Fight at Bayfront Trust meeting may end in criminal charge vs board member

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Commissioner Miguel Gabela also threatened public

Remember that absolutely unhinged Bayfront Park Management Trust meeting last month?

The one where a Trust board member tried to grab filmmaker and activist Billy Corben’s phone, Miami Commissioner Miguel Angel Gabela lunged toward Corben demanding that he be arrested and Gabela’s own sergeant at arms had to physically push the commissioner back?

Well, somebody may soon be charged. And it isn’t Corben.

Trust board member Carlos Martell may be charged with misdemeanor battery in connection with the Aug. 13 confrontation, according to a police incident report. And also the fact that prosecutors have begun asking questions about the incident. Ala Beba Mann.

So much for Gabela’s repeated demands that police arrest everybody recording the public meeting.

Read related: Beba Mann apologizes to Billy Corben at City Hall — after court tells her to

The charge puts the bizarre meeting — which was supposedly called to deal with the sudden resignation of Trust Executive Director Raúl Miró — back in the spotlight just as the Miami City Commission prepares to consider a major restructuring of the troubled agency.

On Thursday’s commission agenda is an ordinance that would make the five city commissioners ex officio members of the Bayfront Park Management Trust’s governing body and give the District 2 commissioner two additional appointments.

In other words, after years of appointing political allies and assorted friends to oversee one of Miami’s most valuable public spaces, commissioners may decide that the answer is to put themselves directly in charge.

What could possibly go wrong?

The proposal, sponsored by Commissioner Damian Pardo, has actually been kicking around City Hall since 2024, deferred and continued repeatedly. But its return now — after Miró’s resignation, the Ultra political-contribution controversy and a Trust meeting that nearly turned into a pay-per-view event — could not be more timely.

Maybe the real emergency at Bayfront Park was never finding somebody to sit in Miró’s chair. Maybe it was the Trust itself.

By now, many Political Cortadito readers have seen the videos from the Aug. 13 meeting. Corben, whose legal name is William Cohen, was recording inside the meeting room at 301 Biscayne Boulevard. As he panned across the room, a woman — apparently Gabela’s wife, Mariela — told him not to record her.

Read related: Raul Miro resigns at Bayfront Park Management Trust as questions pile up

Corben responded that he was not recording her and continued holding his phone.

That is when Martell approached him.

According to City of Miami Police Department incident report — and anybody who sees the video — Martell attempted to grab Corben’s cellphone. When Corben moved the phone away, Martell allegedly grabbed his right arm.

The report says the Trust’s sergeant at arms restrained Martell and pulled him away.

Corben later showed officers his recording. The responding officer wrote that the video was “consistent with the victim’s account of the events,” although the alleged grabbing of Corben’s arm was not visible in the recording. Corben reported no injuries, declined medical assistance and had no visible signs of injury. A detective from the department’s Assaults Unit responded and interviewed Corben and a witness. Police also noted that surveillance footage from inside the building might exist.

You know who else has video? Mariela Gabela and the D1 special counsel, Jose Sanchez-Gronlier. Those should also be seen.

Now Martell is the one reportedly facing a criminal charge.

But Martell’s confrontation with Corben was only the opening act. When Corben demanded that Martell be arrested, Gabela stood up, moved aggressively toward the filmmaker and began demanding that police arrest Corben instead.

For what? Recording a public meeting?

The commissioner appeared ready to turn a government meeting into a fistfight until his own sergeant at arms pushed him back.

Now there’s a City of Miami job that deserves hazardous-duty pay.

It was not Gabela’s first near-brawl in a public meeting. He once appeared ready to throw down with former Commissioner Joe Carollo behind the commission dais. Apparently, replacing Carollo did not mean replacing the performance style.

Corben has been hammering Gabela for months with his “Gabela Gone Wild” videos and another video portraying the commissioner as a caveman. Gabela clearly does not appreciate the attention.

But disliking somebody’s videos does not make recording a public meeting a crime.

After the confrontation with Corben, Gabela turned on Downtown Neighbors Alliance President James Torres, who was also recording. Gabela called Torres a criminal and said he should be arrested, too.

At this rate, the Trust was going to need a prisoner-transport van outside.

Vice Chairman Horacio Aguirre tried to call a recess. It did not exactly restore order. By the time the meeting ended, the departure of the Trust’s executive director — the reason for the emergency meeting in the first place — was almost an afterthought.

The confrontation erupted as residents questioned Gabela about Miró’s resignation, the management of the Trust and political contributions connected to Ultra Music Festival.

Read related: Miguel Gabela’s D1 counsel runs PAC that got $50K from Ultra Music Festival

Torres called Gabela a “criminal” — an allegation for which he offered no evidence — and demanded that the commissioner step down as Trust chairman. He also asked the City Commission to reconsider its April 23 approval of a new Ultra agreement that could keep the massive electronic-music festival at Bayfront Park for as long as 20 years.

That request followed reports that $80,000 from interests connected to Ultra flowed into two political committees associated with people inside Gabela’s orbit shortly after the vote.

As Political Cortadito reported in June, Advance Miami—a political committee chaired by José Sánchez-Gronlier, Gabela’s taxpayer-funded legal and policy adviser—received $50,000 from Ultra-related interests 12 days after the commission vote.  Event Entertainment Group, the company behind Ultra, contributed $20,000. Sandra York, Ultra’s longtime attorney and lobbyist, contributed another $30,000. Both checks were dated May 5.

Journalist Francisco Alvarado separately reported that a political committee associated with Miró received another $30,000 from Ultra-related interests.

Gabela advocated for the long-term Ultra agreement and voted for it April 23.

The contributions do not prove bribery or any quid pro quo. No evidence has been produced establishing that Gabela’s vote was exchanged for political money.

But $80,000 tied to interests that had just secured a potentially 20-year city agreement — arriving in political committees connected to the Trust’s chairman’s City Hall adviser and its executive director within days of the vote — deserves examination.

It deserved answers at the Aug. 13 meeting. Instead, everybody got screaming, lunging and an alleged battery.

Read related: Bayfront Park’s new management looks a lot like the old management in Miami

How did we get here? Let’s review.

Gabela took control of the Bayfront Park Management Trust promising reform after years of criticizing Carollo’s leadership. Then he installed political consultant Raúl Miró as executive director despite Miró having no apparent experience running a public park or a government agency like the Trust. In fact, Corben made a public records request and said that there were more than two dozen candidates who were more qualified. Gabela had earlier said he couldn’t trust any of those people because they could be political plants.

Funny because Miró looks like he was a political plant.

Miró’s salary went from $150,000 to an eye-popping $255,000, a roughly 70% increase, before the public backlash became so intense that Gabela suddenly discovered “fiscal responsibility” and cut it back to $175,000.

Miró also had a separate financial relationship with Gabela’s political operation. His company, Allegis Aviation Services, received nearly $30,000 in March from two political committees associated with Gabela during the same period in which Miró was collecting his taxpayer-funded Trust salary.

For what services? That remains one of many unanswered questions.

Then came scrutiny of Trust expenditures, consultants, contracts and transparency. Then came the Ultra contributions.

And then Miró resigned.

His departure became public in August, although Political Cortadito had heard for weeks that he was leaving. A severance agreement was prepared before the allegedly “emergency” meeting called to respond to his exit.

Santravia Butler, the former deputy director, was named interim executive director. In case anybody still cares or remembers why the meeting was called.

Read related: From reformer to operator? Miguel Gabela starts to look like the old boss

Now, Pardo wants to change how the Trust is run. The ordinance he sponsored for Thursday would rewrite its governing structure so that the five city commissioners become ex officio board members, with two additional members appointed by the District 2 commissioner. That is not merely increased oversight. It would place the elected commission directly inside the body overseeing Bayfront and Maurice A. Ferré parks, their contracts and their lucrative special events.

The proposal has been repeatedly delayed since September 2024. It was deferred, continued and indefinitely deferred across several commission meetings before landing back on Thursday’s agenda.

But the circumstances have changed. The Trust’s executive director is gone. Its chairman is under growing scrutiny. A board member has reportedly been charged following a physical confrontation at a public meeting. Questions continue about Ultra-related political contributions. Residents are demanding that the Ultra agreement be revisited.

And the State Attorney’s Office is asking questions.

Whether installing commissioners as Trust board members would restore accountability — or simply move City Hall’s political warfare directly onto the board — remains to be seen.

It would certainly make one thing easier: The next time a commissioner lunges at somebody during a Trust meeting, there will be four other commissioners sitting close enough to hold him back.

The Aug. 13 emergency meeting was called because Raúl Miró resigned.

Nearly a month later, Miró still looks like the least of Miguel Gabela’s problems.

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