Miami Mayor Francis Suarez is under pressure from both Coconut Grove residents and black activists to veto last week’s vote on the redistricting map, which they say gerrymanders the Grove into three districts.
Suarez, who has been glaringly absent throughout the entire redistricting process, has 10 days from the 3-2 March 24 vote to issue a veto. So that means by Sunday or Monday, at the latest, depending how the city attorney’s office does the math this time.
A group of active residents authored an open letter in the Coconut Grove Spotlight with all the reasons why the redistricting process was a “sham” and the outcome is unfair and seemingly unnecessary.
“This does not pass the smell test and also smacks of gerrymandering in return for favors and personal gain,” they wrote about the whole thing.
Read related: Coconut Grove residents are ignored as Miami carves up D2 in redistricting
Residents plan to rally in front of City Hall Thursday morning to get Baby X’s attention. Naturally, he’s not expected to be there. May Ladra suggest they picket Miami NFT Week at Mana this weekend, where Suarez is going to be a speaker? That may get his attention. He is giving the welcome speech at 1:30 p.m. Friday on the importance of Miami Tech Month, which is April.
Ticket prices range from $348 to $8,997. So, the protest should be outside.
The Miami-Dade chapter of the NAACP also wants a veto. President Daniella Pierre wrote a letter to the mayor urging him to veto the new map, which shifts 114 black voters in a “sliver” of the historic West Grove to the majority-Hispanic District 4, and Commissioner Manolo Reyes, who already said he didn’t want them. The move, opponents said over and over again at public meetings where they were ignored, would dilute the black community’s political power.
“As a civil rights organization, we have a duty to protect our democracy and prevent unfair redistricting plans that pose a threat to equal representation under the law,” Pierre wrote to Suarez. “In our collective effort to do so, we challenge state statutes, policies and local procedures that go against traditional redistricting principles and obligations under the Voting Rights Act.”
Read related: Joe Carollo votes to keep his house — and other Miami redistricting madness
The redistricting consultants hired by the city, attorney Miguel De Grandy and Palmetto Bay Councilman Steve Cody — who are arguably the most seasoned redistricters in the state — have repeatedly said that the map complies with voting laws and the commissioners’ stated criteria. DeGrandy, a former state representative, told the commissioners repeatedly that he could also draw a map that complied with the laws without dividing the Grove; that it was a matter of policy and the commission only needed to give them that direction.
But Commissioners Joe Carollo and Alex Diaz de la Portilla seemed intent on splitting up the Grove. It was personal. Carollo got his $2.2 million house drawn into his district, which saves him thousands on property taxes and millions in potential court judgements. And ADLP got to poke the “actors and activists” that he loathes because they get in the way of his graft.
A veto, which can only be overridden by a 4/5th vote, would really put Reyes on the spot. He voted against the map — even though he seconded it — because he wanted to be “true to his word” about giving back the West Grove. Let’s see if he goes with the other two amigos and switches his vote.
If it comes to that.
Suarez was expected to veto the chief’s firing, but never did. He knows how to. Baby X has issued six vetoes since elected mayor in 2019. The first was to veto the 3-2 commission decision to reverse the Historic and Environmental Board’s denial of the demolition and redevelopment of the Coconut Grove Playhouse. The next veto, the same year, was for the zoning change on the Babylon, which he said deviated from the Miami 21 plan for no good reason. That was the same year the mayor also vetoed a 3-2 vote by the commission to investigate the permit on the deck in the backyard of former City Manager Emilio Gonzalez.
In 2020, he vetoed the commission to take away his power to give away awards, like the keys to the city, and the 3-2 vote on a lawsuit settlement with Magic City Casino over the development rights of a future jai-a-lai fronton. The city attorney, however, told him that veto was invalid.
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He took a break after that. And the last veto was last summer, when he reversed the commission decision to put a charter amendment on the ballot that would change the way the city hires and fires it’s police and fire chiefs.
Read related: Francis Suarez is the absent Mayor VIP of Miami — MIA at the worst time
This one’s a no-brainer. It wouldn’t take much more for DeGrandy and Cody to come up with an alternative that both meets the requirements and protects the integrity of the Grove — without putting a commissioner’s house into his district. And an overwhelming majority of the community thinks a veto is the right thing to do. Not just Grove residents. Everybody.
But it’s going to be difficult for Suarez to veto the map because he needs both Carollo and ADLP to vote in favor of the Miami Freedom Park lease coming up next month, if it’s not deferred again. Of course, District 2 commissioner Ken Russell can’t vote for Miami Freedom Park either now, so it might be dead in the water no matter what.
Then again, because it has nothing to do with tech or crypto, he probably doesn’t care.
NAACP, Coconut Grove residents ask Miami mayor to veto redistricting map added by Ladra on
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