Maybe he lost a little steam while he coordinated the successful national Latino political convention, as the NALEO conference in Orlando last week is called. And it was a big todo, so take a bow, former Sate Rep. Juan Zapata (R-119), who serves as chair of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officers Education Fund.
But now, candidate Zapata is on a roll back home. The first Colombian-American elected to a state seat, when he won his first term in 2002, wants to become the first Colombian-American elected to the county commission in District 11, which is being vacated by Commission Chairman Joe Martinez in his run against Mayor Carlos Gimenez.
First, Zap — as he is commonly called by friends — gets an endorsement Tuesday from State Sen. Anitere Flores, who doesn’t have to worry about ruffling any feathers since she is ARSO, or automatically re-eleted sans opposition. And I’m sure it’s a nice little thank you regalito to her former campaign manager Stephen Ferreiro, who is running Zapata’s campaign, as he always has.
“Zapata is the best man for the job, he has a proven track record of working to lower taxes for families,” Flores, the Senate’s deputy majority whip, said in a statement released by the campaign. “He has demonstrated he understands the issues that affect the West Dade and Kendall community and he will fight for the residents and businesses in his district at the county level the same way he did in Tallahassee.”
His website lists the track-record as including “many pieces of noteworthy legislation to protect the interests of children and the elderly, expand health care options for the uninsured and promote Florida’s economy.” I haven’t really heard anyone say otherwise. Not yet. But I’m sure it’s coming.
Then, Zapata’s people released a poll Wednesday that shows him with a double-digit, 2-to-1 lead over county cop Manny Machado, who everybody says has Martinez’s secret, closet support. Martinez told Zapata he would endorse him, and he has publicly stuck to that; the chairman told Ladra recently that he had given his word and would stay true to it — unless Zap tells him he’s off the hook, basically. Whatever that means. Wink. Nod.
But his campaign manager and closest confidant are working for Machado, who had raised $44,600 by the last reporting deadline of March 31, much of it from Martinez supporters. Not bad for a newby. Zapata, who has been fundraising much longer and collected $70,000 during the same time period (the first quarter this year) reported more than twice as many contributions total, $92,600.
The poll of 300 likely voters, with a 6 percent margin of error, was done June 10th and 11th by Washington D.C. area pollster Jim Burton, a partner at Public Opinion Strategies — a Republican polling firm with more than two decades of experience that has done work for former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and count 72 House members and 19 Senators as clients. Callers were asked: “If the election for county commission from this district were being held today, for whom would you vote?”
According to the Baron, 12 percent of the callers said “definitely” Zapata, while 10 percent said they would “probably” vote for him. Machado got 4 percent “definitely” and 6 percent “probably.” The other guys who didn’t rise from single digits and have no funds reported in their campaigns, don’t factor for much so forgive Ladra for trying to better organize her time and not even go there. Sorry, boys. Better luck next time. But adding the figures up, that gives Zap 22 percent of likely voters to Machado’s 10 percent.
The poll was paid for by Citizens for Progress and Integrity, a PAC formed last fall by (I’ll give you one guess), yep, PAC pro Pepe Riesco, this time with former State Rep. JC Planas, who is a friend and colleague of Zapata’s. Planas was ushered in with what is called the “Fab Five” that year to the state house and also include former State Reps. Marcelo Llorente, who lost in the mayoral recall primary last year but was recently made a honcho on the Gimenez campaign, David Rivera, who has risen to the rank of U.S. Congressman, and former South Miami Mayor Julio “The Good One” Robaina, who hasn’t done much of anything. Oh, wait. He’s lost three elections since then.
Roly Marante, a former county employee (one-time aide to Commissioner Rebeca Sosa) who is now a political and media consultant, serves as a spokesman for the PAC. A spokeman for a PAC? Now there’s something you don’t see every day. A nice trend I hope other PACs start employing. Marante told me that the poll was done pretty much to shut Machado and his people up. Those aren’t his words. Those are Ladra’s words. These are his words:
“We wanted to get a snapshot of the moment because there was a lot of chatter,” Marante said, being kind. He means a lot of trash-talking and finger-pointing. Since Ladra posted about the possible riff between Zapata and Martinez, some lonely soul has been trying — and miserably failing — to spin the betrayal around the other way.
Now, admittedly, there is a whopping 62 percent that is undecided or refused to answer. That’s a bunch. But Ladra expects that the undecideds have already started to pick and choose. There was not that much talk about the upcoming election — chock full as the ballot will be — three weeks ago, just days after we knew for real who was going to run where because they qualified. That was before anyone knew that State Rep. Jeanette Nuñez drew a surprise, last-minute challenge from one-time Miami-Dade School Board candidate Libby Perez (more on that later), who got almost 19 percent of the vote against School Board Member Carlos Curbelo in 2010, the most of any of the other challengers, including Eddy Barea, who owns the Ibeley school uniforms outlets.
And it was before Zapata had done any serious outreach.
Ferreiro reports that, since the survey, the campaign has implemented phone banks, knocked on 3,000 doors and delivered three — count ’em, three — mailers to voters’ homes. They also started airing a cable TV commercial, where “Shirley,” identified as a West Kendall resident, tells us why she supports Zapata, after the poll was taken. So there is reason to believe that the his numbers may have risen and the gap may have widened.
“I have lived and raised my family in this community for the past 30 years. But what happens in county commission can dramatically affect our lives,” says “Shirley,” who looks an awful lot like a woman Ladra has talked to frequently at the Kendall Federation of Homeowners Association meeting, hinting at how that endorsement might go.
Speaking of endorsements: Dade County PBA President John Rivera sent Ladra a list of their chosen candidates Wednesday (more on that later) and, naturally, it includes Martinez and Machado — who has no website but does have a Facebook page with 35 likes compared to Zapata’s 142 likes. But Ferreiro, who said that Zapata already had the county firefighters behind him, hinted at some more endorsements coming later this week or next.
One or two of those could help his numbers go up — or, at least the undecideds go down — when the next poll is done, which Marante says will likely be after the absentee ballots go out in a couple of weeks.
Wait a minute… ABs hit the street in a couple of weeks? You know there’s going to be more on that later.
Zapata has lead, Aniteres Flores in District 11 race added by Ladra on
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