Miami-Dade County, accused of wrongly allocating $13 million in federal grants that must be repaid to the U.S. Housing and Urban Development Department, is about to dole out another $12.5 million of the very same Community Development Block Grants (CDBG), Home Investment Partnerships (HOME) and State Housing Initiatives Partnership (SHIP) monies. How do we know we won’t […]
Tucked into what is going to be a mammoth Miami-Dade County commission meeting Tuesday are two items that seem like they come out of some spy novel: Commissioners will be asked to close their eyes and give a little more than $3 million to “confidential projects” with the code names “Zorin” and “Novel.” Both are […]
It’s very nice that Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez is putting $5 million more into our public parks and $2 million more into animal services and $1 million aside for a summer jobs program for needy youth. What Gimenez didn’t say at his big reveal of the 2015-16 budget Tuesday is that he also wants to […]
Everyone in Miami-Dade County can sigh a breath of relief! Mayor Carlos “Cry Wolf” Gimenez has saved the day! There will be no further cuts to services and personnel, no more “sacrifices” asked of our loyal county employees, no more library closings. In fact, 10 of the 20-some libraries closed two days a week will […]
Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos “Mr. Giveaway” Gimenez apologized profusely for the “past miscalculations” that caused sudden, big increases in taxes for property owners in 234 special taxing districts that pay for extra street lights, security and other neighborhood amenities. And then he admitted that some of the special taxing district property owners have been paying for […]
More than 116,000 Miami-Dade property owners got notices recently that show increases in their special taxing district assessments for the first time in at least four years — some as much as 22 percent. These hikes come because, in part, they’ve not been paying their fair share since at least 2011. But somebody has. Because […]
With zero discussion, and more than two months before the first budget hearing — and the loud boasts about not raising taxes begin — Miami-Dade Commissioners gave preliminary approval Tuesday to a tax increase for more than 116,000 property owners. Yes, a tax increase. In June. The administration has found that these property owners, in […]
The takeaway from Wednesday’s Miami-Dade School Board meeting is not that members gave their attorney 20 days to present options on taking legal action against the county mayor or the state or whoever it is that is responsible for the backlog at the Value Adjustment Board that has caused annual budget shortfalls in the hundreds […]
Looks like the overpaid Miami-Dade County attorneys are going to have to do some actual work. The county filed a motion Monday to dismiss a lawsuit filed by the United Teachers of Dade against Mayor Carlos “Cry Wolf” Gimenez, blaming him for shortfalls in hundreds of millions in taxes that the Miami-Dade School Board was […]
While she may have borne the wrath of Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos “Cry Wolf” Gimenez, county Budget Director Jennifer Glazer Moon got a lot of love, understanding and forgiveness from the commission when they voted Thursday to approve the do-over budget. And she also got the fine imposed by the mayor lifted. County commissioners were forced […]