The two new city attorneys representing Doral after the surprise firing of former City Attorney John Herrin last week have registered to lobby at the city — just within the last three months.
Gil Pastoriza and Dan Espino — who work for the Weiss Serrota Helfman etcetera law firm — registered in January and March, respectively. Pastoriza registered on a rezoning matter for Maradoral Holdings, LLC — an issue he said has since been resolved (that was fast!). He also told Ladra, in a quick and terse conversation before he hung up on me, that he did not have any other lobbying clients in Doral.
Espino didn’t fill out that field on the form when he registered and paid his fee on March 4. But he told Ladra later, in an email, that it was to represent himself and his firm as the city searched for new legal representation.
Espino is assistant city attorney in Medley, which is in the middle of an annexation battle with Doral over property that both cities want. How can he represent both towns?
Is it me or does this have conflict of interest written all over it?
Add to that the fact that Mayor Luigi “Me, me, me!” Boria told everyone — including Herrin, Ladra is told, and the local media — that he had cancelled two weeks ago the request for solicitations for a new attorney. “I don’t see any need” for change, Boria told Miami Herald witer Joey Flechas. He said Herrin had addressed the issues raised earlier this year by Councilwoman Sandra “Warpath” Ruiz.
Add to that the fact that the first order of business for the new attorneys is to provide a written opinion that reflects their verbal advice that, yes, the city council could, indeed, make changes to the charter amendments proposed by the Charter Review Committee — which will be presented to the public Monday — or even propose their own. While Boria may have said he fired Herrin because of bad legal advice, that is obvious BS. Herrin told the mayor at the meeting last week that he provided no advice on the issue the mayor cited. The real reason is that Herrin told them they could not, in fact, change or propose their own charter amendments without approval of the commission, which is a separate and independent board.
See? Among the amendments that might be proposed are term limits that could hamper the political aspirations of Mayor Boria and Councilwomen Ruiz and Christi Fraga — all three of whom voted to oust Herrin and vote in the new, more accommodating attorneys.
Councilwoman Ana Maria Rodriguez and Bettina Rodriguez-Aguilera voted against the firing. Ladra had first written that both also voted against the new hirings, but Rodriguez had voted with the others, in fact, probably because they were already there. She did complain about the process or lack of.
“I’m in shock,” said Rodriguez-Aguilera, who believes the mayor violated the charter by bringing the Herrin’s dismissal up as a last-minute item not on the agenda and compared him to Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro.
“I had to vote against it. I did not go to Washington D.C. … to protest the way that the Venezuelan government and the president there is just changing the laws as he sees fit, to just sit here in the United States of America and not say anything when I see our mayor doing the same thing.”
Boria brought the issue up without putting it on the agenda at the same meeting in which the council approved a measure on first reading that would require such pocket items to be approved by a super majority. He got it in just in time. And it is obvious that he wanted to get rid of Herrin because the former attorney told the mayor and the council what the law said, not what they wanted to hear. Which was that the city charter does not allow the council to interfere with charter amendments except “cosmetically.”
So how is it that these two (by the way, do they both make $175 an hour, basically doubling Doral’s legal costs?) attorney/lobbyists have a different legal opinion of the same charter? And so quickly? Without having to review it and come back to the council with an opinion later? It seems obvious that they have put some thought into this already.
And it seems a little more than convenient.
Pastoriza wouldn’t even address my questions. After taking my call, he suddenly said he could not talk and asked me to submit questions in writing. I said I would. but to be fair, had to tell him I was going to be writing about his having registered as a lobbyist. That is when I asked if he was still representing that property owner, which might be awkward, right? He said no. That is when I asked if he had any other clients in Doral. He said no. But he got testy and again asked me to submit questions in writing.
Ladra got testy when, after I asked for the address to submit those questions, he gave me 2525 Ponce de Leon Blvd. Is he for real? Even though this may indicate an unwillingness on the part of the new city attorney in Doral to answer legitimate questions about potential conflict of interests, Ladra insisted on an email and got one. It took longer for Pastoriza to criticize my style and call me unprofessional than it would have to have just answered the questions.
And there’s been no response to my email yet, but you will have the answers to my many questions as soon as I do.
Neither the mayor nor Councilwoman Ruiz have returned phone calls.
Espino, a former Miami Springs councilman who resigned to run for School Board (he lost), did not return phone calls to his office because he got tied up in “an emergency,” but he provided his limited answers here via email. He says he didn’t know he was on the shortlist to become chief of staff for Boria when the mayor was first elected. And we also hear he is close to former and disgraced State Rep. Ralph Arza, Mayor Boria’s political godfather, whose signature is all over this. Espino told Ladra in an email that he hasn’t seen Arza in “many months.”
You all remember Arza, don’t you? He was forced to resign after he was charged with two felonies in connection with the racial slur and obscenity-filled messages he left on a colleague’s voice mail. Arza is quietly moving behind the scenes. He was one of former Hialeah Mayor Julio Robaina‘s political dogs on the 2011 recall mayoral campaign and helped Boria win election in 2012.
Plenty stinks here. Stay tuned as Ladra sniffs around.
Conflicts of interests cloud city attorneys pick in Doral added by Ladra on
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