Miami-Dade Commissioners will consider on Tuesday approving an $7.8-million contract that was already awarded, and for which work has already started, to you guessed it, Magnum Construction Management — which is the same post-bridge collapse Munilla Construction company under a different name — to build a new county fire station in Sweetwater.

Mayor Daniella Levine Cava (or, rather, someone in her office) awarded the contract for construction of Dolphin Fire Station No. 68 — a brand new, 13,000-square-foot, single story, three-bay station on 1.6 acres of land at 11091 NW 17th St. — in September. That’s five months ago.

Read Full Story

Miami-Dade has a new mayor as of last year. There are five new commissioners. There’s a new Chief Operating Officer. There’s a new director at Miami International Airport, a new chief of procurement.

But the same ol’ politically-connected family is getting the multi-million dollar deals.

Read Full Story

The collapse of the FIU pedestrian bridge and the lawsuits that followed seem to have pushed one-time Miami-Dade County darlings Munilla Construction Management to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
Pedro Munilla, pictured here with his wife, is often out at galas with Mayor and Lourdes Gimenez.
But that doesn’t mean that Pedro Munilla, an insider and longtime member of Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez‘s friends and family plan, can’t do any more municipal business. Munilla — who is related to Gimenez’s wife Lourdes and, as such, also to Miami-Dade School Board Member Mari Tere Rojas — owns at least 10 other active companies with his brothers and Frank Lopez, according to the Florida Division of Corporations.
In fact, MCM Construction of Florida LLC — which a month earlier was Munilla Construction Management LLC — changed its name in December to Magnum Construction Management LLC. At least they don’t have to spend a lot of money on new letterhead or a logo.
And the Gimenez sons — who have either worked for or lobbied for Munilla Construction — likely have jobs forever in one or the other company.
The most recent of the new companies, 315 Sunny Management LLC, was formed in December of last year, nine months after the bridge collapse and before the bankruptcy filing. Munilla’s partner there is Frank Lopez, who is also his partner at Shopping Plaza Corp., one of his first companies, incorporated in 1986, and earlier versions of Sunny Management.
Read related: I-395 signature bridge standoff is political palanca at its best
The Miami Herald and the Real Deal reported on Friday that MCM had sent a press release announcing the bankruptcy in order to put creditors off so they can reorganize. A spokesman has said that the company will continue to operate and has enough capital to finish projects it has already started.
The company could also use the time to negotiate settlements to lawsuits filed by survivors and family members of the six who died when the pedestrian bridge over Southwest 8th Street collapsed March 15. A federal investigation indicated that design flaws led to the cracks in the bridge’s foundation. While MCM partner FIGG Bridge Group designed the FIU pedestrian bridge, MCM supervised the construction and could be liable.
But MPM is not. And neither is Advanced Realty Management. Or 7501 Medley Civil LLC. Or Sunny Management LLC.
So before you start feeling bad for Mr. Munilla, know that he’s got options.

Read Full Story

An $800 mil bid protest plays out on social media

The two highest ranking firms competing for an $800 million contract to improve traffic flow and design and build a new I-395 signature bridge have taken their fight to social media in an effort to put public pressure on the Florida Department of Transportation.

This might be the first time a bid protest plays out on Facebook.

When the politically-connected second place bidder started using the bogus argument that there was not enough public input — and getting electeds like Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez and Commissioner Sally Heyman to act on their behalf — the first place firm started a Facebook page called Connect Miami to provide information about the design that was chosen, which includes a double decker expressway and a 55-acre urban park and heritage trail that pays homage to Overtown and our black and Carribean communities (more on that later).

Read related story: I-395 signature bridge standoff is political palanca at its best

Then, a counter Facebook page was created a few days ago titled “Our Bridge Our Choice” with posts are mostly skewered accounts of the FDOT’s recommendation to award the project to Archer Western/De Moya that say there was not enough public input. This, after more than four years, dozens of public meetings and an aesthetic review board with local officials — including Miami-Dade Commissioner Audrey Edomonson — that not only shortlisted the bridges from 18 to 7, but then ranked the five bidders who submitted them. They won an award for public input. Posts include an editorial written by former Commissioner Marc Sarnoff, who was one of the plaintiffs that in 2013 demanded more public input in the process and then agreed to the settlement with FDOT on the aesthetics review committee’s structure and role. He is complaining now as a private lobbyists and we do not know if he is working for someone because these bidders do not have to report their “campaign expenses.” Though this is exactly what these pages are and some of the opposition is: Paid.

And then on Wednesday, Sen. Rene Garcia weighed in, posting a letter he wrote to FDOT Rachel Cone a day earlier pn his Facebook page supporting the recommendation and saying that he has full confidence that the state agency process had sufficient transparency and more than the required feedback from the public to move forward.

“It is important to get the transformative 836/395 bridge project started for the commuters of Miami Dade County and more importantly to bring Overtown together again,” he wrote before posting the letter.

Garcia is responding to pressure from the second bidder, Fleur/Munilla, on members of the Miami-Dade Delegation of state legislators, urging them to pressure th FDOT. With a bid protest in the work and pressure from the mayor and the county’s Transportation Planning Organization also beating the Munilla’s drum, the Facebook campaigns are about getting the buzz and public opinion influenced early on. I half expect the pages to post the phone numbers for FDOT to be posted urging people to call them about the bridge.

There’s already a bunch of engagement. But Ladra is suspicious as to how Our Bridge Our Choice got four times as many “likes” in only a few days and wonders if they have a robot or are using one of those paid friend or follow generators. Connecting Miami, which started on or about May 12, has 1,243 friends. Our Bridge was created May 19. Its first post was on May 22. And it already has 4,974 likes? Seems unlikely to be organic.

Also, it is the only one of the two pages to have sponsored ads, which means someone is paying Facebook to get their message out. Probably a lot of money, judging by the number of likes.

Make no mistake. Neither page is an authentic community page. But the One Bridge page is more propaganda than the Connecting page, which has a lot of information and drawings about the winning bridge design and what makes it different and special. Cutting traffic down by 80 percent, for example, is a main feature that the other page doesn’t talk about. And it doesn’t pretend to be a grass roots page like the other one. It is straight up the winning bidder providing information.

Ladra is not sure what this does except get us all worked up in a frenzy and make some opportunistic social media “experts” a little money. Because the FDOT is not about to change its mind and say, “Whooooops. Oh, lookie here. We gave this $800 million job to the wrong people. We meant to give it to the mayor’s in-law. Here you go.” Can you imagine the precedent that would set?

Epecially not just because somebody said something on Facebook, where the FDOT South-Miami Area page — which has existed for months, years maybe (I’m not going to keep scrolling down. You do it.) — has only 368 likes. Which is weird because they post alerts on meetings about plans for expanding Kendall Drive and Krome Avenue and Ladra would have expected more people to be interested.

Maybe they should hire someone and spend a little money sponsoring posts. Then they can post the truth.

Carlos Gimenez cronyism could cost us future millions

Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez and his pals on the county commission are trying to sell us a bridge. Not just any bridge. His buddy’s bridge.

Recent hand-wringing over the selection of a firm to design and build an iconic, new signature bridge over Biscayne Boulevard along I-395 has cast a spotlight on just how Gimenez uses the office of the the county mayor to benefit his friends and family members.

The beneficiary this time (again) is Pedro Munilla, who is cousins or something with the mayor’s wife and CEO of Munilla Construction Management. The company gets a lot of government contracts. But not this one (the rendition inset in this paragraph). MCM was one of five firms that bid on the $800 million “signature bridge” project, in partnership with Fluor Enterprises. But it was ranked second by a Florida Department of Transportation selection committee after a process that has taken, on and off, about 25 years. Archer Western/De Moya  was ranked first.

Read related story: Miami-Dade mayor’s pal gets $6 mil extension on contract

Pedro Munilla, pictured here with his wife, is often out at galas with Mayor and Lourdes Gimenez.

One week later, Gimenez wrote a letter asking the FDOT, which is providing $600,000 and overseeing the project, to delay the contract so that the county could weigh in (read: so that Munilla can get a second chance). And he’s using some of his pocket commissioners, like Sally Heyman — well, to be honest, the Munillas write a lot of checks — to try slow the process down. Heyman passed a resolution at the Transportation Planning Organization Thursday urging the FDOT to let them review the bids and provide feedback. It’s not like they don’t have the time anyway, she added, if the Munillas file a bid protest as they have said they intend to do (don’t they always?). That could take up to five or six months to resolve, according to FDOT Secretary James Wolfe, who looked like he couldn’t believe they were even talking about this.

Feedback on a selection that has already been made? To what end? Do these lunatics actually expect the FDOT to suddenly change their minds, switch gears and award the contract to the obviously politically-connected, second-ranked bidder that applied palanca?

That is the $800 million question. And, yes, they do. Because that’s how it’s done in the 305. The FDOT is a state agency used to dealing with state contracts where procurement is less, well, political. But it’s really not that complicated as everyone wants to make it seem. The argument that the mayor and Heyman are making center on the premise that there has not been enough community involvement. Suddenly, out of the blue, after the contract has been awarded, during a public process with dozens of meetings and during which a county commissioner served on an advisory committee, the mayor wrote that the county wants to have more input.

How much you wanna bet he wouldn’t be seeking that input if Munilla had gotten the contract?

This is the Archer Western/De Moya bridge designe that was ranked first by FDOT. It is meant to look like a water fountain.

Because the truth is that, despite a Miami Herald story earlier this month that looks planted and almost manipulated by the mayor’s staff, there has been plenty of discourse and public input on the project. And Ladra is not just talking about the Aesthetic Review Committee on which Commissioner Audrey Edmonson sat, which was how the FDOT settled a lawsuit from city of Miami Mayor Tomas Regalado and then Commissioner Marc Sarnoff in 2013.

“What was settled in 2013 was not honored,” Heyman said at Thursday’s meeting.

Really, Sally? Really? Only Miami Gardens Mayor Oliver Gilbert got it right. The committee makes a recommendation. That doesn’t mean their recommendation has to override what the FDOT technical committee decides is the best bridge for traffic control reasons as well as aesthetic. Remember that easing traffic is the real reason they are doing this. Aesthetic concerns are just an additional bonus.

Read related story: Pot calls kettle black in Trial Rail bid protest by MCM’s Munilla

In fact, let’s review the history of the public input into efforts to build this particular bridge, which the FDOT started to look at around 1992. This timeline was put together with the help of three people close to the process, including a transportation professional and an engineer who has been working on different versions since the original 1992 one. Plus, Ladra was here the whole time.

Even back then, the back up from the northbound I-95 ramp on the 836 was causing havoc on downtown traffic, where ingress and outgress also wasn’t cake. There was also projected growth (its come true) that needed accomodating so they came up with a master plan that was not very masterful, just pretty much just widening and adding lanes. The black community balked because, shit, it looked like a repeat of what messed up Overtown so long ago when they first built I-95 and I-395 right through the community’s commercial streets. In 1996, the project died because there was so much community opposition.

People still talked about doing something in the future, though. They had to. They knew something had to be done eventually. Ideas included tunnels and elevated options. Somewhere between 2003 and 2004, the TPO’s predecessor, the Metropolitan Planning Organization, asked the FDOT to look at it again and while they were doing that, Regalado and Sarnoff sued the state to ensure it would be an iconic bridge that would represent the city for decades to come. The settlement was the creation of an unprecedented aesthetics review committee that had, among its members, a representative from each the county, the city of Miami, the Downtown Development Authority and a the Adrienne Arscht Center for the Performing Arts, which was next door.

This commitee not only had a chance to take the original 18 bridges submitted and shortlist it to seven, they were also given a scoring role, which was not agreed to in the lawsuit settlement. They were given far more power than the FDOT needed to give them. But the state didn’t stop there.

The FDOT opened up an office in Overtown and met with hundreds of people over the course of years. Congresswoman Federica Wilson took a group of people because Ladra saw a picture of that meeting and of about a dozen other meetings where they discussed what they wanted to see in their neighborhood. Perhaps they couldn’t look at specific drawings. They couldn’t. The procurement process has to be done in a “cone of silence” precisely to keep the politics out of it. But they provided feedback on what they wanted to see. There was so much feedback, in fact, that transportation officials soon realized they would not be able to just widen and add lanes. They had to bring some life back into the neighborhood if the project was to move forward. The design includes a park underneath the bridge, the “Heritage Trail” that serves sort of like an North end Underline on steroids with actual historic significance in a part of the county and city that is too often ignored (more on that later).

The process has won awards for its public input. It has been an uprecedented process for FDOT.

And, now, because of the political meddling of a corrupt mayor, they will likely not repeat it. Who would blame them? This cronyism crap is probably also going to cost us millions in the future. Just when we are going to need state and federal dollars the most for our SMART plan to expand mass transit, our mayor pulls the political palanca stunt. Does he really think the FDOT is just going to forget about it and come back for more of this? Heck, there’s already talk that Tampa officials are calling the state agency and saying they will let the FDOT spend the $600 million in Tampa any way they want. And, believe me, those calls are getting more and more attention.

Read related story: Carlos Gimenez son’s firm got $4 million PAC repair job

Ladra is certain that the second-ranked Munilla bridge was pretty. It does look like dancers, however, and that may be why it got a perfect score from John Richard, director of the Adrienne Arscht Center for the Performing Arts (which three years ago gave a no-bid contract worth $4 million to a company that employed the mayor’s son). Richardstanked the other bidders and gave the Munilla project the only perfect score, which is the only reason that the Fluor/Munilla project got scored half a point under Archer Western. Expect Gimenez and others to make a big deal out of that small gap. But please remember that the only reason that happened was Richard’s scoring. He dnot only gave the only perfect scores to Fluor/Munilla, he was also the only one to score the Archer Western bridge as poor. Everybody else was either very good or good or excellent (which is what Edmonson ranked it). And remember that Richard’s facility depends on Gimenez for subsidies that are now competitively sought by other facilities, like the Frost and PAMM museums.

Maybe Richard is acting on Gimenez’s behalf. Because there is no doubt here that Gimenez is acting on his buddy Munilla’s behalf.

The fact that he is so bold and blatant about it is what should be most concerning. Because it shows that Gimenez, who is termed out after these next three and a half years, is going to use his remaining time on the 29th floor to get his friends and families as much as possible.

Like an $800 million bridge.

The Cortadito calendar is back in time for May.

Yes, we missed the last couple of weeks in April but, other than the Gables runoff, nothing important was happening. Ladra needed some time off.

This week, we resume with a few meetings and candidate events. But there must be more going on.

Please make it easier for me and send me information about your government meetings, candidate forums and political protests to edevalle@gmail.com and they’ll keep — or start — appearing in the Cortadito Calendar.

TUESDAY — May 2

8:30 a.m. –The Tuesday Morning Breakfast Club seems to be going through the candidates for this year’s elections as speakers. After having gotten every candidate declared so far for the Group 2 commission seat, the attention has turned to the mayoral race. This Tuesday morning the cafe con leche bunch can hear from former State Sen. Dan Gelber, who filed to run for this seat earlier this year. Commissioner Michael Grieco, who filed last year, is going to speak next week. Former Mayor Matti Bower serves as moderator at the morning meetings, which are at Pueto Sagua Restaurant, 700 Collins Ave.

9:30 a.m. — Our Miami-Dade County Commission meets to consider several things, including $12.2 million in more water and sewer consent decree improvements,  a $37.5 million contract to Munilla Construction, pals of Mayor Carlos Gimenez, for upgrades to Councorse F at Miami International Airport. That’s $37.5 million in upgrades. They will also talk about funding two new park and ride lots for busways, as they continue to stall the inevitable light rail, and the creation of new committees to advise the commission on new municipal incorporation efforts. It also looks like there’s an amendment to the land use code to allow for a new “employment center planned area development” and a “retail entertainment district planned area development” which seem custom made for the American Dream megamall in Northwest Miami-Dade.

6:30 p.m. — There’s a new mayor in Coral Gables, but who is going to be the mayor in North Miami? Voters can meet the candidates Tuesday evening as each of them present their vision for the future of the city. Mayor Smith Joseph has three challengers. Danielle Beauvais, an alternative medical consultant who ran for mayor before, middle school teacher Tyrone Hill, who ran for a council seat in 2001 and lost in the runoff, and retired doctor Hector Medina, who is well known in the community. District 2 Councilwoman Carol Keys is challenged by Ilyana Albarrán, founder of a research and consulting company. District 3 Councilman Philippe Bien-Aime has two challengers: former Councilman Jean Marcellus and security company owner Wancito Francius. The meeting at the Griffing Community Center, 12220 Griffing Blvd., should be over by 8 p.m. The election is May 9.

THURSDAY — May 4

6:30 p.m. — If you want to meet the man behind so many presidents, including Donald Trump, and maybe buy one of his books, then this is the event for you. A Roger Stone book signing at The Club At Renaissance Gables, (the old Victor’s Cafe), at 2340 Sw 32 Ave. The event is supposedly hosted by Trump volunteers but you know Stone is a master at promoting himself, not just candidates. Hurry up. Before he is detained for his part in Russiagate.

7 p.m. — Help plan the future of Palmetto Bay’s park system. A public meeting on the city’s master plan for parks and open spaces begins at 7 p.m. Thursday at Village Hall, 9705 E Hibiscus St.