End county baggage wrap monopoly, end conflict

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If we are to believe the mayor or commissioners of Miami-Dade County, baggage wrap plastic is going to bring Miami International Airport down.

Mayor Carlos Gimenez thinks that any regulations of baggage wrap are “ludicrous” and agrees with MDAD Director Emilio Gonzalez that it will make MIA the laughing stock of the aviation world to start policing plastic. He said that the operational costs and logistics of regulating the wrap that goes through the airport that sees 42 million people a year is less than how much more the county would make from the increased sales that would benefit the vendor with the contract.

And as difficult as it may be for Ladra to say this, he’s got a point.

Commissioners — at least 10 of them — think that the inferior cocooning of luggage by rogue wrappers without a county contract is taking money out of their pockets and, worse, causing widespread chaos. Led by Commissioner Juan Zapata, they said they had an obligation to protect the contractor that won the bid — and, by the way, donated a total of more than $50,000 to several of their campaigns — because, otherwise, who would do business with the county? They won the bid fair and square. What would happen if this kind of rogue business crept in to other county contracts?

They have a point, too, and voted 10-2 (Commissioners Daniella Levine-Cava and Jean Monestime voted against; Sally Heyman was absent) to have the mayor come up with standards for outside vendors that are as strict as whatever standards there are for the contracted vendor.

And it was fun to watch the commission get one over on a mayor who was much too smug throughout the meeting and seemed to relish in this slapdown of the company he rejected for the competition. The commission overrode his recommendation to hire Safe Wrap, which has had more than 30 lobbyists since it started courting the county in the late 1990s, over True Star/Sinapsis, which only had about a dozen.

If it wasn’t sweet outright vengeance for the mayor, it was serendipity. Las malas lenguas say he wants Safe Wrap to come back to renegotiate what it gives the county so that he can go out to bid again.

But in reality, our leaders shouldn’t even be talking about this. We have far bigger problems and issues for them to put their little heads together on than the baggage wrap war at the airport.

And here’s the kicker: They never discussed the one thing that would solve any problem and create a situation where the county — that means you, dear reader — and the consumer (that means you, too) benefits. End the monopoly. Let multiple companies provide the service at MIA.

Why is this multi-million business given to the one company with the best presentation and the slickest lobbyists after a grueling process laden with influence and almost always protested by the other side? The fact that there is so much business sort of drives the point home. Why can’t we divvy up the airport and let several vendors compete for customers by providing a better quality or price?

Commissioners may get the opportunity to end the monopoly sooner rather than later. The mayor is expected to veto their 10-2 decision, which could bring it back up at the next meeting. Political Cortadito has heard that some commissioners may cave.

Commissioner Xavier Suarez told Ladra he would switch his vote if he can be convinced that the cost is higher than the benefit. If, like Gimenez said, “the solution is worse than the problem.”

But he was also open to the idea of opening the monopoly up to other firms.

“My wife asked the same question,” he told Ladra when I asked him why they couldn’t have two or even three companies provide the service.

The only one who would not want that is the current contract holder Safe Wrap. But, like Gimenez said, they basically invented rogue wrapping when they were on the outside and True Star had the contract.

That’s what they call serendipity.

  Carlos Gimenez, Juan Zapata, Miami International Airport