Regalado’s maquinita about face: About facetime access

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Mayor Tomas Regalado looked downright proud Thursday morning as he stood between 48 illegal slot machine maquinitas and about a dozen TV news cameras minutes before a couple of bulldozers crushed them — the illegal gambling machines, not the jouurnalists — into a pile of wood and wires and widgets and whatnot in about 15 minutes.

But let’s take a look at just what he has to be proud of.

Maybe he’s proud of the fact that some of those machines were confiscated in 2004 and are being destroyed nearly a decade later.

Maybe he is proud of Chief Manuel Orosa, who has confiscated  a few dozen machines in the last year or a little more, despite the fact they were all illegal at least because they did not have permits, while former Chief Miguel Exposito was fired presumably in part because he had confiscated 100s in the years prior (100+ more are still reportedly awaiting destruction orders from the court).

Maybe he is proud of the fact that although no municipal permits had been purchased by operators in almost three years, the city did not start to grab them until about three weeks ago — after Lt. Gov. Jennifer Carrol got in trouble for her ties to illegal gaming.

Maybe he’s proud of the ordinance he tried to introduce in 2010 that would have made it easier for maquinita owners to flood Little Havana and Little Haiti with the blinking, buzzing contraptions.

Maybe he’s proud of the fact that he had maquinita industry kingpins — including one that was indicted in a famous federal racketeering case involving Jose M. Battle — help him write the language for that legislation.

Maybe he’s proud that, when backed in a corner during a contentious election year, he does what the state law requires him to do.

Maybe he’s proud that he used his bully pulpit to turn a standard police procedure into an obvious horse and pony show campaign press event. Regalado said it was to “show we support our Miami Police” — who at the time were raiding small bars and cafeterias, confiscating 10 more machines and making six arrests (and would he be stumping this early for an endorsment?) — “and support state law.” Um, you kinda have to.

Ladra is not the only one who smells a 180-degree turn for political convenience.

Note this paragraph in the Miami Herald story about the police activity and press conference: “While that show of force was under way, a career politician who once championed a law to make the machines legal took center stage at a highly publicized event in which 48 of the machines were crushed by bulldozers, and speakers told of the evils maquinitas brought to Miamians.” That was in reference to a comment by Orosa, who admitted — now — that the department often got complaints from families whose loved ones spent the rent and grocery money on maquinitas asking them to do something.

Maybe Regalado is proud that he returned $1,500 in contributions from Jesus Navarro, the maquinita king of Hialeah, who donated that to his mayoral campaign last month.

“Because the subject is silent,” Regalado told Melissa Sanchez of El Nuevo Herald when asked about it. “Ya en Miami, we’re not going to see that business. I didn’t see the need for me to take that money.”

Ladra followed up and asked why he had to give it back. After all, he took $14,000 from them in 2009. What’s the difference?

“Back then, the maquinitas were legal. The only thing they were looking for was access,” Regalado said. “And I wasn’t the only one. Others received also. Other mayoral candidates received also. I was not the only one.”

Now he sounds like a fifth grader who has done something wrong.

Wait a minute. Rewind. “The only thing they were looking for was access?” Access?

So, basically folks, maybe Regalado also used this event as a disguised fundraising tool, since his latest campaign reports show he is way behind (more on that later) his rival, Commissioner Francis Suarez. The inference is clear: “You want access? Give me money.”

But the big focus on Thursday’s stunt — which Suarez has called “a stunning display of hipocrisy and political opportunism” — did seem to be on the other value it had to the mayor’s re-election campaign.

Even Navarro, who was quoted in the story by Sanchez and Enrique Flor in El Nuevo Herald, knows that.

“Mr. Regalado is hurrying everything up to cleanse himself,” said Navarro, owner of the soon-to-be-going-out-of-business All American Amusements.

Navarro– who apparently had access up until recently — said he spoke to Regalado about a month ago, probably around the time he made the contributions that were returned.

“My first question was, ‘Tomasito, when are you going to give the licenses for the maquinas,” he related, referring to permits they were never able to obtain thanks to Suarez’s amendment to his otherwise legitimizing ordinance. Regalado’s alleged response was “that we should wait until after the elections because it was a hot topic.”

Naturally, Regalado denied that the conversation went like that. “What I told him was that the licenses weren’t being given because there was a limbo as it was discussed in Tallahasee,” he told El Nuevo Herald.

Really? In limbo for two years? This has not been a Tallahasee issue for two years.

But Ladra fully expects it to be a Miami campaign issue for seven months.

Even Orosa hinted that, once the destruction orders clear for the other maquinitas, “we hope to be back here very soon,” he said to the line of reporters and cameramen.

I’m going to guess it will be right before the absentee ballots hit.

Meanwhile, taxpayers may be paying storage on these, as fellow blogger — and abuelo to all of us political bloggers — Al Crespo wrote in his crispy CrespoGram Report on the event, which he likened to a field trips since there were about a dozen or so city administration escapees from City Hall who had to tag along because, we guess, they have no actual work to do. Or maybe they are interested in helping the campaign.

So, public records requests are in order for information about the date of the destruction orders and the storage of said gambling equipment, right Al?

I hope the spokespeople Pat Santangelo, a former FHP Lt., and Angel Zayon, a former Spanish-language TV reporter, aren’t busy on another field trip.