-executed plans- that when it comes to #Transportation Policy in #SoFL, there's no such thing as a free ride? 
But #Miami pols, @Tri_Rail & @AllAboardFla can't help themslves when it comes to taking taxpayer dollars and taking credit for something BEFORE the facts are ALL in

Below is a slightly-expanded version of an email that I sent out early last night, after reading the article and tweets below, to just under 200 concerned citizens, pols and news media reps in the Sunshine State, and to transportation reporters and columnists across the U.S.A.
I was not able to send all the tweets to them, so... include them here




 Miami Herald
Tri-Rail would offer free rides to Overtown district residents in station deal
Douglas Hanks, Miami Herald
March 24, 2005

Tri-Rail would offer free passes to large numbers of Overtown residents in exchange for public funding of a new Miami station, part of a deal aimed at piecing together $69 million in tax dollars to bring the commuter line to a privately funded train depot downtown.

The largely state-funded Tri-Rail would offer free passes to residents inside Miami's Overtown/Park West taxing district in exchange for extracting about $30 million from the entity for construction of a Tri-Rail platform in All Aboard Florida's rail complex that's about to begin construction in downtown Miami.

 Read the rest of the article at:
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/article16221608.html



Miami Today
Tourist taxes add-on a creative way to finance vital transit  
Written by Michael Lewis on March 25, 2015
If Miami-Dade commissioners succeed in a creative drive to increase two of our three tourism taxes by one percentage point each, they can amass more than $60 million a year to build mass transit.
Anyone who tries to get around this county knows how vital this is, because bonding this guaranteed revenue could provide several billion dollars to start building transit immediately.
Read the rest of the column at:
http://www.miamitodaynews.com/2015/03/25/tourist-taxes-add-on-a-creative-way-to-finance-vital-transit/


























A few things worth knowing while you digest the facts and anecdotes above and try to make sense of it all:

 In case you forgot -or never knew- the person who led the effort to change the City of Miami's former CRA district and create a new CRA district -done as part of the City of Miami and Miami-Dade County's foolish efforts to build a new taxpayer-built baseball stadium for the Florida Marlins- is none other than Marc Sarnoff.

Yes, the outgoing City of Miami commissioner at the center of this story, now a paid CRA Director, and, oh yeah, someone trying desperately to elect his wife as his successor on the Miami City
Commission. Really.
Hastag: #Context

Now perhaps those of you who doubted me last year when I -alone in South Florida- publicly asked why the one-and-only public All Aboard Florida public scoping meeting scheduled in Miami-Dade County last year was taking place in a crime-ridden area that future users of the train between Miami and Orlando would never willingly visit without an ample display of security.

In case you forgot, this one-and-only AAF public scoping meeting in M-D was scheduled to be held at night, during the week, at a place where, IF you entered its address on Google Maps like I did and looke at it via Street View, what you saw was the side of a liquor store with debris everywhere.
Again, REALLY.

As opposed to, well, having it at a centralized location in the county with plenty of parking spaces outside and plenty of air conditioned seats inside on a hot day that would ACTUALLY draw future paid train passengers for rides to Orlando?
Afterall, AAF is trying to cast as large a net as possible for passengers, aren't they?

Trust me, for their business plan to be successful, their core audience can not consist of just poor people and people who lack a car to make the drive up to Orlando.
But look how clumsily and amateurish it was handled when they had lots of time to decide what they were going to do?
That's called portent, my friends...

Yes, but then THAT is precisely the kind of planning we've come to expect from the same AAF folks who've always got their hands out for more for the public purse, forgetting that many of us still recall how much they bragged and patted themselves on the back early on for how much theirs was a "private" enterprise.

The same people who did NOT even plan on hosting a public scoping meeting anywhere in Broward County for its taxpayers and consumers last year until I embarrassed, shamed and publicly flogged them, via several high-profile emails and blog posts that were cc'd to the South Florida, Orlando and Tampa Bay area  news media, and a handful of people with power and influence in Tallahassee with
an interest in logic intersecting with reason at least, well, OCCASIONALLY in public policy

Me, via the blog last May, which generated more than a few not-so-happy phone calls and emails to people who thought they'd pulled a fast one:

More Transit Policy Woes in South Florida: With stealthy and self-sabotaging friends like All Aboard Florida and SFRTA/Tri-Rail, pro-transit advocates in South Florida don't need any more enemies; 'All Aboard Florida' fails to schedule a single public scoping meeting in Broward County this Spring despite Fort Lauderdale being a proposed station, while SFRTA chief refuses to answer a simple question -Will Hallandale Beach have a station under the proposed Coastal line plan?; Just because you're pro-transit doesn't mean you have to ignore displays of transit incompetency or mismanagement when you see it!
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2013/05/more-transit-policy-woes-in-south.html

After I publicly outed AAF's ill-conceived plan to ignore the very Broward public -and its future customers- who'd no doubt be asked to pay in some manner or form towards a new public train station and assorted infrastructure in Fort Lauderdale, they wised-up and decided to throw one together in Fort Lauderdale.
Wow, talk about disrespecting their own core consumer audience!
WHO would intentionally do THAT???

Not that the people at AAF and the assorted City of Fort Lauderdale and Broward County geniuses have yet to figure out how they'll keep Fort Lauderdale's sizable homeless population from camping en masse in and near any new public train station.
That, of course, is proposed for but a few blocks from Broward County's present central bus depot, off Broward Blvd.

You know, right in the middle of the area where, as has been reported upon for MANY years, homeless people drink (and often defecate) everywhere, as is entirely self-evident to anyone paying attention.
With the City of Fort Lauderdale City Hall but a stone's throw away!
But they just ignore it.

Why?
Unfortunately, because like so many levels of government in South Florida, with rare exceptions -like open-minded Coral Gables City Manager Cathy Swanson-Rivenbark, whom I knew and trusted implicitly from her years of being an Assistant City Manager and City Manager in Hollywood, who consistently talked-the-talk and walked-the-walk on transparency and public input on public policy- they're always thinking that a PR-driven strategy will inevitably trump a logical and well-planned public policy and goal that actually requires genuine public input.

But what they almost always fail to appreciate is that the public buying-in, if the plan is smart and sound, esp. financially, almost always results in genuine public success achieved SOONER, not just the mere illusion of it.

That same unfortunate attitude I think also explains why so many public places in Florida in general and South Florida in particular seem so resolutely mediocre, second-rate and ill-conceived.

Is that what we really want with train/commuter stations that ought to have been built 40 years ago, when I was a kid growing up in North Miami Beach, which perhaps could have kept South Florida from physically expanding beyond reason -and infrastructure- including building stadiums and arenas far from core supporters, when logic would have seen them built near well-planned train stations, which would have benefited everyone, including the team's bottom line?

As a longtime public transit advocate, in Chicago, D.C./Arlington County as well as in South Florida, I think not. 

 But just because we see the important role of public planning and public transit doesn't mean we support breaking the public bank to do so, and pretend that car-centric South Florida is, overnight, going to become transit-friendly, and therefore can sign-off on gold-plating everything so that Marc Sarnoff can see his reflection on a plaque of names for years to come.
What are -and where are?- the benchmarks that AAF and Tri-Rail should have to reach in order to get the deal they want?

My experience is that simplicity and ease-of-use will count for more with the people who actually use a train station in the future, since that's what they will tell their friends, family and work colleagues,
and no amount of PR dollars can ever equal that.

The powers-that-be need to create train stations in Miami and Fort Lauderdale with the same mindset used to create the current international airport in Oslo, where so many first-time visitors feel exactly as I did in 2013: completely at-ease and not the least bit confused or overwhelmed.
Something I know about from using O'Hare so often for so many years in the 1980's while living in Chicago, Evanston and Wilmette.




You actually WANT to linger.
That surely counts for something, no?

 Heia Norge!
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Wednesday, September 18, 2013

Great Miami Hurricane of 1926 - Eighty-seven years ago today, what there was of Miami and South Florida was largely destroyed by a powerful Category 4 hurricane that devastated everything in sight, ending the Florida land boom in a heartbeat, plunging South Florida into an early economic Depression and retarding this area's growth and maturity forever in very profound and fundamental ways that have never been fully explored or understood, even now; The great "IF only" question - what if IT never hit?; And THAT is why they're called the University of Miami Hurricanes


moviemagg YouTube Channel video: The Great Miami Hurricane of 1926 Uploaded August 27, 2012. http://youtu.be/3cEfsp3Mn1s
Great Miami Hurricane of 1926 - Eighty-seven years ago today, in 1926, what there was of Miami and South Florida was largely destroyed by a powerful Category 4 hurricane that devastated everything in sight, ending the Florida land boom in a heartbeat, plunging South Florida into an early economic Depression and retarding this area's growth and maturity forever in very profound and fundamental ways that have never been fully explored or understood, even now; The great "IF only" question - what if it never hit?; And THAT is why they're called the University of Miami Hurricanes 





http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1926_Miami_hurricane

 "as late as the morning of September 17, less than 24 hours before the category 4 storm's effects would begin in South Florida, no warnings had been issued."
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/mfl/?n=miami_hurricane

 "At the height of the storm surge, the water from the Atlantic extended all the way across Miami Beach and Biscayne Bay into the City of Miami for several city blocks."
See map: http://www.srh.noaa.gov/images/mfl/events/1926hurricane/inundation.jpg

 Pictorial history of the Florida hurricane: forty-seven views and five pages of information, September 18, 1926
http://www.wolfsonian.org/explore/collections/pictorial-history-florida-hurricane-september-18-1926-pictorial-history-florida-

 Photo of Great Miami Hurricane of 1926 historical marker:
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/images/mfl/events/1926hurricane/1926_marker_1.JPG
Don Boyd - Miami's new drydock near Biscayne Blvd. as a result of the Hurricane of 1926
http://www.pbase.com/donboyd/image/77164210/original

 More photos at:
http://www.pbase.com/search?q=1926+Hurricane&b=Search+Photos&c=sp
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Monday, July 8, 2013

So guess who fell off the truth-telling bandwagon and got back to his familiar logrolling ways in the Miami Herald? Yes, Maurice Ferre of the Miami-Dade Expressway Authority; FL state Rep. Jeanette Nuñez is 100% correct -the MDX is overstepping its boundaries. Facts show they are arrogant and territorial as hell, and it's clear they want to expand their fiefdom!


View Larger Map
So guess who fell off the truth-telling bandwagon and got back to his familiar logrolling ways in the Miami Herald? Yes, Maurice Ferre of the Miami-Dade Expressway Authority; FL state Rep. Jeanette Nuñez is 100% correct -the MDX is overstepping its boundaries. Facts show they are arrogant and territorial as hell, and it's clear they want to expand their fiefdom!
My comments are after the spin.

Miami Herald
Letter to the Editor
MDX is doing its job
July 7, 2013

Re state Rep. Jeanette Nuñez’s June 30 letter, MDX is overstepping its boundaries:

The Miami-Dade Expressway Authority (MDX) was created by the Florida Legislature and the Miami-Dade County Commission in 1994 as an agency of the state. Seven of MDX’s board of 13 members are appointed by county commissioners and six by the governor. 

On March 19 and June 18, 2013, MDX held public hearings on the rate issue for State Road 836. The MDX Board voted 7-5 in favor of the 70-cent option over the one for 60 cents. This new rate starts the summer of 2014. 

The toll policy and new toll rate were studied, discussed, debated and publicly aired for several years. We are no more a monopoly than the Florida Department of Transportation or Florida’s Turnpike. MDX staff and I, as chair, visited every county commissioner and as many city mayors as would see us to review plans. We were before several editorial boards, on radio and TV talk shows. The Miami Herald covered the toll issues amply and fairly. 

In the six advertised public meetings, two webinars and two public hearings, there was minimal participation. In the last public hearing MDX received the objection and concerns of seven legislators and five mayors preferring 60 cents rather than the 70-cent toll rate per mainline gantry. 

In the same Miami Herald edition, there were other articles on government expenditures for Jackson Health System’s $830 million “wish list” and the county water and sewer department’s pipe plan. Florida’s Turnpike implemented a $12 million-a-year toll hike recently. 

Freedom is not free, and progress has a cost. Americans, and Miamians, well understand that our infrastructure needs drastic repairs. As painful as toll increases are, doing less than our best would be more painful to travelers. 

MDX gets no money from Washington, Tallahassee or Miami-Dade County. If any of these governments wants to help MDX financially, we would gladly review our decisions. 

For seven years Congress has failed to adequately fund the U.S. transportation needs. Bridges are failing everywhere, even, unfortunately, our own Bear Cut Bridge in Key Biscayne. Many local cities, like the growing Doral, are concerned that traffic pains will slow growth and affect quality of life. 

Good public policy requires difficult decisions for all of us. MDX is not overreaching. MDX is doing its job. 

Maurice Ferre, chair, MDX, Miami


A few weeks ago Ferre seemed to be trying to play the all-too-rare voice of reason in Miami-Dade County by opposing fare hikes of this stealthy body most people in M-D not only DON'T understand, but instinctively hate -for good reason.

Unfortunately for both residents and common sense, that was all a mirage, since he's now back to playing the role of sycophant to the hilt that's been his designated role since he's fallen to the outer fringes of relevant politics and public policy.

It's really great that the Herald's feeble-minded Editorial Board is so bereft of any common sense that despite this being known as one of THE most apathetic and least civic-minded regions in the entire country, they run this piece without any mention whatsoever that Ferre is the former mayor of Miami -and wannabe mayor of M-D County- so that all the legions of 
know-it-alls from Aventura to Florida City who moved down here since Hurricane Andrew hit, and as we know, think they know everything -many of them, Jets fans, of course- can have some useful context to better understand a pol calling for more money for his latest crew of insiders.

Naturally, to make the whole log-rolling effort complete, Ferre compliments the Herald.
How did I know THAT was coming?
Experience!


The original Letter to the Editor that Ferre's spin exercise was trying to undo was this bit of spot-on truth-telling:


Miami Herald
Letter to the Editor
MDX is overstepping its boundaries
June 29, 2013

Miami-Dade County commissioners created the Miami-Dade Expressway Authority (MDX) in 1994 to ease traffic congestion and establish local control of toll revenues. Two years later MDX took over the five busiest roadways in the county — the Airport, Dolphin, Don Shula, Gratigny and Snapper Creek expressways. While its foundation and the original intentions of MDX were necessary at the time, in recent months, MDX has overstepped its boundaries and taken advantage of its de facto monopoly over Miami-Dade’s major roadways. 

MDX originally approved a fixed toll rate of 70 cents for the Dolphin Expressway in March, and after a 60-cent alternative was introduced, it called for a public hearing where community members and elected officials could voice their opinions on the matter. On June 19, voice them they did. 

In fact, I and several colleagues from the Miami-Dade legislative delegation attended and condemned the toll increase at an MDX board meeting. We asked the board to pass the less costly alternative, a 60-cent toll per gantry. Nonetheless, the motion for the lower toll failed on a 7-5 vote, even in the face of widespread public opposition. 

Therefore, the MDX board went about its business — not the people’s business — and passed the resolution increasing tolls to 70 cents per mainline gantry and 30 cents per ramp gantry. Before this change, the roundtrip tolls from my district in southwest Miami to downtown were $2.50. If the new tolls are implemented, the cost would rise to $4.20. Commuters who use the expressway will see an increase in what they spend on tolls when the new charges begin next summer. 

MDX has vastly overreached its boundaries as a quasi-governmental body and I hope to remedy the situation for my constituents legislatively before the charges come into effect in June 2014. To borrow the term coined by Roll Back Tolls, MDX is practicing “tollation” — tolling without representation. 

Even though MDX is a state-sanctioned agency, there are systemic inadequacies within its structure. I’m worried that MDX is not held properly accountable for its decisions because there are no elected officials sitting on the board and it has not prudently explored other options to finance future projects. I’m also worried about MDX’s apparent monopoly over tolls in Miami-Dade County and its inability to engage in active listening with the public. 

This decision to raise tolls portrays MDX as having little concern for the economic well-being of the resident, and I will remain adamant in supporting my constituency on this controversial issue. 

Jeanette Nuñez, state representative, Miami

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As always, you can read much more analysis on other problems associated with the arrogant folks at MDX at Transit Miami, where they've been hip to what MDX has been doing for as long as I've been -expanding their fiefdom.
http://www.transitmiami.com/

 Transit Miami @transitmiami https://twitter.com/transitmiami
"Transit Miami is an online web journal dedicated to advancing smart growth oriented land use policies, and mutlimodal transportation in South Florida."

Jeanette Nuñez's profile on the Florida legislature's website:
http://www.myfloridahouse.gov/Sections/Representatives/details.aspx?MemberId=4524
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Sunday, May 20, 2012

Besides a lack of scoring coming off the bench, the other reasons the Miami Heat have lost their way in their playoff series against the Indiana Pacers -palm tree karma, simple math and lack of attention to detail

Above, the electronic mesh advertising billboard sign on the facade above the entrance gates to the AmericanAirlines Arena in downtown Miami around 4 p.m. Tuesday afternoon before that night's Pacers-Heat playoff game. All photos on this post were taken Tuesday May 15, 2012, all  by South Beach Hoosier.


Besides a lack of scoring coming off the bench, the other reasons the Miami Heat lost at home Tuesday night to the Pacers in Game 2 -palm tree karma and simple math. 


The number of playoff games left for the Miami Heat to win the 2012 NBA title going into the best-of-seven series against the Indiana Pacers was 12, but on Tuesday afternoon, with under 4 hours to go before Game 2, already up one game to none, the total was 11, not the 12 that was indicated on the (illegal) signs placed on the palm trees in front of the arena on Biscayne Blvd., opposite The Freedom Tower.
There should've already been an "X" marked thru this number.






Above, looking west towards Biscayne Blvd. from in front of the AAA, and at bottom, looking south from there towards The Freedom Tower and downtown Miami.







Looking east and upwards towards the AAA from the sidewalk along Biscayne Blvd. 
I was in downtown Miami on Tuesday, a warm, muggy and overcast day that looked to be uncomfortable from the get-go when I left Hallandale Beach that morning.
It had glare written all over it, and the closer I got to downtown, the more it was obvious to me that it was one of those days that make sunglasses a must, even for kids.
And yet I saw plenty of tourists walking around near Bayside and the Port of Miami without them, squinting like crazy, which I'm sure will show up in many of the photos they shot that day, once they got home.

On a personal level, I knew the overcast skies and glare would play havoc with any outdoor photos or video I shot as I made my way from the Miami-Dade County Govt, HQ bldg, the Stephen Clark Building I hadn't been at since the Marlins Stadium controversy a few years. 


Having already read the illegal signage story in the Miami Herald the previous week about the Heat, largely owned by the state's wealthiest person, Micky Arison, once again throwing their weight around and acting like they were above local laws, as I went past the area in the morning, I knew I'd have to swing by later to take another first-hand look at what was what.


The Kumho Tires ad image above shows the numbers being crossed-out correctly, showing 11, but the actual sign in front of the arena was not touched, and thus, sports superstition raises its head, as does the palm tree karma for being f-ed with in the first place.
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http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/05/09/2791625/city-tells-miami-heat-to-remove.html
Miami Herald
City tells Miami Heat to remove tire ads wrapped on palm trees at arena
By Andres Viglucci
May 10, 2012

The Miami Heat must have missed the news: The Miami Commission killed a measure two weeks ago that could have allowed advertising banners to be placed on trees.
That didn’t stop the team from wrapping the trunks of 16 royal palms in front of the publicly owned American Airlines Arena on Biscayne Boulevard with ads for Kumho tires. City officials say the ads are illegal.

On Wednesday, just before game five of the Heat’s first-round playoff series with the New York Knicks, code enforcement officers ordered the team to take down the white banners, which carry the slogan “DRIVE to the CHAMPIONSHIP’’ printed sideways above the image of a car tire and a Heat flaming-basketball logo.

“Not very catchy,’’ opined assistant city manager Alice Bravo.

And not very legal, either, she said. The team, which manages the arena, didn’t apply for permits, Bravo said.

Even if it had, Miami-Dade County’s sign ordinance, which applies inside the city as well as in unincorporated areas, frowns upon signs of any kind on trees. Under a section entitled “Prohibited signs,’’ the code reads: “No sign shall be attached to trees.’’

The county owns the arena, but the city is supposed to enforce the Miami-Dade sign ordinance inside its own borders.

The team could be fined if the banners aren’t gone by Thursday, Bravo said, though the city prefers to achieve compliance first. She did not know how long the signs have been up.

The Heat, however, refused to take the signs down. In a statement Wednesday, spokeswoman Lorrie-Ann Diaz said the team would remove the “sponsorship message’’ from the banners but leave them up “until the end of the playoff run’’ while applying for a permit.

Bravo said she was uncertain whether the tree banners without an advertising component would be permissible on the arena property itself, but added that she believes draping banners on palms on the public sidewalk is not. The festooned trees are on both the arena steps and the sidewalk out front.

The Kumho tire ads, in any case, remained up as crowds of fans arrived for the game Wednesday night.

The ads-on-palms flap comes amid growing controversy over the proliferation and legality of LED billboards and other outdoor ads locally, especially in and around downtown Miami. Billboard opponents, county planning administrators and county attorney Robert Cuevas say the county ordinance bars electronic ad billboards, which the city has approved.

More recently, the city commission gave preliminary approval to LED billboards on the Gusman theater downtown, the Miami Children’s Hospital and the Knight Center, as well as in city parks. But on April 26, facing public criticism, the board killed a measure intended to allow ads on parking pay stations and bicycle-rental kiosks that was so broadly worded that it could have permitted them as well on fire hydrants, public buildings, bridges and even shade trees.

Also in violation of the rules, the critics say: The Heat’s digital mesh on the arena facade. The electronic sign, also permitted by the city, shows ads for Goya products, Kia cars, Office Depot and Kumho. But the county’s sign code explicitly disallows ads for goods and services unavailable at the site, Cuevas said in a recent legal opinion.

Cuevas’ memo said enforcement is up to Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez and the county commission.

The elected officials, however, have not taken action.

On Wednesday, an anti-billboard group, Scenic Miami-Dade, filed a complaint with Gimenez’s office over the Heat’s palm-tree ads. The letter opened with a single word: “Disgusting.’’

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As we all know, this is NOT the first time the Heat acted like they owned the property and built everything themselves, when that is not the case. It's a county-subsidized building. 





WFOR-TV
I Team: County Receives Nothing From Heat, Arena Revenue
Reporting Jim DeFede
May 5, 2011 10:52 PM




Biscayne Times
A Waterfront Park for All to Enjoy
REMEMBER “PARCEL B,” THE LAND BEHIND THE MIAMI HEAT’S ARENA? YOU OWN IT BUT CAN’T USE IT -- YET
Written By Erik Bojnansky   
AUGUST 2011

Miami NewTimes
Banana Republican blog
Micky Arison and Miami Heat Get Audited by Miami-Dade Inspector General
By Francisco Alvarado 
January 13 2012 at 2:02 PM


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Monday, April 11, 2011

"Who is in charge in this town?" In which the City of Miami acts like Hallandale Beach and ignores what's right in front of it

This Miami Herald article at the bottom of this post about what was going on in Miami for six months is pretty amazing, but will come as absolutely no surprise to us because it rings so familiar to us in Hallandale Beach. Been there, done that.

Like many of you, I've got my own long list -and collection of photos- regarding Code Compliance and safety violations that are routinely ignored by City Hall or the HB Police or Fire Dept., many of which are right in front of them, while still others are actually violations and safety problems THEY are actually responsible for, but yet they've done nothing about it for YEARS.

All years when present City Manager Marc Antonio was at City Hall in some high-ranking capacity or another.
I'm continually finding myself -and many of you- saying "How can he remain SO oblivious for SO long?"
And why is there STILL absolutely NO FEAR among HB city employees of being terminated for NOT doing their jobs and treating residents with professionalism and honesty?
If not now, when?

Please try your best to make it to one of these meetings if you couldn't attend in March, since we all know that Mayor Cooper truly believes -really!- that the less HB residents attend public meetings, the more it indicates that they think she's doing a great job -not the sad reality, which is that her mean-spirited, egotistical and disorganized manner of running the meetings actually repels people from attending and participating.
Which only hurts the city, not to mention, democracy.

I'll try my best to be at all three meetings, since this is precisely when those foam boards I've spoken to some of you about here in HB about are most useful. Sturdy boards that can be displayed at public meetings -on chairs if need be- with photos and
information on them of the self-evident and longstanding problems that will finally see the light of day. HB City Hall can't deny what's in the photos -but you know they will TRY!

Starting this month, with the help of a new piece of SONY electronic gadgetry that was seemingly tailor-made with bloggers like me in mind, you'll start seeing those old (and new) problems displayed here and on my YouTube Channel page in a way that I believe will make them much harder for City Hall and Cooper's Rubber Stamp Crew and cronies to ignore.

 Hallandale Beach Quadrant Meeting for Northeast Quadrant
Monday, April 11, 2011, 6:30 pm
North Beach Municipal Building, 2813 E. Hallandale Beach Boulevard

Special City Commission Workshop on the Parks Master Plan
Wednesday, April 13, 2011 6-8:00 p.m.,
Hallandale Beach City Hall Commission Chambers, 400 South Federal Highway

Hallandale Beach Quadrant Meeting: Citywide
Saturday, April 30, 2011, 10:00 a.m.
Hallandale Beach City Hall Commission Chambers, 400 South Federal Highway

Wynwood/Overtown

Residents want construction site shut down due to noise, dust

Residents of a Miami neighborhood have been trying for months to get authorities to do something about a noisy, dusty construction site near their homes. Their pleas were ignored until they called the newspaper.

By Jared Goyette

April 7, 2011

For six months, Liz Fate has been unable to open her windows, because when she does, dust from an unpermitted construction site across the street covers her floor and furniture.

She complained to the city of Miami, the Florida Department of Transportation, whose contractor is using the site, and the Miami-Dade County Department of Environmental Resources Management, but nothing happened. Finally last week she complained to the City Attorney’s Office and The Miami Herald, which contacted several government agencies to inquire about the situation.

Within hours, city code-enforcement inspectors visited the property and cited owner David Lombardi for lacking a permit and for improper storage of construction materials in a residential neighborhood.

Now it turns out Lombardi’s tenant, American Engineering and Development, never had city permits to be there to begin with.

“They are operating illegally,’’ said city Zoning Administrator Barnaby L. Min. “If they do not have permits they should not be operating.”

American is leasing the site, 2238 NW Second Ave, from Lombardi — a prominent Wynwood developer and landowner — and using it as a staging area for the construction on nearby Biscayne Boulevard.

Lombardi and the contractor now have until April 11 to either obtain the proper permits, which require approval from the city, or shut down. FDOT has spoken with American Engineering and issued a statement saying that the department will monitor the company’s efforts to reduce dust and comply with the city’s regulations. The department also told the contractor it can’t start work at 5:30 a.m. and must wait until 8 as required by city rules.

A spokesman with the Miami-Dade Department of Environmental Resources Management said that while the dust might be a nuisance, inspectors had tested the air on four separate occasions, and found it didn’t pose a health risk for residents.

The government’s belated actions aren’t enough for Fate. She wants the project stopped altogether.

“We can’t make it safer; we just need to shut it down,” she said. “It needs to be shut down immediately.”

Lombardi said that he believes the work is allowed because the site is zoned light industrial. He doesn’t think Fate’s efforts to stop the work will be successful.

“Would she prefer that we parked containers for the port there?” he said. “I mean, does she understand where she rented? She rented in a neighborhood that’s zoned light industrial. If she wants Brickell Avenue, go rent on Brickell. The rents are triple.”

Min, the zoning administrator, said that only a portion of the property is zoned industrial, and that only that section could be used for the storage of construction material.

City Commissioner Richard Dunn, whose district covers the area, echoed Min’s comments.

“Whatever the law is, it should be upheld,” he said.

Miami Code Enforcement Director Sergio Guadix said he planned to give the contractor time to respond before asking police to stop the work.

Fate lives in Wynwood Lofts, which is also owned by Lombardi. She first started calling city officials and Dunn’s office at the end of September. In the last month, she started going door-to-door at the on the other side of the site, at the New Horizon Square apartments in Overtown.

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Thursday, January 13, 2011

Why are there so many incompetent police officials & pols in South Florida? Miami-Dade police won't repay 'misspent' environmental funds used on flat-screen TVs. Yet another spot-on story by Matthew Haggman that reveals the true depths of the problem in Miami and environs: lack of #ethics & #competency

To those of you reading the spot-on Matthew Haggman story below outside of South Florida, the Miami-Dade County mayor Carlos Alvarez referenced in this article is the very same Carlos Alvarez that was formerly the Miami-Dade County Police Director.

He is also the same Carlos Alvarez that I believe WILL be successfully recalled from office on March 15th, owing to his lethargic, myopic leadership style, and his rather curious predilection for outright duplicity in dealing not only with his colleagues on the publicly-unpopular County Commission -in far too many instances to cite here- but also in his dealings with the general public.
The people who voted for him in the first place.

 Alvarez is part of the harmful mass of middling-mediocrities of elected officials that I have long contended have held South Florida hostage for decades with their short-sighted ego and ethnically-driven brand of public policy that resembles nothing so much as a dog forever chasing its tail.
Somewhat humorous to observe from the outside, perhaps, but not so funny closer to the action, where it's just maddening beyond belief..

Consider what has happened politically to former City of Miami and Miami-Dade County mayors: NOTHING!

Hardly anyone ever talks about it, not even Channel 10's Michael Putney, but the fact is that in one of the largest cities in Florida -and the largest county in the fourth largest state of the country- is the exact opposite of a political launching pad: it's where political ambitions crash-and-burn.
In other states, those people would become governors or U.S. Senators, but here, they just disappear completely.
That's one of the reasons this area is so backward and why the I-4 corridor is considered by many objective observers to be both more important politically and home to more pols who can be elected statewide.
Soon, that black hole he's created in the universe thru his negative karma will swallow Alvarez whole, and he will disappear from sight entirely, recalled from office by an embarrassing margin.
(FYI: My father is a retired Miami-Dade police officer who was on the job for 25 years.)

Sadly for its citizen taxpayers who by now are long used to being the money pinata that is regularly bashed for loose change for purposes unknown -Miami-Dade Commissioners' discretionary funds- this terrific Matthew Haggman story shows what passes for governance in South Florida in the year 2011.
Cops intentionally and brazenly mis-using funds for purposes that have nothing to do with its original intent and nearly everyone involved is making excuses for it, led by the incompetent police officials and gutless Miami-Dade politicians who are the embodiment of the sick political culture, led by Carlos Alvarez, who will be pushed from the political stage with a vengeance in exactly two months for crimes of omission: lack of leadership.

And not that I'm the first person to say it among my circle of friends and acquaintances, but where the hell exactly has Miami-Dade Commissioner Sally Heyman been hiding?
The Northeast Dade district, that includes Miami Beach, is full of lots of smart and well-educated good-government types who have high expectations that whoever represents the district will be someone who's adept at keeping an eye peeled for exactly the sort of dubious behavior this article highlights: lack of effective internal controls and a complete absence of real punishment for people who abuse their authority.

For someone like Heyman, who has such a very high opinion of herself and her record in office, especially about what she thinks is her fiscal and ethical probity and sense of accountability, tell me, other than her vote against the Marlins Stadium in Little Havana, how can you not say that she's been slumping noticeably, almost sleep-walking since it was revealed in 2009 how much taxpayer money she doles out thru her Commissioner's discretionary fund.
Your taxes, her discretionary fund...

excerpts from I-Team: You Pay, Miami-Dade Commission SpendsJanuary 13, 2009 10:25 AM 
 
As the slumping economy drives most people to cut costs, the CBS 4 I-Team learned lawmakers aren’t doing the same with your tax dollars.
Here’s what the CBS4 I-Team Investigator Stephen Stock found after pulling the Miami-Dade county budget for the past three years.
Read the rest of the story at:
http://miami.cbslocal.com/2009/01/13/i-team-you-pay-miami-dade-commission-spends/

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excerpt from I-Team: M-D Commission “Carrying Over” Controversy
March 3, 2009 3:41 PM

District 4 Commissioner Sally Heyman agreed.
“I like opportunity to have it when we need it,” Heyman told the I-Team.
“This is not my money. It is an office fund, it is the people’s money,” Heyman said.
The people’s money that builds up into a financial kitty to be used any way a commissioner wants with little oversight, debate or public input.
Here’s how it works.
Any money budgeted for commissioners’ district offices NOT spent in one fiscal year carries over. It accrues in future years.
Commissioner Sally Heyman says her preliminary records show she has $1,006,000 in carry-over.

Add up all 13 Miami-Dade Commissioners’ carry-over for fiscal year 2007-2008 unaudited and you are talking about almost 4 million dollars in their carry-over kitty. That’s $3,816,000 of your tax dollars that has accrued in carry-over budgets over the years with little oversight, process or debate.

Read the rest of the story at: http://miami.cbslocal.com/2009/03/03/i-team-m-d-commission-carrying-over-controversy/

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http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/01/13/2015129/miami-dade-police-wont-repay-misspent.html

Miami Herald
Miami-Dade police won't repay misspent environmental funds
By Matthew Haggman
January 13, 2011

The Miami-Dade Police Department is acknowledging it misspent funds meant to fight environmental crime on flat-screen TVs, SUVs and firearms.
"Clearly inappropriate,'' Police Director James Loftus says.

But putting the money back into the green funds, as the county's inspector general has requested? Not so fast.

"No, we are not,'' county police spokeswoman Nancy Perez said.

Miami-Dade Inspector General Christopher Mazzella said in a recent memo to Mayor Carlos Alvarez that the police have adopted many of his recommended fixes, following a scathing IG audit that found the police used two environmental trust funds as a kitty for pricey purchases with little connection to environmental crime-fighting.

But the police department is flatly rebuffing two IG recommendations: that it stop using green-fund money to pay expenses such as monthly cellphone and aircard bills, and that it repay the misused public dollars.

"We continue to stand by our original recommendations that the Trust Funds be reimbursed,'' Mazzella said in a Dec. 21 memo to Alvarez.

The police department isn't obligated to follow the IG's recommendations, unless the mayor or the county commission act. And there's little push coming from the county executive's office.

Mayoral spokeswoman Victoria Mallette would only say in a statement that "administrative procedures have been strengthened.'' When pressed whether the mayor thinks county police should pay up, she referred questions to Loftus and hung up.

The standoff is the latest chapter in a scandal that erupted last year over county stewardship of funds that were meant to combat polluters. Instead, amid "overall chaotic administration,'' the funds were steered to "excessive, unreasonable, or unnecessary'' purchases, the IG audit found.

The IG's inquiry, following a Miami Herald series last year that detailed dubious spending, focused on nearly $6 million spent from 2000 to 2009 from two funds: the South Florida Environmental Task Force Trust Fund and Florida Environmental Task Force Trust Fund.

More than $1.1 million was spent on vehicle-related expenses, including the purchase of 23 SUVs and trucks that went to top brass rather than environmental investigators working in remote areas. Another $1.1 million went for cellphones used, in many cases, by officials in non-environmental departments.

Three Sharp 52-inch flat screen TVs were snapped up for about $6,000. Nearly $35,000 was spent on 30 Smith & Wesson M&P-15 rifles and holographic sights. Police justified the firearms on the grounds that an environmental investigator might encounter "a wildlife poacher armed with a high-powered rifle.''

Three Segways were bought for $25,000. One was used periodically to patrol MDPD's suburban headquarters, and two were found "sitting unused in a warehouse,'' auditors found.

The episode served as an embarrassment for embattled Mayor Alvarez, who is facing a recall vote on March 15.

Division Chief Frank Vecin, a close ally and supporter of Mayor Alvarez, was in charge of fund spending. At one point, Alvarez was ferried around in a Chevy Tahoe purchased with green-fund money. The county mayor later returned the automobile, saying he didn't know it was bought with funds meant to fight polluters.

The revelations of fund mismanagement prompted the retirement of Vecin.

"The IG believes the funds were managed improperly,'' said C. Michael Cornely, Vecin's attorney. "It was their opinion. To me, the IG justifies its existence by looking for things and making issues out of things that are not really an issue.''

The two environmental funds, created in 2000 by the county commission and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, were established to help fight polluters in South Florida, which the county has called a "drum dump capital.'' Funding sources included fines and court judgments.

Police director Loftus -- named to the top job in February, after spending questions were already being raised -- now says new money will not be accepted into the two funds. The remaining balance in the accounts is $1.5 million.

In defending his position that the police department need not repay the misspent dollars, Loftus contends that over the life of the trust funds, the department paid some $27 million out of its general fund for the salaries and benefits of officers and directors working environmental investigations -- that, in sum, the contribution of personnel costs far offset the questioned expenses.

Mazzella responded that the trust fund money was "to augment, not replace'' general funds.

If they police were to repay for misspending, the precise amount isn't clear, though the August audit provides a road map.

"We left it to the police to determine what was justified, and repay what was not,'' said Mazzella.

Miami Herald staff writer Martha Brannigan contributed to this report. 

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In case you were wondering, yes, the Frank Vecin mentioned above, the Carlos Alvarez supporter who was in charge of those environmental funds, is the same Miami-Dade police commander who, in the words of Channel 4 News' I-Team , had:
"allegedly been paid hundreds of thousands of dollars by developers to expedite their request for permits and provide access to top county administrators, has agreed to retire..."
http://miami.cbslocal.com/2010/06/23/i-team-police-commander-steps-down/
At the same time Vecin was assisting various developers as CEO and as President of Oak Tree Development, he was also in charge of the police department’s Intergovernmental Bureau, which is responsible for investigating illegal contractors and criminal violations of the county’s building code.
In other words, he was being paid by the very same developers and builders his police unit might be called upon to investigate. Instead it was the developers who found themselves with a valuable friend in the police department.
Here's the link for that I-Team story which also reveals how much Vecin was getting for his handiwork from The Terra Group:
http://miami.cbslocal.com/2010/06/20/i-team-frank-vecin-beyond-the-badge/

 Not that things are any better in the City of Miami.. cops paid overtime for work they didn't do.
That's how it's done down here!
 
http://miami.cbslocal.com/2008/12/10/i-team-money-for-nothing/
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