Longtime Coral Gables Public Relations Manager Maria Rose Higgins-Fallon was unceremoniously transferred to the city’s police department in what seems like a retaliatory move by one or more of the administrators left behind by former City Manager Pat Salerno. Bumped down from the job she’s been doing for 11 years, down from Public Relations Manager […]
It’s homecoming season in the high school world and it looks like Coral Gables is getting ready to crown Cathy Swanson-Rivenbark their own queen. Swanson — who was the city’s economic development director before leaving to Hollywood, where she is now manager — was at Human Resources Monday to be fingerprinted, the only one of […]
After a five-month process that included a trolley tour of the historic City Beautiful and the wining and dining of five finalists, Coral Gables made history by naming its first black city manager. Whoops. Nevermind. Some people are calling it the curse of Pat Salerno. After a long and excruciatingly public process bungled by a bad background […]
Does Coral Gables have a new city manager? Maybe. Maybe not. City Commissioners chose a new top administrator last week, but a routine background check turned up a 2011 child abuse charge that may give them a cause to take another look. James Beard said that the “bogus charge” was dismissed and that he had already explained […]
Coral Gables could name a new city manager very soon, and while there are five finalists, sources tell Ladra there is only one that has the inside track. My money is on Former Doral and South Miami City Manager Yvonne Soler-McKinley, who, sources say,was among the very first names floated to Ladra when Pat Salerno […]
The palm trees on Ponce de Leon Boulevard in Coral Gables — the ones that took out former City Manager Pat Salerno — are being removed today from the corner bumpouts just north of Alhambra Plaza. These would be the 14 Bismarckia palms whose created traffic visibility issues were covered up by Salerno but deemed […]
It will cost Coral Gables nearly $14,000 to remove 14 Bismarckia Palms along Ponce de Leon Boulevard that have been deemed possibly dangerous due to restricted visibility. Seems like a bargain considering each of the trees cost about $12,000 each — a $168,000 investment in further beautifying the City Beautiful. Related story: Coral Gables must […]
The palm trees that cost former Coral Gables City Manager Pat Salerno his job — after he was caught in a lie about them — must go, too. An independent consulting firm has found that 14 Bismarckia Palms along Ponce de Leon Boulevard in downtown Coral Gables do present a visibility issue to drivers, after […]
The city of Doral — which has gone through three city managers in 18 months — will take up to 60 days to find the right replacement for its last administrator, former Miami Mayor Joe Carollo, who was fired Monday in a 3/2 vote. One candidate, however, has already said ‘Thanks but no thanks.’ Mayor […]
Aaaaaah. City employees in Coral Gables have been breathing easier for almost two weeks now that the paranoid and problematic City Manager Pat Salerno, who resigned abruptly last month, is gone. At least physically, though some fear he is still in the background. For most employees — some of whom joked (read: feared) that the […]