The campaigning for state seats in this year’s election has begun in earnest. Looks like the first meet and greet of the season is in Coral Gables Tuesday.

Four Democrat candidates for state office will be there for a Q&A at the Coral Gables Democratic Club’s monthly meeting. Among them, only State Rep. Michael Grieco — now running for state senate — has already been elected. He is challenging Republican incumbent Ileana Garcia in Florida Senate District 36.

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The image could not be more poetically appropriate.

Here he was, the fabulous Mayor Francis Suarez of Miami, standing in front of TV cameras and the world, perfectly manicured eyebrows in place, fancy Bitcoin branded sneakers on like a rock star rapper, calling our city the capital of capital and the future of finance — while making strong man poses for a gazillion photos with a shiny, 11-foot, 3,000-pound metal bull.

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The Miami-Dade Commission election is sneaking up on us — it’s in August, not November, like the state and congressional races — and it’s going to be a pretty important one, with five of the six seats open, thanks to term limits.

Say goodbye to commissioners Jean Monestime, Sally Heyman, Rebeca Sosa, Javier Souto, and Jose “Pepe” Diaz, who is widely rumored to be running for mayor in Sweetwater next. Commissioner Danielle Cohen Higgins, who got her incumbency through an appointment, is going to face her first election but is favored to win, so far.

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Pinecrest Councilwoman Anna Hochkammer — who once aspired to the Florida Senate — is considering a run for State House in District 115, according to a poll that voters got on their cellphones Friday evening.

The first questions of the short poll, after identifiers like race and ethnicity, were to gauge the favorability and unfavorability of several politicians — including both Republican candidates in the 115 race already, GOP campaign veterans and first time candidates Alina Garcia and Alexis Catalayud, who are relatively unknown.

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One week, State Rep. Vance Aloupis (R-115) — who broke with his Republican colleagues to vote against the hateful “Don’t Say Gay” bill — announces he’s decided not to run for re-election so he could spend more time with his family.

Days later, first time state candidate and longtime Republican political operative Alina García jumped into that race from the state Senate District 38 race, where she had raised almost $200,000 through the end of February, according to her most recent campaign report.

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The executive director fired from the Omni Community Redevelopment Agency last month was just the first casualty of Commissioner Alex Diaz de la Portilla‘s wrath — and/or graft.

ADLP was made chairman of the Omni CRA in February and immediately started to retaliate against employees who may have cooperated with authorities in the investigation into ghost employee Jenny Nillo, his longtime lacky. Since former Executive Director Jason Walker was asked to leave the day after Diaz de la Portilla was named chair, every CRA employee has been chased off — except for one.

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