Chairman says D11 is not commissioner’s ‘fiefdom’
A relatively benign ordinance to help encourage development and, ideally, workforce housing near Miami International Airport and other county airfields turned into a public scolding Tuesday when Miami-Dade Commission Chairman Oliver Gilbert took issue with the way Commissioner Roberto Gonzalez took possession of the Miami Executive Airport.
“You don’t have an airport. You keep saying, ‘My airport,'” Gilbert said to Gonzalez after he asked for a five-year carve out of the airport at 12800 SW 145th Ave., formerly known as the Kendall-Tamiami Executive Airport. “The airport is located in your district.
“For far too long, county commissioners have seen their districts as fiefdoms,” Gilbert said. “Opa-Locka [Airport] its in the district I represent. But it’s not mine.”
Read related: Kendall teacher challenges Miami-Dade D11 Commissioner Roberto Gonzalez
Gonzalez said the chairman’s comments were not fair and inferred he was using shorthand for the airport in District 11, which is logically what everyone understood. He also referred to it as Miami Executive Airport at least five times.
“Sir, it’s in my district,” Gonzalez said. “What I am trying to do, commissioner, is represent the people in my district who live around the airport and have a lot of concerns about the density.”
Commissioner Raquel Regalado, who sponsored the ordinance — giving priority to airport employees on the workforce housing — and wanted to move on, accepted the commissioner’s amendment to carve out the Kendall-Tamiami airport. “We have an agreement… we’re good,” she nearly yelled, and Gonzalez talked over Gilbert to thank her for accepting the amendment. The ordinance to revise the prohibitions on what is called the “outer safety zone” passed 11-0.
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After Commissioner Keon Hardemon suggested that the category of “outer safety zone” be eliminated entirely, Regalado agreed to study the issue. The OTZ was originally created to incentivize hotel and motel construction and may be outdated, she said.
“It is an anomaly,” Regalado said. “Most places do not have an ‘outer safety zone.’ We should revisit it and figure out why it exists and if we still need it.
“I don’t know if it’s necessarily in the best interest of all our airports.”
See what she did there? “Our airports.”
Miami-Dade: Oliver Gilbert spanks Rob Gonzalez on ‘my airport’ comment added by Ladra on
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