The Coral Gables Commission will meet for a special meeting this afternoon to name an interim city manager after the abrupt resignation last week of Pat “My Way or the Highway” Salerno when he was apparently caught in a lie that he basically didn’t want to have to explain. But Assistant City Manager Carmen Olazabal, […]
Federal prosecutors will bring two of the most interesting witnesses to the stand Wednesday in the tax evasion and fraud case against former Hialeah Mayor Julio Robaina and wife Raiza, in connection to their alleged shadow banking business that boomed in the City of Progress during Robaina’s reign. Expected to testify today: Councilwoman Vivian “I’ll […]
Miami-Dade Commissioner Jose “Pepe” Diaz may have a challenge to his re-election this year, after all: At least one group has been actively recruiting for a candidate to run against the former Sweetwater mayor. Pet’s Trust Miami — the organization that was able to get a majority of the public to vote on funding improved […]
Fight, fight! But Ladra bets the ugly, public brawl between a group of Republican legislators and the beloved president of Miami Dade College isn’t really over yet and that the former doesn’t know what they have gotten themselves into. Jaws dropped all over the county last week when the typically staid and methodically elegant MDC […]
Miami-Dade Commissioner Jean Monestime raised a whopping $77,000 in contributions in March — more than he has in any other single month since he started raising funds in March of last year — bringing his total to nearly $300,000 for his re-election bid. Monestime’s monthly take was the biggest of all the incumbent commissioners up […]
No, she’s not getting a nose job. Doral Councilwoman Bettina Rodriguez-Aguilera missed the half of the council meeting Wednesday night because she was at Baptist Hospital with an intestinal obstruction. “I do not know how many days I will be here. But I am well taken care off,” she told her Facebook friends Friday morning. […]
Opening statements began today in the federal tax evasion and fraud trial against former Hialeah Mayor Julio Robaina and his wife Raiza, in what is likely to become one of the closest watched local political trials lately — and that’s saying something in this atmosphere. According to documents from the U.S. Attorney’s office, witnesses include […]
We’ve seen some local political comebacks, lately. Founding Miami Lakes Mayor Wayne Slaton returned to office last year after the former mayor was arrested on bribery charges. Former Homestead Councilman Jeff Porter was elected mayor in that southern city last year after that mayor was arrested on other public corruption charges. In 2011, former Miami […]
County commission candidate Daniella Levine Cava submitted just over 1,200 signed petitions Thursday to qualify for the race in District 10 against Commission Vice Chair Lynda Bell — more than the 1,100 she needed to get her name on the ballot. She also announced Thursday that she had raised an additional $54,000 in March, bringing its total raised […]
The morale at Coral Gables City Hall and among municipal employees made a 180 degree turn Tuesday after City Manager Pat Salerno — who was basically, and finally, caught in a lie — resigned abruptly during a commission meeting. “A lot of people are very happy,” said one woman who works at City Hall. But […]