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Hohenstein said he was as surprised about Wednesday’s agenda item as he was when Zapata brought the issue up in July and asked for the ballot language to be written. He was just as surprised at the formation in June of the Friends of Higher Education PAC out of nowhere.
“Nobody has advised me of any change in plans or a site found,” he said, which supports the notion that they are being strong-armed into this.
There are too many unanswered questions for this to really be genuine at the ballot.
(1) Do we know where the youth fair would go? No.
A few sites have been discussed but none are adequate. A parcel outside the Urban Development Boundary has been brought up and scratched as 
anything but a swap for green space lost to the FIU expansion. It was too remote anyway. Another property in the Northwest area seems too close to Broward and not cental enough. Expect Tropical Park to come up again on Wednesday. I don’t know why Commissioner Esteban Bovo lo tiene con eso, but there will be resistance, naturally, from residents in the area and Commissioner Javier Souto, the King of Tropical Park. Bovo is the sponsor of Wednesday’s resolution to take this issue to the ballot, but Commissioner Juan “El Zorro” Zapata seems to be in favor of it already. In an email he sent Friday to his constituents, he told them to vote yes, in favor of the ballot measure, in a Miami Herald online survey that seemed a little weird to begin with. I mean, asking if the voters in Miami-Dade County should have a say in the proposed expansion of FIU and the future of the Youth Fair is a no brainer. Of course they should have a say. The question is: Shouldn’t our electeds should wait until they have details to bring the measure to a public referendum?
(2) Do we know where the money would come from? No.
Everyone tells us there will be no county taxes used but this is a state university that will be getting state tax funds, of which Miami-Dade is a donor county. So, in essence, they are sorta your tax dollars. The state has already given $10 million and Richard Perez, one of the lobbyists for Friends of Higher Education PAC, told Ladra that the reason they need to put this on the ballot is to get more funding. “It’s part of the dilema we have. We’re not going to be getting the full funding in one year,” Perez said, adding that Tallahassee would be more akin to disperse dollars if it saw public support for the expansion. “We thought that would be the appropriate first step, to see if this was something the community wanted,” Perez told Ladra. It’s possible that they will also get private donations for some of the buildings, but there is no official, organized donation drive, Perez said. And couldn’t they use that as a show of support from the community? Ladra is willing to bet that tuition also rises further. The projected cost to relocate the Youth Fair is $230 million — $80 million in construction and another $150 million in road and service improvements — which seems artificially elevated to me. But then what about the FIU improvements? That’s another $900 million. Did I mention the words artificially elevated earlier? How much of that do you think is going to be public dollars vs private dollars?
(3) Do we know what FIU wants to do with the land? No.
Not specifically. The university has said it would develop student housing, parking and research and academic facilities. But we don’t know exactly how 
the $900 million will be split up. They have backed off needing the whole 86 acres and now only need 64 acres — the county will keep the building that houses the gun shows and Cuba Nostalgia and athletic fields and buildings. What’s the ratio of parking spaces to academic facilities and student housing? Where are the studies that show the best uses for this land? What about a transportation study and plan for inside and outside the campus? FIU provided me with a power point presentation that is just page after page of pretty pictures of what it could look like with no real numbers provided.
Actually, this is one of those things that could very well be a good idea. If it were done the right way and for the right reasons. FIU is on the brink of even more greatness and needs to grow to be a world class city university out in suburbia to keep up with the needs of our community. That is true. And the Youth Fair — that bastion of carnies and trailer trash and corn dogs that’s a great place to visit but you wouldn’t want to live there — might find a new home that could be better and enhance the experience the organization provides to the community. Hohenstein told Ladra he is not only open to that, he welcomes it.
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Premature ballot item = pressure on Youth Fair/FIU land deal added by Ladra on
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