A ragtag group of attorneys and former elected officials have formed a committee to elect none other than one-time State Rep. and former Miami-Dade School Board Member Renier Diaz de la Portilla.

And it’s just…meh.

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Two old oak trees on Grand Avenue in Coral Gables were cut down to make way for an entrance into the Wawa gas station and convenience store that is planned for that corner, despite the opposition of many residents and parents at the elementary school across the street.

WaWa will pay a little more than $17,400 for “tree mitigation,” according to emails obtained from the city.

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Plans for the Amerian Dream megamall — billed as the largest retail center/amusement park in the U.S. — will go before the Miami-Dade County Commission for the first time Wednesday as they seek changes to the county land use and development master plan maps. And the two big topics will be traffic and tax breaks.

After all, we are talking about 3.5 million square feet of retail, a 350,000-square-foot amusement park, a 350,000-square-foot water park, a miniature golf course, an indoor ski slope, a lake with underwater submarine rides and water skiing, a 120,000-square-foot entertainment zone with restaurants and nightclubs, a youth sports center, one or more hotels providing 2,000 rooms and enough parking to accomodate all of that.

Traffic is the main concern plaguing both those who opppose the megamall and those who are in favor. There should be plenty of public speakers Wednesday as commissioners consider amending the Comprehensive Development Master Plan, the first step to allow for the mall’s construction.

“I would just hope the plan they show us has a robust transportation plan that allows people to get in and out relatively easily,” said Commission Chairman Esteban Bovo, who otherwise supports the mall because of the jobs it will create — Ladra has heard anywhere from 30,000 to 46,000, with 15,000 being permanent — and the $35 million or so in tax revenue that it is estimated to provide beginning the first year of operation, he said.

“Make no mistake, it’s going to have an impact,” Bovo said. “If what they submit to the board does not show a transportation plan that works for them and for us — and they know this — then this is not going to fly.”

A lot of folks also want promises that developer Triple Five Group is not going to seek tax breaks either from the county or the state — not even through the creation of a special taxing district that would divert tax dollars from the county’s general fund and earmark them for infrastructure and traffic mitigation that the mall’s developers would otherwise have to pay from their own pockets. Impact fees are estimate to cost Triple Five close to $120 million.

“At no time has anybody represented to me in any kind of way that they plan to come to us for financial support,” Bovo said. “He can go to the state and get transportation dollars, but the county is not going to entertain using property taxes to support this project.”

Triple Five sure talked to Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez about a tax break. Gimenez admitted to the Herald that they had been asking for subsidies since Day 1.

Read related story: Mega mall gets public land on rushed timeline

But they already got a tremendous deal on the land, didn’t they? After months of secret negotiations with Gimenez, the mayor in 2015 lobbied the state to put the land — 80 some acres they had already identified they needed to complete their accumulation of properties — on the surplus properties list so that the county could buy it at government-to-government prices. Then he sold it to the developer without getting appraisals or putting it out to bid — for the same government price, $12.3 million. That’s $153,750 an acre, which Ladra is sure is way below market value. So, Gimenez had the county act as a pass through for a special government price on 80 acres of land for a private megamall development. We should hope there’s no more coming from the public trough.

Gimenez told the Miami Herald that he had told Triple Five the county was not interested in diverting any taxes through any “tax increment financing” or special taxing district mechanism and that he had told them so. But the developer has tapped government financing before, for the Mall of America in Minnesota and the first American Dream mall, which is an unfinished empty shell in Meadowlands, N.J. And one of Triple Five’s lobbyists, former State Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla — who coincidentally sponsored legislation last year to allow counties to create their own tax increment financing districts for commercial developments — wouldn’t commit to a no and told Herald reporter Doug Hanks that it was too early for any conversation about public funding.

Too early? Pffft. Here’s a translation of that: Yes, we are going to seek public dollars wherever we can but we just don’t want to talk about that until we get the ball rolling and it is too difficult or cumbersome to stop it.

Diaz de la Portilla also told Ladra that this was just the first of at least seven to nine public meetings and steps for the megamall development. If the requested changes to the CDMP are approved by the commission Wednesday, that gets transmitted to the state for review by several agencies which could set conditions for further approvals. Then it comes back to the county in April or May for zoning changes and the development agreement. That’s when the real wheeling and dealing is supposed to start.

The flagship DLP also said that the only real opposition is coming from competing malls (who, in a funny twist, hired Gimenez pal and fundraiser Alex Heckler as their lobbyist). But Ladra has talked to residents in Miami Lakes and Palm Springs North, as well as environmentalists, who are concerned about the impact. Some business leaders have also quietly questioned the wisdom of such a huge megamall development at a time when retail sales are suffering nationwide (which may be why the New Jersey version of the American Dream is not yet awake).

That brings us back to the taxing district thing, which could possibly offset the losses of a down retail market. While it’s supposedly too early to talk about tax breaks, Diaz de la Portilla said he would be willing Wednesday to talk about anything that commissioners ask him about it. So commissioners better ask him about it! Ladra is talking to every single one of you. We are all watching.

Read related story: American Dream lobby team = casino connections

Although, really, Ladra doesn’t know how much we can believe what the developer and/or their mouthpiece says. The American Dream application says the project, once complete, will attract 40 million visitors a year. That’s more than twice as many as the 19.3 million people who visit Disney’s Magic Kingdom annually. So you’re really telling us there’s going to be more visitors here than at Disney World? Really? Does a ski slope in South Florida have that much pull? 

If that is the case, then the transportation plan better be freaking magical.

There’s also an application at Wednesday’s meeting for a zoning amendment to the land development map for a mixed-use project on a neighboring site by the Graham Companies. This project has a proposed 3-million-square-foot business park with retail, offices, industrial space and hotels, as well as 2,000 apartment.

And that, alone, is expected to generate more than 10,000 new trips by 2020.

Most of us have been preoccupied — perhaps obsessed is a better word — with the presidential or the Miami-Dade mayoral election. But there were a lot of other races that culminated with Tuesday’s vote. Here are some highlights:

Sen. Marco Rubio beat Congressman Patrick Murphy back to gain another six years in office. He has said he will serve all six years. And that is probably true — especially now that Donald Trump won the presidency. If he likes it and wants to stay, the Republican Party will have to back The Donald in 2020. So this means we will have to wait until 2024 to have our first Hispanic president. Good thing Marquito is a young man.

Rubio’s onetime BFF, former Congressman David Rivera lost his bid to go back to the State House — by 45 votes. Isn’t that close enough for a mandatory recount? His 49% showing is much better than he fared in his bid to get back into Congress in 2012, where he lost the primary with just 8 percent in a five-man field (even Joe Martinez beat him). But still, we have a new face in Tallahassee: Robert Asencio, a former Miami-Dade Schools Police lieutenant won one of two House seats that turned blue. Rivera had waged a negative campaign, calling Asencio a child abuser based on a 2003 complaint from the mother of a student who was physically pulled off a bus for acting inappropriately. The investigation was closed without any findings.

Read related story: ‘Child abuser’ allegations in House 118 race ring hollow

But 118 is the second of two local House seats that turned blue Tuesday after Democrat Daisy Baez eeked out a victory over Republican John Couriel to replace termed-out State Rep. Erik Fresen (who is rumored to be after J-Rod’s new Senate seat). Both of them had run previous campaigns and had the benefit of having some name recognition, despite never holding office. But Baez got just under 51% and a lead of 1,301 votes.

Former Congressman Joe Garcia lost his own bid to get his own seat back, but not as closely. There’s a glaringly wide 11-point gap between U.S. Rep. Carlos Curbelo‘s 52% and Garcia’s 41% performance. Ladra suspects that when the numbers are crunched, we’ll find a bunch of Democrats who voted for Curbelo because of his liberal ways marriage equality and sea level rise and his early rejection of Donald Trump. And I bet Garcia is rethinking those ads that compared Curbelo to Trump, who is the apparent winner of the big POTUS prize. Anyway, that giant gap in the year that Curbelo would be allegedly vulnerable — because that’s it, folks, he is welded into that seat now like IRL — should certainly encourage Garcia to stay in the private sector. Ladra said it long ago. The only person that could have beat Curbelo was Ana Rivas Logan. Too bad she decided to run for state senate. Now we’re stuck with him.

Senator Miguel Diaz de la Portilla, a former Miami-Dade Commissioner and flagship of a political dynasty, lost a heated battle with State Rep. (now Sen.) Jose Javier Rodriguez, 46 to 49% — and turned the longheld Republican seat (brother Alex Diaz de la Portilla sat there for a decade before DLP took over in 2010) blue. The senior DLP outspent J-Rod more than 2 to 1, which almost proves that it is worth more to knock on 150,000 doors than it is to buy slick commercials that tries in vain to cast a liberal onetime legal aid attorney as beholden to special interests. It’s too bad. Miguel DLP was my favorite senator and, while J-Rod will likely be stymied, the incumbent actually did some good as a senior member of the majority party and may have better represented the district. Oh well. Maybe DLP will run for Coral Gables mayor next year.

Ending another political dynasty in the other really heated and mostly negative state senate race — and flipping the seat the other way — State Rep. Frank Artiles will move to the other chamber after he beat incumbent Sen. Dwight Bullard, 51% to 41%. Guess all that business about Bullard being a terrorist worked. It’s scary to think we may see a resurgence of Artiles’ ugly bathroom legislation targeting transgenders. But does this mean he can move back into his Palmetto Bay house? He was forced to move out after Ladra caught him living outside his state House district in 2010.

There will be two runoffs for the mayor’s seat in Doral and in Miami Lakes, where none of the candidates were able to garner 50% of the vote.

Read related story: It ain’t over in Doral, Miami Lakes with mayoral runoffs

There was a big upset in the Miami-Dade School Board race where Steve Gallon III beat incumbent Wilbert “Tee” Holloway III with a resounding 61%. Gallon got a lot of the community support in a district — which includes Miami Gardens, Carol City and North Miami — where Holloway was cast as an empty suit. And it earned him a 22-point lead Tuesday. The other school board seat went to Gimenez in-law Maria Teresa Rojas, as expected. Not just because she is a longtime teacher and school administrator but also because the voters in that district probably reacted vehemently to a negative campaign in which her challenger was cast as a Fidel Castro sympathizer. Look soon for an announcement of Political Cortadito’s expansion into school board coverage.

We can also smoke pot to relieve certain debilitating conditions and chill out about having our own solar energy one day as voters approved the medical marijuana constitutional amendment but rejected the amendment on solar energy choice that would have basically limited our choices and allowed Big Energy to control everything. Voters were not fooled by that one — except in Miami-Dade where we actually had a majority vote yes on this wolf in sheep’s clothing (56 to 44%). Shaking my head.

There were also a bunch of questions in municipalities from Homestead to Sunny Isles Beach and we will get to those individually if they warrant it in the next few days. Some notable examples: Voters in Palmetto Bay rejected a proposal to annex a part of West Perrine. In South Miami, they gave the green light for the building of a new City Hall. And, in North Miami Beach, voters approved a slew of charter changes, including term limits and one that makes it easier for the council to fire the city manager. Please feel free to make suggestions/ask questions.

In fact, Ladra has a feeling we will be writing and reading about the results of this ballot for weeks to come.

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.

While everybody was concentrated on the primary last week, several Republicans without August challengers were eager to get to November, with mailers and TV ads already — since even before qualification and the Fourth of July.

That would be State Rep. Frank Artiles, who is running for Senate in District 40 against incumbent Sen. Dwight Bullard, who won Tuesday. Artiles, whose also had people knocking on doors, sent a Happy Fourth of July piece with a framed picture of his family. In others, he touts himself as an education champion. He even sent a 2016-2017 public school calendar as school started. Smart.

Read related story: So much Andrew Korge in the mailbox — maybe a record 

And Artiles is targeting independent voters, which is also smart. He’s got the Republicans sewn up already. And maybe he can win some Democrats over with his campaign against the MDX tolls. The most recent mailer Ladra saw touted Artiles’ fight against these tolls.

Incumbent Sens. Anitere Flores and Miguel Diaz de la Portilla, as well as State Rep. Michael Bileca, have also been working it alongside the August wannabes.

Flores has traveled to the Keys, which are also in her district, for months and she has been airing a TV commercial for a couple of weeks that features her husband, Dustin, and their two boys, who she is raising in the same neighborhood where she grew up.

The Flagship DLP started airing a TV ad this week, paid for by the United Teachers of Dade, featuring real teachers thanking him for listening to them and voting to increase their funding. He also sent a couple of mailers way before the primary. One of them had voter petitions enclosed, so it was even before qualification. The most recent used the Zika scare to offer voters a list of tips voters can keep on the fridge.

Read related story: Miguel DLP vs J-Rod make it a hard choice in Senate 37

Bileca’s most recent “fighting for taxpayers” mailer touts the old Miami Dolphins stadium financing he helped kill in 2013. What? He’s got nothing fresher from the last three years? He, too, is very smartly targeting independent voters. 

But his first piece — “Working Hard. Delivering Results.” — was sent in both English and Spanish and was a four-panel bi-fold. The latest piece is a 8X11 flat card.

Up to the north, State Sen. Rene Garcia and State Reps. Manny Diaz, Jr., Jose Oliva and Bryan Avila have been hitting the streets since at least mid August, when they opened their collective headquarters in Hialeah.

Maybe these early birds know that the weeks ahead are going to give our mailboxes a bellyache, so they snuck in before prime time.

Let’s see if voters remember come November.