Democrats to open new Little Havana office

@PatriciaMazzei

The Florida Democratic Party and Miami-Dade Democratic Party plan to open a new Little Havana office Monday in an effort to target Hispanic voters, the organizations announced Tuesday. It will be the state party's first office in the Florida's largest county.

"We have an aggressive effort to win South Florida by similar margins as 2012 and having the Florida Democratic Party open an office for the first time in Miami-Dade shows our commitment to growing our opportunities in a key region of the state," Allison Tant, chairwoman of the state party, said in a news release.

Added Miami-Dade Chairwoman Annette Taddeo: "In 2012, we increased our margin of victory in Miami-Dade by 70,000 votes. Now we are building on that momentum by continuing the OFA ground game in order to defeat Rick Scott and take back Tallahassee."

OFA refers to President Obama's campaign machine.

Read the press release below.

Miami political consultant funds robocall against Dolphins stadium renovation

@PatriciaMazzei

In the first sign of an opposition campaign against a subsidized renovation to the Miami Dolphins' stadium, a Miami political consultant has paid for an automated call urging listeners to vote "no" in the May 14 referendum.

The robocall, paid for by David Custin's DRC Consulting firm, began targeting likely voters Saturday, Custin said. Absentee ballots were mailed to domestic voters last week, and early voting began Monday.

Custin said he plans to call more than 160,000 voters over the next few days with calls in English and Spanish opposing the proposed renovation to Sun Life Stadium. Pending approval by the Florida Legislature, the Dolphins would receive up to $289 million from increasing the Miami-Dade mainland hotel-tax rate to 7 percent from 6 percent and $90 million from a state sales-tax subsidy, both over 30 years. The football club would refund the county up to $120 million and the state $47 million at the end of the three decades. (Read a breakdown of the deal here.)

Custin said he financed the robocalls because the Dolphins were campaigning "unfettered" for an off-year election that will likely result in low voter turnout. Opponents of the renovations -- particularly Miami auto magnate Norman Braman -- have decided to lobby lawmakers against the deal rather then fund a political campaign. Meantime, the Dolphins have reported raising $1 million for their outreach efforts, from team owner Stephen Ross' stadium coffers.

Early voting for Dolphins stadium referendum begins Monday amid Tallahassee uncertainty

@PatriciaMazzei

Early voting begins Monday in a Miami-Dade election so unusual that the whole thing could be called off by the end of the week.

The Florida Legislature has until the annual lawmaking session ends Friday to approve legislation supporting the Miami Dolphins’ push for a subsidized renovation to Sun Life Stadium. Otherwise, the May 14 referendum asking voters to approve the project will be canceled. The results of the ballots cast up to that point would be kept secret.

There is plenty of opposition — including from both local Republican and Democratic parties — to increasing the mainland Miami-Dade hotel-tax rate to 7 percent from 6 percent to pay the Dolphins up to $289 million over 30 years for the renovation. But no one has financed a full-fledged campaign against the plan so far.

“I don’t think there’s any sense in spending the money I don’t have for something that may not materialize,” said Cutler Bay Mayor Ed MacDougall, who has traveled to Tallahassee to speak against the legislation.

Miami auto magnate Norman Braman, another opponent, has also said he is focusing his efforts lobbying state lawmakers instead of launching a campaign.

The Miami-Dade Republican Party, whose members opposed the deal last month, has not taken further action. Their Democratic counterparts, who are also against the deal, and neutral civic groups have limited themselves to hosting community forums.

As a result, the Dolphins have had phone lines, mailboxes and radio and television airwaves to themselves. The stadium’s political action committee, Friends of Miami First, has raised $1 million since April 1, according to its first campaign finance report filed Friday. All contributions came from the Dolphins and South Florida Stadium LLC, team owner Stephen Ross’ company that owns the Sun Life.

The campaign spent about $347,000 in that period, mostly on advertising and phones to reach voters.

More here.

Commission won't drop Rep. Nuñez's attorney's fees in dismissed ethics case

 While the State Ethics Commission dismissed an ethics complaint against Rep. Jeannette Nuñez, a Miami Republican, last month, she can't pass her attorney's fees to the complainant, the panel decided on Friday.
    On March 13th, the Commission found no probable cause to believe that Nuñez had misused her position to mail a legislatively-funded newsletter to voters who were not her constituents in newly established District 119, in apparent violation of House policy, before the 2012 election Aug. 14th.
    But the Ethics Commission followed a recommendation by staff to reject a petition by Nuñez's attorney, Juan-Carlos Planas, to dismiss attorney's fees and costs the representative incurred in the case.
 

UPDATED Mysterious flier praises Miami lawmaker's opposition to Dolphins stadium renovation

@PatriciaMazzei

The Miami Dolphins are not the only ones sending political advertisements to voters asking them to support a May 14 referendum for a subsidized Sun Life Stadium renovation.

Some voters have also received fliers praising one of the renovation's vocal opponents, state Rep. José Javier Rodríguez, a Miami Democrat.

"José Javier Rodriguez believes there are more pressing needs in his district than providing financial aid to a billionaire," read the flier, apparently referring to Dolphins owner Stephen Ross.

But it's unclear who the pieces are coming from. Rodríguez said he doesn't know who's behind them.

A disclaimer on the mailers says they were sent by Citizen Alliance for a Strong Economy. An electioneering communications organization is registered under that name with the Florida Division of Elections. It had not reported receiving or spending any money as of March 31.

Public records show the ECO's treasurer, Michael Milner (or Millner, the spelling is inconsistent), owns the Harrisburg, Penn., home listed on the fliers as the group's mailing address. The group's registered chairwoman, Carmela Falcone of Melbourne, could not be reached for comment.

UPDATE: Turns out Falcone and Milner have several ECO's registered under their names -- including one, Conservatives United, that was involved last year in the Republican primary for Rodríguez's swing seat. Former state Sen. Alex Diaz de la Portilla defeated former Rep. Gus Barreiro in that race, but only after the shadowy Conservatives United sent mailers bashing Diaz de la Portilla with excerpts from his divorce file. Rodríguez later defeated Diaz de la Portilla.

--with reporting by Douglas Hanks

Jackson hospital board member investigated over alleged ethics violations

By Daniel Chang

As Jackson Health System has struggled to pull out of a daunting financial hole for the last two years, a member of the board that oversees the system has been accused of abusive behavior toward employees in the collections office as he tried to negotiate settlements for unpaid bills owed by his law firm’s clients, according to ethics complaints filed by two Jackson administrators.

The allegations against Stephen Nuell, a Miami personal injury attorney and member of the Financial Recovery Board appointed to help turn around the troubled system, are detailed in complaints filed by the director and the associate administrator of the hospital’s business office.

They allege that Nuell repeatedly called the business office between May 2011 — when he was appointed to the board — and October 2012 to resolve matters for private clients despite being told specifically not to do so.

The two employees also accused Nuell of screaming at them over the phone, calling them “incompetents” and contacting hospital executives directly to intervene when he was unhappy with their efforts.

Nuell declined to comment on the allegations that he exploited his position on the hospital’s board for personal gain.

“There’s a confidential investigation going on,’’ he said.

More here.

Florida dollars for Dolphins stadium renovation may come Miami's foreign banks

via @doug_hanks

To create a tax break for the Miami Dolphins, Florida might eliminate a tax break for Miami’s foreign banks.

On Thursday, the state Senate is scheduled to vote on a bill allowing Florida to pay out $15 million a year in sales-tax rebates for stadium renovations, including a possible $3 million yearly subsidy for the Dolphins’ Sun Life Stadium. To pay for the new stadium dollars, the legislation would end a tax deduction reserved for international banking operations, which in Florida are clustered in the Miami area.

The deduction dates back to the 1980s and costs Florida about $14 million a year in lost tax revenue, according to a Senate analysis. The targeted deduction involves arcane rules of global finance and banking regulation, making the issue an easy one to miss amid the heated argument over whether to invest public dollars in professional sports facilities.

“Which one is sexier: Super Bowls in Miami or international banking?” said David Schwartz, president of the Miami-based Florida International Bankers Association.

In a debate about the stadium plan Wednesday between auto magnate Norman Braman and the Dolphins’ campaign leader, lawyer and community activist H.T. Smith, the banking provision didn’t come up. Instead, the two argued over whether a $350 million upgrade to Sun Life would boost the economy enough to warrant tax dollars. Voters are slated to decide the issue in a May 14 referendum.

More here.

Group tackles creation of new Miami-Dade cities

@PatriciaMazzei

Now that he’s a county commissioner, Juan C. Zapata readily makes this uncomfortable admission: During his eight years in the Florida House of Representatives, he did more for the cities in his South Miami-Dade district than for its stand-alone neighborhoods.

Cities had elected politicians and paid lobbyists jostling for limited state dollars. Neighborhoods didn’t. In the end, the cities got more money for more projects, Zapata said. The neighborhoods were left behind.

“I was able to do nothing for my unincorporated areas,” Zapata has lamented from the commission dais.

That perceived inequity is one of the crucial reasons Zapata, who now represents a swath of unincorporated western suburbs, and other commissioners have given for endorsing countywide incorporation, which would require every inch of Miami-Dade to belong to a city — just like in Broward County.

The long-discussed concept has been recently taken up by a new task force charged with making recommendations on how Miami-Dade should proceed.

That neighborhoods will try to incorporate is a given. A year ago, commissioners lifted a five-year ban on new cities, opening the door for five communities that had already declared their cityhood intentions to revive their efforts. But should the county take an all-or-nothing approach and require that every neighborhood join an existing city or form a new one? And if not, how could Miami-Dade ensure that unincorporated communities receive an adequate level of public services?

More here.

Miami Dolphins: Super Bowl hopes rest on stadium makeover

via @doug_hanks

The Miami Dolphins and local tourism officials presented the National Football League on Tuesday with the most expensive Super Bowl bid in South Florida’s history, but the team’s CEO said amped-up entertainment options won’t be enough if voters don’t approve a subsidized renovation of Sun Life Stadium.

An upgraded stadium “is the only impediment between us and success,’’ Dolphins CEO Mike Dee said in a telephone press conference after a closed-door meeting in New York with NFL executives over the region’s Super Bowl bid. “We have a beautiful home with a rusty fence.”

South Florida’s Super Bowl Host Committee expects to spend about $21 million in private and public funds putting on the kind of Super Bowl outlined in the thick binder presented to NFL executives in New York. The confidential proposal includes creating a Super Bowl theme park in downtown Miami, including closing down Biscayne Boulevard, constructing a “Hail Mary Zip Line” along the waterfront and possibly mooring barges to accommodate some of the action, according to interviews and leaked details about the plans.

“We were impressed by the feedback,’’ Rodney Barreto, the chairman of the local Super Bowl committee, said after the NFL meeting. “We were applauded.”

This week, the NFL met with the three metropolitan areas pursuing Super Bowls 50 and 51 before final bids are due May 7. South Florida and the San Francisco area are competing for the 50th game in 2016, and the loser will take on Houston for the 51st game in 2017.

More here.

Dolphins begin stadium renovation campaign with mailer, visits to Miami-Dade senior centers

@PatriciaMazzei

The first domestic absentee ballots were sent Tuesday for the May 14 referendum asking Miami-Dade voters to approve a subsidized renovation to Sun Life Stadium. And timed with their release was the Miami Dolphins' first campaign flier.

The piece highlights the team's estimate that the $350 million stadium face-lift will create 4,000 jobs and promises the upgrades would attract more Super Bowls, college football championships and international soccer games. "The Miami Dolphins and tourists will pay, not county property taxpayers," the political advertisement says. It's paid for by the team's campaign arm, a political action committee named Friends of Miami First. (More here.)

The mailer does not break down how much public money the stadium would receive -- up to $289 million from the county and $90 million from the state, both over 30 years -- though the it says the Dolphins would repay $159 million. That number comes from the $112 million and the $47 million the team has pledged to refund the county and the state, respectively, at the end of 30 years. That's, of course, if Florida lawmakers sign off on providing the state sales-tax subsidy and allowing Miami-Dade to raise the hotel-tax rate to 7 percent from 6 percent -- which is left unmentioned in the flier.

Dolphins campaign workers have also apparently been making the roundsd at Miami-Dade senior centers, home to reliable, older Hispanic voters who typically cast ballots (usually by mail) in every election.

"Vote sí por la modernización del estadio Sun Life," read a poster standing next to seniors having lunch Tuesday at the Claude and Mildred Pepper Senior Activities Center in Sweetwater. Vote yes for the modernization of Sun Life Stadium.

"Our grassroots supporters have been fanning out across the county speaking to community centers, going door to door, and discussing the benefits of this plan with their friends and neighbors," Miami First spokesman Eric Jotkoff told The Miami Herald in a statement. 

--with reporting by El Nuevo Herald staff writer Brenda Medina