Photos of The Village at Gulfstream construction banners recently erected

"The Village -Grand Opening Fall 2008"
July 27, 2007, Gulfstream Park Race Track and Casino, Hallandale Beach, FL
Looking northeast from US-1 towards the Grandstand and the beach.
In distance, left to right, is The Duo on Hallandale Beach Blvd. -next to the Diplomat Country Club and Golf Course- and The Westin Diplomat Resort and Spa on Hollywood Beach.

"A World Class Destination"
July 27, 2007, Gulfstream Park Race Track and Casino, Hallandale Beach, FL
Looking due east from US-1 towards the Grandstand

Sorry for the hiatus! Hallandale Beach Blog is back!

"Yes! We Are Open"
Construction underway for The Village at Gulfstream Park development slated to open Fall 2008, Gulfstream Park Race Track and Casino, Hallandale Beach, FL July 15, 2007
Temperature about 93, no breeze, heat index a very miserable 101 degrees
Looking east from U.S.-1; photo by South Beach Hoosier


Gulfstream Park Race Track and Casino, Hallandale Beach, FL
July 15, 2007, Looking east from U.S.-1; photo by South Beach Hoosier

Gulfstream Park Race Track and Casino, Hallandale Beach, FL
July 15, 2007, Looking east from U.S.-1; photo by South Beach Hoosier
________________________________
Thursday July 19th, 2007

Hallandale Beach Blog has been on the blogger injured-reserve list recently due to a rather preposterous yet still very painful injury, which explains the general lack of prescient postings of late.

I'm sorry for the delay in getting news of note to you here, as that hasn't necessarily stopped the resident powers-that-be in Hallandale Beach, Hollywood and Aventura from continuing to practice their often harmful brand of public management and democracy, if the things I've seen around the area of late are as real and egregious as they appear to be.

That painful off-the-field injury has now healed sufficiently enough that I can once again return to the comfort of the keyboards and share my thoughts with you here, such as they are.

As the photos above clearly indicate, that time away from the blog has coincided with the construction work that has begun in earnest on the west side of the Gulfstream property for The Village at Gulfstream Park project that were bound to start sooner or later.

Well, "LATER" has officially arrived!

What I do have to offer now, though, are the dozens and dozens of photographs I've taken over the past few months in Hallandale Beach, Aventura and Hollywood of official city/agency neglect, incompetence or general laissez-faire quickly degenerating into laziness.

I've finally organized them to the point that rather than having to often get into rather complicated explanations here to connect the dots, and possibly risk getting into a pointless tangent or two, I can now simply show you the photos I've taken that literally speak volumes, making it far easier to follow my particular train of thought on a subject.

(Granted they'll be from a 35mm camera not a digital one, but I think they'll be good enough to amply illustrate a particular point better than mere words can.)

So don't be left at the train station.

Dave, a.k.a. South Beach Hoosier & Hallandale Beach Blog

Miami 21 Draft

Draft of Miami 21 now online, in advance of first reading on June 28

Received this email last week and meant to post it here as well as my http://www.southbeachhoosier.blogspot.com/ site. Oops!

More info is being made available online now for all you armchair urban policy experts to peruse from the comfort of your home, and not spend time poring over docs in some govt. bldg. with bad A/C or parking -or both.
(I meant to attend the "City of Miami Commissioner's Workshop" on Miami 21
- http://www.miami21.org/ - last Thursday, which would've proved very interesting, in light of the arrest of so many city of Miami planning employees for reasons that we're all familiar with by now. See Miami Herald's front page take from last Friday below: Prosecutor: Miami workers ran 'The Firm' on city time, Authorities said 11 Miami government workers ran a private consulting business on city time.)

The online info allows you to do some reconnaissance in advance of the meeting and see who on the Commission has done their homework and is really following what's being done -and who hasn't- as well as watch and take plenty of copious notes.

Just don't expect anyone to be handing you a microphone to ask one of your trademark penetrating, three-part questions, wherein you bring up the fact where you went to college again, even though it isn't relevant. Ivy Leaguers, this means you!

Found this link on the Miami 21 page with archived articles on the subject, pro and con:
http://www.miami21.org/index.php?submenu=mediapartners&src=news&persist_cat=1&srctype=lister&newssearch=yes&kw=
The aforementioned email from Miami 21 HQ read:

Updated Miami 21 Draft is Available Online

Please visit www.Miami21.org for the latest Miami 21 Draft which was posted today.
For your convenience, we have included an amendments file which indicates all changes taking place from the original Miami 21 Draft (March 16, 2007) to the present Miami 21 Draft (June 20, 2007).
As always, we thank you for your continued participation in the Miami 21 process and encourage your questions and/or comments pertaining to Miami 21.
Quick Links...Miami 21 WebsiteMiami 21
Draft-June 20, 2007Amendments from Original Draft
Upcoming Meetings Contact Information phone:
Miami 21 Hotline (305) 416-2121 fax: (305) 400-5400
email: info@miami21.org
Mailing Address: PO BOX 330708 Miami, FL. 33233
______________________________________
http://www.miamiherald.com/548/story/147570.html
The Miami Herald
June 22, 2007
Prosecutor: Miami workers ran 'The Firm' on city time
BY SUSANNAH A. NESMITH AND MICHAEL VASQUEZ

They called it ''The Firm'' -- a consulting business Miami city government employees were running from their desks at the Riverside Center administrative building.
On Thursday, police and prosecutors called it racketeering and organized fraud.
Police rounded up 10 current and former city workers Thursday and are planning to arrest an 11th when he returns from a vacation abroad.
All are accused of doing construction design and planning work for outside companies on city time, using city computers and equipment, and even visiting the sites in their city vehicles. All but one worked in the city's Capital Improvements department, which is responsible for things like building parks and fixing streets. Two who had been with the city since the mid-1970s recently retired.
''We are arresting virtually an entire arm of city government,'' Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernández Rundle said during a news conference in the lobby of the city administrative building.
The Capital Improvements department has 48 employees, City Manager Pete Hernandez said. The 10 arrested worked together on city construction plans.
The 11th person who will be arrested worked in the zoning department. All are charged with racketeering, theft and fraud among other charges, and each potentially faces 23 to 95 years in prison and loss of their city pension.
The group put together construction plans and designs for clients from the Keys to Ocala, designing everything from shopping centers and day-care centers to private homes, Fernández Rundle said.
They even got the city to buy specialized equipment and computer software that the city had no use for -- so they could use it to do their freelance work, she said.
''These 11 city workers decided that their government paycheck was insufficient and that the taxpayers owed them more,'' she said.

'THE FIRM'
City officials first discovered the scam more than two years ago. Former Assistant City Manager Alicia Cuervo Schreiber said she noticed capital improvements employees in the lobby looking over building plans that had nothing to do with the city. She took a closer look at the department.
''We started seeing there was no production coming out of [Capital Improvements]; meanwhile they were there working until 1 a.m. or 2 a.m.,'' she said.
Then the city received an anonymous letter warning ''there's something going on in your department. They're running a company called The Firm,'' former City Manager Joe Arriola said.
Mary Conway, then department director, began investigating further but couldn't find much.
''At first we thought it was ineptitude or laziness or incompetence,'' said Conway, now chief of operations.
The investigation did turn up pornography on one computer in the office, and an employee was suspended for a few days, but there was nothing on any of the hard drives suggesting employees were doing anything but city business, Cuervo said.
''We didn't realize they were using flash drives,'' she explained.
City officials took the case to Miami Police, who also investigated. But at that point the state attorney's office declined to prosecute, and police agreed.
''It looked strictly administrative,'' Chief John Timoney said. ``You find employees all the time doing stuff on company time.''

CITY HIRES P.I.
The city hired a private investigator for roughly $100,000 to dig up more. When the investigator presented videos of employees traveling to private jobs during work hours, the criminal probe resumed.
Timoney assigned a sergeant and two detectives to the case. The officers were able to install a secret program in the employees' computers that took pictures of whatever was on each computer's screen every minute.
''We were able to calculate that they were spending 85 percent of their time on outside activities,'' Timoney said.
The computer images also enabled detectives to track down 24 projects the group worked on between March 19 and May 22.
Timoney doubled the size of the investigative team after learning that word of the probe had leaked out.
''Frankly, we thought, we've got to shut this down,'' Assistant State Attorney Joe Centorino said. ``We're expecting more people to come forward when they hear about this.''
One of the arrested employees, Jorge Fabregat, was interviewed by detectives on June 12. He admitted doing the work and gave the detectives a handwritten list of 31 projects he had worked on, according to the arrest affidavit.
Investigators described him as a ''low-level'' member of the conspiracy.
The investigation is continuing, with detectives looking at three other employees.
Mayor Manny Diaz told a lobby packed with reporters and city employees that his administration would continue to try to root out what he called the ``bad apples.''
''I pledge zero tolerance for this sort of abuse,'' he said.
City Commissioner Joe Sanchez said he was pleased the city initiated the investigation, though he said City Hall faces a difficult task in keeping the public's trust. ''There's a perception that we're all crooks,'' Sanchez said. ``It's absolutely wrong.''
Charlie Cox, head of the city's general employees union, said his phone Thursday rang ``off the hook.''
''Everybody's upset about it,'' he said.
Hernandez, the city manager, vowed to bring in extra help to get projects moving. He said he would look for consultants and shift other employees' responsibilities to pick up the slack.
While successfully completing many projects, the department has repeatedly found itself the target of criticism for shoddy work, delays and cost overruns.
Karen Cartwright, of Overtown, said she attended a groundbreaking for improvements to Gibson Park, at 401 NW 13th St., in October 2004. She says she was told the various planned upgrades -- which included swimming-pool renovations and a new roof for the recreation center -- would mostly be complete within a year.
''This is 2007, and it's not finished,'' Cartwright said. ``I've heard so many excuses.''

OTHER ISSUES
The department also has faced allegations of favoritism in awarding contracts.
A controversial no-bid Capital Improvements contract that benefited prominent City Hall lobbyist Steve Marin has grown by at least $21 million during the past two or so years. That and other cost increases have left the department cash-strapped -- placing about $39 million worth of planned projects at risk.
Meanwhile, The Miami Herald reported in 2005 that when Conway was the department's director, she was significantly involved in deciding which contractors from a preapproved list received city work -- a list that included her husband Scott's employer, Louisville, Ky.-based Corradino Group.
Corradino Group at the time had received more work than any of the other 22 firms on the list. But county ethics officials, noting that Scott Conway did not have an ownership interest in the company, said no ethics laws had been violated.

A Chilly Reception at HB City Hall: "Are you a reporter?"

Don't have the time to recount the whole story here now -but will be posting in MUCH more detail soon- on a chilly encounter I had Wednesday afternoon at HB City Hall with a representative from the city's Code Compliance office, Corrine Yoder, the Sr. Code Compliance Specialist.
Ms. Yoder is a woman with whom I'd previously spoken to on the phone last year about habitual illegal dumping on US-1 & S.E. 7th Street, directly across the street from Gulfstream Park Race Track & Casino. At a minimum, I wanted to see some warning signs erected, since it was a weekly routine to go by there and see all manner of junk dumped by lazy area residents and contractors alike.
For more on that, see my April 3rd post: http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2007/04/hallandale-beachs-failure-of-illegal.html.

I'd initially come by City Hall Wednesday to get some answers to nagging questions about the final disposition of the city's complaint against the owners of the Sage Bagel Plaza strip mall on the 900 block of Hallandale Beach Blvd., across from the Bank of America branch.
This is an area of the city that I've probably gone past at least twice a day since returning to the area in late 2003 from the Arlington County suburbs of Washington, D.C., where I lived for 15 years.

The sign was severely damaged after the multiple hurricanes of Fall 2005, and clearly posed a mortal threat to pedestrians and drivers along east-bound HBB for months and months, not to mention, not only the customers using the complex parking lot, but people waiting for the bus at the bus stop just a few feet away.

Long story short: Fines began March 13th, 2006 at a rate of $200 a day when the owners didn't comply by the previous day. Eventually, on May 8th of this year, the fine was reduced by 90%, from $17, 200 to $1,720 by HB City Manager Mike Good.

When I attempted to find out whether or not the property owners had to give a specific reason why they should get a reduction in their fine, or whether it was just assumed that one was wanted, Ms. Yoder got very terse and asked if I was a reporter, as if that would somehow explain whether or not public information should actually be made public and dispersed to the greatest number of people who are interested in the subject, no matter how arcane.

Trust me, I've sat on a lot of incriminating photos of HB mismanagement and incompetency for months, but friends, I think the gloves have officially come off!

East-bound SR858/HBB drawbridge sign at night

Photo taken at 1:00 a.m., Wednesday May 30, 2007

Honestly, how oblivious can the City of Hallandale Beach government and its employees be to their own town, and the way it appears to visitors and tourists?
Well, enough so that you'd think that someone from City Hall in general, and DPW in particular, would've noticed this situation, which has been a problem for months and months and made a phone call...
Or, failing that, that City Commissioner Francine Schiller would've seen it, since she MUST pass it every time she goes home at night from City Hall. Apparently not.
That's a perfect way to illustrate how a word like oversight has two completely opposing meanings, especially in a town as poorly run as Hallandale Beach.
______________________________
http://www.wordreference.com/

Adapted From: WordNet 2.0 Copyright 2003 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
oversight
A noun
1 oversight, lapse
a mistake resulting from inattention
Category Tree:
act; human action; human activity
╚nonaccomplishment; nonachievement
╚mistake; error; fault
╚oversight, lapse
2 supervision, supervising, superintendence, oversight
management by overseeing the performance or operation of a person or group
Category Tree:
act; human action; human activity
╚group action
╚social control
╚management; direction
╚supervision, supervising, superintendence, oversight
╚invigilation

3 oversight, inadvertence
an unintentional omission resulting from failure to notice something
Category Tree:
psychological feature
╚cognition; knowledge; noesis
╚process; cognitive process; mental process; operation; cognitive operation
╚basic cognitive process
╚inattention
╚disregard; neglect
╚omission
╚oversight, inadvertence

Hurricane preparedness in Broward County and Hallandale Beach

Upside down hurricane evacuation sign on A1A at 1800 S. Ocean Drive, south of Hallandale Beach Blvd., in front of The Related Group's Beach Club, taken May 29th, 2007;
photo by South Beach Hoosier

June 1st, 2007, the first day of the 2007 Atlantic hurricane season, and the City of Hallandale Beach is already behind the proverbial eight-ball, as the above photo ominously foreshadows.
Yes, it's already later than you think.

If you're a regular reader of Hallandale Beach Blog -or have simply come to it by accident- you need to know that the main reason that I personally hold the City of Hallandale Beach in such low regard, and, frankly, am so contemptuous of it, is that because in the three years since I returned to South Florida (I grew-up in North Miami Beach) from the D.C. suburbs of Arlington County where I lived for 15 years, is because I've personally witnessed, on a daily basis, their chronic inability to do even the smallest aspect of responsible governance correctly or promptly.

Whether it's keeping supplies in the public rest rooms at the beach, keeping street lights on, cleaning up debris along the city's three most-heavily traveled roads, or, if you can believe this, responding to traffic accidents on US-1 -in front of their own building- in less than 20 minutes, as I witnessed last year, after personally walking into the Police Dept. HQ.

Twice.

(See my April 3rd post on HB's joke of a city dumping policy, compete with photos, where junk was dumped just two blocks from HB's own City Hall, directly across the street from Gulfstream Park Race Track & Casino, and phone calls to the appropriate individual produced no tangible results. Ever.
So there it stayed there -for months.)

Things that are taken for granted in other parts of the country -much less, the absence of a resolutely hostile attitude from city employees- fester here for months and even years in some cases, with nary a care expressed by either the elected/appointed officials or HB city employees.

It's a simple point, one that can hardly be expressed better than this:
If, as a city, you consistently prove that you can't handle the simplest tasks, the sort of problems that require easy, straightforward solutions, how can I possibly trust you to handle difficult problems that require real leadership and difficult choices to be made that have very tangible consequences to your own residents, as well as those of Aventura and Hollywood, who must, necessarily, travel over roads in HB?

What do you expect from people who run a city where the most well-known thing in the entire city, The Gulfstream Park Race Track & Casino, the city's largest employer, is NOT pictured on the city's website photo montage?
Hard to believe, but true!

Let me show you two photos that really speak volumes, photos I had planned on using in other contexts on the blog, but which now require their use here.

You'd be hard-pressed to find a municipality in Florida, no matter how small or parochial, where you could routinely park your car in what is clearly understood to be a FIRE ZONE.
It's just something that's not done.

Yet in the City of Hallandale Beach, city employees have routinely parked in front of City Hall's east and south entrances for hours at a time, as I've witnessed for three years.

I've recently seen city cars parked there for up to three hours at a time, and actually been there to witness HB EMS personnel being forced to wait for city or resident's cars to move their vehicles from the entrances to City Hall, so they could pull their ambulance or truck up to the sidewalk and attend someone inside City Hall, as happened in April, something that I've mentioned in phone conversations with both Chief Daniel Sullivan and Chief Johnson.

Believe me, from talking about it with them, the EMS first responders are LONG past being pissed-off about it, yet HB Fire Chief Daniel Sullivan, who's been a member of the force for 24 years and Chief for 8 years, along with that all-star braintrust of City Manager Mike Good, City attorney David Jove and Mayor Joy Cooper, apparently see no need to have the City of HB come into the 21st Century and conform to the same societal norms, rules and regulations that any responsibly run city or town requires of its commercial property owners and merchants, and homeowners with respect to fire hydrants.

You know, commercial property owners such as the RK Diplomat Center on Hallandale Beach Boulevard, where there are plenty of such Fire Zone signs.
How can the city be so clueless?

How can they be so blind to something so obvious in FRONT of their own City Hall?

Where's the simple sign that reads something along the lines of "FIRE Zone, No Parking/Tow Zone, By Order of HB Fire Chief"?

(Just as a point of information, this past Wednesday, on my way over to the library, I saw yet another scofflaw, an HB city car parked in front of the eastern entrance to city hall, #3340 645, FL license plate 13829, parked there from 3 p.m. 'till at least past 4:45 p.m. That's just par for the course.)

And the City of Hallandale Beach City Hall Crew wonders why it's considered a laughingstock by South Florida residents and local media?

Photo of eastern front of City of Hallandale Beach Municipal Complex, May 29th, 2007; photo by South Beach Hoosier

Photo looking east on State Road 858/Hallandale Beach Boulevard, May 29th, 2007; photo by South Beach Hoosier.

Quick: What does the sign say?

The gateway to the beach is a perfect example of the City of Hallandale Beach's neglect and their city employees' and contractors' chronic inability to see the forrest for the trees. (Or the sign for the bush.)

This bush has been growing steadily larger since last summer, yet, somehow, nobody in city government seems to notice that the drawbridge warning sign with flashing yellow lights is disappearing because of a lack of common sense pruning and maintenance.
Not even members of the HB City Commission who pass it just about everyday, like Francine Schiller?

Yes, exactly like someone who lives on A1A.

Hmmm... I'll bet that's how HB senior citizens get stuck walking across the bridge when it goes up, don't you think?
I realize that it's a state bridge, but am I supposed to believe that nobody who works at City hall has never seen it? Really?

I first met Alex Baird, the City of Hallandale Beach's EMS Division Chief last week at the Hallandale Beach branch of the Broward County library, realizing once I showed up that I'd incorrectly written down the meeting info, having placed it for later in the week. C'est la vie!

Part of Mr. Baird's duties include, apparently, being the face of hurricane preparedness in the city, and towards that end, he helped conducted the meeting in the the much larger HB Cultural Community Center from 6:30-9:30 p.m.

(You might recall that the CCC is the place where last December, I saw State Senator Steve Geller, the Florida House Minority Leader,
http://www.flsenate.gov/cgi-bin/View_Page.pl?Tab=legislators&Submenu=1&File=index.html&Directory=Legislators/senate/031/
wearing his other hat, that of lobbyist, where he was at a public meeting attended by me and a handful of others -plus the Miami Herald's Jennifer Lebovich, who was sitting by herself at the table next to me- to hear what his client, Millennium, was planning to do with their property at 2500 HBB.
No shocker that -expand upward and outward.
See #12 on http://www.hallandalebeach.org/DocumentView.asp?DID=203

2500 HBB is the VERY SAME building where the very popular and well-regarded Padrino's restaurant is located, where a horrific murder took place last year that was solved not by HB Police ingenuity or detection, but rather because the guilty suspect was dumb enough to quickly use his victim's credit cards at a Wal-Mart, and was photographed by the store's security cameras -along with his girlfriend- after being alerted by a store clerk who sensed that something wasn't quite right with the transaction.

I was very tempted to ask about the poor security there, the self-evident and longstanding parking lot lighting problems.

The problem?
Oh, that the first five lights you encounter upon pulling into the parking lot there are either broken or obscured by tree branches, including the two lights closest to the sidewalk on HBB, which have been broken for months and months and now into years.
Yes, years as in plural.

In the end, I bit my tongue. Bit over the next few days, I'll have photos to buttress my point.
safety is NOT a concern of Millennium.)

I must admit that though I only spoke to Mr. Baird for a few minutes, I was impressed, since besides the fact that he has a very serious job, I got a real sense that he was forthright and honest, and thus, not one of the armies of City of HB drones who seem to do as little as possible for their paycheck, especially when responding to citizen complaints.

It's a sign of the times that since it's the City of Hallandale Beach you're dealing with, the following is what greets you when you go to the City of Hallandale Beach's NEW website, the supposed new-and-improved one that was years in the making -to replace the one where, to cite but one embarrassing example from many, the police chief, Thomas Magill -who was so busy snapping photos at last night's meeting- didn't have an email address.

You had to know the name of his secretay in order to send him an email.

When you check the link, you find out that Baird's bio isn't there, which would've proved helpful in getting some sense of his professional background, prior to the actual meeting:

"You are here: Home > Staff Directory

Alex Baird Fire & Rescue Title: EMS Chief Phone: 954-457-1481
Return to Staff Directory
No biography exists for this person."

I'll hope to have more info here on the blog regarding Thursday's meeting over the next few days. In the meantime, add this to your list:
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/weather/hurricane/
______________________________

______________________________

Early May storm surge affects beach conditions; Hollywood intrigue

Photos below from Thursday, May 10th, 2007, after a very strong storm surge hit South Florida's coast and swallowed up large stretches of the beach, leaving both clear signs of beach erosion and large pools of standing water everywhere, including on the inland side of the the HB lifeguard stations.

Looking due east

Looking northeast towards Hollywood Beach

Taking the surge in stride and taking advantage of cooler water

The Related Group's Beach Club employees man a sandbag crew after the storm surge hit Hallandale Beach.

Westin Diplomat Resort & Spa beach after storm surge, which left standing water near cabana area and storm wall.

http://www.diplomatresort.com/

_________________________________________

Below are a couple of recent articles about the latest imbroglios impacting Hollywood and its pols:

See Bob Norman's H-wood Mayor Shuts Out Sentinel, Sort Of on his The Daily Pulp blog, complete with New Times reader response: http://blogs.browardpalmbeach.com/pulp/2007/04/mara_shuts_out_sunsentinel.php ___________________________________

South Florida Sun-Sentinel

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/broward/sfl-srecords08may08,0,750017.story?coll=sfla-news-broward

Feds examining campaign finance reports in Hollywood

By Ihosvani Rodriguez

May 8, 2007

Hollywood

A federal agency that conducts union corruption probes has obtained campaign finance reports for the 2004 Hollywood mayoral and commission races, city officials said Monday.

A Miami-Dade County-based investigator with the U.S. Department of Labor's Office of Inspector General made a telephone request May 1 for copies of the election records, but did not indicate why the agency was interested in them, said Hollywood City Clerk Pat Cerney.

Cerney said investigator Jim Stone was also interested in looking at the latest reports for the 2008 mayor and commission races. Those records are available on the city's Web site.

Reached at his office Monday, Stone declined to comment. Agency spokeswoman Adriana Menchaca-Gendon in Washington, D.C., said it was the department's policy not to confirm or deny the existence of an investigation.

Stone works in the agency's Labor Racketeering and Fraud Investigation subdivision in Miami-Dade. The office investigates the activities of the nation's labor unions, according to the agency's Web site and Menchaca-Gendon.

City Commissioner Cathy Anderson said she heard of the request and noted it came about a week after media reports of the latest campaign financial filings.

"It's very depressing what's going on in Hollywood," she said. "It seems everyone is investigating one thing or another."

Union contributions are legal and common in Hollywood elections. Unions representing a wide variety of workers, including city employees, firefighters and teachers, donated at least $500 to most incumbents in re-election campaigns, according to the 2004 campaign records.

Mayor Mara Giulianti's latest reports for her 2008 re-election campaign stand out because of the amount of money she reported receiving from an international plumbers union with a major business interest in Hollywood. Giulianti reported accepting in February at least $25,250 from plumbers and political action committees related to the United Association of Journeymen and Apprentices of the Plumbing and Pipe Fitting Industry of the United States and Canada. In 2004, Giulianti reported receiving $1,000 from the group.

The union's national pension fund owns the Westin Diplomat Resort and Spa.Giulianti could not be reached despite phone messages left at her office and on her cell phone Monday. Union representatives in Washington, D.C., could not be reached for comment.

Giulianti's opponent, Commissioner Peter Bober, and other city commissioners seeking re-election in 2008 reported receiving no money from the union as of March 31. With the exception of Commissioner Richard Blattner, everyone currently on the dais reported receiving at least a $500 check from the plumbers union's political action committee in 2004.

Coral Gables attorney Susan Norton, whose law firm represents management in labor disputes, said in cases such as this, the Labor Department could be trying to make sure the union follows federal guidelines and properly reports campaign contributions. Norton has no involvement with the plumbers union or Hollywood in this instance.

Ihosvani Rodriguez can be reached at ijrodriguez@sun-sentinel.com or 954-385-7908. ____________________________________

Miami Herald

http://www.miamiherald.com/416/story/99462.html

May 7, 2006
Law firm rules roost at City Hall
BY TODD WRIGHT AND RONNIE GREENE

The won-loss record of the law firm of Becker & Poliakoff reads like a boxing champ's: 36-0, with a string of knockouts, stirring comebacks and contested TKOs.
In Hollywood City Hall, this undefeated, undisputed king of contracts, fundraising and influence is a lone lobbying outfit that bills itself as the ''hometown'' law firm in Broward County's third most populous city.
Combining big-money political contributions, deep roots in Hollywood and a highly personal touch with city commissioners, the firm has cultivated an unshakable voting bloc that nearly always includes Mayor Mara Giulianti.
Meanwhile, its client list has skyrocketed -- from 12 in 1999 to 52 in 2005. The next busiest lobbyist in Hollywood listed nine clients last year.
As Hollywood aims to transform itself from sleepy town to destination city, with new high-rises on the beach and condos breaking ground downtown, some insiders say Becker & Poliakoff's lobbyists have garnered so much influence they're now the gatekeepers of the city's growth.
''Every major decision in the city of Hollywood went through them,'' said Sam Finz, the city manager from 1992 through 2002, who said he quit largely because of the firm's influence. ``I felt it was bad government and the taxpayers suffered sometimes.''
Bernie Friedman and partner Alan Koslow, the law firm's two most public faces at City Hall, are longtime Hollywood homesteaders who say they only push projects that will enhance the city.
Koslow, a former Hollywood city attorney who served with four of the current seven members, still addresses them as a confidant.
''I don't think we take undue advantage at all,'' he said in an interview. ``We know how far to go without taking advantage.''
Friedman, a resident since 1960, is a longtime fixture in Hollywood political circles.
''The reason why we have an insider's view is because we roll up our sleeves every single day,'' he said.

`WE ARE SO VISIBLE'
The firm's lawyers are regulars on community boards and at black-tie galas for charities ranging from the Boys and Girls Club to the Hollywood Art and Culture Center. They raise funds for the city's Artspark and the American Jewish Congress.
''Part of the reason people come to us first is because we are so visible in Hollywood,'' Friedman said.
Consider just how visible:
• The firm and its clients bankrolled, conservatively, more than $1 of every $6 to commissioners' campaigns, or $130,000 of the $770,000 to come in since the 2004 elections through 2006.
The firm affixes postage to many commissioners' campaign mailings and helps some new politicos decide whether to run, mapping strategy at an office conference room or over lunch at the nearby Deli Den.
''I have never had to raise money without their help,'' said one beneficiary, Commissioner Fran Russo, who is paid $28,000 a year as a city commissioner. ``I am the poor commissioner. I needed the money.''
• From 2004 to 2006 Becker & Poliakoff's lawyers appeared before commissioners 36 times requesting yes votes for a range of development deals, zoning changes, grants and contracts.
They won every time -- 36 wins in 36 months.
''I have joked more than once referring to us as the economic development agency for the city of Hollywood,'' said founding shareholder Alan Becker, a Florida legislator from 1972 to '78. ``We bring good projects, and we should win.''
• Downtown, its clients have been green-lighted to build $370 million in projects, more than all other developers combined.
Those clients have won approval for $37 million in property tax incentives. The share of new tax revenues their clients will pocket is more than twice that of other developers.
• While representing clients seeking business with the city, Becker & Poliakoff maintains a $50,000-a-year contract as Hollywood's lobbyist in Tallahassee. Hired in 1992, it has kept the job in a series of 15 no-bid extensions.
''The conflict slaps you right in the face,'' said City Manager Cameron Benson.
Mayor Giulianti, longtime friends with Friedman and Koslow and a beneficiary of major campaign support, declined to discuss her relationship with the firm.

CONSTANT PRESENCE
Becker & Poliakoff is headquartered just outside city limits on Stirling Road, but its satellite office could well be City Hall. Finz, the former city manager, recalled how Koslow and Friedman would often be walking out of a commissioner's office as he entered to brief his bosses.
At the negotiating table, Finz said, ``They were quick to tell you what the outcome is going to be. They would blow me off because they knew damn well the vote would go their way.''
Friedman said he was surprised by Finz's comments.
''I always thought we had a great relationship, and I don't ever remember disagreeing with him,'' he said.
The commission, led by Russo and Giulianti, ousted Finz in 2002, two months before his planned retirement. Friedman said the manager's departure had ``absolutely nothing to do with me or Alan Koslow.''
At City Commission meetings, where votes are cast on everything from small grants to million-dollar developments, the firm is a frequent presence. Friedman once dialed some commissioners on the dais as they prepared to vote on a major beach development deal, drawing the ire of City Manager Benson.
'I offer my sincere apology if, in any way, I have made a `mockery' of a Hollywood City Commission meeting,'' Friedman wrote in 2005 after helping his No. 2-ranked client win the contract. He promised to stay seated, not use his cellphone or ``make any hand or face gestures.''
The firm's ties to the commission date three decades, when veteran Commissioner Cathy Anderson met Freidman's father at the bank where she worked, not long before she took office. Dr. Charles Friedman held an account and would often have young Bernie make deposits.
A dozen years ago, Friedman hosted a birthday party for Anderson at the Becker & Poliakoff office, and the lobbyist's daughter dressed up in costume to celebrate. ''I have always felt that Bernie is an honorable, ethical person. I view him as a loyal friend,'' Anderson said.
She added, ``They're the only people that raise any money in Hollywood.''

DELI POLITICS
Before Russo decided in 1999 to run for office, she sat with Friedman at the Deli Den, a favorite haunt near the firm's office. In a lunch meeting Russo said felt more like a job interview, he asked about her vision for Hollywood.
''He basically said they would support me and drum up money for me,'' Russo said. ``But that doesn't mean I was going to vote for them.''
Yet she has, records show.
The firm made good on its promise to Russo again in 2006, when Commissioner Peter Bober suggested barring developers and corporations from contributing to city campaigns and limiting private donations to no more than $200. Russo wanted to pocket as much as she could before any change took place.
''I told my campaign people to call Bernie,'' Russo said. ``They were ready to go.''
The firm quickly secured multiple $500 donations totaling more than $14,000 from its clients, companies that often appear before commissioners.

RESTRICTION FAILS
Ultimately, Bober's reform failed 4-3. Russo, Anderson, Giulianti and then-Commissioner Keith Wasserstrom beat it back.
The four, the biggest recipients of campaign support from the firm and its clients, have been consistent yes votes for Becker & Poliakoff issues.
''What's the big deal?'' Friedman asked, noting that some clients are represented by other politically active firms who also fund-raise. ``To make a generalization that raising money has something to do with votes is insulting.''
Not everyone agrees.
'It's like, `If you do for me, then I'll do for you,' '' said Commissioner Sal Oliveri, who is occasionally among the minority voting no. ``In my opinion, they for the most part have a pretty strong voting bloc on the commission.''
To Becker & Poliakoff and many Hollywood officials, the firm's role as the city's Tallahassee lobbyist has been a clear success. To others, it's a clear conflict.
Friedman, the city's advocate in the capital, recently alerted city leaders that most of their priorities received funding this year, from $200,000 for Rotary Park to $1.4 million for beach renourishment.
In last year's legislative session, Becker & Poliakoff represented gambling establishments -- while working for Hollywood, which opposed increased gaming.
''That to me was an eye-opening experience that I felt very uncomfortable with,'' said City Manager Benson.
Said Friedman: ``We represent Pompano Race Track. Pompano has zero to do with the city of Hollywood.''
Broward County bars its capital lobbyists from lobbying county commissioners during the legislative session. Hollywood doesn't.
Oliveri once tried to force his colleagues' hands: Have the firm be a lobbyist before Hollywood or for it. His motion never gained support. ''Some of my colleagues might be afraid to challenge Bernie because he is a big mover and shaker in all the campaigns,'' he said.

HIGH-RISE SYMBOLS
Along the beach stand striking symbols of the firm's imprint: The 39-story, $800 million Westin Diplomat Resort & Spa that towers over the city's south beach, the even taller Trump Hollywood luxury condos rising nearby, and a planned 17-story $110 million hotel-garage to anchor Johnson Street.
''One of the reasons for our success is we were in the right place at the right time,'' said Koslow, noting how the Westin Diplomat triggered a development domino effect.
Said Anderson: ``We had no development for decades here until developers discovered us, and they had a lot to do with that.''

MILLIONS APPROVED
Its downtown clients have been approved to build five projects with budgets totaling $370 million -- though Friedman noted that only one crane is at work and other developments are years away.
Hollywood's Community Redevelopment Agency, which has control of the millions in new property tax dollars anticipated from developments in the downtown and beach districts, has been unusually generous to clients of Becker & Poliakoff.
With city commission approval, the downtown CRA has agreed to return to the firm's clients 42 percent of new property tax money to be generated in the projects, or $37 million of $89 million. Each client has its own negotiated settlement; they range from 21 to 81 percent over many years, records show.
Developers the firm doesn't represent have been approved for $308 million of downtown projects -- and just 18 percent of new tax money.
Koslow said incentives are a must for complex redevelopments in the city's aged business core. ''That's a project that isn't getting built otherwise,'' he said.
When Koslow rises to address commissioners, he speaks with a familiarity opponents lack. Koslow often sits in the seats generally reserved for city staff, while other lobbyists and vendors find spots across the aisle.
''If you want to kill all the deals that are proposed, if you want to kill them, just put it in there,'' Koslow said last June, as commissioners debated public disclosure requirements that could affect his beach condo-hotel clients.
Taken aback, Commissioner Bober suggested that Koslow had ''made a threat,'' before taking the words back.
''It was not a threat,'' Koslow replied. ``I have never made any threat up here. I just make a persuasive point.''
Later, Anderson suggested limiting the numbers of units that condo hotels could have -- a move that in combination with other zoning strictures would all but stop new beach condo-hotels.
After three hours of debate, the restrictions looked destined to pass. Abruptly, Mayor Giulianti called a recess.
''I'm taking a break. I think that you need to explain or somebody needs to explain to people,'' the mayor said.

ANOTHER KO
The mayor did not make clear to whom she was speaking. But during the 18-minute recess, Koslow sidled up to Anderson. When the meeting reconvened, Anderson's potential reform had died, another KO for Hollywood's hometown firm.
''I would hire them, too,'' Commissioner Russo said. ``They get the job done.''

Trouble continue apace at Hollywood's Young Circle, to the tune of $16.5 Million

Continuing the pattern of years of mismanagement and lack of direction -and these are just the problems the city knows know about now!
It will be a very bad day when Hollywood city manager Cameron Benson & Company see what I've got on the blog soon about a self-evident life and death matter the city continues to ignore right next to the Arts Park at Young Circle.
This, despite my having gone to City Hall in person some nine weeks ago to spell it out in detail to a city employee, even to the point of making a diagram so there was no confusion.
______________________________________
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
FORECLOSURE MAY SOCK HOLLYWOOD IN ITS WALLET PROJECT'S COLLAPSE COULD COST PUBLIC $1.6 MILLION
April 21, 2007
John Holland, Staff writer

Two cornerstone buildings in a project aimed at turning Young Circle into a center of art and culture have gone into foreclosure, leaving taxpayers on the hook for at least $1.6 million in mortgages.
The Young Circle Garage, bought with an $800,000 loan from the city three years ago, goes on the auction block May 17, and the Hollywood Bread Building is being foreclosed while owing at least $800,000 to the city, according to court records. The city never obtained first mortgages, meaning Hollywood is last to be paid if any money remains when the properties are sold.
City officials are negotiating with another developer to take over the project before the auction, but the property owned by HART District Ltd., which covers the entire southeast corner of Young Circle, has been on the block for almost a year without any takers, according to city records.
Community Redevelopment Agency Director Neil Fritz said Friday the city may have to come up with more financial incentives to lure a developer willing to repay the loans and still build a project in line with the city's vision of downtown.
The default by HART ends what city commissioners have called the most mismanaged and ill-conceived project ever approved by the CRA Board, which is comprised of the mayor and City Commission.
Three years ago, in their desire to transform a decrepit slice of downtown into an arts district, commissioners gave HART and its president, Gary Posner, a $7 million package of loans and grants to build a charter school, playhouse and center for the performing arts. Posner bought the entire block between Van Buren and Young Circle, going heavily into debt as South Florida real estate prices soared, county records show.
Although Posner had never undertaken such a large project, the city never conducted any studies to see if he had the financial and technical ability to make it work, commissioners admitted later.
Only the charter school was completed; HART missed every other construction deadline, according to city records. HART repeatedly defaulted on loans and still owes a total of $3.5 million to the city, all of it secured with second or third mortgages on other HART District properties.
Posner would not comment when reached by telephone on Friday, but in the past he blamed rising real estate costs and a lawsuit involving the garage for his troubles.
If Fritz finds a developer before next month's deadline, Hollywood will recoup its loans and the foreclosure problems become moot. If not, the city has to hope some money is left over after all other creditors are paid from the sale price.
"We're perfectly aware of every single deadline and every single foreclosure, and I'm cautiously optimistic that someone will take over Block 58," Fritz said, adding he no longer calls the corner "the HART project". "It's up to the strength of the market to say how much the properties will go for if they are sold (at auction)."
"The worst case scenario is you lose all your money," Fritz said. "But we've taken steps to strengthen our collateral position in the last year, and, depending on the interest in the market, I believe we'll be protected."
The project has been troubled from its inception, beginning when the city helped HART buy the Young Circle Garage from a man who didn't even own the property. After years of lawsuits, HART was awarded the garage and the city took over a third mortgage.
In March, The Hollywood Bread Building, Inc., which sold the building to HART and retained a first mortgage, filed to foreclose, naming Hollywood as owner of a secondary mortgage.
According to court records, Hollywood gave HART an $850,000 loan to buy the Bread Building on Feb. 1, 2004. Posner never made any payments on either loan, according to the foreclosure lawsuit.
In January, after a South Florida Sun-Sentinel investigation outlined years of problems and misspending on the HART District project, City Commissioner Cathy Anderson called for an outside audit, but none of her colleagues backed the plan. Friday, Anderson said she opposes giving money to induce a new buyer."

I will not spend another penny on the HART project," Anderson said. "We've spent plenty already."

John Holland can be reached at jholland@sun-sentinel.com or at 954-356-4516.
Copyright 2007 Sun-Sentinel Company

Hallandale Beach's FAILURE of an illegal dumping program

First, you should know that I've been chomping at the bit to write about this particular problem for weeks.

In many ways, it's the story of the City of Hallandale Beach, writ large, a story of longstanding general incompetency and non-existent supervision, shortsighted management coupled with apathy.

In short, a general sense that you shouldn't mention the fact that the city's elected officials and workers have grown SO accustomed to not being held to account, that to actually expect results was not only too much to ask, but in a sense, only asking for MORE trouble.

That this sort of customer-unfriendly attitude would not be tolerated in most other communities around the country goes without saying.

It's the reason that I finally decided to, chose your metaphor, "bite the bullet" and create a blog that would cover the sorts of quality-of-life issues that I noticed daily in my travels throughout Hallandale Beach, Aventura and Hollywood.

There will be dozens of posts along these lines in the coming weeks and months, examining everything from the city's incompetent & non-existent coordination of FDOT contracted construction along US-1 and HBB, the preposterous non-existant street lighting conditions all around the city -but particularly on the three main streets in town, US-1, Hallandale Beach Blvd. and A1A.

I will especially delve deep into the longstanding myriad safety/aesthetic problems at the the beach, which are the responsibility of the city's Dept. of DPW.

This includes, among other things, the city's only having one working bathroom sink in the Men's restroom at North Beach -out of four- from Thanksgiving 'till last week, a total of four months, and the city's contracted out lifeguards from Jeff Ellis & Associates NOT having access to a jet ski to make rescues of beach goers, even while rip tide conditions have been worse than any in memory, et al.

This particular posting though concerns the epidemic and longstanding problem of illegal dumping in Hallandale Beach, and goaded into finally doing something about it, the City of Hallandale Beach announced that, YES, it had a solution.
So Jennifer Lebovich, the Herald's then-HB correspondent, wrote about the policy:

Miami Herald
December 31, 2006
HALLANDALE BEACH
City takes aim at illegal dumpers
The city is offering rewards to people who report illegal trash dumping as part of an effort to clean up the streets in Hallandale Beach.
BY JENNIFER LEBOVICH

Hallandale Beach is cracking down on people who illegally dump trash in vacant lots and on neighborhood roads in the city.
The Police Department has distributed door hangers and passed out brochures explaining how residents can report illegal dumping.
Broward Crime Stoppers also offers up to a $1,000 reward for tips that lead to the arrest of people dumping illegally, city officials said.
The efforts to keep trash piles and other hazardous materials off city streets ties in with the city's Weed and Seed program, a federally funded initiative aimed at revitalizing neighborhoods.
''The illegal dumping is definitely something we are constantly addressing,'' said Becky Wright, the city's Weed and Seed program coordinator.
Residents who spot illegal dumping should write down the location, what is being dumped, the color and make of the vehicle and a description of the people, if possible, and call the non-emergency police line at 954-765-4321.
The Department of Justice awarded $175,000 to the city in October for the Weed and Seed program. Hallandale Beach will receive the grant money for five years and may get additional funding next year, Wright said.
Weed and Seed money is aimed primarily at improving an area called the Palms of Hallandale Beach, ringed by Pembroke Road and Hallandale Beach Boulevard to the north and south, and Dixie Highway and Interstate 95 to the east and west.
The area was identified for the program because of its higher crime rate, Wright said, adding that half of the funds focus on crime prevention and the other half goes to the Police Department to help reduce crime.
Weed and Seed program members are trying to start another initiative called Guiding Good Choices, a five-week parenting program ''designed to help parents guide their kids away from using substances,'' Wright said.
The group also is starting a job training program for people in the community and plans to set up a program to work with people who have been in jail to help them find a job and a place to live.
____________________________________
Then there was the natural follow-up three weeks later in the Neighbors section of the Herald:

Miami Herald
Neighbors Section, Southeast, p. 12
Police implement anti-dumping plan
January 21, 2007
EILEEN SOLER Special to The Miami Herald

Call it a New Year's resolution. Hallandale Beach police are on a mission to put the brakes on illegal dumping -- the sooner the better. "But first we educate," said Capt. Ken Cowley, who is heading the effort.
Hundreds of no-dumping door hangers have been placed at residences throughout the city in recent weeks. Six no dumping signs have new homes and 25 more will be placed in coming weeks. Hundreds of pamphlets have been distributed, and No Trespassing signs -- to deter dumpers -- went up at the train tracks along Dixie Highway.
But Cowley said citizen support is the real key to spreading the word that police are keeping a sharper eye on dumping and dumpers will be prosecuted.
Crime Stoppers of Broward County is helping residents assist the drive by offering a $1,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of illegal dumpers.
"The residents are the ones who see the dumping. We need them to report it," Cowley said.
According to Florida law, dumping less than 15 pounds of noncommercial litter is not a criminal offense, but it carries a $500 fine. Dumping more than 15 pounds of trash but less than 500 pounds is a first-degree misdemeanor that could cost the guilty party up to $1,000, a year in prison, community service and three three points on his or her driver's license.
Dumping more than 500 pounds of commercial trash or hazardous waste is a third-degree felony punishable by up to a $5,000 fine, five years in jail, community service, reparation to the property and the victim, or forfeiture of the vehicle.
"How would you like it if you tried to make your neighborhood nice but people kept dumping trash in your front yard?
The residents are the victims," Cowley said.
Two people have been arrested since the campaign kicked off six weeks ago.
James McCray, a resident since 1999, supports the project. He is one of several workers from Gulfstream Apartments in the city's southwest section who regularly pick up discarded goods from city sidewalks.
"It's a great idea to clean up a big problem. Just last week, I had to clean up three truckloads right off the street," McCray said two weeks ago.
A recent Friday tour of the city's southwest section with local police revealed streets lined with tidy homes and nicely kept lawns but dotted here there and there with piles of furniture, bedding, appliances, broken toys, palm fronds and black plastic bags loaded with garbage.
Several unlabeled jugs of liquid spilled from one hill of trash into the street where children played.
Three unattended pickup trucks loaded with debris were spotted, and another truck, moving through streets loaded with furniture, was stopped by police to teach the driver about dumping laws.
"We have to get the word out. It's all about education," Cowley said.
Workshops will be scheduled shortly for landlords and tenants about rules for discarding trash and other common issues that affect the quality of life at apartment complexes and other multi-unit residences.
The city's Department of Public Health is ready to issue vouchers for residents to take bulk accumulation outside of the city's regular bulk pickup schedule to the Eco Waste dump station at Pembroke Park.
Residents also are asked to call the department when they spot a new dump.
McCray is all for doing his part. "It's late at night when most people come through dumping. They come from wherever they are and dump trash in our neighborhood. It's not right."
For information, call Hallandale Beach Police Community Officer Martin Jackson at 954-457-1400.

Copyright (c) 2007 The Miami Herald
_____________________________
A few days later, on January 27th, the Herald even deigned to dignify this new program by mentioning it in on their editorial page:

HALLANDALE BEACH
CRACKDOWN ON DUMPERS TIMELY
People who get caught and fined for illegal dumping in this city can't say that they haven't been warned. The city is on a mission to keep its streets clean. So Hallandale Beach police have distributed hundreds of no-dumping door hangers and pamphlets with notices of a crackdown. New no-dumping and no-trespassing signs grace more city streets than previously, and more are coming.
Crime Stoppers of Broward County has pitched in by offering a $1,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of illegal dumpers. The campaign is timely now that visitors are increasing to play at the two newly opened slot machine venues or catch a day at the races.
__________________________________________
The problem? It's an abject failure, from beginning to end.
Nothing ever gets done, even when you call.

The day that particular editorial ran in the Herald, there was a pre-existing, three-day old problem that hadn't been properly dealt with by the City of Hallandale Beach and their news crackdown on illegal dumping.
It's the very reason that with the exception of Keith London last month, I've NEVER voted for an incumbent member of the Hallandale Beach City Council -and neither should you.
And never voted for mayor Joy Cooper!
It's also why I particularly loathe William Julian, the member whose insipid comments and questionable lack-of-action make one wonder if he's living in the same town he's supposed to be representing, since he actually takes credit for the way that things are here, something that an objective but critical observer with any sense of quality-of-life issues would find ludicrous.
Julian's comments on development and traffic congestion are all over the place, depending upon who he's speaking with or whether he's "on the record" with the media.
He has a very John Kerry-like quality.

(For the record, I loathe John Kerry, and have ever since I first saw him in action in 1988 at a U.S. Senate hearing dealing with US-Latin American drug interdiction.
I saw how poorly he had a grasp of the basic facts that the other members of the committee, much less the witnesses and the staffers, took for granted. It was apalling as Kerry he talked for the sake of talking -and the cameras.
He was THE most poorly informed person in a crowded room in the largest hearing room in the entire U.S. Senate office complex.
Months later, after seeing him drive past me by himself in his convertible to the RFK 20th Anniversary Memorial out at Arlington National Cemetery, which I'll have a future posting on- which is weird when you think of how many Massachusetts people were going to this event, including his staff, I even dated two different smart and attractive female LAs from his personal staff.
They, like me, veteran Democratic activists and national Democratic campaign workers, voted AGAINST him for President in 2004, almost entirely because we'd seen first hand what a poorly qualified candidate he was, for reasons that most people had never witnessed upclose and personal.)

To better understand the nature of this abject failure of a problem, let me tell you the story of one Hallandale Beach corner on US-1 in particular, which has a long history of being the dumping ground of local residents and area contractors who are too damn lazy to dispose of their garbage appropriately -or legally.

It's a corner that I have called the HB Code Compliance office about 6-8 times over the past few years, usually reaching Corrine Yoder, even requesting that, at a minimum, a "No Dumping" sign be placed there, with the requisite info about fine amounts and a contact number to report violations.

The sort of sign that you take for granted when you travel throughout this country.
A sign was never put up.

The NW corner of US-1/Federal Highway and S.E. 7th Street is directly opposite the Gulfstream Park Race Track & Casino, the city's largest tourist draw, is next to the U.S. Post Office and one long block south of the City of Hallandale Beach Municipal Complex.
It is also directly next to the North Miami Beach Water Interconnector unit that Hallandale Beach can draw water from in case of an emergency.

On February 1st, 2007, I was walking along the sidewalk and discovered the newest contribution to that neighborhood: cat & dog feces mixed-in with bathroom tiles.

Early February 2007 photo by South Beach Hoosier
Gulfstream Park Race Track & Casino in background

Early February 2007 photo by South Beach Hoosier
It's exactly what an illegal dump of cat and dog feces mixed-in with bathroom tiles would look like if you wanted to dump it!

Later that day, a Sunday, I read Soler's article and resolved that if the mess was still there after Monday, I'd call the number mentioned in the story rather than HB's Code Compliance office as I had many times in the past.
Tuesday afternoon, the mess was still there, so I called the Officer Jackson mentioned in the article, and, unable to speak to him, left a very specific description of the situation on the city voicemail, mentioning that the corner was a regular magnet for illegal dumping by residents and contractors, and reminding him that the city had never placed the appropriate sign there.
Weeks and weeks later absolutely nothing has happened.

There will be dozens of posts along these lines in the coming weeks and months.

I have notebooks full of notes and ancdotes which help paint the picture of a city that is run neither well or properly, but rather by the seat of its pants.

Haitian refugee drama makes HB's moment in national news bitter and futile

I woke up last Tuesday morning at my sister's place in Pembroke Pines, where I was staying for a few days, expecting to finally catch Channel 10's Megan Glaros guest-hosting the weather duties that week on ABC News' Good Morning America, having missed her on Monday.
http://www.local10.com/station/3619791/detail.html

Apparently she'd done that before, but I'd read a nugget in the Herald saying that she'd be doing it and I wanted to see how she interacted with the rest of the ABC crew.


(Megan is from Dyer, Indiana, a.k.a 'The Region," the nickname all IU students use to refer to that part of NW Indiana that's part of the Chicago market, and therefore the part of the state that actually changes its clocks twice a year.


As I understand it, after initially attending T.C.U. in Fort Worth -much like my IU friend Colleen Cole from Elmhurst, IL, who'd earlier been a Horned Frog-turned-Hooosier- Megan , eventually made the right decision to go to IU, where she could dance like crazy!


Have never been able to find out if she was a Red Stepper like my friends Gail Amster and Terri Kearns, who were ridiculously talented dancers.)

Ironically, Megan interned with Tom Skilling at WGN-TV in Chicago and at WRTV in Indy, while I was supposed to intern at Channel 10 down here in the summer of 1981.


That is, until Prof. Don Agostino, a Telecom prof I'd always enjoyed and possibly the then-Dept. Chair, pulled the plug on me.

He told the station's personnel director that though it was a big coup for me to snag a position at the best TV news station in the state -and a Post-Newsweek station at that, which opened up great possibilities for doing something in Washington the following summer- the fact that I was going to be a junior rather than already one, meant that IU wouldn't allow me to accept the internship position,.
Despite her trying to reason with him, since she'd enjoyed success with other IU students in the past at other stations she worked at, and she and I seemed very simpatico, Prof. Agostino said no. I was devastated.

Megan's photo from the Local10.com website. Trust me, it's not PhotoShop, it's just that Megan's an especially good-looking Hoosier!

And then reality interrupted in the form of a small boat with enormous hopes and aspirations, and this area became caught up in a drama that's never really been resolved to anyone's complete satisfaction, certainly not South Florida's frustrated Haitian exile community, which began to grow to large numbers while I was growing up down here in the 1970's in North Miami Beach.

(My fifth-grade home room teacher at Fulford Elementary in North Miami Beach was Anthony Simon, a wonderfully enthusiastic and encouraging first-generation Haitian-American, who was always one of the most popular teachers in school, despite the fact that he taught science, not always every eleven-year old's favorite subject.)

It did prove yet another opportunity for local Miami TV stations to show their chops while ad libbing, always a dicey proposition in the best of times.

Given my longstanding preference for Local10 anyway, because of Michael Putney and Glenna Milberg's consistently top-notch professional performances, and the so-so performance of their news competitors at other stations in not only covering the story, but putting this in perspective in a way that was different from the connect-the-dots interviews with "the usual suspects," I think Channel 10 once again did by far the most complete job for the entire day.

At 6:30 p.m., ABC Evening News with Charlie Gibson even picked up on Michael's slightly incredulous query about where exactly was DHS in all this, in this case, the U.S. Coast Guard's seemingly obliviousness to the approaching craft.
________________________
Miami Herald
March 29th, 2007
Desperate trip was a journey to futility
By Fred Grimm

The numbers don't calculate: 102 people stuffed into a wooden sloop the size of a Biscayne Bay day cruiser, sailing for 22 days and 800 miles through the Windward Passage.
So many. So far. It makes no sense. Until a key element is added to the formula.
Desperation was what sent these boat people on a round-trip journey to futility. Desperation explains why they made a mad run aboard a Haitian sloop built in another century to haul freight from one island port to another. It was never meant to carry human cargo. Never meant to sail far from Haiti. Its single mast was a rough-hewn tree trunk, slightly crooked, rigged with hemp ropes and tattered sails and desperate hopes.
The boat listed in the sand Wednesday on Hallandale Beach, testament to a reckless rage to reach Florida. And if anyone needed proof of the risk involved in such an adventure, the body of a passenger had washed ashore 300 yards south of the boat.
The drowned man was covered in a maroon blanket and strapped to a rescue board. Six Hallandale Beach firemen, like pallbearers in a wretched funeral, carried the body away. The dead man may be the only passenger allowed to stay.

MARCHED INTO BUSES
The surviving 101 were herded into the beach fire station, under the city's famed beach-ball water tower. Later, most of them were led out of the fire station in the most forlorn perp walk ever, before a gauntlet of cops and immigration officers and law-enforcement firepower out of proportion to the weary, dejected refugees filing meekly into the waiting buses.
They wrapped themselves in sheets. Some, inexplicably, had been provided blankets with the colors and sports logos of Florida State or North Carolina State universities. And they were off on the second leg of their unhappy journey. After a brief stay in a federal lockup, they will almost certainly be sent back to Haiti. Moments after they arrived, their official designation became deportees. All that misery? All for nothing.
The buses pulled away, leaving their sloop beached in the sand, still smelling of overloaded humanity. Anyone staring down from the condo towers or strolling along the shore was forced to contemplate the 800-mile distance between the brain and the heart when it comes to U.S. immigration policy.
It's one thing to accept that the U.S. can't simply throw open its doors to unfettered immigration (though some might argue that's an apt description of current policy).
But the notion of deporting the desperate refugees who survived a three-week journey on that rotting boat just hurts the soul.

BAFFLING POLICY
Any such landing on Florida's shores brings attention to the stark unfairness of the wet-foot, dry-foot preference lent to Cuban refugees. Though in today's anti-immigration climate, Washington's notion of fairness might mean deportation for Cubans, rather than leniency for Haitians.
Wednesday's landing came 25 years after another Haitian sailboat, the La Nativite, floundered in the waters off Broward County and 31 bodies washed ashore on Hillsboro Beach. Two were pregnant women so far along in their third trimester that the Broward medical examiner changed the official death toll to 33. It was the catastrophe that brought on the policy of interdicting would-be Haitian refugees at sea.
Interdiction staunched an exodus that had been bringing 1,500 refugees a month to Florida, many of them on primitive sailboats through dangerous waters.
In 1980, at the height of the exodus, lyrics to a popular song in Haiti proclaimed "the teeth of the shark are sweeter than Duvalier's hell.
"Duvalier's long gone, but the old sloop on Hallandale Beach tells how little life has changed on the island. The teeth of the shark, and the likelihood of deportation, even if you survive an 800-mile voyage, still seem sweeter than Haiti's hell.
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Miami Herald
March 29, 2007
HALLANDALE BEACH: A desperate landing, a plea for compassion - More than 100 Haitians came ashore in Hallandale Beach, prompting activists to protest the treatment of Haitian migrants
By Trenton Daniel and Kathleen McGrory

On Day 10, they ran out of food.
The 102 Haitians -- many bruised and scraped from the crowded conditions aboard their flimsy 40-foot sailboat -- endured their perilous journey for 12 more days with toothpaste and saltwater, all anyone had.
The famished migrants, 12 children among them, spotted the pre-dawn glint of Hallandale Beach's high-rise condos on Wednesday. As the boat lurched closer to land, some jumped off, sloshing through waves and staggering ashore.
'They were afraid, trembling and crying, 'Are they going to send me back?' " said Marie Erlande Steril, a North Miami councilwoman who said she helped interview migrants at a nearby fire station after they made it to shore. "They were complaining about how much they risked their lives."
Indeed, one man didn't make it, washing up dead on the sand. Paramedics pried a second loose from a shipboard rope and carried him to the beach on a stretcher.
The migrants told authorities they had spent 22 days aboard the vessel. Their landing spurred local Haitian leaders to protest what they say is unfair treatment of Haitian migrants, who typically are returned to their impoverished homeland.
The boat, with a tiny dinghy attached, left the northern coast of Haiti more than three weeks ago -- possibly from Port-de-Paix but most likely the island of La Tortue, officials said.
It landed around 7:30 a.m. Wednesday near Hallandale Beach Boulevard, behind a row of high-rise condos and hotels including the Westin Diplomat Resort & Spa, which dominates the shoreline in nearby Hollywood.
A crowd of hotel guests and condo dwellers quickly gathered. Wielding binoculars, some stared down from balconies.
News choppers hovered overhead, broadcasting the scene into living rooms in a live reminder of 2002, when 220 Haitians splashed onto Miami's Rickenbacker Causeway.

DEPORTATION LOOMS
Unlike some other immigrants, Haitians are not eligible for Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, which temporarily suspends deportations and enables recipients to get work permits.
Haitian community activists from Pembroke Pines to Miami on Wednesday renewed their demand that the Bush administration grant undocumented Haitian migrants temporary immigration status so they can avoid deportation.
In Little Haiti, about a dozen Haitian leaders gathered Wednesday afternoon to decry the wet-foot/dry-foot policy, which requires most migrants picked up at sea to be repatriated, But the policy allows Cubans who make it to land apply for residency. Others often are sent back.
"It's unsafe and unfair to send any Haitians back to their country," said Marleine Bastien, executive director of Haitian Women of Miami. "There is no rule of law to speak of.
"No decision has been made on where Wednesday's migrants will be detained, said Barbara Gonzalez, a Miami spokeswoman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. She noted they could be housed anywhere in the country.
U.S. Rep. Kendrick B. Meek wrote letters to Julie Myers, the head of ICE, and to Michael Rozos, the agency's field office director in Florida, asking that the migrants not be sent to detention centers outside South Florida.

DRAMATIC LANDING
Early Wednesday's scene was one of desperation and drama.
The boat was run-down, with its sail tattered and its blue and white paint chipped.
"The vessel was obviously unseaworthy and grossly overloaded," said Coast Guard Petty Officer Jennifer Johnson. "Nobody should have embarked on a voyage of that length on a vessel like that."
Before the sailboat reached land, a few passengers jumped into the water and swam several hundred yards to shore. A local lifeguard waded in to help.
Those who remained onboard crowded the deck and watched -- until the sailboat ran aground about half an hour later. That unleashed a mad scramble through waist-deep water.
At that point, police, fire rescue and Coast Guard personnel arrived. Ambulances rushed in.
"It was intense," said Hugo Paez, who ran down to the beach with his camera. "You could tell they really wanted to come to this country."
All told, Hallandale Beach Fire Rescue ushered 101 migrants to a firehouse at Hallandale Beach Boulevard and State Road A1A; the man who died was covered with a maroon blanket and taken away on a stretcher. The survivors were given food and water, said Andrew Casper, a police spokesman.
Dozens of migrants, many draped in white blankets, a few in camouflage, crowded into the firetruck bay.

IN POOR CONDITION

"Some of them looked very, very bad," said Kenol Obnis, a Diplomat hotel waiter who rushed to the firehouse after he saw the boat from a fourth-floor window. Bruises marked the backs of some, he said.
Steril, the North Miami councilwoman and a native of Haiti, also pitched in at the firehouse after seeing the dramatic landing at home on TV.
Steril's cellphone enabled migrant Jean Monestime to call his half-brother Ricardo Francois, a Hollywood delivery driver. The brothers had not seen each other since Francois made a 2001 trip to Port-de-Paix.
"He told me he's here, he didn't die," Francois, 43, said outside the firehouse, waiting to catch a glimpse of his sibling. "I don't know what they're going to do to him."
Seven men and four women were taken to the hospital, with three listed in serious condition. Others were dehydrated and weak from hunger, police said.
Police and paramedics later escorted the remaining migrants onto large passenger buses, some bearing U.S. Department of Homeland Security insignias. The migrants were taken to the Border Patrol facility in Pembroke Pines.
Not all boarded the bus.
Police officers were seen isolating one man, taking him to an underground parking garage.
"Sa ou gen?!" Obnis yelled in Creole, meaning, "What's the matter?!"
The man didn't respond and vanished into the garage.
Onlookers suspected the man may have been singled out as the ship's captain, but a Border Patrol spokesman said authorities had not found that person.
"I do not believe the captain has been positively identified," said Victor Colón, a spokesman for U.S. Customs and Border Protection.