Assistant City Manager Alberto Parjus is in charge meanwhile
Coral Gables City Manager Peter Iglesias will live to see another day at City Hall.
Iglesias survived an attempt to fire him driven by newly-elected Commissioner Ariel Fernandez, who said at Tuesday’s commission meeting that Iglesias was too secretive and rude to residents and was leading the city in the wrong direction.
UPDATED: Well, that didn’t take long.
True to his campaign talk, newly-elected Commissioner Ariel Fernandez has moved to dismiss City Manager Peter Iglesias. He has put a discussion on the May 9 commission agenda “regarding the termination of the city manager.”
When fire department officials and police brass in Coral Gables first raised concerns about the new public safety building the city had designed without their input, they were told it was too late to make any significant changes.
But there have been some minor interior adjustments made just recently after the forced resignation of embattled Assistant City Manager Frank Fernandez, who was also the public safety director and who helped design the original building with office space for himself and a staff of at least two people.
Read related: Coral Gables’ Frank Fernandez is out — but still getting paid
Fernandez resigned last month, effective in April, and is not going to be immediately replaced. So what happens to that space? It has been reworked, said City Manager Peter Iglesias.
Since Iglesias said he does not plan to put public safety back in the hands of an assistant city manager — and, in fact, already put emergency management back in the rightful hands of the fire department — that space for a wannabe police chief is no longer needed (not that it ever was).
“It’s not a big deal,” Iglesias told Ladra about the “minor tweaks” and said that there were no exterior changes made to the footprint of the 5-story, 118,000-square-foot complex going up at 2151 Salzedo Street, about six blocks north of the current and decrepit police and fire department headquarters.
Also, he said, the last minute changes were done with input from the fire department and police department brass.
“They’re interior changes and we worked with everyone. I can tell you I worked with everyone,” Iglesias said.
Read related: New proposed Coral Gables police and fire HQ raises concerns, ‘propaganda’
That italics is his because even the city manager admits that the fire department and police department leaders were not brought into the loop during the initial design phase, which led to concerns about the allocation of space to firefighter housing and equipment wells — and maybe for staff that wasn’t needed.
The $52.2 million complex was designed with the future in mind and is expected to meet the city’s needs for the next 75 years, Iglesias told Ladra. It will replace the old and crumbling police and fire department headquarters at 2801 Salzedo Street (pictured here).
Site work began about a month ago some piles have been installed, the manager said, adding that the target completion is in September, 2020, which seems very optimistic. But the official ground breaking with all the ladeeda city hullaballo is at 11 a.m. Friday.
Expect it to be well attended by the candidates in April’s election.
After three tough and tumble years at the City Beautiful, Coral Gables Assistant City Manager Frank Fernandez is finally on his way out — four months from now.
Fernandez will keep getting his $188,000 annual salary and keep reaping his benefits through April, getting paid to basically sit at home and look for a new job. It amounts to a 20-week severance.
Just in time for the election. Ladra smells a campaign issue.
A “cooperation and transition agreement” signed Monday says he is no longer in charge of anything or anyone but must remain available by phone or email through April 19 should City Manager Peter Iglesias need him for something or other.
Read related: Frank Fernandez and Peter Iglesias stay in Coral Gables — for now
It ends sooner if Fernandez (right) finds a job before that. But c’mon, who wouldn’t make their start date April 20 under these circumstances?
Another good question: What mutual “best interest” is there on this good, green Earth for the city — and this means you, dear taxpayers — to pay Frank Fernandez six figures to stay home and look for a new job?
Iglesias would not return several calls and an email asking to explain why he would ever need Fernandez, who has been a thorn in the side of the police and fire supervisors since he was hired in June of 2015. Iglesias won’t talk to me at all unless, apparently, it is through city spokeswoman Maria Rosa Higgins Fallon.
But Ladra knows that he took police and fire away from Fernandez as soon as he was made interim manager in September. He had both the police chief and fire chief report to him since and he returned the emergency management department to the fire chief’s purview.
Former City Manager Cathy Swanson-Rivenbark — who at least had the guts to speak for herself — brought Fernandez with her from Hollywood and made him public safety director, causing an already strained relationship between herself and the police chief to become toxic and eventually force her resignation in September. Some insiders say it was the Fernandez factor and her stalwart refusal to let him go that led to Swanson-Rivenbark’s abrupt separation from the city. She took a bullet for him, in other words. Sources also say that Fernandez begged to keep his position and that this was the compromise.
Read related: Coral Gables City Manager Cathy Swanson-Rivenbark quits job in battle with chief
But if Iglesias can’t do the job without having Fernandez at home at his beck and call, then commissioners need to reconsider having him in that position permanently.
Because it does not take a talented genius to realize that it is not at all in the mutual “best interest” for Fernandez to keep accruing sick time and personal and vacation time and keep getting benefits through these next four months.
Ladra asked how the exit packages compare, and because he hasn’t worked for the city five years yet, Fernandez is not vested, Higgins Fallon said. Still, he can accrue more annual and sick leave — some top officials get up to 15 or 20 hours a month — and the city will continue to contribute to his 401K plan, according to the agreement.
Read related: Coral Gables cover up on police ‘spy’ protects managers
Ladra was not able to immediately get those exact figures to compare his payout in April to a payout this week, but there is no reason to believe it wouldn’t be significantly higher.
And still he felt the need to stiff one of his underlings with the $174 bill for the going away party he threw for himself and 14 of his closest friends at the police station Friday.
Fernandez will have to turn over his city vehicle, his city-issued weapon(s), his taser gun and any other city-owned equipment by 5 p.m. this Friday.
Except his ipad. He gets to keep the city-issued ipad and a city email through April 19.
What is it that Frank Fernandez has over the city that the city can’t seem to get over him?
It’s been two weeks since Cathy Swanson Rivenbark, officially and reluctantly resigned as city manager in Coral Gables in the light of major commission resistance to her battle with the police chief and insistence that her No. 2 keep his status as the highest ranking cop in the city.
In an ironic twist, Assistant City Manager Frank Fernandez — who many believe is the cause of all the anguish with his sworn status and public safety domain — seems to be sticking around. Fernandez is still a top city administrator, though he is no longer overseeing public safety. The police and fire chiefs report directly to interim City Manager Peter Iglesias, who has made it very clear that Chief Ed Hudak is the top sworn officer in the city.
Everything is happening quietly and quickly, so as to not get any more negative attention that the city leaders hate so much. But, although it is not on the agenda for Tuesday’s meeting, some of the details of the new administrative structure — and hints about the future — may come up anyway. An ENews blast sent Sept. 19 said “The City Commission will discuss the process for hiring a new City Manager at the next Commission Meeting scheduled for September 25.”
Read related: Coral Gables Manager Cathy Swanson-Rivenbark quits job in battle with chief
Ladra’s sources said they expect the mayor to bring it up in his comments. And word is Iglesias will be made acting manager for the foreseeable future, perhaps forever.
Neither Mayor Raul Valdes Fauli nor Commissioner Mike Mena, who have re-election bids six months from now, want to have the whole city manager mess in the public eye with a national search at campaign time. Las malas lenguas say they want to put it off ’til after the April election because they don’t want it to become a campaign issue.
Ladra says too late!
But further than that, there are rampant rumors that Iglesias already has the job permanently. Even while residents and business leaders demand a true national search that is not a total joke like the last one.
Commissioner Vince Lago told Ladra in a text message that he was in no hurry to make another change.
“I am interested in giving Peter a few months to acclimate and show his ability,” Lago wrote. “The issues with Frank are still being ironed out. They are reviewing his job responsibilities and seeing how he can continue to serve in a limited capacity in regards to public safety.”
Ladra heard Fernandez doesn’t even have an office at the police station anymore. Nobody saw him there Monday.
But is he still going to wear a uniform? Is he still gonna carry a gun?
Read related: Coral Gables leaders to discuss police structure; or will it be more theater?
And there is still the issue of human resources, which he also oversaw. If he can still hire and fire police personnel and force Hudak to work with people that he would have passed on, it’s still a problem. That’s something that maybe should be discussed. Is the new Internal Affairs major who was hired despite Hudak wanting someone else going to stay on as well?
And if Fernandez is not overseeing public safety, which — as he and Swanson-Rivenbark liked to stress — is his wheelhouse, then what the hell is he going to be doing? Historic preservation? Parks and Rec?
Iglesias, photographed here taking his seat on the first day of his new job Sept. 11, was hired away from the city of Miami in 2016 by Swanson-Rivenbark to oversee Public Works, Development Services, Parking, Historical Resources and Cultural Arts, Economic Development, and Community Recreation. Some think he’s part of a Bermuda triangle with Fernandez and Cathy but he’s made it clear to commissioners he’s his own man.
Sources say he’s a very capable and straightforward guy and, according to the city, he still makes $179,263.34 a year. No raise. Not yet anyway.
But he’s an engineer, a scientist, a geek of sorts. He’s not a generalist or a deal maker. And some are gonna say he’s not typical city manager material.
Maybe that’s a good thing.
According to the separation agreement signed with the city, Swanson gets a severance of 20 weeks at $3,942 a week for $78,840 and maybe another week if she can sell her accrued sick time. She also gets a 401K valued at $196,458 after the city contributed $51,250 a year for almost four years. But she must give up her car, her medical insurance and her life insurance.
It seems like the bronze version of Pat Salerno‘s golden parachute.
Read related: Pat Salerno upped his retirement benefit before he left
Swanson-Rivenbark wasn’t at the Sept. 11 meeting where her resignation was accepted unanimously. She wanted to be. Sources say an 11th hour effort to list her laurels and make a case for herself was thwarted. So Swanson-Rivenbark put it on paper, in a three page resignation letter with a five page addendum of her proclaimed achievements. To no avail.
Like Ladra said, the decision was unanimous. Even Commissioner Pat Keon, her most stalwart defender, had given up by then. Mounting missteps in the manager’s personal vendetta battle against the popular police chief had already disillusioned the other four at varying degrees. The key was Commissioner Mena, who woke up from a coma just in time to maybe ward off a legit challenge to his seat next year, which is why he wants, shhh… be quiet.
Who? What?
Exactly.
Move along now. Nothing has happened here.
