If you live or work near Miami Beach City Hall, you may have seen the big black billboard truck circling around this week with City Manager Jimmy Morales‘ face plastered on all sides. Yes, from far away it did look a little like Roger Stone’s face. It wasn’t.
“Shame on you, City Manager Jimmy Morales” reads the back of the truck. “Public safety workers deserve fair pay,” reads the side.
And no, this is not the police or fire union attacking Morales. It’s the Communications Workers of America Local 3178, which represents close to 400 employees, mostly lifeguards and 911 dispatchers — the other people whose jobs it is to save lives — but also clerical and code enforcement workers.
After more than two years of getting zero cost of living increases and ahead of Friday’s impasse hearing at City Hall, the largest union in Miami Beach — and the one with the most women and minorities — has ramped up its campaign calling on city leaders to treat them the same as the other city unions, all of which have gotten salary adjustments since 2015.
And they have recently gotten the support of the For Our Future Action Fund political action committee, led by Ashley Walker, former Obama for America state director who now works at Mercury Partners. In a short time, For Our Future has launched a website called MiamiBeachEverydayHeroes.com, an online advertising campaign (photographed right) calling Morales a union buster, at least one direct snail mailer and the traveling billboard. The group has also collected about 1,000 signatures in support of the workers.
Florida Division of Elections documents show that For Our Future Action Fund was created in 2016 and funded with $80,000 from a Washington DC PAC with the same name. It spent all that money on phone banks and political mailers in Palm Beach Gardens last year. There has been no expense other than bank fees since then through the end of March and April expenditures or contributions have not yet been reported so we don’t know who is financing this campaign.
But the union leadership felt as if they had no other choice but to get professional help getting their message out.
“The city manager hasn’t negotiated in good faith,” said union president Rich McKinnon. “We’re going to show tomorrow what we’re asking for and how much it costs versus how much it cost for the other employees.” He would not make the analysis available to Political Cortadito until after Friday’s hearing.
This battle has been a long time coming, however. The city declared impasse on the union negotiations more than a year ago. It took six months to agree on and argue before a special magistrate and another six months or so for the special magistrate to issue his recommendations and then no time at all for Morales to decline all of them. He dangled a small raise in front of the union, but only if they gave up other benefits, such as any right they have to go before the somewhat still powerful city personnel board with gripes or complaints. McKinnon said he is not willing to do that.
“I asked the city manager if he put that into the other contracts, and of course he didn’t,” McKinnon told Ladra, stressing that they just want to be treated equally.
The move certainly seems punitive and is not very flattering to Morales, who was once the personification of government ethics when he served as a county commissioner but has fallen quite far down the slippery slope since he crossed to the dark side.
McKinnon further explained that the CWA workers accepted necessary cuts in the past when the city was short on resources, but always with the idea that they would be made whole when the economic slowdown has ended. Currently, he added, the city has a surplus of about $9 million, while employees are still struggling.
One of those is Janelle Gilbert, a former schoolteacher who started as a lifeguard at the Flamingo Park public pool, the largest aquatic center of three in the city, and is now a supervisor there. A single mom who lives on $24.10 an hour in a one bedroom apartment two blocks from the park, Gilbert is proud to serve as a city Goodwill Ambassador and her 13-year-old son is a Police Athletic League volunteer. But she thought her promotion a few years back would mean her situation would improve.
“I’m grateful for my 40 hours but there’s not much difference because the cost of living keeps going up,” she told Ladra.
A 3 percent raise for Gilbert would represent about 75 cents an hour, but if she gets it retroactive — which is what sources tell Ladra the workers want — it could represent $300 or $400 a month more. “That’s a lot for a single mom,” Gilbert said. “I could get a new apartment for me and my son. That is life changing.”
Morales, McKinnon says, is standing in the way for no reason. It would only take about a third of this year’s surplus to make the workers whole again, he added.
Hmmm… isn’t that about the same amount of money that was stolen electronically from the city by someone who got the city’s bank account numbers and started transferring funds right under Morales’ unaware nose?
In fact, the trouble with the CWA contract started about the time the money started to go missing. Is Morales trying to make the shortage up on the literal backs of lifeguards and 911 call takers?
The impasse hearing begins at 9 a.m. tomorrow at City Hall, but don’t expect any updates in real time. McKinnon told Ladra late Thursday that the city had informed them that the meeting would not be televised and that there would be no public comments allowed.

Read Full Story

It may be a contentious election year with many close races as the Democratic Party tries to snatch up some red seats and Republicans try to hold on and/or turn a few of their own.

But that doesn’t mean they can’t still get along, right?

A bi-partisan group of electeds in three contested races got together last week to promote living wage legislation that would pay a minimum wage of $15 an hour instead of $8.10 an hour.

The press conference came on the heels of an announcement Friday by the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity that the state’s minimum wage would go from $8.05 per hour to $8.10 per hour. Elected officials around the state are saying that this token nickel raise is simply not enough to keep up with the much more rapidly increasing cost of living.

But Ladra bets most of them are Democrats. In Miami we had two, count ’em, two Republicans.

Taking a break from their campaigns for low-wage workers this morning:

• Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, who despite her attack ads calling him a drunk driver, is facing the most serious challenge to her since Annette Taddeo, the OG version (in her first bid for office in 2008) from Democrat Scott Fuhrman.
• State Senator Anitere Flores, who faces attacks of her own from the Florida Democratic Party as they support Debbie Mucarsel-Powell in a redrawn district that is pretty evenly split, or maybe favors Republicans by just a tad. But will they come out to vote?
• State Rep. Jose Javier Rodriguez, who left the comfort of a guaranteed slide back to the House so he could change chambers with a challenge to the ever popular Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla in what has become one of the roughest local campaigns this year (more on that later).

Wait a minute. Didn’t the SEIU endorse DLP? Well, Local 1991 did. They represent the nurses and staff at Jackson and also endorsed Flores, Ros-Lehtinen and Sen. Rene Garcia. The other two locals, 1199 and 32BJ endorsed J-Rod in District 37.

Read related story: Public employee labor union backs three GOP legislators

Ros-Lehtinen has long touted her ability to reach across the aisle and build consensus. She is known to be pro equal rights and she seems to have some sanity regarding climate change. She recently helped write a bipartisan letter to UNESCO about Jerusalem and introduced bipartisan a bills to restore rights of Holocaust survivors. And she’s not voting for Donald Trump.

Still, Ladra is pretty sure it was uncomfortable for her and Flores to be standing with J-Rod while he’s attacking their friend, the Flagship DLP, on the airwaves on a year when he could very well lose his seat — even if they were on opposite sides of the podium.

Despite having Democratic opponents in a Hillary presidential year, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Florida are endorsing two Republican incumbents in this year’s election: Sens. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla and Anitere Flores.

They’ve also endorsed Sen. Rene Garcia, but that’s different. Garcia has no opponent. Miguel DLP and Flores, however, are running in hotly contested districts against challengers supported by the Florida Democratic Party in a rush to win seats this year.

And the three GOP senators are the only Republicans AFSCME endorses in a sea of Democrats.

AFSCME is Florida’s fastest growing union, which is part of a 1.6 million member union that advocates for fairness in the workplace, excellence in public services and prosperity and opportunity for all working families. And like most unions, it typically backs the blue ticket.

But they have broken from the trend for these three.

Why?

“Our wages, benefits, working conditions, health and safety, and even whether we have jobs at all, are in the hands of officials who influence our future,” said Willie Pouncy Jr., AFSCME Florida Region 3 PEOPLE Chair. “After reviewing where Senator Flores stands on the issues important to our state and to the members who live or work in her district, we believe she is the best choice in 2016 for our families, our communities and those we serve.”

And they are not alone. In the case of Flores, who helped kill a law that would have scrapped the county’s wage-theft protection program, she also has the endorsement of the Florida Professional Firefighters Association and every elected official in Homestead, all but one Democrats. Diaz de la Portilla regularly enjoys the support of police and firefighter unions.

“I have a proven track record of effectively fighting for working men and women in our community,” the eldest of the DLP brothers told Ladra.

Said Flores: “During my time in office, I have advocated for a stronger economy, raising incomes and more affordable healthcare benefits for hardworking families— matters important to all Floridians.”

So who is Andrew Korge, who is running against Flores, and State Rep. Jose Javier Rodriguez, who is running against DLP going to get?