Who Will Be The Next Mayor of Miami Dade County? By Geniusofdespair

Rebeca Sosa, Esteban Bovo embracing Carlos Gimenez (looking at each other with goofy eyes), and Daniella Levine Cava.

I woke this morning thinking about who would be the next Mayor when Carlos Gimenez is forced to leave, thankfully. I am sure the planning has begun as the disastrous reign of Gimenez winds down -- another 2 years. He taught me one thing: The mistake a strong mayor can be. He has hurt the County in so many ways.  Also he is a mean-arrogant guy, and he has made his friends rich.

My guess for 3 candidates would be: Commissioners Daniella Levine Cava, Steve Bovo and Rebeca Sosa.

I do think that with Rebeca's husband's passing, she might be inclined to travel and enjoy retired life. Becky also made a bad blunder when she was Chair of the Commission, choosing Lynda Bell as her Vice Chair and letting her over-shadow the Chair at every turn.  In other words, she wasted her Chairmanship, not getting enough of a boost from it.

The other two, I have a suspicion they will run. I do think Daniella will have to deal with the Jimmy Morales curse "not being Cuban enough." One of his parents was not from Cuba.  Neither of Daniella's parents are from Cuba. Does it still hold that you must be Cuban to be Mayor? Levine-Cava is sharp, witty and very likable. I do think she is destined for higher office. Someone has to take Rubio out.

In County elections, because it is non-partisan,  the election is actually the primary in August. Only die hard voters "4's and 5's" vote in August.

Unless there are more than 2 candidates the election for County Mayor is in August. Does anyone know that? I really think having the County Government  non-partisan is a big mistake. People get too confused. If there are more than two candidates they are less likely to pass the 50% mark that is required to win. That is why Eileen Higgins, who won the District 5 race, must face Mrs. Barreiro in June. She won with too low a percentage. I think that Levine-Cava would have more of an advantage in a November election, because everyone knows the parties of the County Commissioners and aren't we expecting that blue wave?

Back to reality, "Ya Did Good" Dorrin Rolle has filed to run again. This could be a disaster for Jean Monestime. Rolle was the worst.

Whatever happened with the Charter Review Task Force recommendations? Will any of them get on the ballot? You can read the final report here.  

I don't think they did a good job. They kept the non-partisan and want to get rid of the term limit requirement that just got approved. They didn't approve eliminating the Strong Mayor. The Commission would have to approve this stuff to get it on the ballot. Maybe they did already. I am not following it closely.

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County Corruption: Why we need the Miami Herald. by Geniusofdespair

I wrote about this China Trip of County Brass once already and was very suspicious of what went on. I said something was fishy with this trip In a post I wrote April 2nd and apparently the Miami Herald agreed and reporter Douglas Hanks did some more digging.  You might notice this is NOT a Miami Herald link because it is buried and I don't have time to find it on the Miami Herald Site. Why did they bury it on line but it was front page in the Newspaper?

Everyone knows that you must not destroy data but the County Information Department issued 13 phones and each one now says: "Wiped by User".  What is even more bizarre, the Supervisor of the IT Department is Myriam Marquez. Sound familiar? Her name should, she was the former top dog at El Nuevo Herald and she formerly was the Editorial Page Editor of the Miami Herald.  If anyone should know that this information should be preserved it is Myriam.  So what happened?

The trip was fishy to begin with.  There was a leg of it not on the itinerary that went to visit the Genting group...that owns the land where the former Miami Herald offices were on Biscayne Bay and they want to build a giant gambling complex there. Why did some of the members of the junket, including the Mayor and his favorite lobbyists, take this detour to Genting? What could have been on the phones to give us some answers?

Myriam Marquez speaking for the Mayor says it was a mistake to have erased the phones. This is no mistake lady. And, you know it. You are selling yourself out for your job.

In fact, the whole erasing scandal appears to have been intentional, the erasing done after the Miami Herald asked for the information and some of the phone users saying they gave it in with all the information on it:

On April 2, the Herald requested some text messages sent and received by Manny Gonzalez, director of the county's trade office, while on the Asia trip. The request identified the number of the temporary phone he had identified in email messages as the number he was using during the trade mission.

Ten days later, on April 12, Tere Florin, a spokeswoman for the department where Gonzalez works, Regulatory and Economic Resources, said a reporter could come to County Hall the following morning to review Gonzalez's phone from China and read any text messages relevant to the request.

But later that day, Florin and Marquez called to say the IT executive assigned to the mayor's office, Jose Marticorena, told them the phone's data had been deleted as part of the security precautions taken after the China trip.

"When I got it, it was wiped," Marticorena said in an interview Tuesday. He said he did not know who had deleted Gonzalez's data, but assumed it was someone else in the IT department. The county apparently has no records showing who had done the wiping. While the log says "Wiped by User" next to the county official's name assigned the phone, several participants, including MIA director Lester Sola and Commissioner Jose "Pepe" Diaz, said they turned over their devices to IT with the data intact.

Myriam Marquez, former Miami Herald big shot - Turning into a sneaky person? Lobbyist Rafael A. Garcia-Toledo in the Background

What are they hiding? This is what a Strong Mayor does. He dictates. Sorry Francis Suarez, I just can't vote for a Strong Mayor ever again. If Gimenez can turn Myriam into a sycophant, what other nefarious things is Mayor Gimenez doing? This smells so bad all I can say is: WTF?

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