With little more than a week to go before the Coral Gables election, voters are getting a mailbboxful of promises and endorsements and attacks. The mailers in Coral Gables are almost always something to talk about — and this year is no exception.

From the endorsement of a former governor to the image of a university that had to be pulled to the giant, trifold of Herald stories from the city’s ugly past that landed in mailboxes Saturday — the Gables has been deluged in postal politics for a couple of weeks now.

The most prolific mailing candidate in this election has to be Mike Mena, who is running for commission in Group 3. Nobody in that race has come close and, in fact, Ladra is not certain that Serafin Sousa, the non candidate, has sent any mailers at all. Marlin Ebbert and Randy Hoff will have each sent two or three by election day. Hers focus on her standing with the anti-development residents and says that she will listen to and speak for them. His focus on his service of almost 30 years as a police officer and include two separate endorsements from former Chief James Butler and former Assistant Chief Ana Baixauli, which should have been one piece with both of them combined. Hoff could have sent another message on the second piece.

Meanwhile, Mena has sent so many mailers that voters are coming to expect a new one when they get home from work. They were getting one every day the week that absentee ballots dropped. But are they memorable? Nah. They’re pretty much cookie cutter. Take his picture out and plug in another young, ambitious lawyer from Miami or Miami Lakes or Miami Beach or wherever and you have the same thing. He uses phrases like “common sense” and “commitment to security.” Yawn.

Read related story: Hoff, Mena stand out in 4-way Gables commission race

That was the same reaction Ladra had with former Commissioner Wayne “Chip” Withers‘ endorsement from former FIU President Modesto “Mitch” Maidique, who coincidentally had picked up an election package and who, Ladra suspects, has an itch to run for office (this endorsement could be a tit for tat). I’m sure it was intended to connect with the hundreds or thousands of FIU students and alumni in the City Beautiful, but it was eh for the rest of us who didn’t go there and there are just as many of non FIU students in the city. Withers, a proud graduate of the University of Florida, would have been better served to use the University of Miami logo.

Then FIU and former Commissioner Ralph Cabrera complained and Withers had to take the image of the smiling Maidique in front of an FIU buillding — letters blazing in neon at the top — off his social media.

“The Withers campaign and you should be aware that neither the campaign nor you are authorized to use the FIU logo or imagery without the express approval and licensing of FIU,” wrote FIU General Counsel Carlos Castillo in a cease and desist letter last week.

Cabrera, who actually did go to FIU (Withers didn’t) and actually led the alumni association at one point, filed a complaint with the Miami-Dade Commission on Ethics and Public Trust. After all, Withers is a Gator! A bull Gator at that, who actually had a skybox in Gainseville at one time and has flown up to see the games.

Read related story: ‘Chip’ Withers vs. Pat Keon because of the Paseo project

“He should have known better. To mislead and say you have done it before without repercussions is completely wrong,” ,” Cabrera told me after Withers was quoted in the Miami Herald saying he had done it before. “I can’t recall him using a university logo before,” added Cabrera, who worked on three of Withers’ past campaigns.

The complaint says Withers intentionally misled voters into thinking that he got the FIU endorsement vis-a-vis Maidique because it implied that he was still the voice of the university.

“The mail piece sent by Withers specifically attempts to confuse voters into believing that Modesto ‘Mitch’ Maidique is still part of FIU and endorses Withers in his oficial capacity. While the piece states that Maidique is the ‘former’ President of FIU, it lists him as a current professor and thus provides the endorsement as part of Maidique’s oficial capacity, an illegal act,” wrote attorney JC Planas in the complaint, because a state university cannot endorse anybody.

“Perhaps the most blatant violation in the piece is the use of the FIU logo in the picture. Had the campaign simply used a picture of Dr. Maidique actually taken in front of that building, it still would likely have been a technical violation. However, super imposing his picture on a larger than ordinary picture of the building with the logo, was a deliberate attempt by Withers to deceive voters into thinking the endorsement was something other than that of an ordinary public citizen with no current leadership role at the University.”

Yeah, maybe. But what Ralph and JC really did was make a blah mailer and make it newsworthy and infinitely more interesting. Now, Ladra wants one for her collection.

Not as much, however, as I want that mailer with commissioner Jeannett Slesnick in a hot rod. In it, she is nicknamed “Speedy Slesnick” for her lack of support for a 5 MPH reduction that does nothing if there are no police officers to enforce it. “Stupid,” is what most voters reacted when they got it. The piece is so bad, it’s good. I want to frame it and hang it on a wall.

Read related story: Coral Gables mayoral race takes nasty, ethnic turn

Ladra also wants the mailer sent by Raul Valdes-Fauli‘s political action committee over the weekend (more on that later), which could be the largest political mailer any voter anywhere has ever gotten. It’s practically a postal billboard. But I only want it because it features me prominently — in several Herald articles from when I covered Coral Gables for the daily newspaper in 2008 and 2009… which means it’s an attack of former Mayor Don Slesnick, who beat Valdes Fauli in 2001. Talk about sour grapes! But guess what? Don Slesnick, who inherited a lot of those problems as well as a recession, is not running now. And, frankly, Jeannett Slesnick — who should, and Ladra suspects will, be judged on her own merits — will make a better mayor than her husband did.

Still, this piece is worthy of applause. It highlights the bad headlines in yellow and makes the stories look like they’re on microfiche with a back background and reverse type on the dates they were published. It’s brilliant campaigning, if somewhat disingenuous. I remember those stories. In fact, I remember Mayor Slesnick complained to the Herald editors about me and asked to have me reassigned. He said I had a “hidden agenda” (don’t they always when they don’t like what I write?). But I wasn’t reassigned because there was no agenda. And when I confronted Slesnick about his complaint, I delivered a print out of all the positive stories about the city, which far outnumbered the bad ones.

Of course, voters are not going to get a mailer on those. Because, like I said, Don isn’t running to get his seat back, unlike some people. And Jeannett Slesnick is running on her own record, not anyone else’s.

Valdes-Fauli must be a bit nervous because he has been the one mostly on the attack. Sure, there have been a few mailers about his endorsements, which include Gov. Jeb Bush, whose low energy cost him the presidential nomination last year, and current empty suit and Mayor Jim Cason and commissioners Vince Lago and Frank Quesada. The message is: If you want things to stay pretty much the same and the development to continue, vote for Raul. Again, Ladra gets the feeling that whoever is running Cason would run Valdes-Fauli, too.

Meanwhile, Slesnick’s mailers have stuck to the endorsements and the issues and the reasons why she is the best candidate for the job, not why Valdes-Fauli ain’t. Voters will get a bi-fold this week with several Gables residents and leaders — including former Florida Gov. and U.S. Sen. Bob Graham (a Democrat) and former State Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla (a Republican).  The mailer ran as an ad in Sunday’s Herald’s Neighbors section. Ladra likes that one if only because it has so many people in it.

She also sent a 20-page magazine about the development — her signature issue and the one thing that can help push her over the top. It details her vote on the different projects and shows that she is not against all development, only what she calls “unacceptable development that strays quite a bit from our master code.”

Perhaps she felt the need to set the record straight. Valdes-Fauli — whose had several attack mailers that intend to mislead the voters — had already sent one out that said she actually voted for the Paseo project. That’s just a lie. A lie nobody believes.

The record clearly shows she voted against it, the sole commissioner in a 4-1 vote. She did vote subsequently on votes benefit the city and to lessen the impact to residents. That’s her job. She’s not going to vote against things that are going to make an already approved project better.

Are we a third through this year already? Does anybody else think it’s going much faster than ever?

Maybe it’s because there is always so much going on.

This week’s Cortadito Calendar seems a little thin, though. I guess people are still pooped from last week, which was a little busier. Or are we saving our strength for next week? Or did Ladra miss something?

If you’re event is not here, you only have yourself (or some lackey) to blame. As always, please keep sending information about your government meetings, candidate forums and political powwows to edevalle@gmail.com and they’ll keep appearing in the Cortadito Calendar.

TUESDAY — March 28

8:30 a.m. — Just in time for the Miami Beach election season! The Tuesday Morning Breakfast Club is back. Or at least one version of it is (another version is announced for April 11). This version seems more legit if only because it is not tied in multiple ways to a big controversial developer. Tuesday’s breakfast is being moderated by none other than former Mayor Matti Bower. The speaker will be commission candidate Joshua Levy, who is running for one of the open seats. Ladra wants to thank Puerto Sagua Restaurant, 700 Collins Ave., for stepping up to the plate as the new venue for this and subsequent   meetings. I recommend la tortilla de platanos maduros.

9 a.m. — It’s gonna be a little awkward at the Coral Gables Commission meeting Tuesday, the first one since every one of Commissioner Jeannett Slesnick‘s colleagues endorsed former mayor Raul Valdes-Fauli in next month’s election. But they’re going to have to grin and bear it as the talk about major changes proposed, once again, for The Plaza project (aka Agave, aka Mediterranean Village, aka Old Spanish Village). They’re also going to talk about opening Giralda Plaza to vehicular traffic. They’ll also consider “piggy backing” off a contract in Aurora, Illinois, for $1.4 million in red light cameras and the corresponding programming. Why Coral Gables would piggyback off a city 1,418 miles away? They will also vote on moving $3.9 million from the “capital improvement fund balance” to the trolley depot/fire station project. And much, much more. See agenda here.

7 p.m. — Donald Trump’s power goes beyond the White House. Everyone is talking about “fake news.” Even the Miami Young Republicans. They are dubbing their meeting Tuesday night “News + Spin: A discussion with the media.” The speakers are Politico’s Marc Caputo, The Miami Herald’s Patricia Mazzei and CBS4’s Jim DeFede (Caputo and DeFede — well, Ladra, too — also once worked at Ma Herald, which shows what a magical place it once was). The “lively debate,” which Ladra suspects will be between the baby Goppers and the top three political journalists in South Florida and not between my esteemed colleagues themselves. It’ll be at CubaOcho Museum and Performing Arts Center, which is a fabulous Little Havana space to go anytime, 1465 SW 8th St. Meet Ladra at Ball & Chain after for a drink.

WEDNESDAY — March 29

6 p.m. — Former Miami Beach Commissioner Michael Gongora has a lot of collegial support. Former Mayor Matti Bower and at least four former commissioners and one current one (Kristen Rosen Gonzalez) are hosting a fundraiser for Gongora’s campaign to get back on the dais. He is running for an open commission seat. The host committee includes former commissioners Ed Tobin, Deede Weithorn, Jorge Exposito and Saul Gross as well as several known longtime activists and preservationists. The shindig is from 6 to 8 p.m. at Poseidon Greek Restaurant, 1131 Washington Ave. And tell him Happy Birthday if you make it.

THURSDAY — March 30

7:30 p.m. — The second of two Coral Gables candidate forums and likely the last official debates before the April 11 election begins at 7:30 p.m. at Coral Gables Congregational Church, 3010 DeSoto Blvd. Ladra apologizes if anyone went last week. The first hour will go to the two candidates running for commission in Group 3, incumbent Pat Keon and former Commissioner Wayne Withers. The second hour will be for the mayoral debate between Commissioner Jeannett Slesnick and former Mayor Raul Valdes-Fauli (incumbent Mayor Jim Cason has decided not to run again, for real this time). This is where many Coral Gables voters make up their minds and the place fills up rather quickly. Doors open at 6:30 but get there earlier if you want a seat up front. Maybe someone can ask Valdes-Fauli about his disengenuous and negative campaigning.

FRIDAY — March 31

3 p.m. —  Miami-Dade Commissioner Daniella Levine Cava will meet with the mayors of the South Dade cities — Palmetto Bay, Cutler Bay, Homestead and Florida City — to discuss South Dade issues. Hopefully that includes any movement on the SMART plan’s south corridor of light rail, not high-speed buses. Since Commissioner Dennis Moss may drop by, the meeting has to be held in the sunshine and is open to the public at the Cutler Bay Town Center,  10720 Caribbean Blvd.

The Coral Gables mayoral race this year already had an epic, Count of Monte Cristo vibe — what with the freshman, lone anti-development commissioner on the dais going up against a former mayor that was booted out 15 years ago for over-development, among other things, by said lone commissioner’s husband.

But now, it seems that former Mayor Raul Valdes-Fauli has pulled the ethnic card, starting a whisper campaign that Commissioner Jeannett Slesnick is anti-Hispanic.

El pobre. His Cuban card is all he’s got going for him.

Read related story: Coral Gables mayoral race: Slesnick vs Valdes-Fauli, Vol. 2

“A lot of people say that its become an ethnic campaign because of the slate,” said Jorge de Cardenas, Valdes-Fauli’s campaign manager, who also ran the campaigns for Mayor Jim Cason. He is referring to the Riviera Neighborhood Association of homeowners who are royally pissed off at the Paseo project approval, and who apparently sought out two candidates for the commission positions. The group has morphed into a grassroots political group called Gables Neighbors United, which has endorsed Slesnick for mayor and longtime activist Marlin Ebbert and former Commissioner Wayne “Chip” Withers. They think they’ve got a cute little acronym for people to remember: SEW. Like, let’s SEW this up.

“Some of these people are going around saying ‘The Cubans are going to take over,’” de Cardenas said. “I guess we’re in Miami. That happens.”

Yes, we’re in Miami. So, sometimes, it’s just expedient to say it happens. This sounds like a campaign strategy to Ladra because (1) why would Slesnick be responsible for what some racist on South Alhambra (and they’re everywhere) has to say and (2) Guess what? The Hispanics have infiltrated the Riviera neighborhood already (they’re everywhere, too), so it would be sorta silly to say something like that — and/or dangerous.

And it’s not like there were a ton of Hispanic choices. Withers is running against another white anglo, Commissioner Pat Keon — pictured to the right in the most blonde on white, ethnic card-free race, lucky them — and while Ebbert is running in an open seat with two Hispanics, only one of them is actually viable (more on that later).

And why are we talking about this anyway? In 2017? Really? The only reason must be that it’s part of the RVF campaign narrative.

Valdes-Fauli did not return a call to his phone. But Slesnick told Ladra that she was going to stick to the issues. “I don’t know how to combat something like this. What do you do? What do you say?”

Maybe she’s right. What can you say? “I am not a racist.” Didn’t work for Richard Nixon with crook. Maybe she doesn’t need to say anything. Valdes-Fauli’s polls must show that he is trailing, with the election two weeks away on April 11th. People are already voting absentee. Time to panic. Which goes a long way to explain the Valdes-Fauli mailer where the successful residential real estate agent is tagged “Speedy Slesnick” and photo-shopped in a red race car. This is because she would rather hire more police officers to enforce the 30 MPH in residential neighborhoods than go down five MPH and still have nobody there when people blow by the required twice as many roadway signs going 50 MPH. The mailer — paid for by one of two Valdes-Fauli PACs — is so bad, it’s good. Someone, please, please save one for Ladra’s collection.

Let’s take a moment here to remind folks that this is likely Valdes-Fauli’s last chance to get back into the office he was tossed from in 2001 by Don Slesnick in a sea change election — two new commissioners were also elected — after he led the effort to close Biltmore Way to vehicular traffic and build a massive administrative annex next to historic City Hall. Ladra covered Coral Gables for the Miami Herald back then, and it seemed to me that he envisioned the building would eventually bear his name.

Valdes-Fauli has been kind of absent since that defeat, coming out of his self-imposed sore loser exile 14 years later, only to endorse Mayor Jim Cason two years ago. In hindsight, Ladra wonders if that was tit for tat since Cason, who immediately rewarded him with an appointment to the charter review committee — a classic step in making the man relevant again — has endorsed him back.

Read related story: Jim Cason runs again ’cause nobody else will

Why does Valdes-Fauli want to be mayor again now — a whole 16 years later? Might it have something to do with all the development that wants to apparently keep coming now in North Gables and along South Dixie Highway? Might he resurrect the City Hall annex idea?

Does anyone else get the impression that someone brought Valdes-Fauli out of retirement and it wasn’t really his own idea to run? Like whoever runs the empty suit that is Cason is going to run him, too?

And since he lost against a Slesnick once before, and he’s desperate, and it’s late, he has gone on the offensive. Ladra hopes Hispanic voters in the Gables see through this pandering and reject it. And I can’t help but wonder if the Cubans in North Gables with his yard signs — the same ones who supported Slesnick in 2015, then were told she was anti Hispanic — know that Valdes-Fauli went to the island and can’t stop talking about what a marvelous trip it was and praises the normalized relations with Cuba’s repressive regime. I bet nobody told them that.

But that’s not really important. The Cuba trip doesn’t make him a worse candidate. Ladra has been to Cuba several times and believes that family trips — not junkets disguised as “educational packages” — are beneficial to the parallel economy that makes the government increasingly irrelevant. It just makes him even more of a calculated sin verguenza for pulling the ethnic card.

Read related story: Jeannett Slesnick winning Gables mayoral money race

What makes Slesnick a better candidate is that she is honest in her campaign, which is mostly about her policy positions — not anybody’s ancestry — on transparency in government and over-development. Like she works super hard to sell single family homes — and everybody knows she is a workaholic — she has worked super hard in the last two years since she was elected, having multiple town hall meetings to gauge constituents’ needs and concerns and being extremely communicative. She is very accessible and is not afraid to go against the administration or the majority on the dais if its what the residents want. Slesnick truly understands that her job is about serving the people and representing their best interests and their hopes and dreams.

And that’s why she has voted four times, at least, against these big, massive developments that have a lot of people in Coral Gables on edge. She was the only no vote, in fact, on the Paseo de la Riviera project on U.S. 1 (rendition to the left), The Plaza on Ponce de Leon — which was Old Spanish Village and then became the Agave project and then Mediterranean Village before it was reborn with one word like Prince or Madonna — and 33 Alhambra. I believe the 16-story Gables Station by Grand Avenue may have been a 3-2 vote.

Funny enough, Valdes-Fauli is trying to get people to believe that she voted for one of those projects, when she simply voted for increased setbacks and lower density after the projects had already been approved. Any suggestion otherwise is disengenuous and further evidence of desperation.

That’s like trying to get them to believe that this house seller, who is an abuela to Hispanic grandchildren, is anti-Hispanic.

Former Coral Gables Mayor Raul Valdes-Fauli isn’t the only one who wants his old job back at City Hall. Former Commissioner Wayne “Chip” Withers, who served for 20 years before leaving office in 2011, qualified last month — for the seat occupied by incumbent Commissioner Pat Keon.

He could have run for the open seat. But Withers has personal, friendly relationships with three of the four candidates there, he told Ladra. Apparently, he does not have a friendly relationship with Keon. Withers supported Mary Young against Keon in 2013.

“I felt I could really go after an incumbent,” Withers said in his aw-shucks Forrest Gump style, which seems disarmingly honest.

And Keon is ripe for the taking. Not known for being exactly responsive to residents, she has become a target for some of the anti-development forces who don’t like some of the larger projects on the city’s horizon, including the Riviera Neighborhood Association, of which he is a member (and who reportedly was shopping around for a candidate), who fought hard against the Paseo project and is now up in arms about a possible overlay zoning district along South Dixie Highway. The commissioner always seems to be making excuses for developers, they say. She treats residents like they don’t know what’s best for them and she knows better.

Read related story: Jeannett Slesnick winning mayoral money race

“There is a general concern that when the choice is between the wishes of a residential community and a developer, they feel that its in favor of the developer a lot of the time,” Withers told Ladra. “Whether that’s perceived or real, it’s there. And there’s an erosion of trust.”

Keon said she was not surprised when Withers jumped into the race. “People were looking for someone to run against me, and I guess he was the taker,” she told Ladra. “We’ll still run a good campaign. He has name recognition. He was a good commissioners for along time, but he said he was tired of it. Now he’s back.”

Keon said it’s all because Withers is mad that the Paseo project was approved last year. But, she added, she only voted in favor after developers scaled down the size and height and made it more palatable for the surrounding neighborhood. “They brought it down a lot and stepped it back from the neighborhood.”

But Withers said the project is still too large and out of scale for the people who live adjacent to it and, more importanty, that the process was flawed. The peer review was tainted, he said, because it was done by architects who worked for the project’s architect on other sites or boards. And he did not get a notice about the zoning hearing because he lives 1,150 feet away on Hardee and the city only notifies residents within 1,000 feet.

He wants to increase notification to residents within a three-mile radius. He also wants to change the amount of time between first and second reading from 30 to 60 days and require a 4/5ths vote on land use changes.

Read related story: Coral Gables explores more development along U.S. 1

Withers said the more recent move to create a zoning master plan for U.S. 1 “is scary” and that the city should work to redevelop or revitalize its 1.8 miles along the federal highway with the cities of South Miami to the southwest and Miami to the northeast for a more consistent zoning application. Otherwise, he says, what we may end up with is a canyon of tall buildings like there is on Bird Road just east of Ponce de Leon Boulevard.

“This is why I got back in,” he said. “All these projects coming online. If we don’t get everything in order, it’s going to be a mess,” Withers said.

“I know I’m an old guy,” said the 65-year-old grandfather. “But I was there for 20 years and I know what worked and what didn’t work.”

He said that things put on the books 20-years ago, like the Mediterranean ordinance that provides for more density as bonus for Mediterranean architecture, might be tweaked. Maybe bonuses should be considered for downtown infill development. “Maybe instead of getting an extra four floors for looking like a Mediterranean castle, you get a bonus for having more green space or more open space.

“I’m not a ‘burn it down’ guy. I know we need development. We have a downtown that pays a majority of our tax base. It would be stupid to kill the golden goose.

“But we can’t let it kill our quality of life,” he said.

Keon said that the city is doing better than it was when Withers was in office, with more money in reserves and a AAA bond rating. She sounds a lot like the city manager when she talks, and no, it is not just because both are women. It’s almost like Keon has picked up Cathy Swanson Rivenbark‘s buzzwords, cadence — even her southern twang.

Withers told Ladra he is staying out of the mayoral bout because he knows and respects both Valdes-Fauli, who he served with for many years, and Slesnick, whose husband he also served with on the dais.

But the Gables is a city where voters, not the candidates themselves, often create slates. Withers and Slesnick are already getting grouped together — along with Marlin Ebbert in the second commission race — by an endorsement from the Riviera Neighbhorhood group.

You can already see the yard signs for the three candidates all up and down South Alhambra and the surrounding streets.

In the race for Coral Gables mayor, Commissioner Jeannett Slesnick is outraising her sole declared oppponent, former Mayor Raul Valdes-Fauli, almost two to one.

According to the latest campaign finance reports filed last week, Slesnick raised $45,350 in January, compared to $24,800 raised by Valdes-Fauli. She also raised $9,950 in December, while the former mayor raised $2,345.

The gap is much bigger, though, because Slesnick has loaned herself $100,000 to Valdes-Fauli’s $10K, giving her a total that is three times as big at $156,300.

Both of them has spent about the same amount, however, leaving Slesnick with a much bigger kitty eight weeks before the election.

Slesnick’s biggest expense is $13,490 in consulting for a phone bank and data to a Missouri company called TJP Strategies. She also paid $6,000 for printed campaign materials, $5,550 on yardsigns, bumper stickers, ads and mailers and $900 on postage.

Ladra looked but couldn’t find any expenses listed for the sickly produced video ad that was aired during Channel 10s This Week in South Florida last weekend. Sure, the media buy will be reported in February and I guess production will be, too. There’s even a version in Spanish narrated by her daughter in law, Cecilia Slesnick.

Read related story: Coral Gables mayoral race — Slesnick vs. Valdes-Fauli, Vol. II

Valdes-Fauli has spent roughly half of his $45,145 total with the biggest item being bumper stickers at $6,300. He spent nearly as much on kick-off expenses (catering was $4,926 and parking was $1,000), $3,800 on postage, $1,256 on door hangers and $1,630 on a video we haven’t seen.

His expenses and contributions also include $4,000 donated and then returned to Mansfield USA, a property development company in Coconut Grove. It was likely returned because it was over the $1,000 limit and was really meant for a political action committee or, worse, 501c4 organization with less public scrutiny.

So, really, Valdes-Fauli only raised $20,800 in January. Slesnick outraised him more than 2 to 1.

Looks like developers saw the Coral Gables Commission pass the controversial Paseo de la Riviera development and started salivating at the mouth.

Because now, Coral Gables city officials are working with an architectural firm to develop a South Dixie Corridor Master Plan for existing and potential future redevelopment opportunities along 2.5 miles of U.S. 1 that goes through the City Beautiful. Key word: Potential. The idea, the city says, is to creat a new “Coral Gables Corridor” with a “unique experience” for drivers, transit users, pedestrians and cyclists — all along one of the most traversed and congested thoroughfares in Miami-Dade.

And the Riviera Neighborhood Association — whose members have sued to stop the Paseo project — is back up in arms. Because they know that the idea really is to build more projects like the hotel and apartment complex planned for the Holiday Inn property that was passed by the commission in 2015.

Read related story: Coral Gables Paseo project up for final approval

Most members will be at tonight’s meeting, even though the community was split in half for two meetings, “whether by accident or design,” according to an email from the RNA. “Whether by accident or design, the meeting invitations split the Riviera Neighborhood into two separate meetings,” said the email sent Sunday, with copious use of exclamation marks. “We stand together to have our united voice heard and tomorrow night, our voice will be heard!”

The group wants the city to stick to its current zoning codes and land use designations, without any of the overlays like “multi-use” or “transit oriented development,” which they correctly identify as code words for upzoning.

“The developers love the ‘overlays’  because they allow them to build whatever they want and give cover to our commissioners who love the developers!”

The Riviera Neighborhood Association wasn’t able to stop the Paseo project (rendering to the right) from getting approved 4-1, with Commissioner Jeannett Slesnick being the only no in December of 2013. But their lawsuit certainly has kept developers from breaking ground. Paseo attorneys tried to have the court dismiss the case, which says that the changes made are inconsistent with the city’s master plan, but the circuit court judge denied their motion. Now, they are appealing that decision.

And, apparently, the city is changing that master plan. 

Tonight’s meeting at 6 p.m. is the first of three community meetings the city planned for residents and “stake holders” to chime in on this new Master Plan. It’s at the Holiday Inn where the Paseo project is supposed to be, 1350 South Dixie Hwyd. Expect some developers and lobbyists to be there. They’ll be the quiet ones.

Ladra guesses the city is looking at the south side of U.S. 1 because the north side is where the county is planning to develop the Underline, a linear park and bikepath from Dadeland Station to Brickell.

Wednesday, the meeting starts at 6 p.m. at Shannon Rolle Center, 3750 S. Dixie Highway and Thursday it’s back at the Holiday Inn.

For questions, contact the City of Coral Gables Economic Development Department at 305-460-5311 or visit: www.coralgables.com/US1MasterPlan.