State legislators have alternately used the words “dead” and “on life support” when talking to me about the Miami Dolphins public-money-for-private stadiums bill. Which may be good news.
May be.
Because I have a sinking sensation that there’s another political bait and switch in the works and we all may be hit with a surprise by the end of session next week.
Several electeds (and a former elected) from the Miami-Dade delegation told me straight out in the last few days that House Speaker Will Weatherford (R-Wesley Chapel) doesn’t even want to bring the House bill back to the appropriations committee. Others say that even if he does take it to committee, it will be the same committee that has not wanted to treat it at all. And that may not change. Especially if, how it looks, he takes the Senate bill, expected to pass thinly in the smaller body (21-19 or something like that), which will benefit five rich stadium owners instead of just our rich stadium owner.
“If they didn’t want to throw money at one, they aren’t going to want to throw money at five,” said State Rep. Carlos Trujillo, who has been working hard to urge his colleagues against this scam.
But I am not so sure. The Senate bill — which is likely what would be brought to the House and, again, I think this was Dolphin pro-stadium strategy — would have the teams “compete” for the money and it gives the legislature just that much wiggle room to make it sound like less of a gift. Passing it also lets them wash their hands of the huge public financing for Sun Life Stadium decision, putting it back on Miami-Dade County voters in a shotgun wedding referendum May 14.
Especially if they don’t want to be attacked later for “disenfranchising” voters who will have already been casting absentee ballots — which I can guarantee is part of the message they are getting not just from Dolphin lobbyist Ron Book but also others who are pushing the team’s agenda.
And they are putting efforts into an absentee ballot campaign. Ladra heard her first pro-stadium radio commercial in Spanish on Cuban radio this morning. A Sweetwater resident told me someone with the Dolphins was at a the city senior center Monday to talk about the referendum — the day before absentee ballots were mailed to voters. Ladra expects there were simultaneous visits to other facilities where one might find a concentration of elderly and easily-manipulated voters whose attention is bought with pastelitos and, well, attention. Look for them at the Little Havana Nutrition and Activities Center nearest you.
“As part of Miami First’s efforts to ensure that all of Miami-Dade residents know the facts about the Sun Life Stadium modernization, which will create over 4,000 jobs while not costing property tax payers a dime, our grassroots supporters have been fanning out across the county speaking to community centers, going door to door, and discussing the benefits of this plan with their friends and neighbors,” said Miami First spokesman Eric Jotkoff, as if we might believe for a South Beach second that this is a grassroots effort.
Actually, he provided a written statement. I make him stutter when we talk.
“Through these efforts, we will make sure that all of Miami-Dade knows that Dolphins will pay for 100 percent of any cost overruns during construction and the team’s commitment to using local contractors for the renovations, providing a substantial boost to the local economy,” Jotkoff ended the statement with.
Know what they won’t say?
- That our tourist tax dollars could be used, instead, to revamp the convention center.
- That Dolphins owner Stephen Ross — who also owns the stadium, unlike the Marlins stadium that the county owns — has a net worth of $4.4 billion and is building a $15 billion mixed use neighborhood in Manhattan’s West Side.
- That the Dolphins will get our tax dollars — in the form of $90 million in state sales tax they no longer will have to pay.
- That the $120 million payback in 30 years will be worth a tiny fraction of that. If this is such a good deal, why don’t we get interest?
That probably won’t be disclosed in the pro-stadium mailers and robocalls that are likely coming, too. Neither will the fact that we will pay 30 percent of it. Ross keeps saying he will pay 70 percent of the cost of the renovations. And Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez — who is oh-so-proud of this deal I hope comes back and bites him in the rear — keeps saying there are no taxpayer dollars going into it. Well then, who is paying the other 30 percent?
Meanwhile, there is no anti-stadium campaign to tell anyone these things. Except for Ladra.
Car mogul Norman Braman — who has no qualms about funding recalls and trying to put his hand-picked candidates into office — is, I’ve heard, a religious man. He is apparently praying that the deal dies in Tallahassee, which is where he’s put all his eggs with some lobbyist Ladra has never heard of.
But this watchdog would feel a whole lot better if we knew there were robocalls and mailers coming with the arguments why to vote NO, against the stadium public financing deal. We needed a phone bank, like, yesterday.
Cutler Bay Mayor Edward “Mac” MacDougall is ready. He’s already put quite a bit of coin into the operation, hiring a campaign strategist and interviewing phone bankers. He told Ladra Monday that he was ready to go, ready to invest more, ready to hire people and put them in his insurance office building near South Dixie Highway and ready to get the ball rolling. But he doesn’t want to do it alone.
And meanwhile, Ross — who was MIA on the issue until the other day — has been smiling and laughing and acting all cocky like he’s already got this in the bag.
Sinking feeling on stadium scam as game clock ticks added by Ladra on
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