Miami Lakes has a $20 million general obligation bond referendum on the ballot to renovate and improve Optimist Park, which has a port-a-pottie and enough chronic flooding to cancel multiple baseball games.
Vice Mayor Jeffrey Rodriguez, who has been out at early voting every day to push a yes vote, gets the prize for the best campaign ad this cycle. And it’s not really an ad. It’s a graphic he posted on the Facebook I Love Miami Lakes page. But it’s a good one.
The image shows how much the additional tax for the park improvements will cost property owners — in croquetas.
If your home is worth $225,000, the bond will cost you the price of one croqueta a week. If it’s a million dollar mansion, you pay the price of four croquetas a week.
Talk about making it relatable. Every budget story should be like this.
Rodriguez took the price of croquetas from the Vicky Bakery online menu, which was $1.40, and added 10 cents for tax.
“When you put it to people that way, it makes a lot of sense,” Rodriguez told Ladra.
Rodriguez, who is not seeking reelection, said the whole reason he ran four years ago was because of the state of Optimist Park as not taken seriously.
“Twenty years ago, they were talking about renovating it. The pay and you go option doesn’t really work for a project so large. You have to do it all in one shot,” Rodriguez said.
“Parks say a lot about a community and that park doesn’t meet up to the standards of Miami Lakes,” he said. “We’ve let this park deteriorate for so long.”
Rodriguez negotiated with the Miami-Dade School Board, which owns the property, for a 60-year lease.
Miami Lakes Optimist Park $20M bond referendum cost in croquetas added by Ladra on
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