A confidential offering memorandum distributed to potential investors last year, shows that the developers of the South Dade Logistics and Technology District — the complex of warehouses they want to build across the Urban Development Boundary — were counting on the “relationships” they had to make it happen.
This is important because the developers had five bites at the apple before the commission finally approved an adjusted application Nov. 1 to develop 311 acres of farmland into an industrial park. While the professional staff and every state and federal agency and environmental group — even Sen. Marco Rubio — urged the commission to vote against the application, many commissioners went out of their way to defend the developers’ position and make their case for them.
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Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava vetoed on Thursday the Nov. 1 vote to move the Urban Development Boundary for a controversial 311-acre industrial park to be developed on flood-prone agricultural land.
After four deferrals gave the developers time to iron out details and make it more palatable to the commission, they were finally able to tweak it enough to convince a super majority, which is what was needed to move the UDB.
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Same 8 commissioners who approved the application could override
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The fourth time was the charm for the developers of the South Dade Logistics and Technology District, a 380-acre industrial and office park proposed on what used to be farmland — just over the Miami-Dade Urban Development Boundary.
They got the necessary 8-4 supermajority, instead of the 9 votes they would have needed if the vacant seat left by the removal of Joe Martinez was filled. But lobbyist Jeffrey Bercow et al can thank two commissioners in particular: Chairman Jose “Pepe” Diaz — who fought tooth and nail for them from the beginning — and Commissioner Raquel Regalado, who changed her vote from no to yes in exchange for (read: under cover of) getting some environmentally endangered lands in return.
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Speculators who want to change the zoning on 800 acres of environmentally sensitive land outside the Urban Development Boundary will get another bite of the apple on Wednesday.
To call them developers would be wrong. They are real estate flippers who have no real plan to develop the land, no announced tenants, and no control of the land in question. About a quarter of the assembled farmland acreage is not even for sale and will not be part of any repurposing. It will continue to grow food, the owner insists.
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It was painful to watch. But worth noting. And Ladra may watch last week’s Miami-Dade Comprehensive Development Master Plan meeting again.
Several Miami-Dade County Commissioners went out of their way and made excruciatingly strange arguments Thursday to defend and promote a land use change that would replace 800 acres of farmland with an industrial park and commercial uses just south of the Florida Turnpike and north of Moody Drive.
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