Everybody is waiting for the other shoe to drop.
By other shoe, Ladra means the tired, old, stinky loafer that is Coral Gables Mayor Vince Lago, who would follow his BFF, mentor and role model, Miami Mayor Francis Suarez, anywhere.
Maybe even to jail.
Last month’s exposé of Suarez’s private life and public service conflicts of interest in the Miami Herald has already touched on Lago’s involvement in some questionable transactions with Rishi Kapoor, the developer who paid Suarez $10,000 a month to “consult” while he got permits from the city for a Coconut Grove project. Mayor Lago — as 40% owner of 1424 Ponce LLC with partner Esteban Suarez, who just happens to be Baby X’s cousin — rented space to Kapoor, to serve as a sales office for a property across the street, a property Kapoor’s company purchased months later.
And the space was never turned into a sales office — even though Kapoor’s company paid more than $12,000 monthly rent. Was that in lieu of a “consulting” fee? Today, the space is back up for lease. The agent? Manny Chamizo, a commercial broker with One Sotheby’s International Realty who was recently accused of criminal stalking — and who Lago has appointed to the city’s Waterways Committee — to sell an office building at 3251 Ponce de Leon Boulevard, a deal that fell apart in 2018 and was revived the following year with the same buyer and seller but at a higher price. Chamizo says he and Lago were robbed of their 2% commission and allegedly sent threatening texts and emails to the buyers.
Read related: Developer who paid Miami mayor also rents from Gables Mayor Vince Lago
Lago, a real estate agent and investor, also hung his real estate license at the firm that sealed the deal for Kapoor’s Location Ventures, selling the 1505 Ponce property for $35.5 million. The brokerage is owned by Oscar de la Rosa, the former Hialeah councilman and son of Hialeah Mayor Esteban Bovo, who also hung his license there. So did Lago’s chief of staff, Chelsea Granell, and attorney William Riley, who was arrested with Miami Commissioner Alex Diaz de la Portilla for bribery and money laundering in the case of the Biscayne Park giveaway to the Centner Academy.
Dime con quien andas y te dire quien eres.
How it started: Lago’s first election victory night.
How it’s going: Lago and Suarez at 2023 Mayor’s Ball.
Even Miami Herald’s longtime senior writer Jay Weaver tied Lago to the Suarez implosion on the Because Miami podcast last week. “The reality is, you got a guy like Francis Suarez, and even Vince Lago for that matter, let’s not leave him out, and but for the fact that Rishi Kapoor is trying to win favor with these guys, he wouldn’t have caused them so much trouble.”
Key word: Them. “Let’s not leave him out.”
But this is just the tip of the iceberg with Lago, who might get his eyebrows done at the same salon as Suarez.
First elected a commissioner in 2013, Lago used to say, often and proudly, that his firm did not do business in Coral Gables — because he knew that could be a conflict. But the BDI Instagram account has photos of projects the company has done on the University of Miami greenhouse and the Hurricanes locker room. They also did the interior of the Miele appliance store on Ponce de Leon Boulevard and the renovations of Graziano’s.
Read related: Coral Gables Mayor Vince Lago has more city business than we thought
“I had a small hand in making sure that this came to a reality,” Lago said at the grand re-opening of the popular Venezuelan steakhouse and market. It’s on video. “My firm, BDI construction in the private sector — because I don’t survive just by being the mayor — I had the privilege of winning this job and building this job for the Graziano family.”
You know, he’s just trying to survive. Because he already paid off the mortgage to his $1.2 million home. But did “making sure” include any nudging at the city permitting department?
Survival is probably also why he started Hammer Lakes, a contracting and redevelopment company, with perennial commission candidate Norman “Tony” Newell in 2022. While Lago is no longer on the the corporate records — he removed himself once he was caught last year — the history is still documented.
No wonder Lago didn’t want to raise his $45,000 annual salary when the commission voted to raise their salaries last year. He doesn’t need to because the job already gets him so many financial benefits.
Read related: Frank Quesada lends $3.5 mil to three Coral Gables political pals in one year
Like low-interest or no-interest loans from his pal, former Commissioner Frank Quesada. The former elected held Lago’s third mortgage in 2022, for just over $616,000. He paid it off early.
Lago — who signed a nasty, racist missive to his daughter’s private school in 2021 ranting against critical race theory even though the school didn’t teach it — likes to say he was unopposed in the last election. But he lost both commission seats when he not only endorsed the losers but also heavily campaigned for them. He’s been bitter ever since.
Maybe he knows he wouldn’t have won if the election had come just a few months later. And he might have a hard time in 2025, if someone without development baggage challenges him.
And if he stays out of jail.
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