Newly-elected Miami-Dade Tax Collector Dariel Fernandez has wasted no time in making his mark in an office that has gotten very little attention in the past.
Fernandez, who has gone to multiple municipalities to explore opening satellite offices, will preside over the ribbon-cutting Monday of the new Driver License Service Point at the tax collector’s department in Downtown Miami, 200 NW Second Ave.
The goal, Fernandez has said, is to streamline services and cut down on long lines in a process that seems to have fallen apart in Miami-Dade — the obtaining or renewing of a driver’s license. The office will serve as a one-stop shop for residents who will now be able to renew their license, tag and pay their property taxes at the same location.
The tax collector’s office will dedicate three service windows exclusively for driver license and motor vehicle transactions, with the capacity to serve at least 90 people a day, according to a department statement. Though that seems like just the morning at Coral Reef. Both walk-ins and appointments will be accepted. Customers will be able to conduct most driver license transactions, with the exception of driving tests.
Read related: Meet our new Supervisor of Elections Alina Garcia and her storied past
Meanwhile, Fernandez has secured an agreement with the Florida Highway Patrol to have patrol units at Driver License Offices across the county to maintain order and intervene when people disrupt services or use violence or intimidation. Apparently, there have been some incidents in the past.
“My goal is to ensure that every individual who walks through our doors is treated with respect and that our staff works in a safe, supportive environment,” Fernandez said.
“For the first time in 67 years, the residents of Miami-Dade County were able to elect their tax collector, and I am honored they elected me. I am here to put the needs of people first,” reads a statement from Fernandez, who seems in his interviews to have taken an English immersion class because he is not reaching for words as much as he was during the campaign.
Fernandez won last November with 56% over former State Rep. and Miami Beach Commissioner David Richardson.
Earlier this month, Fernandez was in Tallahassee for Florida Tax Collectors Association’s annual Legislative Day, where tax collectors from across the state met with state lawmakers and staff to advocate for policies that prioritize citizen convenience, safety, and access to state services.
“As we prepare for the 2025 Legislative Session in March, it’s crucial that we continue to collaborate with Florida’s legislators and partners to implement solutions that meet the ever-changing needs of our communities,” Fernandez said in a statement. In Tallahassee, he met Senators Joe Gruters, Ana Maria Rodriguez and Bryan Avila, and State Representative Omar Blanco.
On a recent Monday, he visited the driver’s license office at Mall of the Americas, one of the most crowded, and walked among the people in line, hearing first hand about their frustrations over long wait times and difficulty securing appointments online.
 
The post New Miami-Dade Tax Collector Dariel Fernandez launches new license desk appeared first on Political Cortadito.

Read Full Story

Kirk Menendez already has important endorsements
Three is the magic number in Coral Gables as that is how many candidates officially qualified last week in each of the three elections in the city’s April 8 election.
Vice Mayor Rhonda Anderson will face Felix Pardo and Laureano Cancio while three other candidates vie for the open seat left by Commissioner Kirk Menendez, who is running for mayor. They are Richard Lara, the hand-picked candidate by Mayor Vince Lago, Claudia Miro, a transportation lobbyist who lost a commission race in 2021, and attorney Thomas “Tom” Wells, an active speaker at commission meetings who sits on the charter review board.
Read related: Two more candidates say they will run for Coral Gables commission in April
But everybody is going to be looking at and taking about the mayor’s race between Lago and Menendez. A third candidate, Michael Abbott, doesn’t really count.
Speaking of count, turnout is going to be key in this race. There are just over 37,200 registered voters in Coral Gables, according to the city clerk. As of last week, there were 3,135 requests for absentee or vote-by-mail ballots, according to Miami-Dade Elections spokesperson Roberto Rodriguez.
That’s a huge increase from the 204 VBM requests on file as of Jan. 16. But not a huge surprise, Rodriguez said.
“Our office has been sending text messages and emails to voters who had a vote-by-mail request on file and provided contact information,” Rodriguez told Political Cortadito, adding that election specific messages would be sent to voters who have upcoming elections.

The deadline to request an absentee ballot for the April 8 election is March 27. The deadline to register to vote in the municipal election is March 10.
Most of the voters who participated in the 2023 election cast their ballots by mail. Of the 6,700 or 6,800 who voted in the two commission races, more than 4,100 were absentee. Turnout could have been low due to the lack of a mayoral race — Lago had no opponent two years ago — but the commission races were both high profile because the mayor was behind two candidates who ultimately lost.
That’s what makes this election so interesting. Lago is not only trying to win. He is trying to get his majority back. He has to not only win his own seat back, which is not a gimme, but also keep Anderson, which is the most certain of the three races, and get Lara into the open seat. It’s definitely a slate, and one can tell by the yard signs along San Amaro Drive, which is the mayor’s neighborhood.
Mayor Lago showed the biggest haul in his last campaign finance report with $$108,750 collected in just the first two weeks of February, almost exclusively in maximum $1,000 checks, according to the campaign documents filed with the city clerk. That’s the largest amount in a single report since the $166K collected last year in the second quarter — which is over three months not two weeks. He also has another $150,000 left sitting in his political action committee, which has its last report through Dec. 31 and we won’t know how much more it has raised until after the election. But Ladra suspects it will be a lot.
In comparison, Menendez has raised less than $18,000.
Read related: Kirk Menendez runs for Coral Gables mayor against city bully Vince Lago
But the last election showed that money does not equal votes in The City Beautiful when commissioners Melissa Castro and Ariel Fernandez beat better-funded candidates who had the mayor’s backing. It may not have officially happened, but Menendez will most certainly have their support. He already has the firefighters’ support and probably will get the police union.

Gables Neighbors United, which some argue helped elect Castro and Fernandez, were quick to come out with their endorsements over the weekend: Menendez and Pardo.
They are holding back, apparently, on the open seat race. But Ladra will bet real money it ain’t Lara.
“Make no mistake about it: Mayor Vince Lago and Vice Mayor Rhonda Anderson are tied at the hip,” reads an email from the homeowners group. “It’s a quid-pro-quo relationship. Lago: ‘You stand by me and vote the way I want you to vote and I’ll introduce you to the people who can make you ‘whole’ and keep you in power. Let’s start with naming you vice mayor!’ ”
Ouch.
“Rhonda: ‘You got it BOSS!’
“While the wording may not be exact, the meaning is. Both are power and money hungry and feeding from the hands of developers and special interests,” the email says.
Which is how the election is going to framed for voters, as usual: Development interests versus resident interests.
But that’s not all. There’s a new issue this year.
“Civility and Stabiliity is his motto,” says the email about Menendez. “We could use a lot of both.
“Divisive behavior and even threats of harm to colleagues and disrepect for residents by Lago have been the tipping points for us, well beyond the favoritism to developers and special interests, to seek a candidate who can once again lead with a calm hand and move the city forward.
“For the past almost-four years, we have witnessed Commissioner Menendez‘ thoughtful approach to oftentimes difficult issues and watched him render solutions that benefit residents and the good of the city,” the email states. “Kirk is a peacemaker and a leader and for these reasons, we join the Coral Gables Fire union in backing Kirk Menendez for Mayor.”
The post Candidates are set for Coral Gables election April 8 as voters request ABs appeared first on Political Cortadito.

Read Full Story

Dime con quien andas y te dire quien eres.
There’s not a Cuban American growing up in Greater Miami that didn’t hear those words from their parents or grandparents when these didn’t approve of your friends. Or their friends. Or your friends’ parents. It translates to, “tell me who you associate with and I will tell you who you are.”
But apparently Coral Gables Mayor Vince Lago did not heed his elders. Because Lago, who keeps surrounding himself with shady characters, is moving next week to appoint another one of his iffy friends to the code enforcement board.
Lago wants to put none other than Benjamin “Ben” Alvarez — who is known as “the Tony Soprano of lawyers” by his own colleagues — on the board to replace someone who apparently hasn’t lived in the city for some time now and was removed.
This is the same Benjamin Alvarez who has been disciplined at least three times by the Florida Bar, including and admonishment in 2017 for threatening his wife — who he was in the middle of a divorce with — and grabbing her phone in a physical altercation. There is a police report that indicates that Alvarez’s gun was taken after his wife expressed fear.
Additionally, a Miami-Dade Commission on Ethics and Public Trust investigation found a serious appearance of impropriety after his firm received city work from his then girlfriend, Veronica Diaz, who was an assistant city attorney in Miami. And, in 2012, a judge ruled against his firm in a fraud case involving forged documents requiring more than $82,000 in restitution.
Read related: More on Ultra bad judicial candidate Veronica Diaz
Alvarez was also suspended for 30 days after he disparaged opposing counsel and publicly reprimanded for misrepresenting, under oath, obstruction of evidence, and for financial mismanagement of a matter involving a client, who just happens to be Manny Chamizo, another shady Lago pal who was charged with criminal stalking and who the mayor appointed to a board.
Doesn’t Lago know any decent people? Among his friends and allies, L’Ego counts former Miami Commissioner Alex Diaz de la Portilla, who was arrested on public corruption charges in 2023 that were dropped last year, and lobbyist Bill Riley, who was arrested alongside ADLP and was in on the real estate deal Lago got in the $640,000 commission from the sale of a Ponce de Leon Boulevard building to Location Ventures, the development firm owned by Rishi Kapoor that was investigated for its $10,000 monthly payments to Miami Mayor Francis Suarez for “consulting. Oh, and he also rented a retail space to Kapoor.
This Ben Alvarez track record has already raised eyebrows in the community and Commissioner Melissa Castro has officially asked the mayor to reconsider and appoint somebody else. This may be unprecedented in Gables commission history.
“As public servants, we have the responsibility to make decisions that protect the integrity of our city and uphold the trust placed in us by our residents,” Castro wrote in a memo to her colleagues.

“This is not a position I take lightly, nor is it one I raise with any sense of personal malintent toward Mr. Alvarez. I have no relationship with him and, to my knowledge, have never met or spoken with him,” Castro wrote. “My sole responsibility is to advocate for the well-being of our residents and ensure that those serving in positions of public trust meet the highest ethical and professional standards.
“The Code Enforcement Board plays a critical role in upholding our city’s quality of life. Its members must be fair, impartial, and above all, committed to enforcing our city’s laws with integrity and transparency. Given the significance of this responsibility, we must ensure that appointees to this board not only meet the technical qualifications but also embody the values and ethical standards that Coral Gables represents.”
Castro sent the memo because she did not want to discuss this publicly at a meeting.
“I take no pleasure in bringing forward information that could cause embarrassment to Mr. Alvarez. He is a resident of Coral Gables, and like all members of our community, he deserves to be treated with respect,” she wrote. “That is why I am addressing this privately among my colleagues first, rather than allowing it to become a public matter unnecessarily.”
Oops. Too late.
“However, I cannot, in good conscience, remain silent when I believe an appointment poses a risk to the integrity of our governance,” Castro said in her memo. “I believe in due process and fairness, and I strongly believe that every individual is innocent until proven guilty.
“Unfortunately, in Mr. Alvarez’s case, the legal system has already determined guilt on multiple occasions.”
Read related: Hypocrite Coral Gables Mayor Vince Lago votes against appointment
Ladra doesn’t think Lago cares about the Alvarez baggage and history. It is not his first controversial appointment. In 2023, the mayor appointed his buddy Manny Chamizo, who is facing felony stalking charges, to the water advisory board. Chamizo’s criminal trial is scheduled for March 24.
Lago uses board appointments to try to get his agenda through. He appointed Nicolas “Nick” Cabrera, the self-appointed Prince of Coral Gables and son of former Commissioner Ralph Cabrera, to the city’s board of adjustments so he could get a setback variance for a gazebo at his house approved. It didn’t work. Lago was denied his pretty little barbecue gazebo.
Last year, he had Planning and Zoning Board member Claudia Miro removed from her position by Vice Mayor Rhonda Anderson after Miro failed to vote to put former Commissioner Wayne “Chip” Withers on the board, as Lago obviously wanted. He sent her a series of butt hurt text messages after her vote.
Miro is now running for commissioner in the open seat vacated by Kirk Menendez in his run for mayor against Lago.
Menendez, meanwhile, has not appointed any would-be criminals to city boards.
Police Report Ben Alvarez by Political Cortadito on Scribd

The post Coral Gables Mayor Vince Lago: All the wrong people in all the wrong places appeared first on Political Cortadito.

Read Full Story

Miami Mayor Francis Suarez made a rare appearance at the city commission meeting last week to push for the return of $20 million to developers of Miami Freedom Park — the boondoggle real estate complex with a soccer stadium in the mix that is being built on the grounds of the old Melreese golf course — even though he tried to make it look like that was always the plan.
Suarez said the $20 million, which the public thought were going to the improvement and acquisition of other parks in the city, were always supposed to go to the maintenance of the 58-acre park, which on the MFP website is called Jorge Mas Canosa Park. He said the “language was very clear” in the 2018 ballot question passed by 60% of the voters in 2018 “that $20 million was going to go to a 58-acre park,” he paused for dramatic effect, “or other green space.”
Key words: Other green space.
But Suarez said that those three little words were only included because it was a constitutional question, which meant that it would dictate what the city could and could not do based on what people voted for. “And you want some legal room in case you want to deviate from what the voters themselves wanted,” the mayor explained.
Did he mean legal wiggle room? So this was intentional? Someone knew all along that the $20 million — sold as a public benefit to sweeten the deal for residents — would never go to “other green space?”
Read related: Miami Freedom Park developers want their $20 million parks donation back
The idea, when the 99-year lease agreement was approved in 2022, was spurred by the “no net loss” policy that meant the loss of green space at Melreese would have to be replaced elsewhere, Suarez said. Because of that policy, the city carved out $7.5 million from the $20 mil to give $2.5 mil to commission districts 2, 3 and 5 for the acquisition and development of new parks, he said. District 4 was punished because Commissioner Manolo Reyes always voted against Miami Freedom Park. District 1 was left out because that’s where Miami Freedom Park is.

“Four months later, the property was rezoned, the no net loss issue was resolved,” Suarez said. “That money should be restored based on what the voters want, or the will of the voters.
“This is a city park that the residents voted in favor of allocating $20 millions to,” he said, forgetting the words “other green space,” this time, and reminding everyone that $20 million today are not the same as 2018 dollars.
“It’s like giving The Underline a haircut.”
To sell it (this time) to commissioners, Suarez sweetened the soured deal with an amendment that would allocate $2.5 million to districts 2, 3 and 5 and basically instructed the city manager to find the funds by April. “So that no resident in the city can say that they, in any way, feel disenfranchised.” It was expanded to $10 million — with another $2.5 mil for District 4 — after Commissioner Joe Carollo volunteered to help the manager find the funds.
“I believe I can find the funds for the three districts, because one was getting more, and find sufficient funds to give commissioner Reyes his $2.5 million also for his district,” said Carollo, who should be investigated for how he spent the millions in funds budgeted by the Bayfront Park Management Trust when he was chair for eight years.
“I will work with the manager and I will show him fairly quickly where the money can be found.”
Shudder.
Carollo blasted the media for “so much disinformation out there” and said the city would have had to spend the money to maintain the 58-acre park anyway.
“At no time have we been speaking about the Mas brothers not going to pay us the $20 million, that they are going to somehow do a switch and bait and use the dollars for their park,” Carollo said, referring to Jorge and Jose Mas, who own the Inter Miami team with David Beckham and are developing the property. Well, that’s kind of what happened.

The bottom line is that the commission voted 4-1 to return the full $20 million into a fund to maintain the park at the soccer stadium complex — which will also have offices, restaurants, stores and a 700-room hotel. Only Commissioner Damian Pardo voted against it, but he told Political Cortadito after the meeting that the did so because he did not have enough time to digest what was being proposed.
Reyes voted in favor because he said the resolution was “respecting the will of the people.” But he voted against another resolution that supported the establishment of a Community Development District, which is an  instrument to collect maintenance fees. Basically, the developers are going to tax themselves — as the only “property owners” — to create an avenue for $500,000 to be earmarked for maintenance of the park for the next 100 years.
Read related: Miami Freedom Park scores yes vote for massive stadium real estate complex
CDDs are typically formed where there are residential owners who can leverage the future tax dollars to borrow on a tax-exempt basis. But because this is a wholly commercial development, with no resident board (at least for now), the developers of Miami Freedom Park won’t be able to do that, Suarez explained. “In this case there is no allowance for housing, because it’s next to the airport, so they can’t borrow on a tax-free basis.”
But, apparently, they can still borrow funds, because the mayor said there was another safety net.
“If they defaulted if they did borrow funds, CDDs do not impact the city in terms of, its not a lien against the city property,” Suarez said. “It would be a lien against the lease hold interest.” He said the tenants requested that the city support their application to become a CDD, which is through the county, because “they want to contribute to the operation and maintenance of the park.”
Okay. But why do they need a CDD to do that? Are they really just trying to borrow money with the lease as collateral?
Suarez stressed all the positives, calling it the best “stadium deal in the world.” He reminded the commission about the $5 million the developers are giving to the Baywalk along Biscayne Bay and the Miami River. Though Ladra thinks they would take that back if there was waterfront at the development site.
He said the $20 million are to shore up the fund because the $500,000 produced by the CDD won’t be enough.
“They want to make sure the the park, which is adjacent to their property, is kept up and maintained,” Suarez said. They didn’t want to leave it up to the city, he said, which “could have years when it maintains it well and years when it maintains it poorly.”
“They want to be able to control that outcome… have the park up to the billion dollar standard that is going up next door.”
“So, this is found money,” Suarez said. “This is money they didn’t have to pay so it’s just going to make the deal better than what it was.”
But what is $20 million in a $1 billion project? Is someone going to argue that the developers — who obviously need better public relations representation — don’t have another $20 million somewhere that they could have used for that? They had to take what amounts to $7.5 million from the city’s taxpayers — because the city manager is going to find that somewhere to fill the hole made by this resolution — to make themselves feel better?
If you like what you read in Political Cortadito, consider making a contribution to independent watchdog journalism. Show your support with a one-time or recurring donation. And thank you!
The post Miami Freedom Park gets its full $20 million back for 58-acre public park appeared first on Political Cortadito.

Read Full Story

It took a lawsuit against him for abusing his power, but Miami Commissioner Joe Carollo was finally stripped of his post as chairman of the Bayfront Park Management Trust, which he has been leading for almost eight years. This comes a month after a whistleblower lawsuit from two former employees who say that Carollo used the Trust as his own personal slush fund.
Commissioners voted 3-2 Thursday — only Chairwoman Christine King sided with Crazy Joe — to remove Carollo as chair. They also replaced him with Commissioner Miguel Gabela, who led the effort to oust him.
“I know you’ve done some good things in the park,” Gabela had told Carollo. “But things have gotten out of hand.”
Carollo and the city were sued last month by former Trust Executive Director Jose Suarez and former Finance Director Jose Canto, who say they were forced to resign after they reported shoddy accounting practices that allowed Carollo to giveaway contracts to his friends and get kickbacks from them. They also said that Carollo used the funds raised by the agency, which oversees both Bayfront and Maurice Ferre parks, to fund his own office events and promote his political profile.
Read related: Miami Joe Carollo Bayfront scandal snares Coral Gables pal Javier Baños
While King said that the commission had already scheduled new board chair appointments for the March meeting, and she didn’t mind waiting, Gabela said the recent news gave the removal a sense of urgency. Commissioner Manolo Reyes agreed.
“It’s about time we stop it, so we don’t get any more black eyes,” Reyes said.

Despite having promised last year to step down in January, Carollo defended his stewardship and called a visibly uncomfortable Chief Financial Officer and Assistant City Manager Larry Spring to the podium help him justify himself, pointing to annual audits and emails that show Commissioner Damian Pardo had also asked questions about the Trust’s funding. Wow. The commissioner in the district of the two parks that the Trust oversees — Bayfront Park and Maurice Ferre Park — dared to asked questions about operations and expenditures? You gotta be kidding.
They should all have been asking questions.
Of course, Carollo used his mic to attack everyone else.
“One of the worst things in life is to be so successful at something, they kill you for it,” he said, WHAT, saying the ouster was motivated by “envy.” No, it was motivated by good common sense.
He reserved his most pointed remarks for Gabela, again, hinting that the District 1 commissioner had made a mistake going after”a guy who was really your biggest supporter here for Allapattah.”
King asked for the commissioner to keep his comments short and non-confrontational. “You want to have a kangaroo court,” he shouted at her and demanded to have his say “if I’m going to be thrown in the dirt by so-called colleagues.”
Read related: Miami Commissioner Joe Carollo wants old lackey to lead Bayfront Park Trust
Carollo said he had every intention of stepping down in January and it’s why he rushed to finish the Bayfront fountain project.”It wa you who was here and Mr. Pardo by Zoom who voted to bring all the boards to the March 13 meeting,” he told Gabela
At that point, King was so frustrated that she called for a pee-pee break. “You know what? I have to go to the bathroom,” she said. “This meeting is in recess.”
But when she came back, it did not get better.
Carollo continued with the emails he said showed that Pardo’s office wanted a formal investigation into the inventory, and specifically the controlled substances, in a veterinarian trailer that the Trust had overpaid for by tens of thousands of dollars. “This is all behind the city manager’s back, going direct to police.
“Mr. Pardo abused his power. Mr. Pardo abused his office… by going directly to the police chief and falsely claim he had anonymous complaints and people coming up to him at meetings.

“Mr. Gabela went to the radio, the Miami Herald, to put my face in the dirt, to try to humiliate me,” Carollo said, tone deaf to the fact that he doesn’t need anybody to humiliate him since he does such a good job himself.
Carollo said that his enemies, the Little Havana businessmen who won a federal First Amendment lawsuit against him and former State Rep. Manuel “Manny” Prieguez, who the commissioner pointed to in the audience — who was laughing out loud — were behind the effort to oust him. He said Prieguez represents a company that wants to put events on at Bayfront Park.
“His handlers got a hold of him right away and told him what to do,” Carollo said about Gabela.
Gabela shot back: “The only person that handles me is my wife.”
Read related: Joe Carollo wants to abolish Miami’s Bayfront Park Management Trust
He called the question three or four times before they actually voted because Carollo went on and on about the war against him.
Gabela has been trying to remove Carollo from the Trust since at least last June. Guess he needed the controversy of a whistleblower lawsuit alleging mismanagement of funds to get it done.
“You’re problem is you’re like Maduro,” Gabela said, comparing Carollo to the Venezuelan dictator. “You don’t want to leave.”
In the end, Carollo said he did not have time for the Bayfront Trust and wanted to give it up — just not to Gabela, who he said wanted the chairmanship “for all the wrong reasons.”
In related news, there was no appetite, as Commissioner Carollo noted, to abolish the Bayfront Trust and, before the chairmanship vote, he voted along with the rest of the commission to unanimously reject the his own measure.
He should have given the chairmanship up then.
The post Miami Commissioner Joe Carollo loses Bayfront Park Trust to Miguel Gabela appeared first on Political Cortadito.

Read Full Story

Before Hialeah Mayor Esteban “Steve” Bovo steps down to take a job at a Washington, D.C., lobbying firm, he voted Tuesday to give himself retirement benefits.
Ladra was still trying to get details on what the deferred compensation plan for electeds would look like, because there was zero discussion or debate about the two ordinances on the dais before everyone voted in favor of giving themselves more free money. But there were no official answers as of Friday afternoon.
According to sources close to City Hall, council members will be vested after five years of service, but the mayor is vested from Day One. It’s also retroactive to October 21, 2021.
Ladra was unable to get more details after several emails to the city clerk and calls to Bovo went unanswered and unreturned.
Read related: Hialeah Mayor Esteban Bovo posts extreme views, promotes ‘big lie’
There will still have to be a second reading Feb. 25 before it’s final.
It’s not exactly a pension, per se. Voters in Hialeah did away with pensions for elected officials in 2013 with 80% approving a charter amendment.  Before that, electeds got a pension after they reached the age of 55 and completed 12 years or more of service on the council. It also required any future changes to the pension plans of elected officials to be approved by a city-wide vote.
It did not wipe out the pensions that were already granted. According to Ballotpedia, former Mayor Raul Martinez gets a pension of $180,000 a year and former Mayor Carlos “Castro” Hernandez gets around $190,000 a year.

Bovo, who makes $190,000 a year in salary and expenses, will be leaving his post to join The Southern Group, a prominent lobbying outfit in D.C., according to the Miami Herald, which reported it last week. His compensation is reportedly going to be higher, but he still felt the need to take a little more from Hialeah taxpayers.
It’s likely that a majority of Hialeah residents don’t have pensions. This population’s average household income was $53,000 a year in 2023, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. That’s household. Individual average salary was at about $25,800. The Census also said that 17.5% of Hialeah’s residents are living at or below the poverty level.
Remember when Miami Commissioner Miguel Gabela pulled the same thing with granting lifetime pensions in his city and got pummeled for it on the radio and in the news? The backlash from the community caused him to want to put an item to reconsider o the agenda. But Mayor Francis Suarez got there first with a veto and was hailed as a hero.
Read related: Bryan Calvo becomes first candidate to file for November Hialeah mayor’s race
But in Hialeah, so far? Crickets.
And here we have a mayor who has one foot out the door, voting on extending his benefits before he does.
Former Councilmember Bryan Calvo, who resigned to run for tax collector (lost in the primary), is now running for mayor in November to replace Bovo and said he would undo the golden parachute as soon as possible if given the chance.
“The pension proposals are a total slap in the face to residents and father proof that Bovo and company are more concerned about extracting every possible cent from the tax payer than public service,” Calvo told Political Cortadito. “For both items to be approved unanimously and without any discussion on the dais is proof that the fix was in for Bovo to make a final cash out before his departure and to setup his heir apparent for a comfortable transition.
“If elected, I will absolutely repeal said ordinances,” said Calvo, who sued Bovo in 2023 for abuse of power after the mayor allegedly hampered his efforts to get 911 information. The lawsuit was dismissed in court last year.
Ladra smells a campaign issue.
The post Steve Bovo’s parting gift: Retirement benefits for himself, Hialeah electeds appeared first on Political Cortadito.

Read Full Story