Napoleon Bonaparte? No, it is our own Donald Slesnick! The Mayor-dom has gone to his head: He wants to run the show at City Hall as if he were the Executive Mayor. And that is exactly what he seems to want: To be the Executive/Strong Mayor! Does Coral Gables need this change? I think not.
What happens when too much power is concentrated in one person? How about this...you get Manny Diaz who has cocooned himself in his office with nary a word to his constituents, now known for rolling out mega plans that voters feel they have had no input in! In the County it was a necessary evil to change to a Strong Mayor. The County government is too large and the Commission too dysfunctional not to have a Strong Mayor to try to balance out the all-powerful 13. But for a small city, where government is working, the consolidated power is not needed. Excessive power blows the regular tax-paying Jane/Joe out of the equation, and you roll out the red-carpet to the special interests. It appears Slesnick is strong-arming a meeting for a power play under the guise of talking about the city’s future.
Citizens: Wake up and attend the workshop to be held at the end of June. Sources don’t know the time and location yet. In the meantime, do your homework and get involved.
12 comments:
Ummm... City of Miami doesn't have a strong mayor form of government. The City Manager in charge of the city administration. To my knowledge, Hialeah is the only Miami-Dade city that has a strong mayor in office.
Sleaznik is trying to deflect the blame for all the crap that is going on in Coral Gables, by saying: "If I was a Strong Mayor and I was running the show, none of this would have happened"
Building & Zoning Deparment scandal
IT Department Scandal
Overdevelopment
Collective Bargaining Problems with Police
Insurance Contract Scandal
Pound for Pound. Coral Gables has more scandal than the County. It just flies under the radar because Elaine Del Valle is not widely read and treats Sleaznick, Brown and Liz Hernandez with kid-gloves.
The reality is, Mayor Don is essentially already a strong Mayor. He has full control over a majority of the City Commission (3 out of 5)
To watch a meeting, I am amazed that When Commissoner Maria Anderson is talking, I can't even see Slesnick's mouth moving. That is some serious talent. They should take that vantriloquist show to the Catskills. Commissioner Chip Withers is no exception either. He will do whatever Slesnick says for fear of reprisal from the old white Coral Gables power base.
Commissioner Billy Kerdyk is a nice guy, but he doesn't want to make any waves and pretty much just does what the majority does.
That leaves Commissioner Ralph Cabrera. He seems to be the only one who ever questions anything and the rest of them treat him pretty much the same way the County Commission treats Carlos Gimenez. The gang up on him and marginalize him.
Don't fool yourself into thinking they don't still run the show.
Old Mayor Don has had the power all along to get rid of David Brown if he wanted to. He just hasn't wanted to. Brown is a real piece of work. He's such an arrogant jerk, that he makes people pine for the likes os Steve Shiver. At least Shiver was a nice guy to your face, despite all the lapses in judgement.
Ah... my city beautiful. It's time for an enema.
Unlike the County, where it would take a wholesale seachange to get a majority on the Board, Coral Gables could be changed by voting out one incumbant: Maria Anderson. She's the lynchpin that holds the whole Slesnick majority together. Change her, and his 3 out of 5 majority falls apart. It's just that easy.
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It is amazing to me that the previous blogger thinks Comm. Anderson is the mayor's puppet. I think she and Mr. Chip Whithers have been consistently voting against the mayor of late. They seem to be the most intellectually honest and prepared among the five elected officials in the city of Coral Gables.
Mr. Cabrera on the other hand has been in the majority along with the Mayor and Mr. Kerdyk. He often attacks his colleagues with emotional outbursts common to a child.
The political coverage of the city's comings and goings is very limited. I suspect that no one outside those behind the closed doors of the deal making know what the heck these folks are up to. City of pleasant living, I think not!
The previous post comparing David Brown to Steve Shiver is also laughable.
If I am not mistaken, Mr. Brown has come through the ranks of the City of Coral Gables employee system and helped rebuild the city's reserves since the fiasco of manager Jack Eads and Mayor Valdes-Fauli's.
Mr. Shiver served a short term as the county manager and did little more than place his cronies in positions of power. Lately he has squandered monies for homeless housing renovations in Homestead. A sad contrast to the record of Mr. Brown.
I think Mr. Cabrera is the weak link on the Coral Gables Commission. Really, let's get serious.
I am correcting the post per the reader above that says Manny is not a strong mayor. I also thought he wasn't.
Thanks Maria.
Good old Mrs. Anderson came in shouting from the rooftops against Merrick Park and overdevelopement and also sang the praises of term limits.
But once she was elected, a 180 degree, flop. Now she hasn't seen a large development she doesn't love (Berkowitz, Gables Spanish Village, etc...) and all of the sudden, now that she's an incumbent, term limits are a bad idea.
The last blogger is obviously the Zoloft supplier for Don, David, and Maria.
Let's focus on the issue of strong mayor...that is why I posted this. Would it be better for Coral Gables? I don't want this blog to get in the middle of a Gables feud. Lets not move in that direction because we all don't know about your City. Educate the rest of us without making the City look like there are a bunch of crazies living there.
Obviously there are some strong feelings about the performance of the commissioners and mayor in the Gables. For a blogger to claim another blogger is the zoloft supplier to elected officials and manager of the city shows a great deal of immaturity. It also makes light of mental illness, clearly something that is at play in the city.
Let's hear it for the Cabrera gang and their political scare tactics.
As for strong mayor for the city, it hasn't been proven that the current Manager form of government is not working. In fact, there have been great successes in the post Eads/Valdes-Fauli era in the city. Residents were upset about low reserves, road closures and out of control development and the government responded. This city like others across the state of Florida is dealing with the new tax structure voters approved in January. It is going to get tougher and decisions will have to be made. My thought is that educated fiscally conservative trained managers almost always perform better than politicians in the position of "manager."
Coral Gables should beware of the mayor trying to pull a fast one to either fire the current manager or other forms of power grabs.
Be afraid of behind the scenes deals Coral Gables residents, be very afraid.
Strong Mayor vs. Executive Mayor:
Here is the issue, when you have a Strong Mayor form of government, the good thing is that you have the accountability of one, and the problem is that you have the accountability of one. When you have a good mayor, the Strong Mayor system is more efficient, the problem is when you have a bad Strong Mayor. Look at the County now with Mayor Alvarez. The man is a "Strong Mayor" but, a very good argument could be made that he is weaker than any major municipal Mayor within his own government.
Also, the Strong Mayor form of government results in a politically selected beaurocracy, rather than a professionally selected beaurocracy. I am not idealistic, I know that politics plays a big role in County/City Appointments today, but, the ability to restrain wholesale political jocking for positioning is very much more lacking in the Strong Mayor form of government.
With the Executive Mayor form of government, the Manager runs the day to day operations. If the Manager is bad, he can be fired right away. The power base is more evenly spread between the Mayors Office, Managers Office and Commission.
If the County is utilized as an example of Strong Mayor form of government, it is early, but at this point, we have to say it is an utter failure, but, that being said, it may be that is the case because we have a visionless hack in charge right now.
clarification: At the April 29, 08 Commission meeting Cabrera said he campaigned for term limits because his campaign manager told him that would be a popular thing to do. He acknowledged he was never in favor of them at that meeting. One might ask, why he did not stick to his beliefs instead of folding to win votes.
He is also on the board of Great Florida Bank which owns some slum buildings in Liberty City. Miami Workers Center has been targeting him and the bank.
I agree the public perception of Strong Mayor is personality-driven. Which is why Carlos Alvarez won his initiative, but Slesnick won't. After too many scandals in Coral Gables, and his push for MORE spending even with record tax revenues, Slesnick isn't the best person for Strong Mayor. And the citizens will show their displeasure with the Council in the spring election when they vote for term limits, and hopefully, defeat Maria Anderson.
P.S. South Miami is the City of Pleasant Living, Coral Gables is the City Beautiful.
Gables Blue said...
Reminder to Gables residents:
The State of the City and Its Future Workshop is scheduled for the City Commission Chambers,
Monday, June 30th 10 a.m.-12 p.m.
All interested parties should attend. Rumor is that this could be part of a power grab to shift the city government to a strong mayor or the less than subtle effort to fire current city manager David Brown.
Stay tuned for updates.
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