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HomeMy WebLinkAboutPACT Letter and ResumesAdrienne Arsht Center for the (Performing Arta of Miami -Dade County May 26, 2026 The Honorable Eileen Higgins Mayor, City of Miami 3500 Pan American Drive Miami, FL 33133 RE: City of Miami Appointment to the Adrienne Arsht Center Trust Board of Directors Dear Mayor Higgins: Pursuant to the Adrienne Arsht Center Trust's Articles of Incorporation, the City of Miami is entitled to appoint three representatives to the Board of the Adrienne Arsht Center Trust (AACT). The terms of your current appointees have ended. We respectfully ask the City of Miami Commission to renew the appointments of Meme Ferre and Brian Goldmeier for a second term, and to appoint Felipe Angulo for his first term on the Arsht board to fill the three open seats. They each bring valuable insight and experience that will strengthen the AACT board. Copies of their resumes are attached for your review as well as an excerpt from our Articles of Incorporation which provides details pertaining to AACT board appointments. In order to proceed with these appointments, the City of Miami Commission must take formal action to fill the vacant seats. Please send us confirmation once the City of Miami Commission has acted on this matter. If you have any questions or require further information, please contact the center's Executive Vice President, Valerie Riles, at vriles@arshtcenter.orq or 786.468.2203. Please notify Valerie when the Commission places these appointments on its agenda so that the three nominees can make an effort to attend the Commission meeting. Sincerely,atr-ta 463061't Hillit Meidar-Alfi Chair, AACT Board of Directors Attachments Copy: Nicole Ewan, City of Miami Assistant City Clerk Sean Gazitua, Co -Chair, AACT Nominating and Governance Committee Meme Ferre Brian Goldmeier Felipe Angulo 1300 Biscayne Blvd, Miami, FL 33132 I Tel: 786.4682000 Fax: 786.468.2001 ArshtCenter.org Brian Y. Goldmeier Biography https://www.linkedin.com/in/brian-goldmeier- 53213b9/ Brian Y. Goldmeier is founder and president of BYG Strategies, Inc., a strategic advisory and political consultancy firm based in Miami, Florida with clients nationwide, region, and local to Florida. Brian serves as a principal advisor and strategist to key public officials, policy makers, opinion leaders, C-suite executives, and nonprofit leaders with his nationwide reach and deep, trusted network of relationships. He and his firm have helped numerous companies as a key driver and deliverer of economic and business development, new -to -market strategies, corporate strategy, and team building. Brian is also a highly sought-after investor and entrepreneur with tremendous experience in start-up and emerging businesses, including fintech and crypto companies as well as other financial, service, and goods sectors of commerce. Through his unmatched ability to create real connection and impact, Brian is recognized as one of the country's most prominent business and government advisory consultants, thought leaders, and community impact volunteers. Over the past decade, he has led fundraising and capital raises for pressing community issues, elections and referenda including county mayor and commission seats, various city and municipal seats, countywide referenda and campaigns for statewide legislative, gubernatorial offices, presidential exploratory committees, and PACs. His firm also provides best -in -class campaign compliance consultation as well as fundraising and opinion leader networking training to elected officials, professional associations, business alliances, and universities. Recognized for his strategic vision, thought leadership, and results -driven orientation, Brian is consistently sought out for his opinion leadership and high impact in business, government, and civic life. His fundraising leadership and stewardship have personally resulted in over $150 million raised for various political and issues campaigns across national, statewide, and South Florida political campaigns, issues, and causes. As a business fundraiser, investor, and business developer, Brian and his firm have been instrumental in creating over $500 million in project and capital raise value. Brian's career began in 2008 working as New England Finance Associate for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. Later in that election cycle, he served as State Finance Director for New Hampshire Congressman Paul Hodes' re-election campaign. In 2009, he worked as South Florida Finance Director for Florida's Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink's campaign for Governor. In subsequent years, Brian has led strategic consulting and political fundraising efforts for dozens of Florida and South Florida campaigns serving elected officials at the federal, state, and local level. His firm has served state legislators, Miami - Dade County and Broward County mayors and commissioners along with other elected officials who have represented the City of Miami, Miami Beach, Coral Gables, and Doral. In addition, Brian has led and championed numerous voter referenda, including a Miami - Dade referendum on teacher salaries in 2018, a Broward County School Board bond in 2014, the Miami -Dade County Civil Courthouse bond in 2014, the Miami Dolphins Stadium bond, the Jackson Health System Bond in 2013, the Miami -Dade County School Board bond, and the Sony IMG Tennis Open referendum in 2012. He worked with former Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine to lead sponsorship operations for the United States Conference of Mayors Annual meeting, which took place in Miami Beach in June 2017. Brian's professional career came full circle when he became one of the youngest members of Hillary Clinton's 2016 National Finance Committee for her 2016 presidential bid, after first working as a junior campaign team member for her in 2008. In the recent 2020 election cycle, Brian was the principal fundraiser and senior consultant for numerous statewide, county, and municipal elections, including for six new Miami -Dade County commission candidates who were successfully elected, as well as a mayoral candidate. An avid sports fan, Brian serves as a fundraising consultant for the Mourning Family Foundation, and he has spearheaded multiple events, including co -hosting President Bill Clinton, violinist David Aaron Carpenter and Chef Todd English. Additionally, he has served as a member of the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce Sports Committee where he has worked on the successful effort to retain the Sony IMG Tennis Tournament in South Florida and has provided strategic consulting to the Miami Dolphins football franchise. Brian was selected to aid in the organization of events for the United States Olympic Committee and Pan American Sports Organization's recent Olympic Congress in Miami. In addition to his professional achievements, Brian is dedicated to community leadership and service, and volunteers his talents and resources to non -profits and professional organizations. He serves on the board of directors for Voices for Children, a nonprofit organization that funds the Miami -Dade Guardian ad Litem program. Brian is currently the co-chair of United Way's Tocqueville Society and has been Sponsorship Chair for United Way's Young Leaders Executive Committee and Vice -Chair of United Way's Annual Mayor's Ball. He is an alumnus of Leadership Florida's Connect Florida Class V, and the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce's Leadership Miami Class 33. Most recently, Brian was elected to serve as a board member for The United Way of Miami -Dade and was selected to serve on to the University of Miami Citizens Board. Brian is an alumnus of Endicott College in Beverly, Massachusetts, where he earned his bachelor's degree in Sports Management with a minor in Hospitality Management and a Master of Business Administration (MBA). While at Endicott, he was the top seed on the college's intercollegiate tennis team. His outside interests include all things sports,=paying tennis and golf, boating and fishing, and travel and dining with family, friends, and business associates. Brian and his wife Nicole Gomez reside in Miami. Meme Ferre' is an artist ,art educator and art activist. She is a native Miamian with a diverse lineage of Puerto Rican, Venezuelan and Cuban descent. The definition of Miami: A gathering of people from many cultures in order to make Miami its own UNIQUE ENTITY. "We create to understand our existence and our sense of purpose. As artists, we have been given the gift and power to magically create a thing of BEAUTY and then give it away." Meme Ferre' 2000 Meme discovered an epic moment at four years of age in her grandfather -Venezuelan Architect Luis Malaussena's Miami studio in his home "La Santa Maria" on Biscayne Bay in mixing colors. In that instant, the satin sunrise ignited the morning light as it sea sawed, dancing and bouncing on the ripples of the sun washed sea. She grabbed that moment and somehow turned it into a lifetime of creating art. She has reinterpreted those embryonic memories into her artwork. At twelve years of age her formal artistic education began with studying Rembrandt's palette and traveling to England with Art Historian and University of Miami professor Dr. Richard Aldrich. At seventeen she was an exchange student to India with the Schools of the Sacred Heart ,involved in a Hindu -Catholic Community Service program.She received a BFA from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York in Painting. At New York University she received a MA in Art and Art Education in Venice, Italy and New York City. She has traveled extensively to Spain, France, India, Central and South America, Europe, the Middle East, New Zealand, Australia and the islands of the Caribbean. She has embedded these experiences into creating overlapping realities in her artwork. The colors of the Caribbean and the mysticism of India are expressed through her abstracted realities. Her life later followed the circuitous route of her ancestry from Miami to Cuba and Venezuela and back to Puerto Rico. It is in the verdant green Puerto Rican mountain range that the essence of the tropical American percussion is expressed in her artwork through the vivid colors and tropical surrealist abstracted scenes. She started Meme Ferre Arte LLC in 1975. She has created a diverse selection of artworks such as :2 dimensional paintings, drawings, banners, ceramic murals, photography, lithography, silk screen, linoleum prints and 3 dimensional sculptures. She has also created art installations and performed in live art performances . Meme did not walk in the footsteps of her family legacy, as one of America's preeminent Hispanic political families. Instead she navigated her inherited sense of cultural and societal passion into the Visual Arts and Art Education.Her father Maurice A. Ferre', Mayor of Miami (1973- 1985) was the first Hispanic Mayor of a major American City. Great Uncle Luis A. Ferre', Governor of Puerto Rico (1969-1973) was an Art Patron (Founder of the Museo of Arte.de Ponce) and recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom(1991 President George H.W. Bush).Great Aunt Sor. Isolina Ferre' was a Missionary nun and also a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1999 President Bill Clinton).Cousin Rosario Ferre' was an author and a National Book Award Finalist.Her ancestors were very important influences in Meme's development as an artist,art educator and art activist. Her artwork is in the collections of the Museo de Arte de Ponce, Ponce,PR ,Perez Art Museum Miami,Miami,FL,Miami Dade Public Library,Miami,FL,Miami Dade County Art in Public Places,Miami,FL and in many private collections. She was an art educator with MDCPS (Miami Dade County Public Schools) from 1989- 2020. Meme has taught over 10,000 students in the last 31 years. She belonged to the Florida Art Education Association (FAEA), and Dade Art Educators Association (DAEA). She was the Resident Artist at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Biscayne Nature Center(BNC) in Key Biscayne, FL from 2006-2014. At BNC she taught art during their Summer Camps and produced Student Art Exhibitions there. She is a Board Member of the Copperbridge Foundation of Miami, FL since 2010-present.The Copperbridge Foundation (CBF) is a non for profit organization 501(c)3 that promotes People to People exchanges between the United States and Brazil, Cuba,Puerto Rico, Argentina and Chile. The CBF's mission is to nurture, encourage, and promote cultural exchange through the panorama of artistic expression.Through this organization, people travel to Puerto Rico, Brazil Argentina and Chile and are able to embrace these countries rich culture of music, dance, and the visual art while interacting with artists themselves. Copperbridge.org She is on the Advisory Board of the Maurice A. Ferre Institute for Civic Leadership at Florida International University(FIU) of Miami, FL since 2022.The MAFerre Institute for Civic Leadership FIU is part of The Steven Green International and Public Affairs (SIPA) and builds on Miami Mayor Maurice A. Ferre's (1973-1985) legacy, preparing FIU students and the members of the public who will effect positive social change in local and global communities. In 2022 she partnered with Glickman Media to produce a Video Production Project on Maurice A. Ferre Civic Leader.The video will be a short 10 minute promotional video highlighting Mayor Ferre's commitment to civic leadership, using historical testimonies. Interviewer will be persons that have been a part of Miami's past, present and future.The purpose of this video is to promote civic leadership roles at FIU and the community.The video will also serve as a teaching/community outreach /fundraising tool by collecting community leader's oral testimonies and recollection on the importance of Mayor Ferre's tenure as mayor and community activism. In addition to this short video, Meme Ferre Arte LLC and Glickman Media intend to create a one -hour documentary as a future project. Ferre.FIU.edu Meme owned her ancestral home "Villa Mary" in Adjuntas, Puerto Rico from 2004-2018.Before that Villa Mary was owned by Meme's great aunt Sister Isolina Ferre.Villa Mary was built in 1918 by Meme's great grandmother Mary Aguayo Casals Ferre'. It is on a 6 acres estate in the verdant "Cordillera Central" mountains in the center of the island. In the summertime Meme painted and created art in this magical location and also stages art workshops and spiritual retreats there. In 2015 Villa Mary was used in a Creative Workshop/Taller Creativo with Puerto Rican Master Artist Carmelo Sobrino. Villa Mary has also been used for photo shoots, movie locations,musical performances and spiritual retreats. She was co-founder of an Art Studio/Art Gallery- Casa Coqui Miami in the Wynwood Art District (the Puerto Rican community of Miami), from 2010-2016 with Puerto Rican artist Hector Maldonado. At Casa Coqui Miami ,art exhibitions,art installations, live art performances, art classes and workshops were held throughout the year. Many students from the Wynwood Art District participated. She has dedicated her life to the advancement of the Arts in Miami and Puerto Rico.She has been sharing her "PASSION FOR THE ARTS" with all her students and with anyone that meets her and encounters her many creations. She has many personal philosophies: LIVE IN THE NOW. MAKE IT UP AS YOU GO. FOLLOW YOUR DREAMS. BE BOLD. PASS IT FORWARD- PA'LANTE. Meme has had an amazing blessed life and spreads her excitement and enthusiasm around.She feels strongly that we need to appreciate and be grateful for all of Life's gifts. Embrace them, cherish them and pass them on. 2022 Felipe Angulo began his career in public service at the Office of the Mayor of Miami -Dade County, where he served for three years as an aide to Mayor Carlos Gimenez. During his tenure, he gained firsthand experience navigating complex governmental operations, policy development, and stakeholder engagement at the county level. Felipe was later appointed as a loaned executive from the Mayor's Office to the 2020 Miami Super Bowl Host Committee, where he was promoted to Director of Community Outreach and Business Connect. In this role, he led government affairs and minority business development initiatives, working closely with public agencies, elected officials, and private sector partners to deliver one of the largest sporting events in the world. Following the Super Bowl, Felipe transitioned to the private sector and is currently a Partner at Capital City Consulting, specializing in public affairs and government relations. He brings a broad and sophisticated legislative background, with experience spanning local and federal political campaigns, fundraising, community engagement, and direct lobbying before local governments. Felipe has played a key role in multiple local referendums, public - private partnership negotiations involving government -owned property, and comprehensive strategies to attract, secure, and advance marquee global events and institutions in Miami. Notably, Felipe helped secure $42 million in public funding in support of the 2026 FIFA World Cup, and has been directly involved in initiatives supporting Formula 1, the Miami Dolphins, El Boat Racing, the College Football National Championship, and Ultra Music Festival. Felipe specializes in Miami -Dade County regulatory and development matters, with a focus on DERM permitting and environmental approvals, construction and real estate development, construction permitting, and land use and zoning policy. He regularly advises clients navigating complex entitlement processes, inter -agency coordination, and legislative approvals at the local level. Felipe currently serves on the Board of the WOW Center, the Florida International University President's Council, the United Way Young Leaders Board, the 2026 Mayor's Ball Host Committee and is active with Special Olympics Florida through philanthropic initiatives.