If you haven’t been keeping up with the latest scandal, check out this video clip by Brian Andrews of Channel 4 For Big Profits: Miami City Employees May Have Benefited By The City Program. The video didn’t mention the $1,000,000 the county kicked in but it is worth seeing. Photo above is Al Lorenzo who ran Manny Diaz's campaign. He got one of the "workforce units" and flipped it the same day he purchased it for a hefty profit. We taxpayers subsidized his windfall. Say thank you Al. The city audit is due out in a month. Apparently this is a leaked partial audit. the State Attorney is also investigating.
It is my understanding that the developer actually told the City and the County that Related would not be checking income. So the County had to get the dollars for Related through a backdoor (not from HUD money). Read yesterday's Ana Menendez post on this same subject.
6 comments:
While I agree that this story is a travesty, no evidence so far points to blaming the buyer/investor. We haven't seen any signed documents or deed restrictions prohibiting the buyers from flipping the units. Let's put blame where and when it's due.
I have always been annoyed (and sickened) to find advertising for these condos forwarded to the "all City employees" list.
It smacks of blatant favoritsm to the developers and why would City administration be advertising to City employees most of whom could never actually afford to buy (and keep)these overpriced closets.
i am not blaming the buyer EXCEPT A BUYER THAT KNOWS WHAT IS UP. Sanchez's chief of staff knew her boss gave the developer a $1,000,000 and Don't think this lobbyist/campaign manager didn't know about the $2,000,000.
These people never get punished. Take a moment and look at Sergio Pino and his actions with all the commissioners esp. Diaz. Wo investigates Pino but the State Attorney. She will never punish her chief campaign contributor, he protects her from the corrupt police union who are always trying to get rid of her for their own reasons.
The developer was Related. They requested and received $1 Mil to $2 Mil from the City and County to create affordable housing. How come they forgot to verify incomes?
This is a warning for anyone buying a condo from The Related Group. At closing, the Related Group will try to take more than their fare share of pro-rated property tax as in the current situation with the Lofts II. The building will not be put on the tax roll until January 1, 2008, but the Related group sent out HUD statements with ficticious numbers claiming they got them from the Miami-Dade county web site. The proposed tax notice they received in early September was for land only with a taxable dollar amount of $201,337.00 yet they were set to collect from $700.00 up for 496 units although a typical 1 bedroom unit should only pay about $80.00 pro-rated tax share. With 26+ projects in Miami, that is a lot of extra undeserved money for Mr. Perez. Since they were called out on this, they have since said they are going to re-work the numbers but only after they were threatened.
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