HomeMy WebLinkAboutCC 2016-07-13 MinutesCity of Miami
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Meeting Minutes
Wednesday, July 13, 2016
9:00 AM
Special Meeting
City Hall Commission Chambers
City Commission
Tomas Regalado, Mayor
Keon Hardemon, Chair
Ken Russell, Vice Chair
Wifredo (Willy) Gort, Commissioner District One
Frank Carollo, Commissioner District Three
Francis Suarez, Commissioner District Four
Daniel J. Alfonso, City Manager
Victoria Mendez, City Attorney
Todd B. Hannon, City Clerk
City Commission
Meeting Minutes July 13, 2016
9:00 A.M. INVOCATION AND PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
ORDER OF THE DAY
Present: Commissioner Gort, Vice Chair Russell, Commissioner Carollo, Commissioner Suarez
and Chair Hardemon
On the 13th day of July 2016, the City Commission of the City of Miami, Florida, met at its
regular meeting place in City Hall, 3500 Pan American Drive, Miami, Florida, in special
session. The Commission Meeting was called to order by Chair Hardemon at 9: 05 a.m. and
adjourned at 12:10 p.m.
Note for the Record: Commissioner Gort entered the Commission chambers at 9:16 a.m., Vice
Chair Russell entered the Commission chambers at 9:24 a.m. and Commissioner Carollo
entered the Commission chambers at 9:26 a.m.
ALSO PRESENT:
Fernando Casamayor, Assistant City Manager
Victoria Mendez, City Attorney
Todd B. Hannon, City Clerk
Chair Hardemon: Welcome to the July 13, 2016 meeting of the City of Miami City Commission
in these historic chambers. The members of the City Commission are Wfredo Gort, Frank
Carollo, Francis Suarez; Ken Russell, the Vice Chair; and me, Keon Hardemon, the Chairman.
And also on the dais are Daniel J. Alfonso, the City Manager; and Victoria Mendez, the City
Attorney; and Todd Hannon, our City Clerk. The meeting will be opened with a prayer and the
pledge of allegiance. All rise.
Invocation and pledge of allegiance delivered.
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair, may I be recognized?
Chair Hardemon: Sure.
Commissioner Suarez: 1 know that Commissioner Carollo and Commissioner Russell are in a
sunshine meeting right now, so 1 just wanted to take a moment to really express my gratitude
towards the members of the committee, those who are here and those who have participated in
this process, for the time that they have given. It's been a, you know, extremely rewarding
process for me. And 1'd also like to thank the City Attorney's Office. 1'd like to thank everyone
who was involved in the process; they worked incredibly hard, incredibly diligently -- the City
Manager's Office, City Clerk's Office. Forrest did a wonderful job. Everybody's done fantastic.
1'd like to thank the members of the public that came. There was a lot of well -attended meetings,
where members of the public came to express their thoughts on this very important endeavor.
And 1 really would like to thank the Commissioners and the Mayor for being here today. 1 know
-- Mr. Mayor, thank you for coming to the last one. Unfortunately, we couldn't make any
progress in the last one, but 1 thank you for coming. And, you know, maybe it was hasty on my
part to schedule it the way that 1 did, so -- but we're here today, and 1 think we're going to have
four, and potentially five a little later, Commissioners. So 1 think, you know, once we have them
here, well get started. But 1 really want to thank you, Mr. Chair, for indulging --1 know we have
a very long July, with a lot of important decisions and a lot of meetings, but 1 just want to thank
everybody for their time and their energy.
Chair Hardemon: Thank you. Want to begin?
Barnaby Min (Deputy City Attorney): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Any person who is a lobbyist,
including all paid persons or firms retained by a principal to advocate for a particular decision
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Meeting Minutes July 13, 2016
SP.1
16-00916
(SP.1)
16-00916a
by the City Commission, must register with the City Clerk and comply with related City
requirements for lobbyists before appearing before the City Commission. A person may not
lobby a City official, board member or staff member until registering. A copy of the Code section
about lobbyists is available in the City Clerk's Office. Any person making a presentation, formal
request or petition to the City Commission concerning real property must make the disclosures
required by City Code in writing. A copy of this Code section is available in the City Clerk's
Office. The material for each item on the agenda is available during the business hours at City
Clerk's Office and online 24 hours a day at www.miamigov.com. Any person may be heard by
the City Commission through the Chair for not more than two minutes on any proposition before
the City Commission, unless modified by the Chair. If the proposition is being continued or
rescheduled, the opportunity to be heard may be at such later date before the City Commission
takes action on such proposition. Anyone wishing to appeal any decision by the City
Commission for any matter considered at this meeting may need a verbatim record of the item. A
video of this meeting may be requested at the Office of Communications or viewed online at
www.miamigov.com. No cell phones or other noise -making devices are permitted in the
Commission chambers; please silence those devices now. No clapping, applauding, heckling, or
verbal outbursts in support or opposition to a speaker or his or her remarks shall be permitted.
Any person making offensive remarks or who becomes unruly in the Commission chambers will
be barred from further attending Commission meetings and may not -- and may be subject to
arrest. No signs or placards shall be allowed in the Commission chambers. Any person with a
disability requiring assistance, auxiliary aids and services for this meeting may notify the City
Clerk. The meeting will end either at the conclusion of the deliberation of the agenda item being
considered at 10 p.m. or at the conclusion of the regularly scheduled agenda, whichever occurs
first. Please note, the Commissioners have generally been briefed by City staff and the City
Attorney on today's special agenda item. Thank you.
SPECIAL MEETING ITEM(S)
DISCUSSION ITEM
DISCUSSION REGARDING THE FINAL REPORT OF THE CHARTER
REVIEW AND REFORM COMMITTEE AND THEIR RECOMMENDATIONS.
Final Report - Charter Review and Reform Committee.pdf
CRRC Member Wales - Standing Memo.pdf
City Attorney - Standing Memo.pdf
16-00916-Submittal-Justin Wales -Citizens Standing Presentation.pdf
16-00916-Submittal-City Attorney's Office -Sample Ballot Questions for Charter Amendments.pdf
16-00916-Submittal-City Attorney's Office -Proposed Changes to the Charter by the CRRC.pdf
16-00916-Submittal-City Attorney's Office -Presentation of Final Report and Recommendations-Ch
Committee.pdf
DISCUSSED
A motion was made by Commissioner Suarez, seconded by Chair Hardemon, and was passed
unanimously, with Commissioner Gort absent, to have the Charter Review and Reform
Committee reconvene to draft and propose ballot questions associated with their charter
amendment recommendations involving Sections 302, 4, 7, 12, 29, 51 and 52, to the City
Commission for review and consideration.
RESOLUTION
A RESOLUTION OF THE MIAMI CITY COMMISSION, BY A FOUR -FIFTHS
(4/5THS) AFFIRMATIVE VOTE, SETTING FORTH A NEW RESOLUTION,
DUE TO THE SUNSETTING OF RESOLUTION NO. 15-0465, ADOPTED
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OCTOBER 22, 2015, EXTENDING THE CITY OF MIAMI CHARTER REVIEW
AND REFORM COMMITTEE, TO CONTINUE THE REVIEW OF THE
CHARTER OF THE CITY OF MIAMI, FLORIDA, AS AMENDED, AND
CONTINUE TO RECOMMEND CHARTER PROPOSALS AND AMENDMENTS
NECESSARY TO UPDATE THE CHARTER; STATING THE COMMITTEE'S
PURPOSE, POWERS, DUTIES, COMPOSITION, APPOINTMENT
QUALIFICATIONS AND REQUIREMENTS FOR MEMBERSHIP; PROVIDING
FOR OFFICERS, RULES OF PROCEDURE, MEETINGS, QUORUM, LEGAL
AND STAFF SUPPORT, ASSIGNMENT OF PERSONNEL, WAIVERS,
WAIVER OF CONFLICT OF INTEREST, AUTOMATIC REAPPOINTMENT,
AND PUBLIC NOTICE; AND PROVIDING FOR AN EFFECTIVE DATE.
Motion by Commissioner Suarez, seconded by Chair Hardemon, that this matter be
ADOPTED PASSED by the following vote.
Votes: Ayes: 4 - Commissioner(s) Russell, Carollo, Suarez and Hardemon
Absent: 1 - Commissioner(s) Gort
R-16-0342
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair, if may?
Chair Hardemon: Yes.
Commissioner Suarez: You know, the way that I'd like to do this today if -- with your indulgence
and the Commissioners' indulgence is -- you know, the idea was first that this would be a
workshop so that the work that the Committee has done can be explained to the members of the
Commission. Obviously, if we have questions, comments, concerns, things that we think should
be drafted differently, et cetera, et cetera, I think those things are all open for discussion. The --
you know, this is a November ballot, potentially, and it's a presidential ballot, and so I suspect
that there will be quite a few things on that ballot. So, you know, there may be -- and I -- you
know, and the Committee -- we did an exhaustive review of the Charter, and it was really, I think,
based on -- and, you know, Committee members are here, and they can obviously always get --
you know, jump in on it -- but it was based on -- if we had the perfect Charter, this is what it
would look like, you know, and we sort of tried to fix it. Every single thing that we thought
essentially was fixable, we tried to fix. Now, we live in a -- sort of a realistic world and a
political world where, you know, there's a somewhat limited bandwidth, and some things may be
more important than others. So I think, you know, it might be a good idea to think about today
as we see the different questions, are these the questions that we want to put to the voters? Do
we want to put them? Do we not want to put them? Do we want to further discuss them? You
know, we noticed this as a special meeting, but, you know, I don't think the intent was necessarily
to be voting today on whether these questions would be on the ballot yet. You know, this was sort
of an informative thing. I -- you know, every single reform that we had, we did three readings,
four readings, five readings in some cases, and so I expect that the Commission will also, having
been look -- you know, probably exposed to this for the first time, have some questions and
comments, and the Mayor, maybe, as well, so -- I see him approaching the podium, so go ahead.
Mayor Tomas Regalado: Before it gets hot. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Commissioner Suarez;
and thank you for the work that you all have done. 1 remember that 1 brought this item to you a
long time ago, and the City Commission did create the Charter Review Committee, because the
Charter is a living document, and 1 am -- 1 understand the need to reform, and 1-- as a City
Commissioner, 1 participated in several of these meetings. 1 have review all the proposals, and 1
think --1 just think --1 have several questions, and some of the questions has to do with how to
explain this to the voters, which will have the last word. Like, for instance, there is an item about
the powers of the Mayor, transferring all the powers of the City Manager to the Mayor, but what
it doesn't say is the powers of the City Commission. If this -- if the intent of this was to mirror
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some of the different forms of government that we have throughout Dade County in terms of the
strong Mayor -- Hialeah, Hialeah Gardens, Sweetwater, Medley County -- some of these Charter
changes on those municipalities. And on the County government, there is a responsibility that is
shifted to the City Commission, like the City Commission selects the Chair; the Chair controls
the agenda, things like that. 1 don't see it. 1 also see something that 1 think the intent, it's a very
good cause, because what we lived through several years ago, which is the suspension and
removal of the Chief of Police and Fire Chief that Charter section will be delete so that the
Police Chief and the Fire Chief will be subject to removal by the City Manager. Now, my
question is, if the strong Mayor were to pass in any election, do we have to again go to the voters
to change the Charter in order for this to say the Mayor or it's imply that all the Mayor's powers
are the former powers of the Manager? One thing that 1 see here is the --1 think it's a cleanup,
and 1 understand this. 1 am glad that the recall of the Mayor is in the proposal. There is no
recall protocol for the Mayor. 1 also -- in the reorganization of City department, 1 understand
the intent, but what 1 see here in 11 can be interpreted by the voters as eliminating one
department that belongs but don't belong to the City of Miami. Number 11, Department of
Off -Street Parking/Off-Street Parking Board. That Charter section will be deleted and
consolidate the Department of Off -Street Parking/Miami Parking Authority into Section 8. 1
understand this. However, the voters may think that what they're doing is that they are
eliminating the Miami Parking Authority, which is something that we don't have authority over.
And remember that there was a referendum that failed to eliminate the Off -Street Parking. 1
agree with Commissioner Suarez. In the November elections, you will have not only the
Presidential ballot; also US Senate seat, Congress; any runoff on the judges, and several
amendments that will draw more people, and maybe the County will have some amendments. 1
don't know. But we have to -- and 1 understand the 75 words, but 1 just think -- and the -- also,
the strong Mayor form of government doesn't clarify if the term limits kick in or doesn't kick in;
something that was approved by the voters in 2003. And the reason I'm saying all this is because
we recently had a referendum about the tower on Bayside property, and how the voters voted on
the premise that it didn't have public money and then it got public money, and then it went to
court, and then it was settled. So 1 just want to just tell you that, of course, 1-- since 1 like
campaigning, 1 will be campaigning for this. So for myself 1 want to know. Thank you.
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair?
Chair Hardemon: Thank you very much.
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair. So 1 just wanted to address some of the concerns that the
Mayor -- the way 1 thought we were going to do this would be to allow the City Attorney's Office
to make a presentation of the Charter questions that the Committee has approved in the order
that they approved them, because 1 think, for whatever reason, we ended up doing it a certain
way. And 1 think, in order to maintain the integrity of the work that we did, you know, 1 think we
should do it that way as well. But 1 just wanted to address some of the concerns that the Mayor
had. The -- some of them had to do with strong Mayor. Some of them had to do with Chapter
26. The Committee -- and we'll hear a presentation on the strong Mayor when we get there. And
the Committee specifically stated that -- and we defined, very clearly that the Commission selects
its own Chair and the Chair has a certain duration and there's a Vice Chair, et cetera, et cetera.
So that process is outlined in the reform. And if we haven't gotten you a package of it, Mr.
Mayor, we'll get it to you, and 1 apologize if we haven't gotten it to you in advance of the
meeting.
Mayor Regalado: No, 1 understand that, but the voters don't know that.
Commissioner Suarez: No, of course. And part of going to the election is educating them on
what the reform is, of course.
Mayor Regalado: Right, but it's not written.
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Commissioner Suarez: Yeah, it is written.
Mayor Regalado: No.
Commissioner Suarez: That's what I'm saying.
Mayor Regalado: No, I mean in the 75 words.
Commissioner Suarez: Oh, you mean it's not in the question. I got it.
Mayor Regalado: Yeah.
Commissioner Suarez: 1 understand what you mean. My apologies. 1 didn't understand what
you meant. 1 thought you meant it wasn't written in the actual ballot language. I got it now. So
what you're referring to is the ballot language itself
Mayor Regalado: Right.
Commissioner Suarez: Got it. Okay, okay. Now 1 understand what you're saying. 1 thought you
meant it wasn't written in the actual change. Understood. Is that your concern also on the term
limits; that it's not in the ballot language?
Mayor Regalado: That's right.
Commissioner Suarez: Okay. But not that it's not in the actual --?
Mayor Regalado: Right.
Commissioner Suarez: Understood. Okay, I get it.
Chair Hardemon: So as 1 understand, there are a couple different bodies that are here. You
have the Charter Review Reform Committee, so I'm sure there's a presentation that you all want
to make. I'll allow you to make that presentation. And then the City Commission --1 mean, the
City Attorney, I'm sure you have the presentation of the ballot questions so that we can begin to
really dive into what the issues really are, and that will bring us to discussion on many of the
issues that the Mayor brought up. 1 will also allow the public a reasonable opportunity to be
heard, and we'll do that once those presentations are made so everyone has an opportunity to see
what those -- at least those presentations are. And so --
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair, do you want to wait like a couple minutes to see if we get a
full Commission? Because I think they're about to wrap it up over there.
Chair Hardemon: Okay.
Commissioner Suarez: It's up to you.
Chair Hardemon: No, no. That's fine. The -- Grace, I want your opinion about something. You
don't have to give it now, but just letting you know. That one of the -- you know, we've been
having very late meetings, and I'm concerned about the public and their reasonable opportunity
to be heard, because it seems to me to be somewhat burdensome for a member of the public to
come at 9 o'clock in the morning and then wait for an item that's going to be called, say, at 7, 8
o'clock in the evening. And so part of what I was thinking about --
Commissioner Suarez: Or 1 in the morning.
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Chair Hardemon: -- Or 1 in the morning, for that matter. Part of what 1 was thinking -- well,
I'm thinking through right now, and 171 be bringing it to the Commission to consider, is an item
that, you know, the State law requires that the public have a reasonable opportunity to be heard,
and so they need a time to speak on an item, and generally, we have that time to speak before
each item and -- but it leads to it being less predictable as to when the item will be called, unless,
of course, there's a time certain, and you wouldn't believe the number of time certain requests
that we get coming to the Commission. And so -- and at the core of it all, what they're asking for
is a time to be heard, because it can vary so greatly if it's not a time certain. And so what I'm
thinking about -- and Commissioners, 1 want you to know this -- is to have a designated time in
the morning -- 9 o'clock, 9:30 -- that the public will be heard on all items that are on the agenda.
So if you are concerned about a single item, you do not have to wait until a certain time; you can
predict now on this meeting in this month, if I'm there at 9:30, the public has a reasonable
opportunity to be heard, you make all of your concerns to be known to the Commission, and then
we go and tackle the rest of the body of the work; similar to what the County does. You know,
there's a time when I looked at how the County did it -- before 1 became Chair, 1 looked at how
the County did it, and 1 thought that maybe ours was better, but when 1-- as 1 reflect now about
how the members of the public have to wait and such, it may be best to do it at one time so that
people have an opportunity to be heard. And we can say, in fact, No; this person had a chance
to be heard. "Because my concern -- and Grace, 1 know you're very smart; that's why I'm
directing this towards you. My concern is when an issue is placed on the agenda and it's not
heard until 9 o'clock -- and initially, 1 called it burdensome for the member in the public to
actually speak or wait to speak on a item until that time. To me, if I were a lawyer arguing a
case, 1 would probably say it was not a reasonable opportunity to be heard, because, you know,
it was unreasonable for her to have to wait that long for an item to be heard at such a late time
when, you know, they have other lives, other than coming here before us. So that's where I'm
thinking about going, so I'll be introducing something at least to the Commissioners so we can
really talk about this, to drill down to it, to make everything -- to give our public a better
opportunity to be heard at our meetings at a reasonable time. You're recognized, sir.
Commissioner Gort: Mr. Chairman, 1 just want to say, 1 have to leave here 11:45.
Chair Hardemon: Today? Okay. We have four right now.
Commissioner Suarez: And by the way -- no, go ahead.
Chair Hardemon: Oh.
Commissioner Suarez: And I welcome any opportunity to shorten the Commission meetings.
Chair Hardemon: Okay. You all say that. They say a lot of things. They keep saying those
things, and that's what make the meetings long, right? All right, so we have five of us now; we
can begin the presentation by the Charter Review Committee.
Vice Chair Russell: Mr. Chair, I apologize for our tardiness on behalf of the Commission. We
had an early morning sunshine, and I was late for that, and that caused us to be late for this, so I
apologize.
Chair Hardemon: You're recognized, sir.
Forrest Andrews (Assistant City Attorney): Good morning, Mr. Mayor, Mr. Chair, members of
the City Commission. My name is Forrest Andrews. I'm an Assistant City Attorney. I'm also the
legal advisor to the Charter Review & Reform Committee, and 1 will be presenting the final
report and recommendations to you all here today. 1 prepared a PowerPoint presentation which
will give a summery overview of the recommendations. Throughout the presentation, there will
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be various members of the Committee who will give a little bit more detail on certain proposals.
For instance, the standing recommendation will be presented by Justin Wales; strong Mayor
presentation will be presented by Committee Member Luis Gazitua; and the CIP (Civilian
Investigative Panel) recommendation will be given by a representative from the Civilian
Investigative Panel. With that said, the Charter Review Committee was reestablished by this
Commission in order to conduct a comprehensive review of the Charter and provide
recommendations for amendments to the Charter. The Committee met approximately 19 times
over the course of 19 months. As Commissioner Suarez stated, each proposal was voted on, was
discussed, and debated at least two times before it was approved. And there was extensive public
participation from the public, from employees, from members of various boards, so this was a
public process. Beginning with the presentation, I know that many of you are curious as to what
proposed ballot language would look like, so I have drafted here -- this is a draft. Obviously, it's
subject to whether or not the recommendations will even be approved or if the language is going
to be modified, but this will give you an idea of what the ballot language may look like.
Commissioner Suarez: Can I ask a question, Forrest?
Mr. Andrews: Sure.
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair, if may?
Chair Hardemon: Sure.
Commissioner Suarez: If you can --1 don't know if we have it available, the -- because it comes
out kind of blurry, for some reason, on our screen. It comes out clear there, but on our screen,
it's a little blurry for the Commissioners who are trying to maybe read it off their screen.
Victoria Mendez (City Attorney): You need hard copies?
Commissioner Suarez: If we have.
Ms. Mendez: Okay, we'll make copies.
Commissioner Suarez: Just to follow. Because I don't know if you're seeing it on your screen,
but it's kind of blurry. I don't know if anybody can read it on theirs.
Ms. Mendez: Well make -- well get hard copies to you.
Mr. Andrews: Okay.
Commissioner Suarez: And the members of the audience, please, as well.
Mr. Andrews: And there's also going -- the language is also going to be separate for each -- it's
going to follow each actual recommendation, so hopefully, it'll appear clearer on your screen,
but this just gives you an idea upfront of what the language will look like.
Vice Chair Russell: Mr. Chair?
Chair Hardemon: Yes.
Vice Chair Russell: Who -- did the committees [sic] create this draft language? 1 mean, the
Charter Review Committee created this draft language or it was -- who came up with the
wording?
Mr. Andrews: Of the ballot language?
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Vice Chair Russell: Yes.
Mr. Andrews: The City Attorney's Office drafted the ballot question, based on the language that
was approved by the Committee.
Vice Chair Russell: And within this process, as we end up directing ballot language to be
created, does it come back to us before --
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Vice Chair Russell: -- it goes further?
Commissioner Suarez: So may I just jump in on that?
Chair Hardemon: Of course.
Commissioner Suarez: So the way -- and you guys were back there when 1 sort of made some
introductory comments. My idea today was to have sort of a workshop, where we go through the
comments -- the Mayor already expressed some concerns that he has with some of the ballot
language, and so my guess will be that we're going to go through this. You may have concerns
with the ballot language; you may have concerns with the actual legislation that goes behind the
ballot language, which is separate and apart from the lang -- you know, what goes to the voters
and what the voters vote on. So, you know, my idea was let's get that all out now. Let's get it out
in the open, and let's debate it, discuss it, and then make recommendations, and then potentially
bring it back. If we're interested in putting that potentially on the ballot, bring it back for a vote,
9ea'br IIay, you know, at some other point --
Vice Chair Russell: Yes.
Commissioner Suarez: -- but not today.
Vice Chair Russell: Yes, absolute -- I mean, that --
Commissioner Suarez: Right.
Vice Chair Russell: -- And that's why I'm seeing this for the first time.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Vice Chair Russell: The ballot language, to me, is the most important part --
Commissioner Suarez: Of course.
Vice Chair Russell: -- because that's where -- whether the voters truly understand what they're
voting for is absolutely the most important thing.
Commissioner Suarez: Understood.
Vice Chair Russell: So --
Commissioner Suarez: Agreed.
Vice Chair Russell: -- thank you.
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Mr. Andrews: Okay. So beginning with the first recommendation, Section 7, Election of City
Commissioners and Mayor. "This recommendation was really brought forth from the City Clerk,
who noted that currently, the Charter states that a runoff election is to be held the second
Tuesday after the first Monday in November. The County does it differently. They hold their
runoff elections the third Tuesday after the first Monday in November. So in order to make it
consistent with the County and hopefully save some resources with these types of elections, the
Committee believed that it would be best to have the two coincide on the same date.
Commissioner Suarez: And just to be clear, it's stated this way in our Charter. We have changed
it by ordinance, but 1 think the Clerk has taken the position that the better process is to change it
by Charter rather than to continually do it by ordinance, because in effect, we're having an
ordinance that's different from what's stated in our Charter.
Vice Chair Russell: Would the ballot language explain to the voter what it currently is and what
we're changing it to or just what we're changing it to?
Mr. Andrews: Yes, it'll say what it currently is and what it will be changed to. And this is a --
this is the ballot language that 1 showed you earlier. Hopefully, it comes up a little clearer on
your screen now.
Commissioner Suarez: It's a little clearer, yeah.
Mr. Andrews: Okay.
Commissioner Suarez: And it says here, bather than,'.-o it actually says -- it says, bather than the
second Tuesday after the first Monday in November. "So it actually specifies the difference in
what's being changed, where it says, bather than."
Chair Hardemon: Looks like a Law Games'guestion.
Mr. Andrews: The next section is Section 5, and this deals with the -- currently, it deals with the
initiative process. The Committee's recommendation is to consolidate the initiative process and
the referendum process, which is contained in Section 6, into one section. So there would be a
new Section 5 with the initiative and referendum process. And the purpose of -- the overarching
purpose of this is to make the process less burdensome for citizens who want to go through this
process, and one of the ways to make it less burdensome is to -- there's requirements that there be
one signature per page, and that each page has to be notarized. To get rid of that, you can get,
you know, as many signatures as you reasonably can on the page, and then the document itself
just has to be notarized.
Chair Hardemon: Did anyone give any opinion as to why they thought it was smart to have one
signature per page for notarization?
Mr. Andrews: No, we don't know the reason behind that.
Chair Hardemon: Because I -- when I think about it, I was just -- you know, I didn't know -- and
there's been other issues in other jurisdictions where --
Commissioner Suarez: Sure.
Chair Hardemon: -- they've had false signatures or forged signatures and things of that nature,
so 1 would assume -- just a laymen -- that it may have something to do with that and not just like
paper and such. And so that's one of the things 1 thought about when 1 read that.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah, I think for us and the Committee, our objective was -- first of all,
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it's a little confusing, the two processes. And the second part was we wanted to make it easier for
residents and for citizens to engage and to be able to change their government. So, you know,
resident participation, resident engagement in the political process is something that 1 think is
important, and so what we wanted to do was simplify the process and make it easier so that
residents could actually advocate for things and get changes to the -- you know, to either law or
to the Charter.
Chair Hardemon: 1 understand that part.
Mayor Regalado: I just have a brief legal question. After the recall of the Mayor and a
Commissioner in the County, the County Commission made it difficult for the recall process by
one page notarized and certain time. Question is, if-- and I believe that we should make it
simple, but is the County ordinance part of what we have to follow in the City of Miami, or we
can have our own process? Can we divorce from the County requirement?
Mr. Andrews: Well, I think the County Code would provide a floor of what we would have to
comply with. If we want to give extra benefits to the citizens of the City, then I believe we could
do that.
Mayor Regalado: You can do that. You can, like, for instance, expand the time where you can
get signatures in the City of Miami? You don't have to have one page for one signature? Is that
what you're saying; that we can create our own process so it will be easier for the residents?
Mr. Andrews: Well, I think the intent is to make this easier for the citizens (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
Mayor Regalado: No, 1 understand the intent, but the question is, do we have to follow the
County or can we create our own process?
Mr. Andrews: Well, generally, we do have to follow the County.
Mayor Regalado: Then why are we having this?
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair, if may?
Chair Hardemon: You're recognized, then Commissioner Carollo.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah. We have our own process right now. We have a process by which
we can have initiatives or referendum questions. That exists currently in the Charter, and so
we've been -- we've had our own process for many, many, many years. The issue here is we are
-- we've looked at this as two separate processes, and we've sort of thought to ourselves, Why is it
two distinct things and with different rules? And it's complicated. We should simplify this, unify
it, and make it easier so that citizens have a better ability to engage in the process of potentially
reforming their own government. "And so 1 think, to answer your question, certainly, there are
certain things that the County can preempt the City in, legally, but --
Mayor Regalado: Certain? No; all things, because he just said that we have to follow the
County. And what I'm saying is that the County limits the time frame, and I think it should be
expanded. The question is, can we do this by ourself [sicJ? And the County orders one page,
one signature, notarized; and I'm saying, can we make it easier for the people? That's all I'm
saying.
Mr. Andrews: And the way that 1 see it is that the County is providing a minimum for what has
to be done, and if the City is going beyond that to provide it -- to make it more easier, then they
could do that in that situation.
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Commissioner Suarez: And 1 would also say, Mr. Mayor, because you made a very declaratory
statement that the County is preempting us. The County can have a process for amending its
own Charter that is different from the City's process to amend its Charter, so they're two distinct
things. Unless the County were to say, All cities have to amend their Charter by doing this, 'then
they're preempting cities' rights to create their own rules by which they can amend their own
Charters or have initiatives or referendums, whatever the case may be. In this case, we've had
our own processes for a while. They're just cumbersome. They're not really -- you know, as you
said, they're not really easy, and what we're trying to do is unify them and make them easier for
our residents to be able to petition their government and change their government.
Mr. Andrews: And then another way that the Committee recommended making it easier is to
reduce the signature threshold from 15 percent down to 10 percent. It's also important to note
that while emergency measures -- what may be subject to referendum, they will still go into effect,
even while the referendum is pending. And finally, the City Commission, if there's some -- if a
initiative, a referendum is approved, the City Commission would be unable --
Commissioner Suarez: Awesome.
Mr. Andrews: -- to modify that or repeal that for a period of two years.
Chair Hardemon: That also is something 1 had a question about. Say you elect a Mayor that
you're not happy with. Say his name is Carlos Alvarez, so for that matter, because that was an
issue that came up. No. You know -- no, I'll just use the measures. So we enact a -- they enact a
law -- or we enact a law that people aren't happy with, and so they move to repeal the law. And
in fact, they do it, but there's more harm than good that's done. We, as elected officials, see that
there's more harm than good that's done within that, say, six months' time that the law's been
there, and the constituents realize also that there's more harm -- good --1 mean, more harm done
than good by repealing the law or the measure. Do you think there's an issue where now you're
saying you can't make any changes or you can't enact the law that is essentially opposite of that
or with -- unless two years pass? I've never seen anything like this. That doesn't mean it has -- it
does not exist, but 1'd just like to know where have you seen it that you think that this is the best
thing for us to do?
Mr. Andrews: Well, 1 can say that this issue was discussed at the -- by the Committee. The exact
same concern that you had was discussed, and there was thoughts of whether it should be two
years, should it be a year, but the Committee then decided that it's best that if the people want
something, whether right or wrong, it should be allowed to go into effect.
Chair Hardemon: But in fact, wouldn't that be --? If you place a measure to be heard -- that's
the people's will -- if you repeal a measure, that's the people's will. Now, if a Commission
decides they want to do something different, then the voters have an opportunity to say whether
or not they want that Commissioner to participate on the board. And, you know, 1 just don't want
a measure to be more important than the decision -making authority of the Commission. Yes, sir.
Commissioner Suarez: No, and I hear what you're saying, and I think, like Mr. Andrews said,
this is something we struggled with. We struggled with how much time? Should there be any
time? You know, should it be longer? Should it be shorter? I think this is precisely why we have
these workshops, because I think these are the kinds of things that we can debate, and reasonable
people can have differences of opinion. And, you know, one of the things I told the Committee is,
Look, you know, we're going to make the recommendations that we make. We're going to
struggle with these issues. We've struggled with them long and hard, and the Commission will
struggle with them at all'=- I mean, as well, and they'll make their decisions also in terms of what
they think is right. "I think the intent here was if citizens go through the process and are that
passionate to engage in their government and pass a law or pass a Charter reform, or whatever
the case may be -- actually, this would be more of a measure, an ordinance -- then to what extent
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are we going to respect that effort in conjunction with the voters' vote beyond that effort? For
example, when we get elected, we're elected for four years. 1 mean, we respect, essentially, the
will of the voter in that decision for four years before we go back to the voters and say, lley, we
want to consult you again on whether we should stay here or whether somebody else should be
here. "So the question is, you know, to the -- if someone goes through this process, a civic
engagement process, gets something on a ballot, gets it passed by the voters, to what extent are
we going to respect that? Or can we just in the next Commission meeting say, you know, just like
any other ordinance, !ley, we're three Commissioners; we just don't agree,'and we change the
law, and it is what it is? So 1 think that was what we struggled with. We struggled with, you
know, how long do you -- you know, does that measure sort of stay in effect without it being
changed if somebody's gone through that civic engagement process, gone through the vote, and
the whole thing?
Mr. Andrews: And this is the sample ballot language for Section 5.
Chair Hardemon: Now, this says the -- 10 percent of the electors, so that is the entire registered
body to vote in the City of Miami, electors?
Mr. Andrews: Yes.
Chair Hardemon: Okay.
Commissioner Suarez: And by the way, that's the way it's written in the Charter. Is that -- is it --
are we finally -- is it the electors, or is it of the people who vote in the election? Oh, no. It says,
the electors, right --
Mr. Andrews: Yes.
Commissioner Suarez: -- because that's actually getting it on. That's right. Yeah.
Mr. Andrews: Yes.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah, it's the electors.
Mr. Andrews: Right.
Commissioner Suarez: My apologies.
Mr. Andrews: Okay. All right. The next section is Section 6, so there will be --
Chair Hardemon: One second. Mr. Clerk, generally, in a City election, what is the percentage
of our electors that vote?
Todd B. Hannon (City Clerk): It depends on whether it's citywide or district. But if we're going
to take a snapshot of citywide, 1 believe it's roughly 12 to 13 percent.
Chair Hardemon: Okay.
Mr. Hannon: Maybe a little higher.
Chair Hardemon: Thank you.
Mr. Andrews: The next section would be a new Section 6, which would provide a Charter
amendment initiative. It's -- it would be the same process as Section 5 with the initiative process.
It would just pertain specifically to the ability to propose amendments to the Charter, and the
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next slide is the proposed ballot language for that. Next is Section 12, which pertains to filling
vacancies for Mayor and Commission. The intent here from the Committee was that the
Committee believes that a timely and straightforward process should be had for filling the
vacancies, because continuity in government is important. The Committee was also cognizant of
the fact that this can breed lawsuits. And so, in order to spare the City from the time and
expenses of lawsuits where, for example, if an elected official is suspended, and then they're
absolved from allegations of wrongdoing, and then they want to come back to their seat but
there's somebody already there, the Charter currently doesn't provide a mechanism for that; and
so, you know, more likely than not, the elected official is going to file a lawsuit to try to get their
seat back. So the intent here is to create a process where if a elected official is suspended from
office, they're absolved from wrongdoing, they would automatically be able to return back to
their seat.
Commissioner Suarez: And, you know, this is a -- sort of a byproduct of some of the things that
we've seen over the last few years and trying to clean up language, now that we have this
opportunity to sort of take into account examples of things that have actually happened.
Chair Hardemon: It should be more -- it should -- I personally think that our State process
should be more likened to the Federal process than the State. 1 mean, part of the reason we're in
this -- we have this problem is because if you're accused of a wrongdoing in the State of Florida,
the Governor has the authority to remove you from office, and no facts really have come to show
that you will be proven beyond a reasonable doubt guilty.
Commissioner Suarez: Right.
Chair Hardemon: So that's why you have the situation like you have in other cities where if
someone's found not guilty, and now you have to, in your case, sue the City to get that place
back. When you look at the Federal Government, you look at -- just recently, Corrine Brown,
was just indicted on some crimes, and she will serve until she's exonerated, so.
Commissioner Carollo: Mr. Chairman.
Chair Hardemon: Yes.
Commissioner Carollo: I'll go a step further. The City also bears the financial burden of that,
because we pay the salary of the sitting elected official; plus, fan elected official is absorbed
[sic], they -- when they come back, they also get their whole salary as if they were in office. So,
financially, the City bears payment for, in essence, two elected officials.
Chair Hardemon: Two elected officials.
Commissioner Carollo: So the financial bear -- the financial issue is put on the City.
Chair Hardemon: Maybe that should be one of those initiatives that we advocate for as a city
and a state, if the State law changes.
Commissioner Suarez: It is a State law change, yeah.
Chair Hardemon: Yeah.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Chair Hardemon: You want to say something?
Mayor Regalado: Can I asked a question --
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Chair Hardemon: Sure.
Mayor Regalado: -- Chairman? On this question -- and I understand the intent. And like
Commissioner Suarez said, we have gone through it several time. But what I don't understand is
that the voters will be asked that it's okay to have a special election if the Commission fails to
appoint, right?
Mr. Andrews: Right.
Mayor Regalado: And that special election, we know, has to be held in 60 days. So the person
is elected, and it says that that person will finish the term of the person that was suspended, but
at the same time said that if the person is absolved --
Chair Hardemon: Yeah, you're right.
Mayor Regalado: -- it's coming back. So who's going to sue who?
Mr. Andrews: Well, the --1 think the person who was suspended and who is coming back, their
rights would trump the person who is filling the seat. So the person who's filling the seat is
doing so subject to the person coming back. Now, the example that 1 gave is where the vacancy
is created by a suspension, but it could be created by some other reason. So the person who's
filling the seat, they may finish the term because of a vacancy that the person resigns or some
other reason that he's just not coming back.
Mayor Regalado: So what are we asking the voters? Because -- I mean, no --
Commissioner Suarez: Fair question.
Commissioner Carollo: Mr. Chairman.
Chair Hardemon: Yes.
Commissioner Carollo: 1 think the Mayor has a valid point. As a matter offact, 1 think that it
should state that until the end of the term or the elected official returning -- or being absolved
and returning back to its original --
Chair Hardemon: Whichever occurs first.
Commissioner Carollo: Exactly.
Chair Hardemon: Yeah.
Commissioner Carollo: I think it should have -- so I believe the Mayor does have a valid point.
Commissioner Suarez: And just -- if may -- and I think this goes to Commissioner Russell's
initial question. The Committee did not work on the questions, just to be clear. They worked on
changes to the Charter, and the City Attorney's Office has crafted these questions. So part of
what we're here doing today, I think, is analyzing, you know, how good, or what needs to be in
the question, certainly. So I think those are all legitimate issues.
Vice Chair Russell: Mr. Chair.
Chair Hardemon: Yes.
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Vice Chair Russell: 1 think that's part of the problem, perhaps, where we mess it up. If we've got
citizens getting together to help us put together the Charter amendments, and then we, with legal
degrees and legal degrees and come up with the actual wording of how it's crafted, we then take
it away from the laymen's terms that would be best understood. I'm wondering if there's a
process, once ballot language is sort of vetted with the average voter. Like they say, a
newspaper should be able to be read by a fifth grader. 1 think that's sort of the standard of
education you should need to have to be able get the gist of what's going on in that language.
And if an average citizen cannot read this ballot and get what's going on and really truly know
whether they're voting 9es'br IIo'bn what they're changing, it's done wrong. So is there a process
to actually take our ballot language, other than just up here, and sort of test it with the citizens?
Could we do that?
Mr. Andrews: Time permit --
Ms. Mendez: You can --
Commissioner Gort: You can do that.
Ms. Mendez: -- do anything you want.
Commissioner Suarez: Absolutely.
Ms. Mendez: Just know that you have do this in 75 words.
Vice Chair Russell: Right.
Ms. Mendez: And that's the real problem. You have to write a question reflecting a change in 75
words, so --
Commissioner Suarez: And there are other legal requirements. It has to be a single subject, et
cetera, et cetera.
Ms. Mendez: Of course, but 1-- it -- you know, the point is that each of these sections has a
question that has to be done in 75 words, and that's the biggest challenge. With that said, that is
what we're here for. These are drafts --
Commissioner Suarez: Of course.
Ms. Mendez: -- that needs to be vetted. We have, you know, the Committee here. We have
citizens. We can post these somewhere. And there could be, you know, suggestions as well, but
just note, 75 words.
Chair Hardemon: Yeah. It can be very easy to overcomplicate the process, you know, and -- I
mean, you can present to a group ofpeople three different ballot languages, if you will, but
always, I think that you should reduce the number of options that someone has to choose from if
you want them to make a decision, especially in a reasonable time. But if you want to put
together a collection ofpeople, you can invite people here and say, Which language do you think
is most easy to be understood? "And I don't know if you'll get the average citizen that will come
in here, but you'll certainly get some citizens, maybe more from your district than from mine,
maybe more from yours than from Carollo's, but you'll get someone here that's going to give an
opinion, and then someone's going to say, !didn't understand the language anyway, "so
(UNINTELLIGIBLE).
Commissioner Suarez: And 1 would just say, 1 think the purpose of the Committee, you know, in
great part, was for us to select people, whether they be citizens or lawyers, or whatever, you
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know, we decided that we wanted to choose to sit on the Committee. Some people chose lawyers.
Some people chose just regular citizens. Some people chose advocates, whatever. So 1 think
that's part of it. 1 think when it comes down to the question itself as the City Attorney said,
there's only 75 words, you know. 1 think it's -- we have the responsibility, at the end of the day,
to make responsible decisions in terms of what goes before the voters, and that's where it gets
into somewhat of a political process, because it's going to be voted on by the voters. And 1 think,
you know, the Mayor expressed some legitimate concerns about some of the language; 1 think
Commissioner Carollo and you and everyone, but that's what 1 think we're here for.
Commissioner Gort: Mr. Chairman.
Chair Hardemon: Yes.
Commissioner Gort: My experience been, ifpeople do not understand it, they'll vote against it --
Commissioner Carollo: Yep.
Commissioner Gort: -- or they will not vote on it, so it's -- has to be very simple, like it was
stated before, and people need to understand. At the same time, if we really want it to pass, we
have to go and campaign. We have to go and educate the community the reason why we're doing
these changes. We have to do the job also.
Vice Chair Russell: Mr. Chair. In the business world, we do focus groups. If you're coming out
with a new advertising slogan, you sit some people down and you say, Fley, read this slogan.
What do you think it meant? you know. And if they can't spit it back to you and get what you
were trying to intend for them to understand, you've gotten it wrong. But if we're not actually
doing that part -- and maybe it's something of an informal process that we're going to do on our
own as we work out the ballot language, and then we come back if there's no formal process for
it. But, you know, it's time permitting, 1 understand; 75 words, 1 understand, but we got to get it
right.
Commissioner Suarez: No, I agree. Maybe we should do focus groups about the GOB (General
Obligation Bond) bond that we are considering putting on the ballot, you know, in two weeks,
and have, you know, four or five different focus groups where we talk to people about that,
because that's a very big issue that's going to be, you know, enormously impactful. And, you
know, I agree. I mean, I think what's good for the goose is good for the gander, for sure.
Vice Chair Russell: Agreed.
Mr. Andrews: And this is just a sample ballot question. Again, it's just a draft.
Commissioner Suarez: By the way, look, at the end of the day, you know, these deadlines that we
have are somewhat artificial to a certain extent, because they're deadlines for elections. And we
-- initially when we started this process, we were going to put it on the August -- if you
remember, the August ballot, and that deadline came and went; and a deadline is coming for the
November ballot, and that deadline might come and go too. 1 can tell you, 1 think the Committee
has completed its work. You know, we have done the work of reviewing the Charter and revising
the Charter. When it gets put on a ballot, how it gets put on a ballot, you know, to what extent
we have more public input than we've already had in the year and a half that we've been looking
at this and -- you know, it's totally up to this Commission. I'm at peace with that.
Ms. Mendez: If you want it --
Commissioner Gort: Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Mendez: --for November, though, August 9 is the drop dead.
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Commissioner Suarez: I understand.
Ms. Mendez: So if you want more input, that's something that you need to figure out with the
time frames we have present now.
Chair Hardemon: Commissioner Gort.
Commissioner Gort: This one's one that 1 really care for it, because 1 don't want people to go
through what 1 had to go through in 2010, where 1 had three elections in a year and a half. So
this is very important; that whenever they go to election, they'll finish the term.
Vice Chair Russell: Mr. Chair. Certainly, the way that this ballot is -- question is worded, the
Mayor and Commissioner Carollo's concerns are confirmed here that we have two phrases in
there basically opposing each other; one saying that if someone's absolved, they get back in, and
-- immediately; and the other saying, Whoever wins the special election gets to stay for the
remainder of the unexpired term. "So there definitely needs a clarification.
Commissioner Suarez: And I agree that it's confusing, as well.
Vice Chair Russell: It's not even confusing. It's actually contradictory. Even if you --
Commissioner Suarez: 1 agree that it's contradictory.
Vice Chair Russell: Yeah.
Commissioner Suarez: I was trying to be nice.
Mr. Andrews: That could be clarified, okay. Next is Section 18, which would be Establishment
and Reorganization of the City Departments. "There would be no substantive changes with this
recommendation. It would just be moving the current City departments, which are the Miami
Parking Authority, Department of Fire -Rescue, the Police Department, and Department of
Finance into one section, Section 18.
Chair Hardemon: Do those types of changes require a vote from the -- like a referendum if it's
not a substantive change; it's mere reorganization?
Mr. Andrews: 1 think it does because it is amending the Charter, moving these departments from
one section and putting it into another. So there is an amendment going on.
Commissioner Suarez: And 1 think the question, Mr. Chair, is -- and, you know, again, these
were -- again, we did this process thinking, What's the perfect Charter going to look like? "Now it
comes to us, and we have to decide what is the bandwidth of the voter, you know, in a November
ballot? You know, is it a good ballot to be putting clean-up language of our Charter -- you
know, things that maybe are not very substantive in nature, but in a perfect world, our Charter
would read a little more clearly if things were cleaned up this way. So that's really something
that the Committee -- you know, the Commission has to decide.
Chair Hardemon: Yeah.
Mr. Andrews: And part and parcel with this recommendation would be the deletion of Section
23, because Department of Off -Street Parking would be moving into Section 18. There would be
a deletion of Section 24 because Fire Rescue and the Police Department, again, would be moved
into Section 18, deleting Section 25, and this would be the sample ballot language.
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Ms. Mendez: If any member of the public just wants the questions themselves, they're here in the
corner.
Mayor Regalado: 1 got a question for the City Attorney or --1 don't know -- the panel or
somebody. Why should the voters care about this question? What is the benefit to the residents
of Miami?
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair. 1 think that's a great question, Mayor, and 1 think there may
not be, and that's the point. You know, the point is sometimes -- this is a clean-up provision, but
we may not feel that it's worthy of putting it on a ballot, because, as you said, there may not be a
tangible benefit to the voters, other than cleaning up the Charter.
Mayor Regalado: Okay.
Unidentified Speaker: (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
Commissioner Suarez: What's that?
Unidentified Speaker: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) put it on a subsequent (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah, we can put that on a -- also on a subsequent ballot as well, where
it's not as heavy and loaded up as this one may be. That's another option that we have.
Mr. Andrews: The next recommendation is in Section 26, which pertains to Suspension and
Removal of the Chief of Police and Fire Chief "The Committee has recommended that this
section be deleted. Currently, the City Manager has the power to appoint those individuals, so
the Committee believed that the City Manager should also have the power to remove them, as
well.
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair, if may?
Chair Hardemon: Mm-hmm.
Commissioner Suarez: Very briefly on this. This is a provision that's been in the Charter for
almost since the beginning of the Charter. We have had, I think, two instances in a hundred
years where this provision has come into effect. The last one that we had was, I believe, in 2000
and --
Mayor Regalado: '11.
Commissioner Suarez: --'11, and it was a very ugly situation for the City, where we had a
22-hour meeting; you know, sort of aired out our dirty laundry; and, you know, historically, it's
created problems in the City. And 1 think, you know, whatever system of government we're in,
whether it's Council/Manager, whether it's executive Mayor/Manager, whether it's strong Mayor,
1 think this provision needs to go. Whoever is the CEO (Chief Executive Officer), whether it's the
Manager, the Mayor, or whomever, should have the right to hire and fire the department heads.
And we've just seen some really bad situations with this provision, and 1 think it's scarred the
City. So that's -- the Committee recommended it.
Commissioner Gort: It's common sense.
Commissioner Suarez: Common sense.
Mr. Andrews: Here's a draft of the ballot question for that section or for that recommendation.
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Commissioner Suarez: And by the way, 1 would just add that between -- in the next time that we
meet to discuss this, if anyone has suggestions on ballot language -- making it better, making it
clearer, making it more understandable --1 would urge you to participate in the process that
way, because 1 think that that's a very good way of helping.
Ms. Mendez: And 1 wanted to clarify that the questions -- because we have such a short
turnaround on the -- you know, the fact that if we were going to place these for a vote or to place
them on the ballot for November, if that was the will of this Commission, my office had to draft
questions for you to consider. So that is also why they're here before you now, and so that they
could be vetted, and then you issue the timelines for when and if they're going to be heard.
Vice Chair Russell: Mr. Chair. Why would we list the specific cases under which they would be
-- could be removed, and then also say, Any other just and reasonable cause? Why not just say,
Any just and reasonable cause? 1 just worry when we do start listing things that that's where you
create the opportunity for challenge or you create a burden. Drunkenness, for example. It
doesn't seem very well-defined here, but if -- does that mean if -- whether on or off duty, they're
found drunk anywhere, the Manager has the right to remove them or --? 1 mean --
Chair Hardemon: You don't want a drunk on or off duty.
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair --
Chair Hardemon: You don't want --
Commissioner Suarez: -- f I may?
Chair Hardemon: -- You don't want anyone that's drunk. Yes.
Vice Chair Russell: Right.
Commissioner Suarez: So this is what's currently in the Charter right now.
Vice Chair Russell: Correct.
Commissioner Suarez: In other words, the Charter currently allows the Manager to fire the
Chief --
Commissioner Gort: Yeah.
Commissioner Suarez: -- Fire or Police for these -- immortality. That's, 1 think --
Vice Chair Russell: Very broad, very vague.
Commissioner Suarez: Well, 1-- not only that; 1 think it's anachronistic. 1 mean, 1 think it's --1
can't imagine somebody getting fired for immortality today in our Charter.
Commissioner Gort: You'll be amazed if you look at the TV (television) (UNINTELLIGIBLE),
your phones, and things like that.
Commissioner Suarez: It's true. It's true. But anyhow, it's just a very old clause. And then at
the end, there's a catch-all, for all reasonable causes,'A-o the idea here is -- and then there's a --
there's this process by which you can challenge it. And so what we're doing is giving the
Manager or the Mayor, whoever it is, whoever the proper person is, the right to do it, as any
other department head would be, you know. Basically at will.
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Vice Chair Russell: All right.
Chair Hardemon: 1 want to give you an opportunity to speak.
Ms. Solares: Thank you. Just -- I'm somewhat confused here, even though I just heard you,
Commissioner Suarez --
Chair Hardemon: And just state your name.
Grace Solares: Grace Solares, 60 Southwest 30th Road. You tend -- you just stated that it's
either -- see, here it says 17ie City Manager. "One of the things --1 came to the podium just to say,
well, if you do this -- if you implement this and you put it on the ballot, and you have also on the
ballot the strong Mayor issue, it would do away with this; because technically, under the strong
Mayor, there wouldn't be a City Manager.
Commissioner Suarez: Of course.
Ms. Solares: So this is just like contradictory. I think-- I don't know what you're going to do. I
think if -- whatever this Commission decides --
Commissioner Suarez: Sure.
Ms. Solares: -- If it's the City -- strong Mayor that they're going to put it there, they should put
the strong Mayor instead of the City Manager, because it's quite confusing.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah. And the Mayor mentioned that in his opening remarks, and 1
agree. Obviously, we'll get there to the strong Mayor, and 1 think that's one of the major
decisions that this committee has to make. But certainly, if the Committee decides that they want
to advance something like that and want to advance something like this, it would have to be
parallel.
Ms. Solares: Yeah, exactly.
Commissioner Suarez: Sure.
Ms. Solares: Thank you.
Ms. Mendez: We contemplated that. Depending on the will of the Commission, then the
questions would be crafted and the language would be crafted, too.
Commissioner Suarez: And keep in mind, Ms. Solares, that we did this the way that 1 asked
Forrest to present this and the way that the Committee approved it, and we held -- we did the
strong Mayor last, so we did some of this stuff in advance.
Commissioner Gort: Well, what happen here, the challenge will be in court.
Commissioner Suarez: I'm sorry?
Commissioner Gort: If there's a challenge, they will do it in court. They will not come in the
Commission.
Commissioner Suarez: Correct.
Vice Chair Russell: Right.
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Commissioner Gort: All right.
Commissioner Suarez: That's right.
Mr. Andrews: The next section is Section 19, Office of the City Attorney. "Currently, the section
pertaining to the City Attorney is in Section 21, so that section would be removed to Section 19.
It would discuss the qualifications and duties of the City Attorney. One of the qualifications
would be that the City Attorney would have to be an attorney at law who has been in good
standing with the Florida Bar for at least 10 years. Their duties would -- clarify that he or she
represents the City, its agencies, instrumentalities, and boards, unless the Charter provides
otherwise. Also, the employees of the City Attorney would be unclassified, and the City Attorney
would have the discretion to discharge, remove and replace any employee for -- at any time
without cause. The next slide just clarifies the recommendation to delete Section 21. And this is
the proposed or the drafted ballot language for that recommendation.
Commissioner Suarez: And again, Mr. Mayor, this one is kind of similar to the same question
that you asked in terms of the consolidation of departments. You know, we have to decide
collectively whether this is something that rises to the level of putting this on the November
ballot, or maybe at some future ballot, because it is kind of like clean-up language, and so some
of the stuff that we did is very substantive, and some of the stuff that we did is just things that we
thought were wise to do. We're good.
Mr. Andrews: Next, Section 3(F)(iii) is powers of the City. One of the recommendations by the
Committee was to define i aterfront property. "The Committee believed that at times, it could be
unduly burdensome to require that every piece of property that may be considered waterfront
property be subject to referendum, so it decided to -- thinks that it's in the City's best interest to
limit it to certain properties which abut certain bodies of water. Those bodies of water would be
the Atlantic Ocean, Biscayne Bay, Little River, the Miami River, and all navigable waterways.
The Committee also recommends that the fair market value of return to the City under -- for a
lease or contract of waterfront property should be determined by two State -- independent
State -certified appraisers. For consistency purposes, the Charter uses the term Eontract'L- and
Management agreement'is also interspersed in there -- but the Committee believed that Eontract"
would be a better term to capture exactly what it is the City is engaging in. And then finally, the
referendum approval language. At the end, in order to approve the sale or lease of property at
referendum, currently the Charter states that it has to be approved by a majority of the voters of
the City. That has spawned several lawsuits saying that that's ambiguous. And although we've
been successful in those lawsuits, we believe that just to cut that off that argument off in the
future --
Commissioner Suarez: Clarify.
Mr. Andrews: -- that the language should be clarified to state that it's majority of votes cast by
the electorate. And here is a draft of the ballot question.
Commissioner Suarez: And 1 think -- you know, of that whole entire presentation, 1 think the one
thing that 1 keyed in on that was important is a State -certified appraiser, because you can say,
!{vo appraisals,'and they can be anybody. 1 mean, they can be realtors, they can be internal
people, they can be, you know, just about anybody. And 1 think the Committee was very specific
-- and 1 think that was Board Member Kneapler who specifically proposed that it be a
State -certified appraiser. In other words, this is an outside person that's certified by the State
that's qualified to provide this kind of an appraisal, not just anybody. That also can spawn
lawsuits about whether we're getting fair market value. If anyone is appraising the property and
it's not a person who's certified, then how good is that appraisal?
ChairHardemon: I have a question.
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Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Chair Hardemon: Where you -- in this sample ballot question where you say, Only City -owned
waterfront property consisting of a single folio number which abuts the Atlantic Ocean,'{vhy use
the language Atingle folio number? "I'm assuming -- say, for instance, you may have property that
could abut water that may have more than one folio number.
Mr. Andrews: I believe for purposes of identification of the property, that's something that the
Committee wanted to throw in there to identify the property and connect that to the -- abutting
the certain bodies of water.
Chair Hardemon: Okay.
Mr. Andrews: Next, Section 14, the Committee has recommended that the Charter establish an
Office of the Citizens'Advocate,'and that person would be responsible for investigating citizen
complaints, whether it be of elected officials, of employees, for alleged violations of the Charter,
City Code, ethical requirements. The citizens' advocate would kind of be like a middleman -- or
middle person who would receive the complaints, determine if there's any basis to it, and then
would refer it to the appropriate investigating agency, whether it be the State Attorneys Office,
the Commission -- Miami -Dade Commission on Ethics, and so forth.
Chair Hardemon: Other entities that do the same thing?
Mr. Andrews: Correct.
Chair Hardemon: Okay.
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair. And -- yeah. Go ahead. No.
Chair Hardemon: Mr. Mayor.
Mayor Regalado: Question: The question has 63 words, so we can do 75 --
Commissioner Suarez: You can add --
Mayor Regalado: -- correct?
Commissioner Suarez: -- 12 words.
Mayor Regalado: Well, I think the fundamental question is, Who appoints that person?"
Mr. Andrews: That would be -- they would be -- serve at the pleasure of the City Commission, so
it would be the City Commission.
Mayor Regalado: But you just said that this person will investigate the City Commission.
Mr. Andrews: That is the proposal from the Committee that --
Commissioner Gort: Can be appointed --
Mayor Regalado: How do you do that?
Chair Hardemon: They also provide recommendations --
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Mr. Andrews: Right.
Chair Hardemon: -- to other authorities.
Mayor Regalado: How do you do that?
Chair Hardemon: Look, I'm one of those individuals that --
Mayor Regalado: That is funny.
Chair Hardemon: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) add more and more investigatory authorities. 1 think we
have more than enough with the Ethics Commission, with the Inspector Generals, with the --
there's a plethora of different --
Ms. Mendez: I can give you the litany of lists, which is, we have the Auditor General, we have
the Inspector General of the County, we have the Commission on Ethics at the County, we have
the State Attorney's Office, we have the Commission on Ethics at the State, we have --
Commissioner Suarez: U.S. Attorney's Office.
Ms. Mendez: -- the wonderful citizens of the City ofMiami, as well. Honestly, this is overkill.
Chair Hardemon: Who can make recommendations -- I mean, who can --
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair.
Chair Hardemon: --file complaints to those -- all of those different authorities? And -- I'll let --
go ahead.
Commissioner Suarez: Let me just jump in and say this: This was originally sort of proposed as
an ombudsmen, and first of all, that word -- we quickly went away from the word 3mbudsman, "
because it -- everybody understands -- 1'm sure a lot of people understand what it means. I'm
sure there's a lot of people that don't understand what it means. But the point was that, you
know, if a citizen either -- let's say, public record, or if they want to get their tree trimmed, or
whatever the case may be, and they're not getting a response from the government, who do they
go to? And that was what the Committee was considering. There was also an aspect of as the
Mayor said, investigating or, you know, potentially making referrals, or things of that nature.
Those are things that we debated, you know, and 1 think it's important on this particular one to
also look at the language that underpins the citizens' advocate position. 1 mean, there was
debate about expanding bureaucracy, creating another office; how many employees would it
have; how much would it cost? 1 mean, there was a variety of questions. But the idea was if you
go to your government -- let's say they get a public record and nobody wants to give it to you --
which happens all the time. We get -- we have public records lawsuits all the time -- who is the
person --?
Ms. Mendez: Not that nobody wants to give. It's matter of just finding the records.
Commissioner Suarez: Okay. Well, that's in the eye of the beholder, if you will, but let's say you
go to your government and nobody wants to give you a document, a public record. The question
is, Who do you go to? "And, you know, if you're being stonewalled by several people, what -- who
do you have in your own government that can advocate on your behalf? So.
Chair Hardemon: Commissioner Gort.
Commissioner Gort: Let's be realistic. We have 16 -- how many we want to put in the ballot?
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Commissioner Suarez: And --
Commissioner Gort: This is a November ballot, where the County's got a lot of other thing; the
State has a lot of them. We've got to pick the one we believe are the most important at this time.
Commissioner Suarez: Understood.
Commissioner Gort: And 1 don't think it should be more than four, personally.
Commissioner Suarez: Understood.
Commissioner Gort: It's up to you all, but let's be realistic about it.
Commissioner Suarez: I understand.
Commissioner Gort: Let's concentrate on the most important ones.
Chair Hardemon: Please, move on.
Mr. Andrews: All right. Then there's the sample ballot language for that proposal. Next is the
Civilian Investigative Panel. 171 briefly summarize this, and then 171 allow Mr. Quick, who is the
lawyer for the CIP, to do a brief presentation. The Civilian Investigative Panel -- well, the
Committee recommends that the CIP be as independent as possible from the City; and to that
end, they should have the power to appoint and remove their staff, subject to Commission
approval. There should be an annual budget established by ordinance. They should be able to
investigate the uses of force resulting in death or great bodily harm and other police conduct --
mis -- other police conduct. And another recommendation is that to require the Police Chief to
respond in writing to the CIP's written requests within 45 days; currently, 1 believe that he has to
do so in 30 days.
John Quick: Thank you, Mayor, Mr. Chair, Commission. I also wanted to thank the Charter
Review Committee for the -- too far away -- wonderful work that they've done and the
presentations that they've made to you today. Just as a reminder as to how this -- the language
from the CIP -- I'm sorry, John Quick. I'm the independent counsellor the Civilian Investigative
Panel. Just as a reminder as to how the proposed language is now coming before you, the
Commission, back in 2014, created an Independent Review Committee to look into some issues of
the CIP. That Independent Review Committee then issued recommendations and determinations;
and really, the bulk of the language that's before you today or that's being presented before you
by the Charter Review Commission [sic] stems from the IRC's (Independent Review Panel's)
recommendations and determinations. There are a few other ones that are really more
clarifications or to make them consistent with what the CIP's ordinance is. I'm happy to go
through each one, if the Commission would like; or if there are only specific questions, I can do
that as well. But with the -- looking at the language in Section 51 -- I'm looking at Exhibit 16 --
where the first proposal talks about the composition of the CIP, where it's 12 civilian members,
and then there's a 13th appointee by the Chief of Police. That's really a clarification and brings
it consistent with the ordinance. That's how the CIP has been operating, but it was felt important
if we were going to make these changes, to clam the nomination process and just how many
and how the CIP will be made up or how it will be composed. The -- Section B'bf -- or
Subsection B'bf a 51, where it discusses the professional staff which includes the executive
director, independent legal counsel, there is -- obviously, there's an independent counsel in
existence; otherwise, I wouldn't be here, but that was specifically in the CIP ordinance.
However, there was not specific mention of the executive director in that -- in the ordinance. The
IRC thought that that was important, that there would be a specific mention of the executive
director. The IRC also, what they said in their recommendation number 4 was that they felt that
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it should be independent, and that they should try to make it more independent than 1 guess it
was at the time. And one of the issues that they brought up was that the appointment and the
removal of the executive director or the independent counsel would be done at the discretion of
the CIP with approval by the City Commission. And 1 do want to mention that, because 1 know
that in a prior section that was discussed related to the City Attorney's Office, Sections 19 and
21. It talked about that the City Attorney was authorized to retain or terminate anyone
representing the City at the City Attorney's Office discretion, so this is a carve -out -- or 1 guess
should be considered a carve -out, because in this section, it would put the independent counsel
at the discretion of the CIP and the Commission, as opposed to the City Attorney's Office. And
again, that comes from the IRC's recommendations and determinations as to why that's being put
forward. The third one, Subsection C','tvhich talks about operating on an annual budget. That
was again something that comes from the IRC's recommendations and determinations. They felt
that the CIP was being underfunded, and that they wanted to try to make it more independent,
and truly oversee -- provide civilian oversight of the Police Department in an independent
manner, separate and apart from the department itself and consistent with the intent as to why
the CIP was created. The -- Subsection D,'6vhich talks about the issuance of subpoenas, this 1
look at really more of a clarification. The prior ordinance -- or the prior Charter provision
talked about the CIP had subpoena powers, but didn't really define what 5'ubpoena powers"
meant, so now it talks about that. It has the power to issue subpoenas for allegations of a
criminal nature. Obviously, the CIP still cannot interfere with criminal investigations or State
investigations; and as well, it waits for IA (Internal Affairs) -- the completion of IA
investigations, if and when there are one -- is one. So this is really more of a clarification as to
what .subpoena powers'ineans so that it's clear that the CIP has these powers. The final
subsection, F,'fs -- again, stems from a recommendation from the Independent Review
Committee; that they felt that the CIP should investigate -- and, in fact, they put forward that
they should dutomatically'fnvestigate any incidences of serious bodily injury or death. The
proposed language doesn't quite go that far, but it does talk about -- that they have the power to
investigate police uses offorce; the power to independently investigate matters, which it has
now, but it's just to make it clearer. And then one of the other recommendations that the IRC put
forth was that it has the power to review Police Department policies and practices. Now, prior,
it had the power to review policies; now it's including policies and practices. And 1 think what
the IRC recognizes, the CIP is kind of in a unique situation or has a unique view, because they're
seeing various allegations that come through; some of which may be unfounded; some of it may
be founded, and they have the unique ability to look at that, to look at the -- a year's worth of
complaints and say, you know, Yes, we're seeing an issue here,'br 've're not seeing an issue here."
And 1 think the IRC said, you know, We think that the CIP should have the power to not just make
recommendations regarding policies but also practices as well so that they can bring that
forward. "If the Commission has any questions, I'm happy to answer them.
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair.
Chair Hardemon: You're recognized.
Commissioner Suarez: You want to jump in there, Julia?
Julia Dawson: Yes.
Commissioner Suarez: Ms. Dawson.
Ms. Dawson: I can do that now or I can wait.
Commissioner Suarez: No, no, please.
Ms. Dawson: I'm at the micro -- I'm sorry. Julia Dawson, 1701 Southwest 4th Avenue, Miami,
Florida. I'm here as a community activist, and someone who has a long-standing interest, an
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ongoing interest in the Civilian Investigative Panel and policing issues in general. I'm here
because, as Mr. Quick has pointed out, there seems to be some confusion between the Section 19
and 21 that refers to the City Attorney's Office; and Section 51, which deals with the Civilian
Investigative Panel. As Mr. Quick explained, it was the IRC's strong recommendation that the
CIP be as independent as possible, and he's outlined many of the steps that have been taken and
put -- and proposed that would accomplish that. One of them is taking the independent counsel
out from the City Attorney's purview and the City Attorney's ability to hire and fire, and put it in
the hands of the Civilian Investigative Panel, with the approval of the City Commissioners.
However, in Section 19 and 21, where it says that The Office of the City Attorney, which sets
forth as City Attorneys' qualifications, terms, duties,'et cetera, and providing the City Attorney
with sole discretion to select, appoint, employ, discharge, remove and replace such employees
and any counsel retained to represent the City at any time without cause." The Independent
Counsel represents the interest of the CIP in court proceedings, as has happened in the
D'Agostino case.
Chair Hardemon: But does the --
Ms. Dawson: This seems to be in conflict -- the independence of the independent counsel, under
Section 51, seems to be in conflict -- or actually, rather, Section 19 and 21 seems to be in conflict
with Section 51, and I think that needs to be cleared up, because otherwise --
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair.
Ms. Dawson: -- that's a lingering question as to how that works.
Chair Hardemon: It said it represents the City. Go ahead.
Commissioner Suarez: I think it can be clarified fairly easily. I think it would -- if you just said
something like, Except as otherwise provided in the Charter,7 think would clarify that. In other
words, you know, she gets the right to choose all those attorneys, axcept as otherwise provided,"
and I think there's -- you know, it's being otherwise provided'fn a different section; a specific
attorney that's being chosen in a different way, so I think that's a very easy thing to clean up.
Ms. Dawson: That sounds like a reasonable possible solution, so long as it is clear that the
independent counsel for the CIP is not hired or fired by the City Attorney; that that power's in the
hands of the CIP, with the approval of the Commission.
Commissioner Suarez: And I think we all agreed on that. After the IRC report, there were
discussions that -- we had a specific case on this issue, and I think the Committee was unanimous
in that recommendation. I would just add one last thing f -- or do you have more to --?
Ms. Dawson: No.
Commissioner Suarez: No, 1 would just add that we struggled, and 1 think the Commissioners
will struggle potentially with the minimum funding level in order to maintain independence, and
1 think that is something that the Committee struggled with, and the way we came to consensus
was putting in -- the change in Section C. "But to the credit of you know, a lot of the advocates
that came, they were asking the Commission to come with an ordinance that would potentially
set forth a minimum funding level, and so they were -- they sort of compromised and said that
they maybe understood that it couldn't be memorialized in the Charter, but that they wanted an
ordinance, and 1 suspect that will be coming before us shortly, and we'll be able to debate that at
that point and decide what we want to do.
Ms. Dawson: And if I may, that's correct. And there is language in the Charter which does
require the Commission to fund the CIP, but puts very broad description of that funding. It does
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not index it to anything, and does not put a specific figure, or anything like that. And we look
forward to the Commission considering the ordinance changes the CIP has prepared and are
ready to present, and hopefully will be presented at the budget meetings in September.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Ms. Dawson: And we look forward to your support on that. And if Mr. Quick is satisfied that the
suggestion by Commissioner Suarez solves the discrepancy between these two sections, then I
think we're good.
Mr. Quick: 1 think, assuming that this section's put to the voters and the voters --
Commissioner Suarez: Of course.
Mr. Quick: -- pass it, then 1 think that that language would --
Commissioner Suarez: Sure. That makes sense.
Mr. Quick: -- work, yes.
Commissioner Suarez: I would just say also, Mr. Quick, that maybe -- and of course,
Commissioners can have their independent meetings with the City Attorney on this issue. But on
the sample ballot language, I don't know if you've looked at it carefully, butl think we should
look at it carefully, because I think have a couple of questions on that -- on the ballot language
itself.
Ms. Dawson: For Section 51?
Commissioner Suarez: Correct.
Ms. Dawson: All right.
Commissioner Suarez: So I would -- I think we need to work on it. Is that okay?
Ms. Dawson: Okay.
Mr. Quick: Thank you.
Commissioner Suarez: Thanks.
Mr. Andrews: The next recommendation pertains to Section 52, which is the Citizens' Bill of
Rights. "The first recommendation by the Committee is to place the Citizens' Bill of Rights at the
beginning of the Charter. Currently, it's located at the very end. The Committee also
recommends adopting the Miami -Dade County Citizens' Bill of Rights. There's language in the
City's Citizens' Bill of Rights which guarantees rights related to the abatement of air and water
pollution, and the Committee believes that land pollution should also be part of that as well.
There's language that if a citizen sues under the -- for a Charter violation, they can recover
costs. The Committee believes that that should be clarified; that the citizen cannot recover
attorney's fees in such a lawsuit. And the Committee also believes that a -- that there should be a
Charter Review Committee established by the Charter that will meet every eight years to do what
it is that they did for the past 19 months. And also, there is a proposal to give citizen standing to
sue or to enforce the Charter, and Committee Member Justin Wales will do a presentation on
that.
Justin Wales: Hello. My name is Justin Wales. I'm a lawyer with Carlton Fields, and also a
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member of the citi=en -- of the Charter Review & Reform Committee. 1 was appointed to the
Committee, 1 think, three or four months ago and, you know, was reviewing all of the work that
the Committee had done before 1 got there about -- all the work that 1 had been doing -- that
they've been doing to improve the Charter and to improve, really, the lives and rights of the
citi=ens of the City of Miami. And the question kept coming up, which is, Well, to what end? "And
members of the Board were -- okay -- were speaking --1 guess he's going to help me get this --
about what is a right without a remedy? And what are the -- what is the recourse of the citi=ens
if there is a violation of the Charter? And we heard from a number of members from the public
who had attempted to address violations or perceived violations of the Charter, but were unable
to because the City Attorney's Office raised standing as a defense against a lawsuit. So we
proposed these suggested revisions, which really attempt to make sure that the City officials and
employees abide by the provisions of the Charter, and it grants specifically the citi=ens of Miami
the right to enforce Charter in a court of law. The Charter Review & Reform Committee
approved these amendments by a vote of 9-2. The proposal does -- my part of the proposal does
four things. The first thing it does is it recogni=es that the City of Miami's Charter is the City of
Miami's Constitution. The Citi=ens'Bill of Rights is the Bill of Rights of our Constitution, so it
brings the Bill of Rights to the very front of the Charter, just like you have the Bill of Rights in
the State, in the County, and in the Federal Constitution. It's the first thing you see. My notes
have gone away. Okay, the second is it adopts by reference -- and I'm sure this will come up in a
second -- it adopts by reference the provisions of the County's Citi=ens'Bill of Rights that are
already applicable to the City of Miami. It also changes the term general law'to .statutory law'fo
bring it in line with the common and well -understood definition of what general law consists of
The third thing it does is it adds the enumerated right as the first enumerated right of the citi=ens
of the City of Miami to be governed by the rule of law. The provision says -- and this -- sorry --
To be governed by the rule of law, the City of Miami Charter is the Constitution of the City of
Miami, and the City shall abide by all of its provisions. "Finally, it adds language to the
already -existing remedial provision of the Citi:ens'Bill of Rights that says that C'iti=ens shall be
deemed to have standing to bring legal actions to enforce this City's Charter. "An important
discussion that needs to occur is, What is standing under Florida law? "For those of you on the
panel who have gone to law school, the types of standing cases that you remember from law
school were Federal standing cases. And under Federal law, Altanding'is a radically different
thing than it is under Florida law. Under Federal law, .standing heals with subject matter
jurisdiction, meaning -- here it is -- it deals with subject matter jurisdiction, which means the
ability of a court to hear a case. This is because Federal courts are courts of limited
jurisdiction. Under Florida law, however, Danding'fs merely a waivable affirmative defense that
does not affect a court's jurisdiction to hear a case. The same as (UNINTELLIGIBLE). It just a
defense that a defendant can bring, but it does not affect the abilities of the court to hear a case.
It's because under Florida law, circuit courts are plenary in nature. They can hear any case that
is not explicitly -- they're not explicitly prevented from hearing. There's a related concept called
A'pecial injury.'Special injury originated in the law of nuisance and has been applied to taxpayer
suits. A taxpayer suit is where a citi=en suing as a taxpayer challenges the taxing and spending
decision of a political body. The reason why courts have determined that you need special injury
for a taxpayer suit is because the taxing and spending decisions are discretionary. It's a political
decision whether you choose to increase funds going to one place or another and you didn't want
citi=ens complaining about every, you know, decision that could possibly affect their tax burden.
Until the Solares opinion -- well, let me say this: Before the -- The reason why Charter
challenges, prior to the Solares opinion, did not need to show -- plaintiffs did not need to show a
special injury is because abiding by the Charter is not a discretionary choice. This panel and
the City, in general, must abide by the Charter's provisions. So there was no need to show a
special injury because it was not a matter of challenging the discretion of a political body. And
indeed, there were about seven years of cases in which the Florida Supreme Court and also the
Third District Court of Appeal recogni=ed the rights of plaintiffs to sue the City to enforce the
Charter, but this changed in the Solares case, which said that this implied right to sue under the
Charter is no longer the law in Florida; Third District Court of Appeal -- under a Third District
Court ofAppeal's decision. I'm sure the panel has received the legal memorandum on this issue.
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There was sort of a back and forth in the Charter -- among the members of the Charter Review &
Reform Committee and the City Attorney's Office; and the City Attorney's Office raised two
arguments, a policy and a legal argument, against passing this provision. The legal argument
was that the City does not have the power to grant its citi=ens the right to enforce its -- their own
Charter, and they rely on two cases. The first is the Solares case, and there's a case called
Winn -Dixie. The Solares case, however, is not at all applicable. In Solares, Grace was suing to
-- under this implied right of standing. She was suing because there was a vio -- an alleged
violation of the Charter, and she argued that that gave her the right under, you know, decades of
case law. Florida -- Third District Court of Appeal disagreed with that, but it had nothing to do
with the right of a city to explicitly grant standing to its citi=ens. The other case that they cite for
the proposition that an ordinance cannot create circuit court jurisdiction is called Winn -Dixie
versus Farris. That's a Fourth DCA (District Court of Appeals) case that's not binding on -- in
this jurisdiction. But anyway, this is not an ordinance. And that case dealt with a preemption
issue. The Fourth DCA said that an ordinance that's already preempted by the State Constitution
can't create circuit court jurisdiction. It has nothing to do with this. In fact -- so there's no
authority to hold that this City does not have the right to grant standing to its citi=ens, and that
makes sense, because standing, as 1 said, under Florida law, is an affirmative defense. 1t can be
waived by the City, by policy, or by Charter. And it's a long -- settled under Florida law -- this is
a Florida Wildlife case -- that standing that's conferred by legislation need not show -- you know,
plaintiffs need not show a special injury. There is one case that has dealt with a expressed
citi=en's standing provision that we could find in Florida. 1t was a Third District Court of Appeal
case from 1978 called Krant_ler. And in that case, a County citi=en brought suit alleging a
violation of the County's Citi=ens' Bill of Rights that expressly -- and based standing on a
provision that expressly confers standing to citi=ens to enforce that provision. The Third District
Court of Appeal rejected the County's argument that those wishing to sue under the County's
Citi=ens'Bill of Rights must also demonstrate a special injury. And the quote -- you can see it on
the board -- is, Ira tax -paying citi=en of Dade County could not contest alleged violations of this
bill in a court of equity, the stated purpose of the bill would be ignored. "Finally, the City
Attorney in their memo argued that it's bad policy to grant citi=ens the right to enforce the
Charter. And they said that what it will -- what will happen is there will be a deluge of lawsuits
from citi=ens suing the City Commission for every political decision that they don't agree with.
Well, it's not true. The citi=en standing would only allow them to sue for alleged Charter
violations; not for discretionary decisions by the body; but also, there's no support that this will
bring a deluge of lawsuits. Prior to Solares and the invention by the Third DCA of the special
injury requirement for all Charter violations, there were about 10 cases that we could find in 60
years in which a citi=en sued to enforce a Charter. The County is a great example. In the
County, it has had an expressed standing provision in its Citi:ens'Bill of Rights for about 40
years. Dan Paul drafted the original language way back in the day. And Krant_ler, the case 1
mentioned before, is the only case, prior to 2015, in which standing was based solely on the
provision granted to the citi=ens, and this suggests a couple things. One, citi=ens do not like
suing their government. It's incredibly expensive; it's burdensome; it's uncomfortable. It also
suggests, however, that this acts -- granting citi=ens standing acts as a deterrent against Charter
violations. Other deterrents that would contradict the notion that this will bring a deluge of
lawsuits is that there are tools available to the City if there are frivolous lawsuits brought. There
are sanctions that you can bring against a lawyer who brings frivolous lawsuits. There are
motions, prosecution claims you can bring. There are 57.105 sanctions available to the court --
to the City. Finally, the proposal does not provide for attorney's fees, so you're not running the
risk of creating a cottage industry for attorneys looking to -- wish to enforce the Charter. And
finally, this does not authori=e damage claims against the City for its decisions; it's only
declaratory claims to enforce the Charter. So that is the end of my presentation. I'm happy to
answer any questions or sit back. 1 think there's probably other people who would like to speak
on this.
Chair Hardemon: I'm sure the City Attorney's going to have --
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Mr. Wales: Yes.
Chair Hardemon: -- something that she wants to speak to about this issue.
Mr. Wales: I'm sure.
Chair Hardemon: But you don't necessarily have to take the opportunity now. We can continue
on with the presentation, and then we'll come back to all the substantive arguments. Mr. Mayor.
Mayor Regalado: Chairman, I have a question. The proposed ballot language on standing here
in this document from the City Attorney, number 11 is -- as it is: Shall Miami Charter Section 52
be amended to provide citizens standing to enforce the Charter?"So the number of words are 15
-- not 50 -- 15. 60 more are allowed. Now, the question that some people are going --
Commissioner Suarez: I think you have the wrong one.
Mayor Regalado: -- to ask -- yeah, I'm reading the ballot language here.
Vice Chair Russell: We haven't gotten there yet.
Commissioner Suarez: The one that I have is bigger. 52?
Mr. Andrews: There were two. There were -- a separate one just for standing; and then, there
was one --
Commissioner Suarez: Got it.
Mr. Andrews: -- that create -- that included all the different --
Mayor Regalado: So that was my question.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Mayor Regalado: Is there a separate one for standing?
Mr. Andrews: Yes. I wanted to give the Commission --
Mayor Regalado: And that's --
Mr. Andrews: -- an idea of what a separate one would look like, as well as --
Mayor Regalado: -- only 15 words?
Mr. Andrews: Correct.
Mayor Regalado: So the question that the people are going to ask is: What is standing?"
Commissioner Suarez: Absolutely.
Mayor Regalado: And the question -- the other question is: How do you translate to Spanish
and Creole 'standing?"'
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair, if may? I think the Mayor has an excellent point. I think we
-- and it's funny, because as Justin was finishing his presentation -- and he did a fantastic
presentation -- but he was talking about, What are the remedies?"
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Mr. Wales: Yeah.
Commissioner Suare:. And in legal parlance, the remedies -- we talk in those words, you know.
But 1 was going to clarify for purposes of the Commission that what he means was, you know, for
example, if the court were to issue mandamus, they would require the City to comply with the
Charter; in other words, that would be what the court would be -- you know, would be ordering;
that the City comply with the Charter. So 1 think the Mayor has an excellent point. 1 think
there's another thing that is a concern, and 1 don't know how the Commission feels about this or
the Mayor. We have in the sample ballot language for 52 -- you know, where it says here, To
prohibit attorney's fees as a remedy for Charter violation. "Now, if that is currently not -- you
know, if we can't get attorney's fees now, currently, 1 think putting that in there almost works
against the ballot question, if you get what I'm saying, because if what you're trying to convey
here is rights -- right? -- the right, you know, guaranteed rights relating to the abatement of land
pollution, establishing a committee that will meet every eight years, et cetera, et cetera, saying
here, To prohibit attorney's fees as a remedy for Charter violations,'that -- that's not really a
right, per se, and could actually work against the question. So 1 don't know whether, you know,
that's something that we need to think about drafting -wise; and politically, too. 1 think, you
know, we have to look at: What are our residents going to be reading and what are they going to
be voting on?"
Vice Chair Russell: Mr. Chair.
Chair Hardemon: Yes.
Vice Chair Russell: Same thing regarding attorney's fees. 1'd like to understand a little better
how the Committee's process went in discussing that. Was there a part of the group that felt that
granting attorney's fees should be done? I'm concerned that not allowing attorney's fees to be
recovered creates an undue burden where only wealthy citi=ens would be able to challenge their
government. Is that a concern?
Mr. Wales: Well, so my experience on the Committee --1 was appointed -- the section related to
the Citi=ens'Bill of Rights was sort of split into two. 1 was appointed after the discussion already
occurred about to -- clarifying that attorney's fees were not included under the cost. And that's
really not a substantive change; that's to bring in line to a lot of case law that says that cost does
not include attorney's fees. 1 don't know what the discussion was, but 1 will say that adding
attorney's fees, you know, creates a real barrier to the City violating its Charter. 1 mean, it
creates an incentive for them to follow its own rules, because there will be a lawsuit against it.
Right now, it's very difficult to sue the City; it's very expensive, it's very burdensome, but if you
create that incentive, it'll, you know, prohibit more Charter violations, I believe. I'm not sure if --
Mr. Andrews: Mr. Vice Chair, there was a discussion about that, but 1 think the Committee saw
the opposite view; that this would actually provide an incentive for people to file lawsuits against
the City, and believed that that was not in the City's best interest, and so wanted to clarify that
costs would not include attorney's fees.
Vice Chair Russell: I was watching in the audience as I saw-- Krieger nodding his head and
Kneapler shaking his head, so I'm sure there was discussion and disagreement at the Committee
level.
Commissioner Suare:. There absolutely was. And 1 think Mr. Kneapler, who spent a lot of his
own money on attorney's fees; and Mr. Brahman, who spent a lot of money on attorney's fees,
you know, there was some disagreement about whether or not, you know, the City should pay for
it or not. 1 mean, obviously, what we're doing here, 1 think, is important. You know, giving our
citi=ens the right to redress Charter violations is something that seems logical. You would think
we have that right, and we don't, as citi=ens; or at least, it's been -- it's arguable that we don't,
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and it's been debated and litigated, and some courts have ruled that we don't. So 1 think this
certainly is important, an important reform for citizens' participation and protection, for them to
be able to protect themselves against -- in potentially a city government that won't follow its own
Charter. Whether we go a step further and say we will compensate those people who are, you
know, who are -- who have established a good claim, you know, that could get expensive, but it
may be something that we're willing to pay. And now, keep this in mind, too: That everything
that we pay in this government is being paid for by all the members of the community. So the
question is do -- a public policy, 1 think, decision.
Vice Chair Russell: Right.
Commissioner Suarez: Do -- essentially, do the citizens of the City of Miami want to share in the
burden, if you will, of one person suing the government, you know, getting good attorneys, you
know, and winning a case? And the answer may be Yes. "The answer may be, Yes," the citizens
want to cooperate or collaborate in the payment of fees where they're redressing -- where a
citizen is redressing a Charter violation. That may be the public policy that we, as citizens -- but
that definitely would have to be specified in the question, for sure.
Vice Chair Russell: 1 think if we take it to a certain extent, but then we don't give it the teeth or
-- the concern that it creates a cottage industry or an incentive to sue, 1 think that's less of a
concern. And how expensive it is certainly shouldn't be a concern if they're right. If they win the
case and we have violated the Charter as a city, you know, yeah, we should be on the hook for it.
1-- in my personal opinion; otherwise, very few people --1 mean, we set up this nice provision
where they can challenge their own government -- can afford to challenge their own government.
And if they're right and they go through all of that, they're going to be bankrupted, in the hole,
but they were right.
Commissioner Suarez: And 1 would add to that -- to support your argument -- that the citizens
are going to vote. If we make it -- if we specify it in the question, they're going to vote whether or
not that is a component of whether or not they want to establish that right. My question to you
is: Politically, will the citizens maybe be afraid of the cost and maybe not grant it? You know
what I'm saying?
Vice Chair Russell: Right.
Commissioner Suarez: So that's a fear that 1 have, but I'm perfectly fine with either -- 1'm only
one vote --
Vice Chair Russell: Yeah.
Commissioner Suarez: -- but I'm perfectly fine with either/or. 1 think it --
Vice Chair Russell: 1 don't know how well versed the citizens would be on cost versus attorney's
fees to start with.
Commissioner Suarez: Right.
Vice Chair Russell: They would see all that --
Commissioner Suarez: Agreed.
Vice Chair Russell: -- there. But, certainly, for me, you know, 1 would like to put this before the
voters.
Commissioner Suarez: Okay.
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Vice Chair Russell: And to get it right, though, for me, it's that you recover their cost in
attorney's fees if they win, if they're right; obviously, not if they're -- if it's frivolous or if they're --
if they lose. And to address the deluge argument, the flood of potential lawsuits that this could
create, it would only create a rightful flood if we are violating our Charter over and over again.
If we're not violating our Charter --
Commissioner Suarez: Sure.
Vice Chair Russell: -- there won't be a flood.
Commissioner Suarez: Of course.
Vice Chair Russell: And if that flood does come and we are violating our Charter that often,
that's the bigger problem; not that we allowed them to do it; that we are doing the violations.
Commissioner Suarez: I agree with that. That's the way normal people think. I think what
happens, unfortunately, is we live in a very litigious society, so --
Vice Chair Russell: True.
Commissioner Suarez: -- you know, people sue if-- 1 wish that were the case; that people only
sued when there was a legitimate reason to sue and when there was a right reason to sue.
Unfortunately, that's not the society that we live in, but I'm -- you know, I'm comfortable if this
Commission is comfortable saying -- because -- but 1 think right now, the question is confusing.
By saying in the question of the Citizens' Bill of Rights that we're not allowing them to recover
attorney's fees, 1 think that could be fatal to the question.
Vice Chair Russell: If it was already in there, especially, you know.
Commissioner Suarez: Right.
Vice Chair Russell: Yeah.
Commissioner Suarez: And so my issue is the question is not well drafted. And then the question
-- then the second part is on standing -- and then the Mayor made a good point, you know.
There's only -- what? -- 16 words or something like that? So 1 think he's got a good point. We
have to better define what that means in normal parlance. And then if you want to make
recovery of attorney's fees for successful litigants a part of it, you know, the voters will decide
whether they want to bear that cost or not.
Vice Chair Russell: Yeah. 1 mean, forget about translating to Creole. Ask the average voter
what the word 5'tanding'means, you know.
Mr. Wales: 1 think -- my suggestion is that it should say either the right to sue to enforce the
Charter or something --
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Vice Chair Russell: I agree.
Mr. Wales: -- along that line.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah, that makes sense.
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Mr. Wales: I mean, that would --
Commissioner Suarez: It's pretty clear.
Mr. Wales: -- if they want to know what that means.
Vice Chair Russell: And just to be on the record, I would like to see the --
Commissioner Suarez: Prevailing parties.
Vice Chair Russell: -- attorney's fees included in there, but in the opposite direction; that they
are covered --
Commissioner Suarez: Right.
Vice Chair Russell: -- in the event of the --
Commissioner Suarez: So we have to delete it from the other question is what I'm getting at,
okay?
Vice Chair Russell: Okay.
Commissioner Suarez: So -- and that would have to be taken out, so.
Vice Chair Russell: I mean, that's just my initial thought, but --
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's fine.
Vice Chair Russell: -- I'm certainly open to discussion and further --
Commissioner Suarez: 1 think that's what this is for.
Vice Chair Russell: -- going in the direction --
Commissioner Suarez: And I think we also --
Vice Chair Russell: -- but that's my gut feeling on it.
Commissioner Suarez: -- Look, 1 think that's what this is for. We have time to contemplate it. 1
mean, 1-- you know, again, we're in a contemplative mode here. And the next time that we talk
about this, whenever that is, you know, if we're deciding to put things -- you know, at that point
-- you know, you're going to have time to think about it, you know, and to think about whether or
not this is something -- because it is a -- there's a political reality here, which is we're doing
something significant, which is giving our citizens the right to sue their government if they're
violating the Charter. 1 think that's -- should be a no-brainer, and it's not, for whatever reason.
Second aspect is, you know, if they're successful, should we pay their lawyers? And, you know, 1
think we have good lawyers in the audience, certainly, and 1 think people that are responsible
that wouldn't drive up the cost on our citizens, but there are others that may not be so
responsible.
Vice Chair Russell: 1 guess my initial question was just to wonder if the Committee took that into
account in their final recommendation that attorney's fees wouldn't be covered. Was that just a
weighing of the political realities of trying to get it passed, or did the Committee truly feel that
attorney's costs shouldn't be covered?
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Mr. Wales: Well, the clarification, I believe, happened before the standing provision was even
proposed, so I'm not sure if that was considered.
Commissioner Suarez: Did we -- I mean, and there's other Committee members here -- take up
that issue in the discussion of standing? We did?
Stanley Krieger: Yeah.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah. You want to -- Stanley, you want to come in real quick and just --?
Because you -- thank you.
Mr. Krieger: I'm Stanley Krieger. 1 live at 1717 North Bayshore Drive. This was an issue that
was debated rather vigorously at our meetings. We took into account the cost to the City. We
took into account the frivolous natures of -- whatever. And it was -- as 1 recall, it was a very
close vote among the Committee members to leave it in, in the hopes that we could get this
passed. We think that the standing thing is a very important thing for the citizens to have, and
especially if there's a violation of the Charter. And as Justin said, it's limited to the violations of
the Charter and, you know, a couple of other -- and the Bill of Rights. With those limitations, 1
don't think you're going to have a heck of a lot of lawsuits unless, as the Commissioner points
out, you guys go off the deep end and do things you shouldn't be doing. 1 can understand why
the City Attorney's Office only put 15 words in here, because they are vigorously opposed to this.
And 1 would recommend that, if you would like, we probably could hold another Committee
hearing to go over the sample ballot language as --
Commissioner Suarez: I have no problem with that.
Mr. Krieger: -- in an effort to help --
Commissioner Suarez: Sure.
Mr. Krieger: -- if you'd like.
Commissioner Suarez: If that's the direction of the Commission, I have no problem with that,
whatsoever. Thankyou --
Mr. Krieger: Thank you.
Mr. Wales: Thankyou.
Commissioner Suarez: -- Mr. Krieger.
Vice Chair Russell: Thanks.
Commissioner Suarez: Thank you.
Mr. Andrews: Next section -- the next recommendation is for Section 29(B,) which pertains to
the City -owned property, sale or lease; similar to Section 3(F)(iii). The recommendation is to
require that the fair market value return to the City be determined by State -certified appraisers.
There's a recommendation to clarify that the competitive bidding exemption for property
conveyed to implement governmental projects apply to City agencies and instrumentalities. And
the Committee has also recommended that various exceptions from the competitive bidding
requirement be deleted. Those exceptions are: The disposition of property acquired as a result
offoreclosure; conveyances involving property acquired from the County due to delinquent
taxes, and the Committee also recommends that the exemption -- the four -- where the
Commission can by four -fifths vote approve a one-time lease extension within the last five years
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of a lease. Those are the recommendations of the Committee on this section, and here is a draft
of the ballot language for the recommendation.
Chair Hardemon: So in laymen's language, the first part -- well, explain this to me in laymen's
language.
Mr. Andrews: The first part about requiring fair market value?
Chair Hardemon: No. I get that part.
Mr. Andrews: Okay.
Chair Hardemon: That's why I didn't -- but understanding fair market value, 7 understand two
independent appraisers, but the competitive bidding exemption for property conveyed to -- from
a governmental project applies to --
Mr. Andrews: Right.
Chair Hardemon: -- City -- what do you say?
Mr. Andrews: So what that's supposed to, I guess, clam is that where -- if a City agency or
instrumentality conveys property to another governmental entity, then the competitive bidding
requirements would not apply. They -- That conveyance would be exempt from competitive
bidding requirements. However, if the agency or instrumentality conveyed it to a
non -governmental entity, a private party, then the conveyance would be subject to competitive
bid.
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair, if may?
Chair Hardemon: Yes.
Commissioner Suarez: So we struggled a lot with this, as well. We debated this tremendously,
and we were trying to avoid a situation where a property can be conveyed to a subdivision of the
City and then to a third parry, and thereby waive the 29(B) requirements. We tried to do it a
variety of different ways. We finally just settled on taking out the exemption; in other words, just
basically requiring fair market value. lithe City's going to sell property, get fair market value
for it, because that's what the citizens would most likely want. And that's -- again, it was a
struggle. We -- this is one of those 1 think we went four, five or six times with the language in
terms of trying to construct something that captured the intent of what we were trying to do, and
1 think failing doing that -- and it happened to us on a couple of occasions. Go ahead.
Chair Hardemon: So my question is: How does this affect where I have infill property in my
district --
Commissioner Suarez: Mm-hmm.
Chair Hardemon: -- that, in a sense, the City owns, but the City gained from an entity such as
the Liberty City Trust; that Trust, which had land and dollars that were supposed to be used to
bring about economic development in that area. So part of the things that we intend to do is with
that land -- which the Trust has done in the past, and which 1 want to continue to do -- we
provide that land to 501(c) (3)'s, economic development corporations that build affordable
housing on that site. It lowers the cost, of course, to the person that's purchasing it, and then it
puts families in those households, so now you can purchase properties in those areas from land
that was given from the City to that private entity or that 501(c)(3) to create those types of
projects. As 1 read this language, it appears to me that it would affect that type of transaction.
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Ms. Mendez: Actually, it shouldn't, because that --
Commissioner Suarez: No, it shouldn't.
Ms. Mendez: -- it still has Exception A, 'conveying property to implement housing programs or
projects which are intended to benefit persons or households with low or moderate income; the
criteria of which to be provided for by Federal or State, or by the City Commission. So you still
have that power.
Mr. Andrews: All right. And finally -- oh, go ahead.
Linda Carroll: Commission, may I -- my name is Linda Carroll, and my office is at 44 West
Flagler Street, here in Miami.
Chair Hardemon: How are you doing, Ms. Carroll?
Ms. Carroll: I would like -- thank you.
Chair Hardemon: What type of offices do you have?
Ms. Carroll: Grace works with me, so you can imagine.
Chair Hardemon: Oh.
Commissioner Suarez: Oh.
Chair Hardemon: Very good offices.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Chair Hardemon: Let's put it that way.
Ms. Carroll: Well, thank you. 1 agree with that part of it, at least. 1 would like to address this
particular language here, because the City of Miami, prior to you all becoming members of the
Commission, was notorious for doing a shell game. The DDA (Downtown Development
Authority) is the most egregious violator of what is attempted here right now. They attempted to
use the language, City agency,'in order to transfer the land that we now know is the monstrosity
as the baseball stadium. Ultimately, they had -- the City Commission at that time had to bite the
bullet and just convey it outright to the County. But there was -- the original memorandum of
understanding that was written in, 1 think, about 2007, stated that they were going to transfer the
land from the City to the DDA, which is a subdivision of the City of Miami, so that the DDA in
turn could then lease it without having to go through any bidding for purposes of what money the
City was going to get. Now, the language is there, and it was clear that transferring the land to
the County would satisfy that, but the County really didn't want to buy into that, because they
didn't want to be on the hook by being the owner of the land. 1 went to a hearing with regard to
another piece of land, and in fact --1 don't know if it was the DDA and the baseball stadium or
some other piece of property -- that it was clearly stated Mayor Dia: acknowledged on the
record, because 1 had a court reporter there, why they wanted to transfer the land to the DDA.
And the question was: Is that just to get around the prohibition about -- in terms of getting
competitive bids? And it was said, des. "And -- excuse me -- it was MSEA (Miami Sports &
Exhibition Authority); that's what -- that was the one that -- they did it. They've also done it --
the charter school. They wanted to get land to a private charter company so that then that land
could be utilized for this private charter company to use City -owned land to build a building and
have all of the benefits of it, but not go through a competitive bidding from one charter company
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-- one charter school to another. They used the DDAfor that. And that's -- the charter school is
a very fine school, but the City's not getting any money for it. There was no competitive bidding,
and it was just a shell game. Grace just reminded me it was MSEA that was being utilized or
attempted to be utilized for purposes of a baseball stadium. So if you allow this kind of
amendment, you're going to go back to the backroom negotiations, and whatever agency that --
or City agency somebody wants to use, you know, that's not right. The benefits in what is needed
isYes,' oor low-income housing and certain benefits that are going to affect the people who are
living in the neighborhoods, who are going to be most directly affected by whatever change is
going to go about here, but not to do -- allow this kind of shell game. I'm sorry. Yes,
Commissioner.
Commissioner Suarez: No, 1 was going to say, sort of to your point, 1 thought we had eliminated
Section C,"that was my under -- that was my recollection.
Mr. Andrews: No. Section C'{vas revised; it wasn't eliminated.
Commissioner Suarez: I thought we had, because I know that there was a discussion about how
it would be revised? Huh? It was eliminated, right?
Mr. Krieger: (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
Commissioner Suarez: Right. And so -- because 1 remember -- my point being that we struggled
to try to revise it for many, many meetings, and then 1 think we ultimately settled on eliminating
it; that was my recollection.
Mr. Andrews: My recollection -- and I apologize --
Commissioner Suarez: No, no, it's okay.
Mr. Andrews: -- my recollection was that we did -- there was a lot of back and forth, a lot of
different drafts of that language, but the intent was to clam that it would apply to all City
agencies, instrumentalities. We came up with a definition to define Eity'A-o that it would be clear
what the transactions would apply to, and so 1 thought that there was an agreement as to
language, ultimately. 1 didn't --
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah. 1 think maybe this is something that we can take up at this
subsequent Committee meeting and sort of look at -- maybe in the interim, you can listen to the
meeting --
Mr. Andrews: Sure.
Commissioner Suarez: -- or that portion of the meeting, because I'm pretty confident that we
eliminated that. Now, whether that's a good thing or a bad thing, 1 mean, we can debate it up
here, but that would address your issue, which is the shell game.
Ms. Carroll: That's correct.
Commissioner Suarez: You know, and so we struggled with, Flow do we prevent the City from
doing that shell game? "And 1 think in our attempts -- our multiple attempts to try to redraft the
language, 1 think we decided at the end, Look, the best course of action here is to just eliminate
it. "Now, whether or not the Commission will agree with that is a whole 'nother issue, but 1 think
that's -- 1'm pretty sure that's where we went with that.
Ms. Carroll: Thank you.
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Vice Chair Russell: Mr. Chair.
Ms. Mendez: So, Commissioner, just to be clear, you're thinking that the intent of the Committee
was to eliminate this exception?
Commissioner Suarez: That was my recollection, yeah.
Ms. Mendez: Okay.
Commissioner Suarez: My recollection was -- and 1 think it was in the last meeting that we did
it, as well. We -- again, there was a variety of drafts of how this provision would be redrafted,
including a bottom paragraph that sort of better defined some of the issues in Sub-C, and we
played with that and we tried to make it work and, you know, we used the MSEA example as one
example and we --1 think at the end, sort of threw up our hands and said, Look, maybe the best
thing to do here is just to eliminate the exception totally, you know, and not allow for -- you
know, if it's a government -to -government transaction, we still get fair market value. There's no
exception for there being --
Ms. Mendez: Right. 1 think 1 was present at that meeting, and there was also discussion about,
you know, FDOT (Florida Department of Transportation) projects --
Commissioner Suarez: Sure.
Ms. Mendez: -- and right-of-ways [sic], and a whole bunch of little things that happen on a
day-to-day basis and --
Commissioner Suarez: You don't think there was consensus at the end of it all?
Ms. Mendez: -- but don't think there was a consensus to eliminate the whole section, but think
there was the hope of addressing specific issues.
Commissioner Suarez: Okay.
Ms. Mendez: So 1 just don't think that is -- it's totally vetted right.
Commissioner Suarez: If we're going to go back and work on the questions, if that's what the
Commission is asking us to do, I think we should relook at just this issue.
Ms. Carroll: 1 think -- Commissioner, 1 think the language is in -- 29(A), for example, there are
certain conditions for -- 1 think unifying development projects or some other kind of projects, and
it specifically exempts a conveyance to, for example, State agencies or the State Government.
There are -- had transfers to the Federal Government, so that there is language that if you want
to be assured, be able to convey it without going through bidding or any of these other things
when you -- when it's clearly not going to be a shell game. It's already there in one of -- it's
either 29(B) -- 29(A) or -- there's another section under 29(B), but to leave just this vague
phrase, agencies and instrumentalities, '7 can assure you, I've done -- 1've spent a lot of time
researching what that means, and it's so open-ended you can get anything, and you're going to
get the shell game.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah. And 1 think the intent of the Committee was -- we had passed an
ordinance that we wanted to memorialize in a Charter provision that would close the loop
forever, and 1 think that was the objective, and so we'll go back to the drawing board on that.
Vice Chair Russell: Mr. Chair. Thank you. And I really appreciate this, as well. I think it was
either my first or my second Commission meeting --
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Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Vice Chair Russell: -- that we brought this up and addressed it as a Commission, the issues in
29(B); and specifically, to MSEA. My question to Ms. Carroll was: Each time in your statement
you mentioned DDA. "Did you mean MSEA,'br are you talking both DDA and MSEA?
Ms. Carroll: The DDA has been used that way. The charter school is a perfect example. And I
have a (UNINTELLIGIBLE) of all kinds of legal documents where this private entity wound up
getting -- hand-picked this land up there. That's not to say it's not serving a function, but it's just
private industry just getting tax-free all this land, without having to pay anything; and certainly
not leasing it, and then they pay $1 a year, because all they're doing is paying the DDA.
Vice Chair Russell: Sure. 1 think the transfers to --
Ms. Carroll: And -- but MSEA's also involved -- has been involved in that, as well.
Vice Chair Russell: -- traditional -- other independent -- government agencies independent of
our city are what we want to allow and facilitate. But agencies that we create is where the shell
game could actually happen, because we're thinking in our own best interests as a city. And if
it's an agency we've created, does that allow a bypass of 29(B)?
Ms. Carroll: Commissioner, there was a -- during a budget hearing about three or four years
ago, one Commissioner asked, Why do we continue having MSEA? "And another Commissioner
responded and pointed out, 1't's because that's how we're able to utilize that'=- MSEA doesn't
really serve any purpose. It has -- its function is no longer needed -- or is satisfied, rather.
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair.
Ms. Carroll: And they just use it for purposes of transferring property.
Chair Hardemon: 1 don't know if that's -- would be a true statement, but --
Commissioner Suarez: Well, 1'll go a little further; 1'll go a little further than that and 1'll say, for
example, a baseball stadium is a good example. It could be transferred, no cost to the County so
that a private entity doesn't have to pay taxes on it. And there is no fair market value that's
obtained at the end of the day. Or it doesn't really have to be a baseball --1 don't want to pick
on baseball. Any sport; any sport, for that matter. It could be transferred to the County for free.
That -- the private entity that ultimately gets the -- whatever -- if it's a lease or the deed of the
property or whatever -- wouldn't have to pay taxes on it. It'd be -- if it's County -owned property.
And the City wouldn't necessarily get fair market value. So the question is: If we take this out,
we are preventing ourselves from making a deal like that. That may be a good thing; that may
not be a good thing. 1 don't know. At some point, our citizens may want us to do deals where we
don't get any money and that's our contribution to the deal, you know; the land, for example.
That may not be a good deal. That may be viewed as a good deal.
Chair Hardemon: That was part of my concern when we discussed this earlier, and 1 made that
point, especially to Commissioner Gort that, you know, you may not want to tie your hands when
it comes to your ability to negotiate in the future, some deal in the future. Now, when -- if there
is a -- if that's something that's done in the public, 1 mean, it's very public that you can see that
you're creating this deal; not speaking if there is something that is done underhanded to the
benefit of some private entity, 1 don't know of any specific things like that. But 1 can attest to the
desire sometime in the future to maybe negotiate a deal that has very huge benefits to the public,
but that would require -- that may be time sensitive that may require not going to referendum
sometime in the future, you know?
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Commissioner Suarez: Yeah. And again, like, you know, whenever we're taking away discretion
from ourselves, it's usually because things have happened that have gotten us to a point where
there's either a loss of confidence or, you know, whatever the case may be. So you're right. 1
mean, we have to decide whether we want to put to the voters a situation where, you know, where
they don't want us to have that ability or not.
Ms. Carroll: 1 would suggest to you, Commissioner, that if you're going to take away taxpayers'
land, land that is going to be used for a private -- for the benefit of a private entity that's going to
-- making money on the deal -- if you're going to give it away tax-free or even lease it tax-free,
then 1 think the taxpayers should have it in -- some kind of an ability to say lip'br down," 9es'br
Commissioner Suarez: Yes. And here's the problem: 1 agree with what you're saying. The
problem is, in structuring the language, where we had a lot of problem is you're talking about a
three -person transaction; government -government, and then a third party, which is the private
entity, right? So we were -- we struggled with -- for example, let's say the government gets it and
then sells it. Can we put a covenant, for example, that requires the government to hold it for a
certain period of time, you know, before that second government gets some value for it or no
value for it?
Ms. Carroll: There's another provision -- I think it's in 29(A) --
Commissioner Suarez: Okay.
Ms. Carroll: -- that if you're giving land to certain type of entities or leasing and they are
tax-exempt that they have -- they may still be tax-exempt, but as part of the contract deal, they
pay the City an amount of money that would be the equivalent of the fair market value of -- in the
taxes.
Commissioner Suarez: We'll go back to the drawing board on this one, if that's okay with you
guys, because I think this needs work. Thank you.
Ms. Carroll: Thank you.
Mr. Andrews: And finally, the last section that the Committee proposes to amend is Section 4.
I'm going -- there are several -- the main proposal is a strong Mayor proposal. 1 just want to go
down the proposals that are not related to strong Mayor real quick; the first one being that the
elected officials -- clarifying that elected officials can be recalled and providing that -- a process
for that; also clarifying that a run-off election will not be required where a candidate is
unopposed. Currently, the Charter requires that a special election be held even if there's only
one -- even if a candidate withdraws, leaving only one, so that would clean that up. There's also
a mayoral residency requirement, requiring the Mayor to reside within the City during their term.
And with that, 1 will now turn the presentation over to Committee Member Luis Gazitua to
discuss the strong Mayor proposal.
Luis Gazitua: Good -- morning still. Luis Gazitua, offices at 95 Merrick Way, 33134. Thank
you for the opportunity to present this. We had a very diverse and interesting Committee. We
had the old school represented by Mr. Kneapler; you know, the new school, represented by Mr.
Wales, who's really impressive. And we took it upon ourselves to discuss what the strong Mayor
could be here. And we decided to propose to you a framework for you to just consider and look
at -- it's at your discretion if you want to bring it to the voters -- but to give it some structure so
you could actually perceive how it would work here, should you decide to bring this item to the
voters. So with regard to the details, the City Commission composition remains the same. The
Mayor shall -- as now -- shall not be a member of the Commission. The City Commission now,
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though, will elect its own Chairman and Vice Chairman by majority. The Chairman shall have
the power to organize committees in order to do the people's work within the departments. The
Mayor then will be responsible for the management of administrative departments. The
Commissioners may make direct inquiries based on their Charter powers or in pursuit of
constituent requests to staff administrative staff, not through the Mayor's office. The Mayor is
responsible for carrying out the ordinances and resolutions or other measures adopted by this
body. The Mayor or his designees shall attend all meetings with the right to take part in the
discussion, but not vote, unless otherwise provided in the Charter, because there are certain
positions. The Mayor shall appoint, reprimand or remove all department directors, subordinates
and employees. His powers -- those powers do not extend to the City Attorney, City Commission
staff, City Clerk or the Independent Auditor General. Appointment of department directors shall
be effective, unless disapproved by a four -fifth vote of this body at the next regularly scheduled
meeting. And, as discussed before, the Mayor, as the Chief Administrator, shall have the power
to remove the Fire and Police Chief without cause; the language that was suggested. With
regard to absence and vacancy, if the Mayor is voluntarily absent -- vacation, et cetera, travel
for business -- he shall appoint a qualified member of the Administration to carry out the duties
in the brief absence. In the case of vacancy -- incapacity, death, recall, removal, what have you
-- immediately after being elected, the Mayor shall designate a qualified Administrator to
exercise the powers in order to operate the government until he is replaced, but the power of veto
does not go to that individual. And most importantly, the Mayor may be recalled, and we
clarified that in the Charter. We believe that this framework allows you all to debate and think
about how it could work. If you have any inquiry, 1 could share some of the --1 guess it'd be
legislative history from our little Committee on our discussions; and if not, 1 pass it to you, Mr.
Chair.
Chair Hardemon: 1 have a quick question before the Mayor chimes in. In the proposal, 1 saw
that the City Commission could have discussion with, for instance, or make inquiries to
subordinates of the Mayor, but still cannot direct the Mayor's staff. The Mayor, of course, would
be able to direct all of staff. So say you have a Mayor that's not friendly with a Commissioner.
How does that Mayor -- because he's responsible for the staff -- is -- well, is it possible, rather,
and if so, can you elaborate that the Mayor, through his direction to his staff could put a
Commissioner -- the funny term that was created was l'n the penalty box'= -
Commissioner Suarez: Penalty box.
Chair Hardemon: -- but a more serious -- on a more serious note, can he affect business or
things that are being done to service his constituents?
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah. 1 would just say that the way -- when we talked about this issue --
because this issue was debated significantly, and we looked first to what is the current Charter;
in other words, what does the Charter allow for or not allow for right now? And right now, what
the Charter states is that the Mayor and Commissioners cannot direct the City Manager to do
anything. Not only does it say that, but it says that if we do direct the Manager or -- it's a
misdemeanor.
Unidentified Speaker: Yeah.
Commissioner Suarez: And so, you know, to me that made no -- that makes no sense. It makes
no sense that if a -- you know, that you would create this possibility where elected officials would
not be able to talk to staff or would be hindered from talking to staff to get things accomplished
for their constituents. At the same time, 1 think it's important that there be a division of
responsibilities, if you will. You know, the Commission does certain things. The Mayor or the
Administrator, for that matter -- really, it could be under any form of government. It has to be
clear who the boss is. It can't be that an employee is going, is my boss the Mayor? Is my boss
the Commissioner? "You know, it kind of works both ways where, you know, you don't want
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employees feeling like they have to respond --1 think one of the problems that 1 have with the
current system of government -- and 1 say this about the Manager system -- is, you know, it's very
difficult under this current system to please six people, you know, one -- five of which can't talk
to each other. And what we've seen historically under this system of government, just since 1 got
here in 2009, is we've had five City Managers in almost seven years. And so -- and 1 think it --1
forget how many there was from the inception of the system of government, but 1 think it's in the
teens. So -- and we've had about, you know, 12, 13, 14, 15 years. So it's a little bit more than a
Manager a year, which 1 don't think is a particularly good way of running our form of
government, but, you know, this -- what this does is it actually makes it more liberal for
Commissioners to be involved in some of the day-to-day operational aspects of the government
than we currently have the ability to do under the current system of government.
Chair Hardemon: See, but the thought that comes to my mind, the Manager -- we can't direct the
Manager's staff today.
Commissioner Suarez: Correct. Thank you.
Chair Hardemon: However, the Manager can be removed by the Commission.
Commissioner Suarez: Correct.
Chair Hardemon: So if there are things that the Manager is doing that we believe is not fair to
our constituents, that we believe is not something that we believe the Manager should be doing,
the Commission has the authority to remove him.
Commissioner Suarez: Correct.
Chair Hardemon: That check is important, because that would discourage the Manager from
doing things that would offend or that would hurt any of our districts -- right? -- because if you
see that the Manager is treating your district in an unfair manner, you bring it to our attention --
Commissioner Gort: Question.
Chair Hardemon: -- and --
Commissioner Suarez: Of course.
Chair Hardemon: -- if you can prove it --
Commissioner Suarez: Of course.
Chair Hardemon: -- you would want us to act on it. And so in the -- what you're proposing to
us, 1 don't see a remedy like that for the Commission.
Commissioner Suarez: Can I -- I don't think that remedy exists, and I think, to be completely
frank, unless you think otherwise, I don't know that that remedy exists, because I think what
you're doing here is you're changing the system of government. And so, in changing the system
of government, you're moding to some extent the different powers, without a doubt. For
example, for the Commission, you're giving them a power to choose their own Chairman, their
own Vice Chairman; and, in a sense, sort of run their own affairs, which right now is done by the
Mayor's position. So that's a power that, arguably, sort of goes back to the Commission. By
contrast, what you're articulating -- which right now, we don't have the power to do, either --
other than firing the Manager, which -- I mean, and, you know, we just had a situation a few
weeks ago where the -- you know, we almost did that. And the Mayor stood up and said, !flour
of you decide to fire him, I'm going to put him back the next day. If five of you decide to fire him,
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I'm going to put him back the next day. "So even that power that we currently have under our
current system of government is a little bit illusory, because it's subject to the Mayor deciding.
Chair Hardemon: Yeah, but the Mayor can be overruled.
Commissioner Suarez: Agreed.
Chair Hardemon: And that's the difference.
Commissioner Suarez: Agreed.
Chair Hardemon: But --
Commissioner Suarez: I agree.
Chair Hardemon: -- in this situation that we just explained, I don't see anything that would keep
a Commissioner who may be at odds with the Mayor from --
Commissioner Suarez: Well, one of the things that we put in there -- and 1 think, you know, it
was based on that concern, and 1 think it was expressed by several board members -- was the
ability to disapprove department heads. That wasn't in the initial draft that we had initially came
up with, and the reason why was precisely for what you're talking about. We wanted to create
some sort of a check and balance so that if the Mayor is appointing directors that are either not
qualified or not maybe in consultation with the Commission, is not cooperating with the
Commission, the Commission does have a check over essentially all the department directors
where they could disapprove of a department director. So 1 think that is a significant check that
doesn't currently exist in the current system of government, and that was one of the things that
was done for that.
Chair Hardemon: And -- but in this system -- correct me if I'm wrong -- we have the ability to do
it, but only in that next meeting.
Unidentified Speaker: Correct.
Chair Hardemon: Right. So that may be --
Unidentified Speaker: Two weeks away.
Chair Hardemon: -- say -- so, for instance, you may -- say they appoint someone that upon
meeting that person and speaking with them, they seem to be competent and they seem
well -intended. But then after that first meeting passes, then we learn of his incompetence; we
learn of his ill will. We don't retain any authority to remove him; is that correct?
Commissioner Suarez: Correct. And 1 think, you know, at some point, you know, you have to
look at how you want to structure the government and who is going to be responsible for what.
And 1 think, you know, we could -- you know, by the way, there was discussion and 1 think at
least one board member and 1 think Ms. Solares, as well, you know, that prefer actually the old
system of government that we had where the -- and 1 don't want to put words in your mouth, Ms.
Solares -- Council -Manager system of government where you have the Mayor, who sits on the
Council as one of the five members; and then you have, you know, sort of a professional
Manager, if you will. And a lot of cities are structured that way. We used to be structured that
way. What 1 think all members agreed was that the current system that we have is not a good
system, and that it's fostered instability, you know, Managers all over the place, and it just
hasn't, in my opinion -- or in the opinion of the Committee, as well, you know, it just hasn't been
a system of government that creates a good functioning government.
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Mr. Gazitua: Mr. Chair, some of the other checks that the Commission may have is: They
obviously control the budget, they approve the budget; the Chairman sets the agenda, and the
Commission sets the salary of the Mayor. All comes down to the pocketbook, unfortunately.
Chair Hardemon: I'm going to -- Commissioner Gort, Vice Chairman, and then the Mayor.
Commissioner Gort: I'm going to be going in a little while, but I just want you to -- I don't know
if can give some of the -- I've looked over all of this. I already selected one, two, three, four,
five, six, seven that I think are very important, according to my personal feeling, which is Section
4, 7, 12, 3(F), 51, 52, and 29. We got to make sure we know how many -- put the priorities.
Vice Chair Russell: Those are the ones you wanton the ballot?
Commissioner Gort: That's the one that 1 looked at it, 1 think it should be looked into. It's up to
the Commissioners to look at because --
Vice Chair Russell: Could you say it again?
Commissioner Gort: -- 4, 7, 12, 3(F), 51, 52, and 29.
Commissioner Suarez: 3(F) you said? 3(F)?
Commissioner Gort: Yes.
Commissioner Suarez: The --
Commissioner Gort: Referendum approving the majority vote --
Commissioner Suarez: What were the other ones, Mr. -- Commissioner? 29?
Commissioner Gort: 51, 52, and 29.
Commissioner Suarez: Okay.
Commissioner Gort: They're just food for thought.
Commissioner Suarez: Got it.
Commissioner Gort: Because we have to make sure -- we have to prioritize.
Commissioner Suarez: You know, we could -- I mean, if it's the will of this Commission for us to
look at those sections only, look at the ballot language of those sections only, and go back to the
drawing board on what -- that one issue on 29, that -- we can bring that back to this Commission
if that's what the will of-- yeah, please.
Vice Chair Russell: Mr. Chair, before Commissioner Gort leaves, I'm curious. How do you feel
about this one, about the strong Mayor situation, if could ask?
Commissioner Gort: 1 believe the type of government that we have and we continue to go --1
don't have any problem with the strong Mayor. 1 think the Commission will still have the power.
It's like everything else. It's -- you have to learn to count. The Mayor, if he's not doing the right
thing, and the Commission doesn't feel very happy about it -- or any one of the employees that he
hired, the Commission has the power to let him know, Listen, Mr. Mayor, we don't think your
department's doing that good of a job, 'bnd let the people decide.
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Commissioner Suarez: And I think you do also have the power to de fund the position of
somebody if you're not happy with them.
Vice Chair Russell: That's drastic.
Commissioner Suarez: I guess that's pretty drastic, but you could do that.
Vice Chair Russell: Mr. Chair.
Chair Hardemon: Yes.
Vice Chair Russell: So 1 think if this goes to ballot, the inclination of the people -- there'll be
some confusion there, because 1 don't know that they, as a whole, generally understand the
differences. There would probably be an assumption that we do have a strong Mayor. They
think of a Mayor as an executive position, and so they would be very surprised to read that we
don't have a strong Mayor. If you use the -- even the word ,'trongYersus riot strong,'iro you want
that? Of course, the inclination -- the psychology of the question points to, Yes, of course, 1 want
a strong Mayor. "The nuance of what that creates is what the public would not know until -- if
this were to go to ballot. 1 would like to see that we've really vetted it to make sure that it --
there's the proper checks and balances, the proper separation of powers, because this is a
fundamental change to the functioning of our government. We would basically be politicizing an
administrative position and forcing our political position to become a very administrative
specialist. And so what we're asking the voters -- which they probably don't know. When there's
an election for Mayor, they look at the candidates, they see the marketing, they hear the
speeches, and they choose the best leader. Do they know whether that leader is a administrative
leader or a visionary leader? You know, when you're electing your Governor, you know what
you're asking for. I want a Governor to govern, you know. This is -- and so if we do go this
route -- and 1 would like to see some sort of checks and balances; perhaps if we could even think
about the legislative ability that we, as Commissioners, become the true legislators of the City,
that a Mayor and/or Administration wouldn't be bringing legislation. We would be bringing the
legislation, and they would be bringing it to us for sponsorship of legislation. 1 believe this is
done in other branches of -- in other levels of government, because what 1'd like to create, if we
do it this way, is a true Mayor, but not necessarily a super Commissioner, for example. And so
that -- take any -- you know, you got to think of this in the worst case scenario. If we put this in
place, the type of person that could get elected, what abuses could be created in this? And if we,
as a Commission, can say, Mr. Mayor'=- we can direct the Mayor as the City Manager in this
case, or else what, though? If we direct the Mayor and say, !ley, this is not getting done in my
district,'br This initiative we'd like you to study,'br whatever, and they say, Sure,'bnd they don't
do it, we actually have zero recourse. And the only recourse to the public is four years later.
And so that might -- unless for a recall situation --
Chair Hardemon: Right. But it's been done --
Vice Chair Russell: -- which is pretty drastic.
Chair Hardemon: -- in the County. They just had a -- they just recently changed from -- went to
a strong Mayor system. 1 know they're discussing it right now, whether or not they want to
change back, but that's another --
Commissioner Suarez: They dropped that discussion, FYI (for your information).
Chair Hardemon: I saw the meetings. I wouldn't -- I'd say --
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah. Well, I will say this: You have -- one of the points you made was
an excellent point -- many of them were, but this one in particular: There was testimony in -- by
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Board Member Llorente, who couldn't make it here today that at the time the voters voted for this
form of government, the executive form of government, they thought they were voting for a strong
Mayor form of government; that was what they were sold on. And there were articles in the
paper, Miami creates a strong Mayor form ofgovernment,'bnd, well -- and that's not really what
happened, 1 think. So 1 think you're right on that. 1 am very interested in your idea of legislation
originating with the legislative body versus with anyone else. 1 think that's an interesting way of
maintaining a better balance of power, so I'm certainly, you know, open to that myself, as a
Commissioner voting on this issue. Go ahead.
Commissioner Gort: Let's hear from the Mayor.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Mayor Regalado: Thank you. 1 really appreciate the time, the hours that the Committee spent
on vetting all these ideas. 1 really appreciate the City Commission spending hours and hours
and working and reading all the material, but 1 think that it's important that we understand that
it's the voters and not us who are going to be making these changings, and for that, we go back
to what we've been saying throughout the morning; that things need to be clear, things need to
be transparent. And Commissioner Suarez just said that when the voters approved the form of
government that we have now, they thought that they were voting for a strong form of
government; some, yes. The form of government was mirrored from the County and people did
believe that -- some people -- they were voting for a strong Mayor form of government. So if you
were to bring this to the voters, you have to make it clear. For instance, again, we go back to the
ballot language or the proposed ballot language: Shall Miami Charter Section 4 be amended
commencing with the November 2017 mayoral election to eliminate the City Manager position;
to recognize the Mayor as the Chief Executive and Administrative Officer of the City, and
transferring administrative duties to the Mayor? "1 guess that's a ballot question and ballot
language; however, it doesn't say in this ballot what the powers of the Commission will be, so the
people will not be voting on the ballot. You think that you can defend that in court, but the
people will not be voting on the powers of the Commission. The Commission has the power to
appoint itself the Chairman, run the agenda and/or have control of the agenda. 1 don't know if
Mr. Gazitua said that; it wasn't clarified. Number two, the salary, 1-- you know, 1 think that we
should understand that the voters in South Florida and in the country and in the County, and in
the City had kind of -- have kind -- some kind of government (UNINTELLIGIBLE), and if you
don't say -- if you don't come clean and say, The Mayor is going to make this much money'=- as a
matter of fact, the voters set the salary of the Commissioners in 2003.
Chair Hardemon: Or rather you set it.
Mayor Regalado: Huh?
Chair Hardemon: I'm joking.
Mayor Regalado: 1 was there. So 1 don't know this thing about the Commission setting -- and 1
understand it's precedent. 1 understand it's doing the things that we did before. 1-- the voters
should know that the Committee requested that the Mayor immediately after taking office appoint
somebody who could be the Mayor, like a Vice President, like a Deputy Mayor, non -elected, that
will finish the term of the Mayor if the Mayor is removed or disqualified, or whatever; that if the
-- dies or whatever. So there are many questions here, especially on the powers of the
Commission. It is not reflect here. 1 do not understand the language for number 15: Shall
Miami Charter Section 4 be amendment [sic] to provide a Mayoral resident requirement and
recall procedure, claming the runoff election process and permitting City Commissioners to
communicate in writing with the administrative staff? "Number one, we do have a residency
requirement. We didn't have -- we always had a recall procedure until it was taken ()Tithe
Charter around 2000, and now should be back. The runoff election has been clarifying in other
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of the proposal. And Permitting City Commissioners to communicate in writing with the
administrative staff, 'does that mean that what now the Commission is doing or the Mayor is
illegal? Because everyone here communicates with the staff. One -- say -- one thing --
Ms. Mendez: Staff through the -- just to clarify, everybody --
Commissioner Suarez: Please clam that.
Ms. Mendez: Right. Everybody communicates with --
Chair Hardemon: Communicates; he's not saying direct."
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ms. Mendez: All right. It's basically through the Manager.
Commissioner Suarez: Right.
Ms. Mendez: It's always through the Manager.
Mayor Regalado: And are you sure of that?
Ms. Mendez: Well --
Mayor Regalado: Are you sure --
Ms. Mendez: I am pretty sure --
Mayor Regalado: -- that it's happening --?
Ms. Mendez: -- that it's directly --
Mayor Regalado: Are you sure that it's happening right now?
Ms. Mendez: I think questions are asked.
Commissioner Gort: Right.
Ms. Mendez: Questions may be asked, which is in the purview, obviously, but --
Mayor Regalado: So that -- so my question is: Are you sure that now every communication goes
to the -- through the City Manager from any elected official?
Vice Chair Russell: Every direction or every communication?
Mayor Regalado: No, no.
Commissioner Gort: Communication.
Mayor Regalado: There is no direction. No one directs --
Commissioner Suarez: Right.
Mayor Regalado: -- the Administration, and that's an established fact.
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Ms. Mendez: Okay.
Mayor Regalado: I am saying --
Commissioner Suarez: Right, right, right.
Ms. Mendez: Right. I just wanted to --
Mayor Regalado: -- are you sure?
Ms. Mendez: -- that to be clear on the record.
Mayor Regalado: Huh?
Commissioner Suarez: No, no --
Ms. Mendez: 1 wanted that to be clear.
Commissioner Suarez: -- I understand what he's saying. There's a difference between lhirecting"
and communicating."
Commissioner Gort: Right.
Commissioner Suarez: And what he's saying is we may communicate with a variety of people --
Mayor Regalado: Exactly.
Commissioner Suarez: -- you know what I mean? And --
Mayor Regalado: Which has been happening --
Commissioner Suarez: -- right.
Mayor Regalado: -- forever.
Commissioner Suarez: I think that's a very good point, and I think, you know, like I said, you
know, I think I'm -- this workshop has worked exactly as I thought it would, which is that
everyone has gotten -- you know, put on the record their concerns. And I think the major ones
are we have to look at the ballot language of all of these things; and secondly, maybe we should
limit to the ones that Commissioner Gort specified, if everyone is okay with that, in conjunction
with looking at the 29(B) provision and coming back to the Commission with that. I think that's
pretty good direction for the Committee.
Mayor Regalado: And going back to what Commissioner Suarez said, that the people in maybe
2000 --1 think it was 2000 or -- no -- '99, 1 think it was; '99, '98 -- '98. 1 was here, but kind of
seen the -- did voted for what they thought was a strong Mayor form of government. So now,
you're going back to the voters to ask for a vote on a strong form government -- form of
government -- Mayor form of government, whatever. Commissioner Suarez said that this is a
change of government, so the people should know if this is a change of government or not. And
the people should know if there is a change of government, will term limits apply? 1 understand
that there is something written here about two terms and not being able to run or whatever. 1
understand that, but we need to come clean with the people of Miami in -- now. If they made a
mistake; if they made a mistake by thinking that they were voting for a strong Mayor, they need
to be told that they are voting for a strong Mayor and what that strong Mayor is. Like, for
instance, it's mandated that the Mayor hire like a City Manager or Administrative Executive
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Assistant, so the name changes. The only thing that changed is that that person could be the
mayor without being elected, and that's something that you need to tell the voters. You also need
to tell the voters that the Commissioners will have to approve any appointment; any and all
appointment. It is not in the ballot. And, of course, to me, the salary of the Mayor, it's
important, because 1 remember; 1 remember what happened right here on the last -- on the only
meeting in December of one night, it was about midnight, 1 think Graciela came back the other
meeting to protest. It was around midnight and 1 remember the Commissioner Johnny Winton
said to City Manager Ariola, l think that we should do something about the Christmas gift that
we thought about {ve talked about,'bnd Yeah, yeah, let's do it now. "There were no people here.
And so the Christmas gift was to raise the salary of Mayor Manny Diaz from 97,000 to 150, 000.
There was no public hearing. When 1 came in, 1 did what 1 promised in the campaign. 1 went
back to --1 resigned the rest of the salary that the former Mayor had. And these are things that
people don't want to hear, because they may be politically incorrect, and they might be
embarrassing; like the number of Managers that we have had. 1 remember a time that we had a
Manager one day; another, two days; another, three days. That was back when we were here
changing Mayors and Managers. People don't like to hear that --1 mean, some people -- but the
people of Miami have the right to know. I'm just saying, 1 like campaigning, so --1 love
campaigning; that's what 1 love. And 1 will be campaigning, but 1 will be telling the people that
this have faults; that it have faults, and all of the amendment, by the way. So 1 just don't know
what you guys want to do, but 1 think that we should have very clear understanding of what
they're going to do, because, you know, 1 have been reporting, first, many elections; and then 1
have been involved in many elections. And 1 can tell you for a fact that the regular voter, the
voter that is loyal, that goes to every election, the voter that wants to be engaged, the voter that
goes and tries to understand every single thing and every single candidate, when they see
amendment, when in doubt, they vote IIo. "They would never vote 9es. "So if you guys wants [sic]
to place several things that you feel is necessary, 1 think that we have to explain it, because 1 can
predict that many of these item will go down inflame.
Chair Hardemon: Thank you very much.
Commissioner Suarez: Mr. Chair.
Chair Hardemon: Commissioner.
Commissioner Suarez: Thank you. You know, 1 guess 1 could talk about all the things that the
Mayor talked about there, but 1 won't. I'll just say 1 think we all love to campaign. 1 think that's
why we're all here. But 1 would also say that -- 1 just want to correct something that you said. 1
didn't say that the voters thought they were getting a strong Mayor. The board member, Mike
Liorente, quoted the New York Times, 1 believe, in saying that that's what the publication said.
So 1 just want to just clarify that for the record; that that wasn't something that 1 said. That was
something that one of the board members said. 1 think he cited more than one publication,
actually. 1 think one of them was the New York Times. 1 think the other one may have been the
Wail Street Journal or something like that. There were two big publications, anyways. 1 agree
with you, Mayor. 1 think, you know, you're absolutely right in pointing out some of the
deficiencies in the ballot language of many of these. The one that you cited in the strong Mayor
is only 41 words. We have another, you know, 34 if we decided we want to go forward with that.
We did discuss the issue of the mayoral salary; that was discussed with the Committee. And
certainty, you can have your opinion as to what you think is in the question, and everybody else
has that right, you know, as Commissioners, to decide what that's going to be. And of course,
you have the right to campaign for it or not, and, you know, if it -- assuming it even gets on the
ballot. So that'll be, you know, what the Committee has to decide and what the Commission has
to decide, and what the voters have to decide. And, you know, as for term limits, 1 think the
Committee was very clear that term limits should apply to the Mayor. And if -- you know, the
only person that that would apply to is you. And if you decide that that's something that's unfair,
you know, and if it gets put on a ballot, then you obviously have the right to, you know, sue the
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City of Miami so that you can run on that election if that's something that you want to do. I don't
know that that's what's going to happen, but, certainly, you know, everybody here has the right to
do what they think is fair and correct. So if -- Mr. Chair, if I may? 1 was thinking that
Commissioner Gort's direction was very good direction; including the Mayor's direction and
some of the Commissioners' directions, where we have to really look at this ballot language.
You're absolutely right; a lot of it is nowhere near where it needs to be to go on a ballot. And we
will certainly take that constructive criticism together and look at that, and all the other issues
that 1 think were presented here today. Mr. Chair.
Vice Chair Russell: Before we wrap it up, though, 1'd just like to hear a little more about the
strong Mayor position. You expressed some concerns regarding the Commission's ability to
remove a Manager if they don't have a Manager anymore. Are those concerns strong enough
that you would like to see changes to it, or that you feel it should not go forward to -- or do you
feel -- it's a condition you don't like, but it's something that the voters should decide at the end of
the day? And the same with Commissioner Carollo. 1 haven't really gotten a sense of you as --
from the Commission -- of how you feel about either the change in the system of government
itself and/or whether it should go forward to the ballot. I'm just kind of curious. Commissioner
Gort has expressed; Commissioner Suare= has expressed, and I'm just curious where the Board
stands.
Chair Hardemon: Commissioner Carollo.
Commissioner Carollo: I'll yield to the Chair.
Vice Chair Russell: Sorry. 1 didn't mean to put anyone on the spot.
Chair Hardemon: No, no --
Vice Chair Russell: This is our chance to talk about it. I just kind of want to know what
everyone feels.
Chair Hardemon: -- the concern that 1 expressed -- think back to it -- is basically regarding if
you have a Mayor that is not friendly to a certain Commissioner that it could have negative
effects on that district that that Commissioner represents. And we joke about this whole thing
called a penalty box, and what the penalty box is -- well, because you weren't here when it was
spoken of at length -- the penalty box was a term that came about because a certain
Commissioner felt like the Manager was treating him unfairly, and so he was being penali=ed.
And so when we take that term literally, what you essentially have is when you have a strong
Mayor, a Mayor that is not kind to a district -- say this was the County and the Mayor [sic] in
the district was 3. Then those individuals who would be in District 3 would be upset; essentially,
not with the Mayor, but with their Commissioner, because they make their requests to their
Commissioner. Their Commissioner is trying to get things done, and the Commissioner can't get
his -- the Administration to act favorably towards him. And so, essentially, what could happen is
you have a Mayor that puts pressure on a Commissioner where that pressure turns out to be
something where his constituents look at that Commissioner as someone who can't get the job
done. And if he can't get the job done, then maybe we need to choose a new Commissioner. And
so 1 would hate that a Mayor has the authority or the power to influence the district of a
Commissioner to say, That Commissioner needs to go, because he doesn't play by my rules and
he's not on my side. "And when you compare that to here, and what we have today, where we
have the authority to remove a Manager; although we can't remove, say -- the Manager has to
respond at some point to the concerns of the Commission, because if he doesn't, he's going to
find himself hard-pressed to keep the job. And so that part of it makes me a little uncomfortable,
because 1 can imagine a time where you have a Mayor that just doesn't like a particular
representative, and that representative then will be at a disadvantage to that strong Mayor,
because the only thing that he can do as a Commissioner then is to encourage someone to
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remove the Mayor. And so, 1 mean, that's a battle in itself.
Vice Chair Russell: Right, right.
Chair Hardemon: So that's your only recourse. So that was what 1 was thinking about. 1 didn't
know if there was another option that maybe the Committee had thought about in that particular
situation. It just -- and then, certainly, you can't get into a position where you're advising the
staff of the Mayor, because if you're advising the staff of the Mayor and that staff is given a
different instruction, if you will, from the Mayor, now you put that staff member in a very tough
position. So 1 just think it's something --1 don't know if-- there may not be a solution to that;
there may be. Ms. Grace, you had something you want to say? But there may not be a solution
to it; there may be. But 1 just know that that is a reality that could occur, and 1 think would be
devastating to certain communities. Yes, ma'am.
Grace Solares: Thank you, Mr. Chair. Grace Solares, 60 Southwest 30th Road. 1 could not
have said it any better, what you just said. A strong Mayor will take a tremendous amount of
power from each and every one of you, make no mistakes, because exactly what you say is true.
Ifyou do not play ball with that Mayor, your things in your area may take a little bit longer until
you come around and start voting the way that Mayor would want you to vote. That's not the
reason why we elect district representatives. We want our represent --1 want Commissioner
Russell -- nearly said SarnoffL- Commissioner Russell to be responsive to all of us in District 2,
but 1 don't want Commissioner Russell, that in order to be responsive to us, have to actually vote
the way that particular strong Mayor wants him to vote. The other issue that they've actually
passed that each and every one of you be able to actually compact the different departments of
the City, that's going to be chaotic, totally chaotic. That has to be the Manager job. Can you
imagine if Commissioner Carollo calls the CIP (Capital Improvement Programs) -- the Planning
& Zoning or Commiss -- you, Commissioner; or you -- different -- to the same individual -- to
Public Works, for example, who is that man going to please first? Who? Because you're all
exerting pressure over him now with this new proposal. That is a huge mistake, a huge mistake.
You can fire the City Manager, you can. You cannot fire a strong Mayor. You have to swallow it,
because the only ones that can remove him is us, by way of a recall. And you know what? That
takes a lot of money. It's doable, 1 can tell you for myself to remove a Commissioner, because
it's less money; the requirements is less. When you remove a Mayor, it's much more money. You
require more people, more percentage; and therefore, we, the people, don't have it. So 1 am
totally opposed to this, totally opposed. 1 think it works well when you want to -- tweak it, one
thing or the other, is fine. But giving an individual so much power over a city -- you can see the
County, they're having their own problems, the Commissioners there. They tried to do
something, and Sosa pulled it back, from what 1 heard, for whatever reason. But they're having a
(UNINTELLIGIBLE). But here, with five people, my God, would be to simply to nullify you all;
just five people. So 1 want you to be very, very careful on what you're doing here. 1 know that
Commissioner Suarez would make a wonderful Mayor.
Commissioner Suarez: Thank you.
Ms. Solares: But May -- Mr. Suarez -- Commissioner Suarez, laws are made for everyone --
Commissioner Suarez: Agreed.
Ms. Solares: -- notforyou only.
Commissioner Suarez: Of course.
Ms. Solares: If it were just for you, and when you leave, then we just change it to now, that
would be fine. But right now, the -- we don't know who's going to come after you if you make it
to be the next Mayor. 1 don't know.
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Commissioner Suarez: Sure.
Ms. Solares: So assume for the moment Sarnoff was the strong Mayor. Oh, God, I'd move out of
the City; 1 mean, really. So on that one, I'm finished. Please don't do it. It's not a good thing for
the City. With reference to standing, if you -- it is extremely important that you actually allow it,
because this fallacy that is going to open the floodgates, that is not true. It takes -- well, it took
$400,000 from Mr. Kneapler, hundreds of thousands of dollars from Mr. Herbits. You need to
have the money. You need to have it in order to go to a lawyer. They not -- they're not going to
-- A lawyer doesn't say to you, You know what? Let's go ahead and sue the City. Oh, sue God,
for that matter, and then we'll see. If I win, then I'll collect. "They don't do that. They want their
money ahead of time. So you always have to have the money. So if you do put into the
amendment that there'll be, if they win, a --
Commissioner Suarez: Recovery of attorney's fees.
Ms. Solares: -- recovery of attorney's fees, remember that that person had to pay it first; that it
was not done free. So do consider putting in standing; whether with the fees or not with the fees,
1 don't care. 1 don't care, as long as the standing is there; with reimbursement or not, but the
standing should be.
Chair Hardemon: Vice Chairman.
Ms. Solares: Thank you, sir.
Vice Chair Russell: Thank you, Grace. To address your concern, Grace, as well as the Chair, in
our Federal system, there is a mechanism by which the legislative body can remove the
President, can impeach the President. Is there a version of that that we would like to entertain
here that would still retain some sort of check and balance over that strong Mayor if the
legislative body as a whole --1 don't think it's as simple as a three -fifths vote or something like
that, but I'm wondering if that was considered with this.
Chair Hardemon: I don't -- I'm wondering in this -- in a city government, it would be much more
difficult --
Commissioner Suarez: Impeachment?
Chair Hardemon: -- because you would have to bring about a charge, so you would have to --1
know this: If you have the same body that's bringing about the charge that has to weigh in on
whether or not there is some wrongdoing by that person, then -- hear me -- you stack the deck
against that individual who's being impeached, if you will. If three forms -- if you have three
branches of government, it's much more simple to -- one part brings a charge; the next part
hears the concern, and then go from there.
Commissioner Suarez: I'll be honest with you. I think this has been phenomenally successful,
honestly, today. I mean, this is far more enlightening for me than I thought it was going to be,
the three hours that we've taken here to talk about all these questions. To be completely blunt, I
really honestly want to thank the Mayor, too, because I think he pointed out a lot of deficiencies;
particularly with the questions, per se, and I -- you know, we didn't get the questions until -- you
know, and it's not anybody's fault. We've been working very diligently. We didn't get the
questions until recently, and so I think we have a little bit more work to do, I mean, clearly. We
have work to do on the questions, some of which are significantly deficient in terms of
explanation. And we do have to understand -- and the Mayor's right, and I think Commissioner
Carollo and others expressed it, you know -- this is a political process, and they have a right to
understand clearly, and -- like you said -- very easily what it is exactly that we're voting on. So
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with your permission, I'd love to take those sections and the amendments that relate to them;
look at those questions and digest everything that this workshop has, you know, has kind of
unleashed, and keep working, if that's okay with you all.
Chair Hardemon: So by what you're referring to, are you going to narrow down the issues to a
certain number of issues --
Commissioner Suarez: Correct.
Chair Hardemon: -- that we're going to vote on later? Can you --
Commissioner Suarez: To the provisions, right.
Chair Hardemon: -- and can you say what those numbers --?
Commissioner Suarez: Commissioner Gort said 4, which is obviously system of government; 7,
12, 3(F), 29 --
Chair Hardemon: 3(F), 29.
Commissioner Suarez: -- 51 and 52.
Chair Hardemon: And I just want to be clear on what those are --
Commissioner Suarez: Sony?
Chair Hardemon: -- so everyone understands.
Ms. Mendez: I --
Chair Hardemon: You say number 4 is --
Ms. Mendez: Right. Was it --? 4, 7, 12, 3(F), 51, 52 and 29.
Commissioner Suarez: Correct.
Ms. Mendez: I'm reading it in the order that --
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah, yeah, I'm sorry. I put the 29 before the 51 and the 52.
Ms. Mendez: Oh, I'm sorry.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah, yeah; 51, 52, and 29. That's fine --
Ms. Mendez: Okay.
Commissioner Suarez: -- the way that you said it.
Chair Hardemon: So you -- when you're saying, 4, 7, 12, you're referring to the document that
you passed out?
Ms. Mendez: The sections --
Commissioner Suarez: The sections of the Charter.
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Ms. Mendez: -- of the Charter.
Commissioner Suarez: Right.
Ms. Mendez: The actual sections.
Chair Hardemon: Okay. So --
Vice Chair Russell: And the other ones, what happens to them?
Chair Hardemon: -- then if you read them aloud, Section 4 would be the system of government.
Commissioner Suarez: Right.
Chair Hardemon: What's 7?
Mr. Andrews: 7 is the election of City Commissioners and Mayor.
Vice Chair Russell: The schedule.
Chair Hardemon: And 12 would be --?
Mr. Andrews: Filling vacancies for Mayor and Commission.
Chair Hardemon: 3(F)?
Mr. Andrews: Powers of the City.
Chair Hardemon: Powers of the City?
Mr. Andrews: Yeah, the City's powers.
Vice Chair Russell: With regard to real estate.
Commissioner Suarez: Right.
Ms. Mendez: Right. But --
Vice Chair Russell: That one, right, (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
Ms. Mendez: -- 3(F) has to do with acquisition and disposition ofproperty and services.
Chair Hardemon: Okay.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Chair Hardemon: Disposal of property, okay.
Commissioner Suarez: Right. 29?
Mr. Andrews: That's the sale or lease of City -owned property.
Chair Hardemon: But that -- 29 is the one that we discussed where we --
Mr. Andrews: 29(B) --
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Commissioner Suarez: We put -- all of 29.
Chair Hardemon: So how is -- I'm trying to see, what's the difference between 3(F) and 29?
Commissioner Suarez: There's a difference.
Ms. Mendez: It's -- one has to do --
Commissioner Suarez: Right.
Ms. Mendez: -- with the powers --
Commissioner Suarez: Right.
Ms. Mendez: -- and one mainly with waterfront properties --
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Ms. Mendez: -- and such.
Chair Hardemon: That's the waterfront properties.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Chair Hardemon: All right. Okay. And then 51?
Commissioner Suarez: And 1 just want to clarify that 52 includes the standing provision. 1 want
to make that clear --
Ms. Mendez: Right.
Commissioner Suarez: -- because the standing provision is a separate --
Ms. Mendez: It's two questions.
Commissioner Suarez: Right. Thank you.
Chair Hardemon: So 51 is CIP?
Ms. Mendez: Right. 51 is CIP. 52 --
Mr. Andrews: Citizens' Bill ofRights.
Ms. Mendez: -- is Citizens' Bill ofRights. And then the separate question also having to do with,
Shall 52 be amended to include standing?"
Commissioner Suarez: Right. 1 just want to make sure that the standing is part of it, obviously;
that we've all agree that standing is part of it.
Commissioner Carollo: Mr. Chairman.
Chair Hardemon: You're recognized, sir.
Commissioner Carollo: Real quick, what happens to the rest of them? For example, I think we
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all agreed on the third Tuesday, to put it in --
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah, that's 7.
Vice Chair Russell: That's on there.
Commissioner Carollo: That is 7?
Commissioner Suarez: I believe so.
Mr. Andrews: Yeah, that's 7.
ChairHardemon: Yeah, it's 7.
Ms. Mendez: Right.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah.
Ms. Mendez: And with regard to scheduling, is -- are these still at play for a November ballot? I
kind of need to know that for scheduling of --
Commissioner Suarez: We'll --
Ms. Mendez: -- a lot of things.
Commissioner Suarez: -- meet in Committee and we'll talk about it. I mean, I think the
Commission --
Ms. Mendez: Okay. So you'll set -- because the only reason why -- and I apologize for harping
on it; it's just I don't want to let any of you down --
Commissioner Suarez: Of course.
Ms. Mendez: -- with regard to scheduling, and the Clerk probably will pounce on me if I don't
mention something, also. It's just that we -- you know, to have these placed on the ballot, we
would have to bring them on the 29th, the special -- not the special meeting, but the reset
meeting that we have on Friday, the 29th, in order to make --
Commissioner Suarez: I got it.
Ms. Mendez: Okay.
Commissioner Suarez: Thank you.
Vice Chair Russell: And the others would not be taken up on this ballot?
Commissioner Suarez: Correct.
Vice Chair Russell: But could be next year or --
Commissioner Suarez: Sure.
Vice Chair Russell: -- otherwise.
ChairHardemon: Right. So is there a motion that's in agreeance with what the Commissioner
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proposes?
Commissioner Suarez: I'll move it, I guess, fit needs to be moved; I don't know. Does it have to
be moved or --?
Commissioner Carollo: I don't think it has to.
Commissioner Suarez: I don't think so. Yeah.
Chair Hardemon: 1 just want to make sure it's the will of the body that we discussed these things.
That's why 1 asked for the motion.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah, I'll move -- right, I'll move for that, then, sure.
Chair Hardemon: So it's been properly moved that we address items 4, 7, 12, 3(F), 29, 51 and
52, to be brought back at a new meeting --
Commissioner Suarez: Right.
Chair Hardemon: -- of the City of Miami Commission. So all the other items will not be added
to the November or -- the November ballot or a ballot that's subsequent to --
Commissioner Suarez: And just to be clear, because I see Commissioner Carollo's face sort of
scrunching up. Look, I think what we've done here is we've narrowed the field.
Chair Hardemon: This is good.
Commissioner Suarez: The -- narrowed the field. We have issues related to the question, which 1
think the Mayor has brought up a lot of good points, and many others have. We have issues
related to the language. We've listened to a lot of the concerns, so 1 think, not to get too
conclusory as to how we're going to move forward, but we've digested it. This is the first
workshop. We're going to go back into Committee and talk about it from there, if that's okay.
Chair Hardemon: Okay.
Commissioner Suarez: But we do have limitation and --
Chair Hardemon: The Chair will second that motion. Any further discussion on the motion?
Vice Chair Russell: When you say back into Committee,'you mean the Charter Review
Committee will reconvene?
Commissioner Suarez: Correct.
Vice Chair Russell: Because I thought they were finished, actually, after today's --
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah, I mean, but I think that the direction has been to reconvene and
look at the questions themselves.
Vice Chair Russell: Got it.
Commissioner Suarez: Yeah. Because we did -- we never looked at that.
Chair Hardemon: Any further discussion on the item?
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Commissioner Suarez: No.
Chair Hardemon: Seeing none, all in favor, say aye."
The Commission (Collectively): Aye.
Chair Hardemon: All right. Motion passes.
Ms. Mendez: And Chairman, 1 just wanted to bring up another point, because 1 don't remember
right now, because the question -- the resolution for the Charter Committee wasn't clear as to
any sunsetting provision, so 1 just want to make sure that there is a motion to amend any, if
necessary, to amend any --
Commissioner Suarez: So moved.
Ms. Mendez: -- resolution to --
Commissioner Suarez: So moved.
Ms. Mendez: Okay.
Chair Hardemon: What's the motion?
Ms. Mendez: To amend any resolution to make sure that the Charter Committee is still active
and in full force to continue the work of the Commission.
Chair Hardemon: Okay. The Chair seconds. All in favor, say aye."
The Commission (Collectively): Aye.
Chair Hardemon: Motion passes. This meeting has come to a conclusion.
Ms. Mendez: We have our two attorney/client sessions and we have the actual -- the attorney for
the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) upstairs. So is there a will of the Commission to
do any of the two client sessions before a lunch break; like the SEC one?
Chair Hardemon: I mean, we either go to lunch now and come back at 2 --
Commissioner Carollo: 2:30.
Chair Hardemon: -- or -- he says -- one says 2: 30.
Ms. Mendez: Okay.
Chair Hardemon: That means it'll be 3. That's why I said 2.
Ms. Mendez: Okay. So --
Chair Hardemon: I think we should come back at 2.
Ms. Mendez: At 2? Okay.
Chair Hardemon: Yes.
Ms. Mendez: I'm just going to --
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ADJOURNMENT
Todd B. Hannon (City Clerk): Victoria, Victoria, it's a separate agenda, so if you're going to
read a statement, we would have to open up that special meeting so you may --
Ms. Mendez: Okay. So well come back at 2.
Mr. Hannon: Yes, yes.
END OF SPECIAL MEETING
The meeting adjourned at 12:10 p.m.
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