Damn the manatees!

That’s basically what the Miami-Dade Commission said on Wednesday when it approved the Miami International Boat Show’s application to increase the number of boat slips by about a third to almost 1,000 and have “sea trials” — kind of like test drives for boats — in sensitive manatee nesting and feeding areas during their five-day event in downtown this January.

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Two sneaky attempts to stop the crack down on puppy mills have been thwarted, thanks mostly to animal rights activists who kept their eye on the bouncing ball and waged a campaign of complaints to get two amendments pulled from legislative bills this session.
And they took on one of the most powerful lobbyists in the state to do it.
It’s a testament to the power of grass roots organizing that the Pets’ Trust and other animal rights groups like the Animal Legal Defense Fund beat powerful Tallahassee lobbyist Ron Book — and perhaps something that we can apply to other issues, such as gun sense and charter schools.
“It was a victory for ‘we the people’ and a lesson in how our government is supposed to work,” Michael Rosenberg, one of the Pets’ Trust founders, told Ladra.
Related: Carlos Gimenez keeps rejecting voter-approved Pets’ Trust
Book represents Petland, a chain of pet stores — and the first result on your screen if you google “puppy mills Florida.” The Humane Society and other agencies have investigated the chain, which is the biggest national retail supplier of puppy mill dogs. There is one in Kendall. Basically, they resell puppies from USDA-licensed breeders that, activists have proven, put profits over the health and well-being of the dog, keeping hundreds of dogs in cramped and substandard conditions. Many die are kept in wire cages with urine and feces for days. Many die or have injuries and illnesses. The dogs that breed live in captivity their entire lives, with one purpose only: breed more puppies for profit. It’s a very sad existence.
Last year, the city of Miami passed an ordinance that prohibits the sale of any dogs that were bred in puppy mills, like in this photo right. Stores can sell pups from hobby breeders, who treat their animals like pets and only breed once or twice a year. Another 57 or 58 municipalities have similar laws include Hollywood, Hallandale Beach and Hillsborough County.
Book tried twice to get amendments into two different bills to basically void any local puppy mill ordinances like those. The first was a carefully disguised line in the Agriculture and Consumer Services department’s 300-page bill about oyster farming and seed labels. It didn’t even include the word animal or pet in it. Supporters contended it meant anything that could be bought or sold legally.
But animal activists saw right through it and it was removed.
Then, State Rep. Halsey Beshears (R-Monticello), right, tried to sneak it back in again Monday, filing an amendment to 160-page tax package to prohibit municipalities from restricting the sale of “taxable personal property” that could be legally sold. That would include dogs and cats. And it was caught again.
Monday afternoon, the Pets’ Trust sent the following email blast:
“Our legislative sessions ends this Friday. During these final days, lobbyists seeking to implement the agendas of their clients are doing some sneaky things. Mr. Ron Book is the lobbyist for puppy stores and is one of the top lobbyists in the state. He convinced Representative Beshears to support puppy stores and Mr. Beshears listened, adding an amendment  (two sentences in a 300-page bill) that stops communities from banning puppy stores. This is not the way our government should operate, with a powerful lobbyist dictating to a representative what he wants
How about what WE want!!!!? Please call Representative Beshears and urge him to reject that amendment and fight with us to stop puppy stores.
Then, call Senator Lauren Book, the daughter of Ron Book.  While Lauren fights to protect abused children, Ron Book leads the way to protect abusers of puppies. Call Senator Book and ask her to fight against this Bill, and to enlighten her father on the horrific puppy mills
CALL NOW!!!!
Please send to ten other people.”
Ladra thinks it was that last line that did it.
Signed by Pets’ Trust founders Rosenberg and Rita Schwartz, the email sent to more than 33,000 supporters included both lawmakers’ office numbers. Then, Commissioner Daniella Levine Cava forwarded it to her email list. The senators must have been deluged with calls.
Related: Animal shelter show hides truth about services, kill rate
The next day, an angry Ron Book emailed Rosenberg, calling the email blast he sent “trashy.” But Ladra doesn’t see anything trashy about it. It’s honest. Just plain matter of fact. And, guess what? It was effective. The amendment was pulled Tuesday evening.
Or we could say it was “trashed.”
Next email campaign should be to get Miami-Dade — which passed an ordinance in 2014 that forces stores to advertise the source of their puppies — to get more aggressive and outright ban the importation of any animals from puppy mills. Especially now that, as the Tampa Bay Times reported, the federal government is redacting the reports from the USDA investigators on these hellholes. What good is knowing the source if we can’t find out anything about their history?
Commissioner Levine Cava — who some may think forgot her promise to help voters make the Pets’ Trust initiative that passed with 65% become a reality — is working on a puppy mill ordinance, but may not have the support she needs.
Call your commissioner and tell them that this is a no brainer.
And to not let any lobbyist help write it up.
 

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Ralph Garcia-Toledo, the man who went from being Mayor Carlos Gimenez‘s driver to being a grossly-overpaid $200 consultant subcontractor on a $140 million water and sewer contract secured by his BFF, the mayor, sure is living the mogul’s life.

Here he is at Joe’s Stone Crabs, enjoying a leisurely lunch, we presume, with two lovely ladies — who work at County Hall.

It’s good to have palanca!

The picture was posted just around noon Thursday by Mary Juncadella Ferreiro, the deputy chief of staff for Miami-Dade Commissioner Sally Heyman. She is the one on the left. With the duck lips (channeling Barby Gimenez, are we?).

Ladra is told the other woman — the one on the right without the pouty ducky face — is also a Heyman staffer: Chief of Staff Bonnie Michaels, who looks like she really wanted to be in the picture.

Please notice the likes. I don’t follow Juncadella (mamadukes24), who has a private Instagram account (obviously someone I know does). But you can tell from the screen save that Brian Goldmeier, the mayor’s fundraiser, likes the photo. If lobster and blondes keep the Gimenez campaign finance chair happy, what are we gonna do, right?

Read related story: Why Carlos Gimenez should not have four more years

And he can afford it, okay? His contract guarantees him up to $18 million in the next 12 years. What’s a few hundred bucks for a nice dinner with wine and a couple of friends?

Just look at how happy he is! It almost looks like a date and RGT is now divorced from his lobbyist wife, Vicky Garcia Toledo, so we guess it could be. Who’s the third wheel?

Or maybe it was a belated birthday celebration: Garcia-Toledo turned 54 earlier this month.

Bet I know what he wished for: Four more years of the gravy train under Gimenez, which guarantees him lots of lobster in the future.

Carlos Gimenez is not the man I voted for in 2011.

The man we once considered an outsider on the dais, the voice of the people, has turned into the consummate inside deal broker, a man so entrenched in special interests and corrupt that his best friend and campaign finance chair has a $200-an-hour county contract worth $18 million over the next 12 years.

Gimenez went from being Ladra’s “Golden Boy” to a “Tainted Boy” — after he hooked up with the Hialeah hoodlums — and then “Cry Wolf Carlos,” after he kept threatening to lay everybody off, to “Mr. Giveaway,” when he started just giving millions away to millionaires.

It’s been a slippery slope. And as he faces the first real challenge to his dark and arrogant rule, it’s time to remind everyone why Carlos Gimenez should not be allowed to have another four years, what would be his last four years as mayor.

2011 — The Year of Setting Up

The descent started right after being elected in 2011. The new mayor asked the Commission on Ethics and Public Trust for an opinion on deals that were brought to the county by one of his two sons — the red light camera lobbyist or the project manager for a major construction firm. He was told to keep an arm’s distance. So he created an arm. Or, rather, five of them.

The deputy mayor system was created specifically to insulate Gimenez from his sons as well as his lobbyist friends and their special interest and still be able to wheel and deal at arm’s length. But it’s all a show. Because don’t think for a minute that dealing with Alina Hudak or Ed Marquez is any different than dealing with Carlos Gimenez. They will do what he wants them to do.

He also cut taxes by 12 percent, without really considering how that would impact the county in the following years. He did this 19 days after being sworn in July 1, 2011. And we’ve been paying the consequences ever since. Talk about inexperience and mismanagement. It was irresponsible. But, heck, it sounds good in robocalls and radio ads.

2012: The Year of the First Taste of Power 

In the summer of 2012, Mayor Gimenez got the commission to approve up to $5 million in funding to meet the county’s insurance deductible for damage done by heavy rains that year to the Ziff Ballet Opera House at the Arsht Performing Arts Center. Somewhere around 2,500 patrons had to be evacuated after water came gushing through the roof during a May performance of The Lion King. Though the $5 million comes from county coffers, the independent Performing Arts Center Trust was charged with hiring the contractors to make the repairs. Normally the PAC gets the county procurement department to request bids for its projects, but this was an emergency, county staffers told Ladra. And the job went to the company that hired the mayor’s son, Julio Gimenez.

In August that year, his campaign against a challenge from former Commissioner Joe Martinez gets caught up in an illegal absentee ballot operation. One of several people caught and arrested with dozens of absentee ballots was seen walking in and out of his Hialeah campaign office. He may not have known about it, but he certainly didn’t do enough about it after he found out. The man who told me personally in 2011 that he would reform absentee ballots to cut down on fraud was now looking the other way because it benefited him.

Nothing happens. Investigators later say they were stopped from going into Gimenez’s Hialeah campaign office because the State Attorney, whose campaign manager was also working for Gimenez, would not seek a subpoena. Nobody got jail time. And nobody followed up on the investigation, even though there was evidence that there were more people involved.

It’s never been spoken of again.

2013: The Year he “saved” Libraries

An obsession with sports stadiums started when early in 2013, Gimenez proposed a tourist bed tax increase to fund renovations and a roof at Dolphins Stadium, something he needed the state legislature to pass. He thought the idea was so revolutionary and fantastic — “best idea ever,” he called it — that he went so far as to having it put on fast track for a referendum and having the Miami Dolphins pay for it. The measure failed to get any support in Tallahasee and died.

Not to get too depressed about it, Gimenez flew to Paris for the air show and then later met his pal, lobbyist Jorge Luis Lopez, in Italy so they could get backstage passes to the Vatican.

When he came back, Gimenez proposed fire rescue cuts known as “brown outs” that would have some units at some stations out of service for several hours or days at a time. It would have severely impacted neighborhood service and response times. After firefighters had several street protests, the idea was dropped and money magically found (one of several times) to keep the fire rescue staffing levels.

But to fix the broken budget — which he had broken two years earlier, folks — Gimenez also proposed closing libraries and drastically cutting library programs and services. After much protest at County Hall and a number of budget town halls around the county, money was magically found again and the administration ended up only closing some branches on some weekdays and cutting staff.

There’s more. Please press this “continue reading” button to “turn the page.”

One of the main criticisms on Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez is that he is too comfy close with lobbyists.

It’s not just Ladra. A June 2013 poll showed that 55% of the people think he’s too beholden to lobbyists and special interests, and is being led by them rather than by the best interests of the county and taxpayers in his multiple, multi-million-dollar deal negotiations.

Little did they know, however, that he is soooo linked arm-in-arm with lobbyists that he has the sons of two cabilderos in the executive circle on his staff. Why not? After all, his own son is a lobbyist. Maybe he sees a little of his boy in these employees.

Read related story: Poll: Mayor Carlos Gimenez is too comfy close to lobbyists

Alex Ferro, the mayor’s chief of staff, is the son of lobbyist Simon Ferro. He’s been with Gimenez since the 2011 campaign, jumping from the Marcelo Llorente camp after the former State Rep. came in third in the recall replacement race. Llorente, also a lobbyist, is his cousin.

Ferro started as director of external affairs, a position that no longer exists (maybe because it was custom created) but became chief of staff in August 2014 after Lisa Martinez up and left for no apparent reason. Ferro got an 83% percent raise and makes $145,000 a year now. That’s more than Deputy Mayor Russell Benford (the black one). And he’s gotten to travel far and wide with Gimenez — to Denver, the White House (second from right in the photo here), even Paris.

His dad, Simon Ferro, has lobbied on land use issues, on zoning changes, a South Dade landfill and development of a Port Miami parcel. He’s represented Larkin Hospital, developers like Adrian Homes, shopping plazas and schools. Last year, he secured $400,000 in Building Better Communities bond monies for a Section 8 apartment building in Miami Beach. This year, he registered to lobby for two clients: Biscayne Housing, to argue for a tax exemption for a housing developer, and Bindor Somi, on issues related to a transit owned parcel in South Miami.

Michael Weiss is a mayor’s aide and the son of Richard Weiss, senior partner at Weiss, Serota Helfman, one of the main lobbying firms in Miami-Dade. Mike Weiss, who calls himself a policy and legislative analyst on his LinkedIn profile, was hired last year for an annual salary of $52,300.

Read related story: Carlos Gimenez new chief of staff gets 83% raise

His dad is registered this year but has not listed any clients so far. Last year, Richard Weiss lobbied for the city of Miami Gardens in their fight with the county over control of zoning and permitting of then SunLife, now Hard Rock Stadium. In 2013, he represented the Miami Heat organization in its negotiations for an extended agreement at the American Airlines Arena — which came out very favorable for them.

It’s hard not to wonder if Weiss’ position had other applicants and if it was competitive. Was it even advertised? There are 12 mayor’s aides. One of the other ones is Dotty Vazquez, the known boletera who worked on Gimenez”s 2012 campaign and got paid $10,000 for consulting (code word for absentee ballot collection).

Could there be 13? Maybe 14? Or more. I mean, how many lobbyist kids are graduating?  Are Jorge Luis Lopez‘s sons old enough yet to be looking for a job? Does Brian May have any kids? Maybe a daughter for a change?

Gimenez has long been criticized for being too close to lobbyists and one has to wonder if this is not one of those ways they scratch each others’ backs.

Read related story: Boleteras alive and well — and working in the mayor’s office

The poll in June 2014 by Bendixen Amandi for The Miami Herald, showed that 55 percent of the 400 people asked thought that Gimenez was too close to lobbyists. Only 27% believe he is negotiating in our best interest.

Among Hispanics, where Gimenez showed the most support in that poll, 52% thought he was too close to lobbyists and acting on behlf of special interests. But the number skyrocketed to 65% among black voters and 60% among white Anglo voters. Among Democrats, 59% saying these special interests exert too much influence over Gimenez.

“These are the disturbing figures,” Fernand Amandi, one of the pollsters — who since then has developed a mid morning political talk show on 610 WIOD — told Ladra two years ago.

But imagine how much more disturbing the figures would be if people knew that Gimenez had the sons of two lobbyists working in his office as some of his closest advisers.