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

Miguel Gabela’s handpicked, unqualified director exits

There’s a hastily-called emergency meeting of the Bayfront Park Management Trust at noon Thursday with a single item — to name an interim director now that Raúl Miró, the handpicked and totally unqualified executive director under Miami Commissioner Miguel Gabela, has resigned.

And just when it was getting good, too.

Who didn’t see this coming?

Miró, whose spectacular salary increase, political committee connections and stewardship of what is arguably the most important city-owned park have generated one red flag after another, is out. His last day is Friday, multiple sources told Political Cortadito.

And this doesn’t exactly look spontaneous.

Ladra has been hearing for at least two weeks that Miró had a foot out the door. Las malas lenguas say there is already a severance agreement typed up and ready to go.

But wait. It gets better.

Word around City Hall is that Commissioner Gabela — who took control of the Trust promising to clean up the mess left behind by former Commissioner Joe Carollo, and then quickly made his own — already has another political ally in mind for the job. Sure, Santravia Butler, the deputy executive director, will get the interim job. But Butler has been there since before Gabela, through two different Carollos, so the commissioner probably won’t like her.

Miró’s departure comes just as new questions are being raised about the cozy relationship between his political fundraising operation and companies doing business with the very public agency he ran.

Francisco Alvarado reported on his blog The Miamian Wednesday that Miamians For Fairness, a political action committee chaired by Miró and registered to his Sunny Isles Beach home address, received tens of thousands of dollars from businesses with interests before the Bayfront Park Management Trust.

And these aren’t six-degrees-of-separation connections. We’re talking about Ultra Music Festival.

Shortly before Miró was named interim executive director in April 2025, Miamians For Fairness received $10,000 from Ultra parent company Event Entertainment Group. Several months after Miró took over the Trust, the PAC received another $10,000 from Event Entertainment Group and $10,000 from Ultra founder Russell Faibisch, according to Alvarado’s review of campaign finance reports.

Then, in April, the Miami City Commission approved a new agreement allowing Ultra to continue using Bayfront Park for another 20 years.

Nothing to see here, folks. Keep dancing.

Event Entertainment Group was, in fact, registered to lobby the city in connection with both its Bayfront Park use agreement and a revocable license agreement involving the city and the Trust. And Ultra wasn’t alone.

Miró’s PAC also collected $5,000 from Bayside Marketplace, which has a 99-year lease at Bayfront Park, and another $5,000 from Worldwide Amherst Media, a billboard company with an advertising agreement with the Trust, Alvarado reported.

His story — and Ladra is pissed off that she didn’t catch this PAC money when she wrote about Ultra’s $50,000 contribution to the other Gabela PAC — raises exactly the kind of questions that an independent inspector general ought to be asking. At the very least, somebody should determine whether Miró solicited these contributions, what role — if any — he played in matters affecting the donors, whether he disclosed the relationships and what safeguards existed to keep his political activities separate from his public job.

Miró did not respond to Alvarado’s calls and texts seeking answers. Imagine that.

Ladra knows the feeling.

Miró also did not respond when Political Cortadito repeatedly sought answers earlier this year about spending at the Trust, including payments to two companies that seem to follow Gabela around City Hall like remoras on a shark: Atlantis Solutions and Elandor.

Public records obtained by Political Cortadito showed that Atlantis and Elandor had billed the Trust a combined $129,000 for branding, media, signage, logos, drone footage, website work and other services. Among the charges were $1,250 for a custom wax-and-seal stamp, thousands for “content creation,” more than $10,000 for drone piloting and video footage and repeated charges for web and logo design.

These are the same two firms that have received hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars through Gabela’s District 1 office for public relations, social media, banners, vehicle wraps and other work promoting the commissioner, his district and, sometimes, his wife. The promotion included a 120-page full color magazine sent to every District 1 resident.

Funny how the same names keep popping up. Almost like there’s a system.

And Miró wasn’t just some parks administrator who accidentally wandered into Gabela’s political orbit.

Political Cortadito reported in May that Miró’s company, Allegis Aviation Services, had also been paid by political committees aligned with Gabela. Records reviewed at the time showed $16,000 paid to Allegis by Miamians for Truth and Fairness and Justice and another $13,663 from Miamians For Fairness.

Now Alvarado has followed the money farther.

Miamians For Fairness raised more than $170,000, including large checks from developers, land-use interests and city vendors. The committee transferred $100,000 in December to another Gabela-aligned committee, Serve & Protect Miami.

Serve & Protect Miami then sent $146,300 to Advance Miami, another political committee established by José Sánchez-Gronlier — who just happens to work as legal counsel in Gabela’s District 1 office at a taxpayer-funded salary of $130,000 a year. That’s the one Ladra reported got the $50K from Ultra interests.

Miamians For Fairness also contributed another $31,697 directly to Advance Miami, Alvarado reported.

Follow that? From the Miró PAC to a Gabela-aligned PAC and then to a PAC run by Gabela’s taxpayer-paid district lawyer.

It’s like political Russian nesting dolls. Except every time you open one, there’s another campaign finance report inside.

This new information makes Gabela’s ferocious defense of Miró — particularly that infamous 70% pay raise — even more interesting.

Remember that? Miró was making $150,000 as interim executive director when Gabela championed an increase to $255,000 as Miró was made permanent. Not bad for a guy with no college education who was only asking for $50,000 as an event coordinator in his 2023 job application with the city.

After weeks of public outrage, and getting called out at public meetings, Gabela suddenly discovered “fiscal responsibility” and engineered a reduction of Miró’s salary to $175,000 in June.

How convenient that Miró is now leaving altogether.

Let’s remember how we got here. Gabela came into office as the supposed reformer. The outsider. The guy who was going to expose what Carollo had done with Bayfront Park and finally show taxpayers where all the money went.

Instead, Gabela took over the Trust and installed Miró.

Then Miró got the giant raise.

Then the same vendors collecting hundreds of thousands from Gabela’s district office started showing up on Bayfront Park invoices.

Then questions arose about political committee payments to Miró’s own company.

Then we learned that Miró’s political committee was raising money from companies doing business with Bayfront Park.

And now Miró is resigning.

Again: Who didn’t see this coming?

The more important question now is what happens Thursday. Someone has to run Bayfront Park and Maurice Ferré Park after Miró leaves Friday. And las malas lenguas tell Ladra that Gabela already has another preferred candidate. That should immediately put every member of the Bayfront Park Management Trust on notice.

But, hey, here”s a thought: Maybe Gabela shouldn’t be involved in the next appointment. Maybe he shouldn’t be involved in the Bayfront Park Trust. It’s not even in his district.

And any other candidate needs to have qualifications, sure, but also no clear ties to political relationships, fundraising committees or any other part of the increasingly complicated Gabela political family tree.

The commissioner himself said last year that he would resign as chairman of the Bayfront Park Management Trust. He hasn’t.

Maybe Thursday would be a good time to keep that promise.

James Torres, president of the Downtown Neighbors Association — who does live in District 2, next to the park — told Political Cortadito Wednesday that he was going to call for Gabela to step down and let another commissioner chair the Bayfront Park Trust.

“He was fully aware of the shenanigans going on,” Torres said. And he has another good idea: “The Ultra vote needs to come back to the commission.

“The community has no confidence in Miguel Gabela or in the Bayfront Park Trust,” Torres said. “Corruption has no place.”

Ladra would go further and second Alvarado’s suggestion that Miami’s new Inspector General Antonio Diaz introduce himself. at Maybe show up the emergency meeting.

Because Miró’s resignation doesn’t answer the questions surrounding the Trust. It creates more of them.

Why is he leaving now? When did Gabela know? Why was a severance package prepared before the public was told? What does that package give Miró? Who negotiated it?

And, most importantly, what exactly happened inside the Bayfront Park Management Trust while Miró was running it?

There are now enough overlapping political committees, vendors, contributors, public contracts and taxpayer-funded employees to warrant something more serious than another emergency meeting and another handpicked executive director.

This kind of independent, government watchdog reporting is crucial to transparency and democracy. And more so every day. Help shine a light on the darker corners of our community with a contribution to Political Cortadito. Click here. Ladra thanks you for your support.

Raul Miro city of Miami application 2023 by Political Cortadito

Raul Miro resigns at Bayfront Park Management Trust as questions pile up added by Ladra on August 12, 2026
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