The debate ended in September, when the new majority on the Coral Gables Commission — Melissa Castro, Ariel Fernandez and Kirk Menendez — voted to keep the Election Day in the City Beautiful in April on odd years rather than move it to the general election on even years.
Commissioners also voted unanimously to create a charter review committee that would consider such changes in a more complete and inclusive way. That committee had an organizational meeting but has yet to tackle any of the issues that will be put before them.
So who’s collecting signatures to change the election date without any action by the charter review committee?
Read related: Coral Gables Mayor Vince Lago loses majority, Election Day November move
A resident sent Ladra the image of this petition and said that someone had actually knocked on her door to get her signature. The guy was from Long Island, New York, and said he was getting paid to collect signatures. The voter ran into him later at the corner of LeJeune Road and Alhambra and asked how it was going. Not too well, he told her.
That’s probably because most people want the elections to stay the way they are. They wrote emails and came out against it when it was proposed last year. They don’t like the idea that the powers that be, the establishment that was beaten by voters in the last election, are the first in line to make this change precisely so that people like Fernandez and Castro have a harder time getting elected.
Just listen to this video interview of former Gables Mayor Raul Valdes-Fauli.
To be sure, RVF has always been a jerk. But this is a new low.
Is Valdes-Fauli behind the petition? Or others like him? Someone has to have paid the gentleman collecting the signatures.
Mayor Vince Lago, who lobbied hard for the November general date, has a balance of $550,000 sitting in his political action committee, Coral Gables First. He also has the attitude and arrogance to bypass the charter review board.
“They’re in the process of meeting. They’re going to take community input,” Menendez told Ladra. He didn’t know about the petition and seemed to be taken aback. “If the charter review committee did a petition, I think we would have heard about it,” he said.
Menendez initially voted in favor of the change to November on even years, but he asked for the second reading to be delayed a bit so that residents would have a chance to be heard. He switched his vote to no after the item was put on the agenda right away.
Read related: Coral Gables moves quickly to move city elections from April to November
“That’s the way to do it,” Menendez said of the resident-board. “That gives an opportunity for public input and then they can come back with a rationale instead of just rushing it through.”
His appointment to the board is Tom Wells. Vice Mayor Rhonda Anderson, who was also in favor of the change, appointed former State Rep. Annie Betancourt. Castro appointed Jane Moskowitz. Lago appointed former Mayor Don Slesnick. And Fernandez appointed Felix Pardo.
The five will have their first public town hall meeting at 6 p.m. March 21 in Commission Chambers at City Hall.
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“This seems to be something to go around the charter review process,” Fernandez told Ladra after we told him about the petition. “The question is who’s funding this campaign and what are the motives behind it.
“This just shows the establishment and special interests continue to push the narrative and try to keep the power they have at City Hall.”
It also shows that Lago and his camp don’t know when to stand down.
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