Ralph Rosado, an urban planning consultant and longtime Miami resident who is running in the special election next month in District 4 to replace Manolo Reyes — who died unexpectedly at 80 after having a health setback — was spotted filming a campaign video at Douglas Park Thursday afternoon. Also spotted: Commissioner Joe Carollo, acting as director.
In a candid camera video provided to Political Cortadito late Thursday, Marjory Carollo is also on the set, holding a clipboard, as Rosado walks along with his mother-in-law, on Joe Carollo’s cue.
It’s not the first sign that Rosado is Carollo’s candidate for the June 3 special election. But it’s the most evident one that he is heavily involved in Rosado’s campaign. He needs that third vote now that Commission Chairwoman Christine King is going along with almost everything he says. Commissioners Miguel Gabela and Damian Pardo are pretty much lost to him.
Read related: Miami voters to fill Manolo Reyes’ District 4 seat with June special election
Carollo already talked Rosado up on his weekday morning radio show, saying the day of the special meeting where commissioners met to decide whether to appoint someone to the seat or go to a special election, that he thought Rosado was the best choice.
Crazy Joe was not at the kick-off for Rosado’s campaign at La Carreta on 8th Street Thursday night. Almost nobody was. It was a small crowd and did not seem too excited, judging by the video taken by community outreach strategist Nadir Perez and shared on his Instagram. Rosado told Ladra that “a lot of residents” went.
“I have not sought out the endorsement of anybody on the commission,” Rosado said, adding that Carollo may prefer him to Jose Regalado — son of former Mayor Tomas and brother of Miami-Dade Commissioner Raquel — who is running against him and has the Reyes family’s endorsement. “He doesn’t love some of the other people on the other side. There’s some bad blood.”
Ya think?
Rosado, the former city manager at North Bay Village, also said he had been all over the city Thursday recording video for the campaign and denied that Carollo had been at the park with him. “No. He was not directing. He wasn’t there,” Rosado told Political Cortadito. When Ladra told him she had video of Carollo and his wife at the park with him and his mother-in-law, and asked if he wanted to change or stick to his answer, Rosado hesitated a little. Then he said, “I’ll get back to you.’”
Of course, he did not. And yeah, no, I wouldn’t want to own up to it either, Ralph. We get ya.
But it is very clear from this video taken from a car parked at the park that Carollo is directing here.

There’s been a rumor that former Commissoner Alex Diaz de la Portilla, who has been walking and knocking on doors in his threatened run for mayor, is helping Regalado. It might even be a whisper campaign from Team Rosado to balance out the Carollo baggage. But that is nonsense. Regalado’s campaign team is sister Raquel Regalado, Alex Miranda doing digital and the like, Emiliano Antuñez doing canvassing and mailers, maybe. ADLP would not fit in.
Read related: Jose Regalado resigns city job to run for Miami commissioner in District 4
Maybe it’s just because everyone expects Diaz de la Portilla and Carollo to run against each other for mayor.
Or maybe it’s because the political action committee that is printing materials for Jose Regalado is called Proven Leadership for Miami, while ADLP’s is Proven Leadership for Miami-Dade. Proven Leadership for Miami is chaired by Horacio Aguirre, who once ran against Diaz de la Portilla in District 1. The chairman of the Miami River Commission is very good friends with Property Appraiser Tomas Regalado, whose campaign gave the PAC $2,880 this January in its last recorded contribution, according to campaign finance reports, which indicate it was used in the property appraiser’s race, as well.
Rosado’s PAC, meanwhile, is Citizens for Ethics in Government — I know, and he’s Carollo’s candidate! — which has raised $268,740 since November — $100K of which is his own — more than half of it in the first quarter this year, according to campaign finance reports. He has hired Brian Goldmeier as his professional fundraiser and Jesse Manzano as his campaign consultant, the same team that recently helped Coral Gables Mayor Vince Lago get re-elected.
Both Manzano and Carollo served as consultants to former Miami-Dade Mayor now Congressman Carlos Gimenez on his 2016 re-election campaign.
The post Miami’s District 4 candidate Ralph Rosado is backed, helped by Joe Carollo appeared first on Political Cortadito.

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On her 50th birthday, Denise Galvez Turros — a longtime resident, marketing professional and community advocate — will officially announce her candidacy Tuesday and file paperwork to run in the November election for the commission seat in District 3.
Today, that is Commissioner Joe Carollo‘s seat. But he is termed out and threatening to run for mayor.
Galvez — who lost a previous bid for office in 2017 — says her vision is to “create an Efficient, Safe, Clean and Smart Miami.” ESCSM? You can’t even pronounce that. A marketing guru should know better.
Read related: Is Miami’s Joe Carollo using District 3 public money to campaign in District 4?
Galvez has been a champion and activist for Little Havana for several years and has spoken out against corruption at City Hall and, specifically, Carollo, who she often blasts on her social media. She served on the city’s Historic Preservation Board and is taking credit, in her statement, for exposing City Attorney Victoria Mendez‘s family scheme involving the state Guardianship program and the homes of elderly, vulnerable people. Mendez and her husband have been accused of gaming the system to buy properties for much less than they were worth. She was eventually fired, though it was for far more than that, believe it or not.
And, here, Ladra thought it was the dogged reporting by WLRN that exposed Tricky Vicky.
In 2017, Galvez ran in District 4 against Manolo Reyes, who won and passed away earlier this month, and lobbyist Ralph Rosado, who is running to replace Reyes in the June 3 special election against Jose Regalado, son of the former mayor and current property appraiser and brother of the county commissioner. Galvez got 534 votes out of 7,413 for 7%.

She had sued to get her name first on the ballot as Galvez instead of Turros, which is the name of husband, a well-known local musician. It would have given her an edge, but would have delayed the election, and a judge ruled against her. The court battle, however, caused Ladra to sniff around and learn that Galvez, sans Turros, was arrested in 1994 for credit card fraud and 2010 for driving under the influence.
Since the redistricting, her home has been shifted into District 3 and she could be running in a crowded field that includes former Commissioner Frank Carollo, brother of the current commissioner who served there previously, and Brenda Betancourt, president of the Calle Ocho Inter-American Chamber of Commerce and a frequent speaker at commission meetings, too.
Read related: Jose Regalado resigns city job to run for Miami commissioner in District 4
Thee other candidates have filed paperwork intending to run: Oscar Elio Alejandro, Yvonne Bayona and Rolando Escalona, who reported raising the most in the first quarter with $37,722 — $5,000 of which came from lobbyist and former State Rep. Manuel Prieguez, who also helped elect former Miami Commissioner Alex Diaz de la Portilla and current District 1 Commissioner Miguel Gabela.
“After years of pushing for meaningful change from the outside as an activist, Galvez Turros is now stepping forward to deliver results from within City Hall,” said an email announcing her candidacy. “Her campaign focuses on enhancing public safety and public transportation, revitalizing neighborhoods, preserving Miami’s historic character and tree canopy, and cutting government waste and corruption.
“Miami deserves a government that works for them. Galvez Turros’ priorities will include a review and overhaul of our entire City codes including the many conflicts in Miami 21 that have for years been a barrier for small businesses and residents navigating the bureaucracy.”
“I’m ready to get to work,” Galvez said in a statement. “I’ve been building a list of priorities since 2017. I know exactly what needs to be done — and I’m not here to make a career out of politics. I won’t be deterred by political games or special interest pressure.
“Let’s fix what’s broken, protect what matters, and plan boldly for Miami’s future.”
The post Denise Galvez Turros announces she’ll run for Miami Commission in District 3 appeared first on Political Cortadito.

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Miami Commissioner Joe Carollo is having a Mother’s Day event this Friday — but it’s not in his district for his own constituents. It’s in District 4, where there is a special election next month to fill the vacancy caused when Manolo Reyes died.
Ya think Crazy Joe could be thinking to take D4 candidate Ralph Rosado, the lobbyist that Carollo is openly supporting in the race? That election is June 3 and there’s not a lot of time to do the meet and greets — or to get people to request their absentee or vote-by-mail ballots.
Even if Carollo doesn’t take Rosado (now that he is busted), it looks like an official city event. That means he is using District 3 funds and staff for an event at the the gallery at Smathers Plaza in District 4, an affordable housing community for seniors with 182 units, the same year that he is threatening to run for mayor citywide. Smathers is a beehive of super voters on 30th Avenue, about eight blocks out of District 3. And Carollo needs some help in District 4 if he wants to beat the boatload of other candidates that are signing up for the mayor’s race in November.
Read related: Miami voters to fill Manolo Reyes’ District 4 seat with June special election
Why not a Mother’s Day event? He or Rosado can bring roses with the pastelitos. The ladies will go nuts.
Who cares if he’s campaigning on city time and the city’s dime? It’s not like he needs it. Carollo has more than $1.7 million on hand in his political action committee, Miami First. But Ladra bets he has other events planned outside District 3.
The party Friday gets started at 3 p.m. and there will be music, food, entertainment, “gifts and more,” according to the poster that was spotted on a wall in one of the towers.
And, just maybe, there will be absentee ballot requests.

 
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Three municipalities in Miami-Dade are possibly signing up to be inspected by the Florida State Department of Governmental Efficiency, the state’s own Elon Musk group —  let’s just call it Baby DOGE — to find and root out waste, inefficiency and fraud.
Last week, the city of Miami Commission voted to ask Baby DOGE “to come to the city of Miami and look for government waste and fraud.” And in Coral Gables, a commissioner wants the state’s DOGE to review the city’s budget “to make recommendations on elimination of government waste” before this year’s budget process begins. They’ll discuss it next month.
They join Hialeah, whose council last month approved a resolution supporting Gov. Ron DeSantis‘ establishment of Baby DOGE and Mayor Esteban “Steve” Bovo invited the governor to come check out the city’s books. What does he care? He was already on his way out to go work in D.C. as a lobbyist, anyway.
DeSantis announced he had established the task force in February to, among other things, “look into local government expenditures by utilizing publicly available county and municipal spending records to expose bloat within local governance.” But, of course, he has asked municipalities to cooperate.
Gables Commissioner Ariel Fernandez has asked the city clerk to put a resolution on the agenda for the May 20 commission meeting to discuss a possible Baby DOGE review with his colleagues. “There may be things that we have not noticed,” he told Political Cortadito.
In Miami, it was Commissioner Joe Carollo‘s pocket item at Thursday’s meeting. Even though Miami’s Chief Financial Officer Larry Spring said that the city did not meet the threshold for DOGE intervention, Carollo said it would be a good idea anyway.
Commissioner Miguel Gabela asked if not meeting the threshold means the city is in good financial health. Um, Spring said, don’t get carried away.

“I’m not gonna use the words ‘good financial health,’” Spring said. “We affirmed what they asked us, which is… have we met any of the criteria [to trigger a review]. And the answer was no.”
Read related: Miami Commission moves forward with Allapattah CRA — sans Joe Carollo
Two speakers from the public were also in favor.
Brenda Betancourt, president of the Calle Ocho Inter-American Chamber of Commerce and a candidate for commission in District 3, dared the commissioners to do it.
“This would be a good way to make sure that every single dollar that is collected from the city of Miami residents are actually invested in the best interest of the residents.” Betancourt, a frequent speaker at public comment, said. “If the city, in the way it has been managed for years, doesn’t have any problems, I don’t see why they can’t have the department of efficiency that can actually prove to the city of Miami residents that we are spending our money correctly.”
And Downtown Neighbors Association President James Torres, who has been on a social media tear against the Downtown Development Authority, was also supportive — and it gave him another opportunity to hit the agency.
“This is an important issue that should be taken up. We do have government waste, especially with the Downtown Development Authority,” he said. “If this agency moves forward, it’s going to do what we’ve been asking for.”
But a third woman said it could wreak havoc, like it’s done at the federal level.
“It concerns me. We need a certain number of employees and we need a certain number of procedures to function as a government,” she said. “This is again move fast and breakl things that’s what scares me. I have a computer science degree. I am a systems thinker. I understand hs concepts,” she said about Musk. “Again, I worry about applying software mentality to people.
“Consider the health of our functioning democracy.”
Read related: Effort to dissolve Miami DDA cites ‘bloated’ salaries, redundancy, UFC gift
It almost seemed like Commission Chairwoman Christine King and Commissioner Damian Pardo were going to do just that.
“I don’t want there to come in and be a swift sweep of whole departments and people are out of work,” King said. “Efficiency? Yes. But just a broad stroke of… and whole departments are gone? I am not in support of that.
“I am always in support of looking at our processes. We should do that just regularly every so couple of years,” King added. “But I will not support a broad stroke of getting rid of whole departments.”
Pardo said he wanted to “remind everyone that we have an inspector general’s office that is kicking in and we do have audits, I believe in forensic audits. if we want to invite further oversight, great,” he said. “But like you, madame chair, if it’s something that’s fast and let’s break things, I will not support it.”
All Carollo had to say, though, was that it was just to identify efficiencies, and that an ultimate decision would come back to the city commission.
“This is an additional set of eyes,” Carollo said, “so the we can truly live on that word that is thrown around so often — transparency.”
At the end of the discussion, it passed unanimously.
Nobody wants to be seen as defending waste and fraud.

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In what seems like an obvious case of political retaliation, Miami Commissioner Joe Carollo — who is still butt hurt over being stripped from the Bayfront Park Management Trust — tried in vain Thursday to stop the Allapattah Community Redevelopment Agency from moving forward.
He used to support Allapattah getting its own CRA, when he and Commissioner Miguel Gabela were pals for a short while, since both of them were mad at Commissoner Damian Pardo. But then Gabela dropped his lifetime pensions idea and Carollo — who is accused of abusing his post and mismanaging funds at the Bayfront Trust — was removed as chairman, which was then given to Gabela, who represents District 1, including Allapattah, and has been fighting to get his own CRA for more than a year.
Read related: Compromise may be reached at Miami commission on Omni/Allapattah CRAs
Carollo tried to make it seem Thursday like his motive for voting against the CRA was to keep the property tax dollars from leaving the general fund to go directly into that neighborhood. It’s also the “reason” why he had the item deferred from the last meeting earlier this month, to find out how much it was going to cost the city. He and Gabela got into it then, too, with Gabela asking how much the city had spent on attorneys for the multiple lawsuits stemming from Carollo’s abuse of power — since he was so “fiscally concerned” — and Carollo calling Gabela “Tony Soprano.”
He said Thursday that the funds for the CRA were the same dollars “we use every day for police, fire, garbage collection and every city service. How will we replace those funds back in. Because when you take money away, there’s only two ways to resolve it: You have to make cuts or you have to find new money.”
Staff tried to explain the CRA projects would be funded by any tax revenue greater than the amount collected on the base year. They can receive 50% of this tax increase or 95%, and Miami Chief Financial Officer Larry Spring recommended the Allapattah CRA be funded with 50%. That means $281.4 million would be diverted to the CRA over 30 years. It would have been $534.5 million at the higher percentage, he said.
But it’s like shouting into a vast void.
Carollo also said that it would take more than five years for enough money to accumulate to make a difference. And if “we’ll assume and make believe he gets re-elected,” then Gabela “won’t even be around when the real money comes in to make an impact.”
He doesn’t know how CRAs work, apparently. Maybe he thinks it’s like the Bayfront Trust, a personal slush fund for the chair.
“This is not money that is being taken from the general fund. It doesn’t exist yet,” explained Pardo, adding that CRAs work with the city and sometimes pay the city’s debts, like the Omni CRA — the extension of which was held hostage while Gabela fought for his Allapattah one — is doing with the port tunnel.
“It is not us against them,” Pardo said.
Read related: Fight over Omni CRA causes new rifts, alliances on Miami City Commission
Either way, Gabela didn’t care. “I don’t need your vote. Call the question.” He must have said “call the question” five or six times. It wasn’t as good as the meeting April 10, where the two yelled at each other and Gabela banged on the dais and demanded to know what Carollo had cost the city in legal fees.
“I want the figure. I want it one my desk,” Gabela told City Attorney George Wysong. “I expect, please, an answer to the question I’ve been asking for a year now. How much has Joe Carollo cost the city in legal fees?”
The answer was still elusive last week. But the CRA motion, which was establishing the business plan and setting boundaries, passed 3-1. It still need to get approval from the county before a CRA can be officially established.
Gabela, who always seems to be looking down when he talks, was also able to pass a resolution so the the city attorney is informed any time legal fees for outside counsel reach $500,000 in any new case where they are retained to represent an elected official. It was totally about Carollo, who has cost the city close to $10 million in legal fees for different cases. “You know the gentleman over there has a truck record, a very bad track record,” Gabela said.
He had originally wanted it to be a $150,000 threshold but changed it to $500K to get the needed vote from Chairwoman Christine King. “Something is better than nothing,” Gabela said.
“As a practitioner, I know cases don’t wrap up in a few months. Cases sometimes take years,” King said, adding that the rule would now apply to future commissioners as well. “I am not going to legislate based on personalities because this doesn’t only affect us.”
But the measure only calls for the city commission to be informed, much as it is informed when another city department is going spend more than $25,000 on something.
“I think we’re talking about transparency and having a threshold where it’s disclosed,” Pardo said.
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His grandchildren already call it “Abue’s Park.” Now, it’s official.
The Miami City Commission on Thursday renamed West End Park as Manolo Reyes Park to honor the popular and beloved District 4 commissioner — who his grandchildren called “Abue” for abuelo — who died earlier this month at the age of 80 after battling health issues.
They also gave Reyes — who had hoped to run for mayor — the honorary title of “mayor emeritus, posthumously, as a mark of deep respect and appreciation for his exceptional leadership, legacy and dedication to public service,” and voted to support a Florida Senate measure to co-designate 57th Avenue between 8th Street and Flagler as Manolo Reyes Boulevard.
The room, which was packed with department directors and city staff, erupted in applause.
Read related: Miami voters to fill Manolo Reyes’ District 4 seat with June special election
The late commissioner’s family joined the commissioners on the dais, and Manny Reyes, the namesake son, spoke on their behalf.
“We are overwhelmed with all the love that the city has poured out to us and to him,” Reyes said. “Dad was a very noble man. A man of service… He would probably be looking down and saying ‘I don’t deserve this. I was just doing what I knew was right to do.’”
Commission Chairwoman Christine King‘s voice broke as she said, “It’s an honor to do it.”

On the other side of her, Commissioner Joe Carollo kept his distance. He was the only member of the commission not greeted by Reyes’ widow or family. Probably because he’s been a bully to Reyes and then had his mayoral campaign kick-off on the same day the late commissioner was buried.
West End Park, now Manolo Reyes Park, is a 16.6 acre recreational space at 6030 Southwest 2nd Street in Flagami and the site of a $16.8 million renovation project the commissioner championed that started last year. The grand opening is expected within weeks and the park will feature:

A new swimming pool and pool building
A children’s splash pad with spray features
Artificial turf on multi-use sports field
A walking trail and outdoor exercise equipment
Two tennis courts
Two basketball courts
Two pickleball courts
A new paved plaza entry with service entrance
New landscaping and irrigation
A lightning warning system
Art in public places components

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