UPDATED: Well, that didn’t take long.
True to his campaign talk, newly-elected Commissioner Ariel Fernandez has moved to dismiss City Manager Peter Iglesias. He has put a discussion on the May 9 commission agenda “regarding the termination of the city manager.”
Fernandez, who won with nearly 60% of the vote, has had issues with the city manager for months, if not years. But he says he is fulfilling the wishes of the voters.
“The message I’ve gotten from the residents is pretty clear: They want a new direction for the city,” Fernandez told Political Cortadito. Isn’t that what the new commission is for?
“Yes, but you need a city manager that doesn’t have his own personal agenda,” Fernandez said. He points to a recent visit by Iglesias to the planning and zoning board to request height and density increases on a city parking lot — without commission direction. “Nobody told him to do that,” he said.
Fernandez met with Iglesias for more than two hours Tuesday and gave him an opportunity to step down. Iglesias told him he served at the will of the commission. He told Ladra he has the votes to stay.
“I think I’m doing a good job,” Iglesias told Ladra. “I work at the direction of the commission. If the commission wants to fire me, they’ll fire me.”
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But that’s not all Fernandez wants. The government and campaign consultant — who has suspended publishing the popular Gables Insider blog — has hit the ground running full speed ahead with an ambitious first meeting that addresses other issues he campaigned on.
“None of these items should be a surprise to anyone,” Fernandez said.
He wants to scrap the “mobility hub,” a $63 million redevelopment of a parking garage with electric vehicle charging stations and a launch pad for Amazon drones. He wants to require people who go before the city with zoning applications or bids or proposals to disclose any campaign contributions they’ve made. And he wants city commissioners, not the city manager, to appoint members of the Board of Architects.
“If residents are truly the ones in charge, their elected representatives should be the ones appointing the Board of Architects,” Fernandez said, adding that all the current members are from outside the city. “Several architects on the campaign trail said they had applied and never heard back,” he added.
The disclosure on campaign donations is just “an extra level of transparency,” Fernandez said.
And scrapping the mobility hub has been one of his campaign promises. “Do we really need a $63 million glorified parking garage,” he asks, adding that it will cost $100 million by the time it’s finished.
Fernandez agrees that the parking garage “needs a refresh.” But he says it averages 100 vacant spaces a day and that there is no need to redevelop and expand it. Most egregious, he says, is the park on the roof. “You’re opening doors for developers’ green space to be on the roof,” Fernandez said. “They can say, ‘I’m going to do it now because you did it.'”
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A petition with 1,600 resident signatures against the project was dismissed by the mayor as a small number. Tell that to Commissioner Kirk Menendez, who won in 2021 by 350 votes.
This first meeting for Fernandez and newly-elected Commissioner Melissa Castro — who were sworn in on Friday — is going to be long. Did Fernandez bite off more than he can chew?
“Why wait? You have to start somewhere,” Fernandez said. “And when you have a mandate, you have to lead with a mandate.”
Iglesias was hired in 2016 as an assistant city manager and was promoted to his position in 2018 after Cathy Swanson-Rivenbark was chased away after a protracted battle with the popular police chief and several residents. Prior to that, Iglesias worked in senior positions at the city of Miami in Building, Planning and Zoning and Information Technology. Las malas lenguas blame him for bringing a slew of former Miami city employees to the Gables payroll. A University of Miami graduate with a Bachelor of Science in engineering, Iglesias was recently named Engineer of the Year by the Association of Cuban American Engineers (ACAE) for his efforts to advance the role of engineers.
Fernandez said he doesn’t have anyone in mind for the top administrative position and would want to do a national search. “I’d like to bring somebody fresh who has no ties to local developers,” he said.
Assistant City Manager Alberto Parjus would likely serve as interim.
The city manager oversees a $195-million operating budget and a $220-million capital plan and leads 1,100 employees in a city of a more than 51,000 residents. She or he reports to the mayor and four city commissioners, not just the mayor as some might think.
New Coral Gables commissioner wants to fire city manager Peter Iglesias added by Ladra on
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