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200 people saw Monday night.
Cabrera hit one of the best hooks on development, drawing an audible gasp from the room when he disclosed that Cason had 
gotten eight maximum $1,000 checks from Agave developers of the Mediterranean Village, what used to be known as Old Spanish Village, a project that will have variance requests for parking requirements and height limitations, among possibly others. Cason also received five $1,000 checks from developer Armando Codina, who has another project in the Gables pipeline. So that’s $13,000 of his first $20K coming from special interests who need to go before the city commission.
“I’ve received money in the past election from some developers. I think it’s a good project,” Cason said, referring to the Agave project and denying any quid pro quo insinuations. “I’m a person of integrity. They like me. They want me to win because they want me to carry out the good works we’re doing.”
“Sure they like you, because this is an opportunity for them to get your support on a project,” Cabrera said.
Cason also lied when he said the neighbors like the project. Ladra was with Cabrera when he walked that neighborhood just south of Miracle Mile and west of Douglas Road. Several homeowners are afraid of the traffic it will bring and unhappy about losing the parking they have on the street in front of their homes. Many of them do not have driveways.
It was almost laughable when Cason brought up the same tired Cabrera quote he used against his political nemesis two years ago, and out of context again to serve his evil purposes, when the former commissioner was sarcastically chiding his colleagues for not taking up pension reform. “You know when we’ll do it? When the proverbial excrement hits the oscillating device,” Cabrera said. Cason knows very well that Cabrera was being facetious and for him to suggest otherwise is just plain dishonest. But because he’s got nothing else to run on, the incumbent likes to point at this one quote as a reason why Cabrera is not, I don’t know, polite(?) enough to be mayor.
Better to be impolite than dishonest. Ladra thinks it was one of Commissioner Cabrera’s defining moments. Like he said at the debate, Cabrera is not one to go along to get along. He asks the difficult questions. He applies pressure so that the priorities are discussed. He’s not afraid to call things as he sees them.
Over and over again, a visibly more nervous Cason attacked Cabrera with empty, hollow claims that he had done nothing on the issues he was talking about today. It seemed like he was coached to do that. When cornered, say, “Yeah, but you didn’t fix that when you were here.” To which, after the fifth or sixth time, Cabrera responded: “I was a commissioner, Jim. You are a mayor.”
But, in fact, Cabrera had hard examples on many of the things he was talking about. He opted out of the pension plan himself, to show leadership by example since they wanted other employees to switch from the city to the state system. He also worked with administration to reduce the overtime multiplier back in 2006, while Cason — who doesn’t really want to run for mayor 
and is just doing it to bug Ralph — has been unable to do anything because of his bad blood with the unions.
Read related story: Jim Cason runs again ’cause ‘nobody else will’
Cason had few details about anything, just a lot of pretty words strung together that ended in some ridiculous fantasy, magical imaginary trolley ride through the Gables with him as mayor leading the way along all the sidewalks he’s apparently personally fixed himself and median landscaping — median landscaping?!?! –– the projects that are going up. It sounded like a ride through Mr. Cason’s Neighborhood.
Cabrera had figures and numbers and ideas — like moving the election from April to August or November, not because it saves the city $150,000 but because it increases participation.
Ladra hopes that Ralph can meet more people between now and April 14. Or even between now and March 24, which is when absentee ballots drop. And he’s knocking on hundreds of doors every weekend. Because once people meet him and hear his position on the issues, his experience and his intention to make Coral Gables far more transparent than it is today, they realize that he is the best of the two candidates for so many reasons.
Luckily, Monday night’s exchange is caught on video. And you’ll all get another chance to see that later this month when the Coral Gables Chamber of Commerce hosts its own debate.
Stay tuned.
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