Miami Beach decision looms as Levine slate threatens

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It’s been quiet on this blog for days as Ladra has been busy biting her nails about the outcome of today’s Miami Beach elections.

Runoffs in three council races have never been so important. Why? Because the right candidate can help maintain checks and balances in the city by the sea for the next couple of crucial years as important development decisions are made. The wrong candidates can turn Miami Beach into a rubber-stamping government much like Hialeah’s where special interests gain ground and freedom of the press could lose it.

Mayor Elect Philip Levine, who apparently already has the self-established power to decide who is press and who is not, has gone out of his way to support at least two of the candidates in the races: Cutie-pie attorney Michael Grieco against incumbent Commissioner Jorge Exposito and activist Joy Malakoff against termed-out Mayor Matti Bower, who is running for a commission seat. He had a “friend raiser” for them last week to rally the voters.

While the third candidate on his reported slate was left off the party invite, activist Elsa Urquiza showed up anyway. Many believe Levine is helping Urquiza anyway against Micky Steinberg, but he is doing it more quietly and mostly through his campaign consultant, David Custin, and some gutter politics vis-a-vis the tainted endorsement of also ran Sherry Roberts.

Maybe Levine knows something we don’t, like that Steinberg, the wife of former State Rep. Richard “Sext Me” Steinberg, will win. After all, he has the money for daily polls if he wants ’em.

Why is Levine so involved in the commission races? Because he needs a super majority to get anything done about the convention center. And it would be nice to have friends who owe him a favor on the dais next to him when he wants to push his agenda (read: termed-out Commissioner Jonah Wolfson‘s agenda).

Why is it important to vote for the opposite of what Levine wants? Because this is a democracy and the only way to ensure that it stays that way is to keep special interests — whether they be convention center developers or just some individual millionaire media mogul who wants to choose who is the press and who is not — from owning the majority of any elected body.

I’m not really too concerned about the Grieco/Exposito race. I actually have reservations about both candidates. But I think that Grieco will disappoint Levine and his crafty crew by not being a yes man and I would look forward to that. It may not happen, however, because that is the one race in which I think Levine’s slate mate is already doomed, whose last name is neither Jewish nor Hispanic. Expo beat Greico in the Nov. 6 primary in early voting, absentee ballots and election day nods. But if turnout remains abysmally low today without the pull of the dramatic mayoral brawl that left Commissioner Michael Gongora out, then ABs will rule. And that is where the incumbent reigned Nov. 6, with a more than 550-vote lead.

Ladra somehow feels the other two races are the closer contests.

For all her popularity, Bower has high unpopulars, too. And some voters are not pleased to see her on the ballot at all, after she was termed out as mayor. Bower says she would have happily gone back to private life — if special interests were not trying to grab a hold of her city. And Malakoff has Levine’s money and momentum as well as Custin’s highly-motivated interest.

In the other race, Urquiza is not a candidate you want to underestimate. She has the support of community groups and the police union and has paid her dues to get here. Too bad she turned to Custin and his baggage (read: Wolfson) to take her the rest of the way. Ladra probably would have supported her otherwise. And maybe it wouldn’t be so close, as people tell me the one thing they like least about her is that connection and how it’s turned to gutter politics to slander Steinberg.

But the same low turnout that hurts Grieco will help Urquiza, who was able to keep the pace, almost, on absentee ballots and early voting but was blown out of the water by Steinberg on election day.

Ladra does not envy the people of Miami Beach. But if you are still undecided or haven’t been motivated to go today yet, here is a little push that might make the difference:

Vote for Bower not because she was endorsed (perhaps for the wrong reasons) by Save Dade and The Miami Herald, not because you want to set a precedent for term-limited politicos (which it does not) nor because you don’t blame Bower for not catching the corruption under her watch these past years (though it is not entirely her fault). Vote for Bower because Malakoff is an unknown who is seemingly going to owe her election to another unknown, Levine, who got an also ran to change his endorsement in that race.

Vote for Steinberg not because she has ties to Tallahassee or is the mother of young children, which brings a perspective that the city leadership can benefit from, but because Urquiza would give David Custin — who represents the tow truck industry in Miami Beach — one more conduit into city contracts and coffers. And because in her ugly endorsement of Urquiza, Roberts lied and said Steinberg — whose sister is a lesbian — an anti-gay candidate. That should not be rewarded, but rather punished.

Vote today to send two messages: Gutter politics will not sway you and the new mayor is not going to just do whatever he wants.

  Jorge Exposito, Matti Bower, Micky Steinberg, Philip Levine