So the $400 million fuel depot deal is apparently dead.
Just days after Political Cortadito asked whether Miami-Dade taxpayers were about to become the proud owners of one of the most expensive governmental “oops” moments in local history — and dopes in what looks like a long con job — Mayor Daniella Levine Cava slammed the brakes on the reported $400 million deal to buy back the Fisher Island fuel depot that serves the ships at PortMiami
And just like that, the fuel farm fiasco entered its next phase: Lawyers.
In a memo released Friday, Levine Cava formally rejected the deal negotiated by her suddenly-former Chief Operating Officer Jimmy Morales 
and former PortMiami Director Hydi Webb — and now we know why both were forced to resign this week — saying the price tag was simply too high.
En otras palabras: Are you people out of your f$#%^ng minds?
After weeks of criticism and a growing chorus of people asking why Miami-Dade taxpayers should pay more than twice what the Fisher Island fuel terminal sold for less than a year ago, La Alcaldesa formally tossed the proposed purchase Friday.
And just like that, what looked like a controversial buyout became a full-blown legal and political war.
Read related: Miami-Dade’s $400 million ‘oops’ — Fisher Island fuel depot fight explodes
The reported deal would have paid the owners of the Fisher Island fuel depot roughly $200 million upfront and another $200 million over time. That’s the same property Miami-Dade had multiple opportunities to buy before Chicago-based HRP Group and its high-powered development partners — including locals Jorge Perez of The Related Group and Russell Galbut of everything — stepped in and purchased it for about $180 
million, then threatened to build luxury condominiums on it.
The same property county officials now insist is absolutely essential to the future of PortMiami. The same 10 acres that suddenly became worth twice as much once government realized it needed it. Funny how that works.
Levine Cava said the county will instead pursue eminent domain — the government’s power to take private property for public use while paying what a court determines is fair compensation. She, and apparently others, believe that they can prove the Fisher Island fuel terminal — which supplies marine fuel to PortMiami cruise and cargo ships — is crucial to the county’s very existence.
Eminent domain is what Commissioner Oliver Gilbert suggested last October, when the county entered into mediation with the developer, w ho had already purchased the property.
Read related: Eminent domain item at Miami-Dade could be result of fuel depot debacle
In a statement to Political Cortadito, HRP CEO Roberto Perez argued that the company spent years identifying the site, assembling investors, conducting due diligence, and creating what it sees as a multi-billion-dollar redevelopment opportunity.
HRP says Miami-Dade was aware the property was for sale for years, was invited to buy it — indeed encouraged to do so by the cruise industry 
people — and declined multiple opportunities to do so.
“The County finds itself in this position as a direct result of its own incompetence after years and frankly decades of failure to plan for PortMiami infrastructure,” Perez said. And he’s not wrong.
“Seizing private property is not the solution for public failure,” he added.
Oh, and that they still intend to pursue redevelopment, which sounds a little like an empty threat because the land is still zoned heavy manufacturing and industrial, not luxury high-rise. The county doesn’t have to approve a zoning change.
Maybe he’s just mad that his long con job was exposed and it’s now not such an easy flip.
Read related: Fisher Island fuel depot flipping fiasco smells like a long con on Miami-Dade
Fisher Island residents aren’t exactly cheering either.
Many supported the condo redevelopment and have already sued to block a county acquisition, arguing that the fuel facility is an aging industrial use sitting next to homes, a school, and hurricane evacuation routes. So the county now faces opposition not just from the developers, but also a segment of the island community.
And taxpayers may end up funding years of litigation to determine how much the county must pay for a property it says it cannot live without.
Perhaps the most remarkable part of the entire saga is that none of this had to happen. The property didn’t suddenly appear. The fuel depot wasn’t 
hidden. The port didn’t materialize overnight.
Everybody knew the facility existed. Everybody knew it was privately owned. Everybody knew it was for sale.
Yet somehow Miami-Dade government woke up in the ninth inning and discovered the fuel supply for the Cruise Capital of the World belonged to somebody else.
That realization already cost two top officials their jobs. Now it may cost taxpayers years of litigation.
And unlike the reported $400 million deal, nobody yet knows what that final bill will be.
What we do know: The county won’t write the check. The developers won’t walk away. The residents won’t stop suing.
And the fuel depot that everybody suddenly claims is indispensable is headed into what could become one of the nastiest and most expensive land fights Miami has seen in years.
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Property owners are legally entitled to receive the fair market value of the property being taken by eminent domain. What will the presiding court deem “just compensation,” the current real estate value of $400,000,000, more? Miami-Dade County has a cadre of highly paid, ostensibly brilliant lawyers. Still, given the nature of the litigation, the County may hire external legal help with the expertise needed for the legal challenge before it. Then add to the cost of paying for what the court may end up deeming “just compensation” for the land in dispute, protracted external legal fees; it is going to get very expensive for county taxpayers, who will ultimately pay the bill. So besides Jimmy Morales and Hydi Webb, who else must resign as a consequence of this monumental taxpayers’ dollar fiasco? Cava! In the interim, let Jorge Perez and Russell Galbut keep the land and try to build luxury apartment buildings on it. The environmental challenges they will face will be “Sisyphean,” requiring not only the removal of the tank farm and the fuel within it but also the remediation of decades of contaminated soil and sanitizing the excavated terrain before they can start building. For environmentalists, it will be a cause célèbre! Is there still room within Dodge Island to build a fuel tank farm? Doubt it, but if so, that would be the ideal location. If not, and as an interim solution, until a permanent fuel tank is built at a suitable location in unincorporated Miami-Dade, bring the fuel by rail tankers from Port Everglades. Ultimately, Miami-Dade County taxpayers will end up paying for this most recent Cava failure.
Isn’t the definition of Eminent Domain the government’s legal authority to take private property for a public purpose? Isn’t this technically a business use for the benefit of the cruise port?
Under Article X, Section 6 of the Florida Constitution, no property shall be taken except for a valid public use, and without full compensation to the owner. So will compensation be for the full appraised value?
In plain terms, the government can’t take your land just because they want it or screw up and not buy it correctly. The taking must serve a public need, such as a highway, school, or utility improvement—and even then, you’re entitled to far more than a check for fair market value.
The Mayor doesn’t act by herself. Recall all commissioners and the Mayor and please leave Otaola out if it 🤣🤣
Mayor Cava and her vast army of vastly overpriced staff screwed up. They are all novices. They are stupid to let Jorge Perez and Russell Galbut rob the taxpayers. But isn’t this so Miami? Billionaires robbing taxpayers.
” I’m surprised, though maybe I shouldn’t be, at the gall of the Fisher Island residents. They built their homes, their school, and everything else with that facility sitting right there. Now they’re suddenly clamoring about its possible danger to the community? It reminds me of Doral residents who gladly purchased homes in the county incinerator’s backyard and then howled upon hearing of plans to keep the incinerator there. If you had no qualms about buying when the “eyesore” was there, then you should have no problem with it remaining where it is.”
OUTSTANDING as 100 percent correct .
I’m in Doral and it was same thing with the incinerator which should have stayed right where it was granted new model built like Japan has and certainly a different company running it .
Going by how long my roof now stays clean since incinerator is no longer operating , I suspect it was pumping out some bad stuff but no one forced me to buy in Doral , I knew it was here when bought my house .
Who is representing the taxpayers?
Jimmy Morales always falls like a cat. What an embarrassing guy
Incompetents Have Offices on The 29 Floor of The County Building That Floor Has The Must “Unqualify ” Staff Ever Assembled !
I’m surprised, though maybe I shouldn’t be, at the gall of the Fisher Island residents. They built their homes, their school, and everything else with that facility sitting right there. Now they’re suddenly clamoring about its possible danger to the community? It reminds me of Doral residents who gladly purchased homes in the county incinerator’s backyard and then howled upon hearing of plans to keep the incinerator there. If you had no qualms about buying when the “eyesore” was there, then you should have no problem with it remaining where it is.
Who is in charge of foresight?
Cava. Mayor Cava. Why didn’t Mayor Daniella Cava act sooner? Why didn’t Cava step up and buy the site for $150 Million years ago? Is Cava a novice? Did Cava have useless super expensive staffers? Does Cava have zero business experience? Is Cava being played by Jorge Perez and Russell Galbut? Who is looking out for the taxpayers?
Very rich – pun intended – of the Fisher Island residents to say “the fuel facility is an aging industrial use sitting next to homes, a school, and hurricane evacuation routes” when the facility has been there before their million dollar condos, school and evacuation route (that consists of yachts or their private 24-hour passenger ferry) were built and bought by them.
This is a battle that should not even have been fought. Buying a piece of land zoned as heavy manufacturing with a fuel depot that has been there way before the billionaires’ condos were built, and expecting the government to just rezone it residential is plain dumb. How tacky and entitled can they be! I guess we’ll find out soon enough.