Miami Herald: The Economic Time Machine ... by gimleteye

The Miami Herald finally tallies a toll for the worst economic meltdown since the Great Depression. It is 2011, and the Herald reports: "The Great Recession set back South Florida's economy almost a decade." The housing bubble peaked in in 2005. Eyeonmiami began publishing in November 2006: our goal was to fill in blanks left by the city's only daily newspaper, especially with regards to the failure to cover the local origins of the economic crash.

We have made this argument time and again; South Florida is the epicenter of the crisis because this place had all the elements to trigger a bubble in housing and construction: namely, politically fueled campaigns, elections and legislatures skewed to zoning changes and permitting of construction, development and raw materials like lime rock to benefit political benefactors and an elite made wealthy by suburban sprawl and low cost growth, whose central feature was shifting costs (for water, sewer, public parks and other infrastructure) to future taxpayers.

At the time when it might have made a difference, The Miami Herald was silent on the forces deforming democracy in Florida (except for Jim Morin and less frequently, Carl Hiaasen). The Great Recession unfurled in other sprawl-prone regions. But here, in Florida, the mechanics were perfected through manipulation of political messaging that vaulted reactionary conservativism forward: the decline of Florida's environment-- and the Everglades-- mirrors the decadal slump in common sense and community purpose. (check our archives, under Jeb Bush, for a sample.)

We continue to pay the price, evidenced by the resistance of the county commission and its unreformable majority despite recall elections. Or, the horrible goings-on in Tallahassee, under the stewardship of the most conservative, GOP dominated legislature in 50 years and a tone-deaf governor. (If on Monday, former county mayor Alex Penelas is brought back by the commission as a "temporary" fix for the power vacuum at County Hall left by Alvarez' recall, it will only confirm that local government operates in a parallel universe from the massive economic dislocation its own actions substantially abetted.)

The economic collapse occurred around the United States while leaving largely intact the same forces that triggered it. The reallocation of wealth goes on, today, unimpeded. It happened locally-- with banks and bankers receiving special treatment (through TARP) and allowed to continue to exert influence on political decision-making despite the fact their businesses are essentially 'walking dead' (cf. US Century Bank). This is one reason I question whether the projected recovery-- noted in the Herald report, Economic Time Machine-- is real or just another lapse to provide what is badly needed: accountability and responsibility for the housing bubble and crash.

I recall how the region's most respected economists and real estate experts predicted in the Herald pages a recovery, back in 2008, that would occur by late 2009 or early 2010 by the latest. When the prospect was raised that the economy might falter longer, the experts universally denied anything could unfold as we have now experienced.

These had the same ring of optimism and conviction as Lennar advertisements for tract housing featuring special incentives for buyers "that are unique in history and would disappear any day now". The ads appeared, month after month. These are the same experts being quoted by the Herald today as saying we have 'turned the corner'. We'll see about that, but there is plenty of reason to be concerned about what is happening beneath the numbers suggesting a recovery is underway. I hope the Herald "Economic Time Machine" means that the newspaper is committed to a more muscular and rigorous examination of history-- to assess responsibility and accountability--, but history is not on the side of optimism. Bowing to advertisers and an elite that phoned its grievances to the publisher every time the scent of critique appeared on the Herald's pages during the boom, the newspaper let down its readers and subscriber base. Asking for more is not asking for the Herald to be clairvoyant: it is simply, to be more like Eyeonmiami.