They have 5 years to build the museum. At least that is a good clause. It wasn't clear if it goes back to the county if it isn't built. You know there will be extensions if it isn't because that is government at work.
The Virginia Key Trust did not get the land from the City of Miami for their planned museum. The city owns the land, the Trust manages it and has to raise the money to build the African American history museum they have been planning for years. The city plan is a better plan all around. Think about it Barbara Jordan unless you are planning on tossing me a 1/2 acre. If you do this deal for Nigerians, soon you will have to give free land to Croatians, Italians, Russians, etc. for museums. Where do you stop? Maybe at Seychelles?
Here is a really good idea. Why not give some land to Wings Over Miami Air Museum? They could use it. They pay the county rent over at Kendall-Tamiami Airport. The Air Museum should at the very least have free rent if the County is so willing to offload our land. We already have an existing museum over there in Kendall that is going broke from the high rent the County is charging. That is so not fair to help one Museum and bankrupt another.
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| 2 parcels the county is planning on giving to the Nigerian American Foundation. |
31 comments:
According to an article i saw in the Kendall Gazette, Wings Over Miami is paying the county aviation department over $74,000 a year in rent. That money is raised by the board of directors and on the missed rent payments from the really bad years, the county has put 18% interest on the back delinquencies and penalties. Then they added another 18% to allow them to go on a payment plan to repay the missed rent.
It sounds like if any museum in this county needs county support that is the one. How can they run around giving $ to other museums and stadiums, and ignore one that flies Historical planes for the community ?
Isn't aviation important to Miami? What about veterans?
This is strange. There is no museum for American Blacks in this county, yet she is ready to give our land for a Nigerian museum? These are some strange elected officials.
How can the county screw a museum that is on their own property?
Where is Commissioner Souto on the this. The county gives every wine and cheese museum board lots of money, land, bay views and then the only flying museum south of Orlando that is a working museum gets run off the county property.
I am out at the airport all the time and I assumed that they got a dollar a year rent. The museum is good for the airport.
I think the commissioner is Zapata. Abreu is the department director. May be we need to call them. I am a veteran that jumped in nam. Thes guys have a f-14. I like it there.
BBM
If they are giving land away for Nigerian museum, it is only because the commission has run out of used cars, vans, buses and police cars to give away to foreign countries and nonprofits.
Someone musta told Jordan that it either would make money for someone (museums are not huge money makers) or this is a political payback in action. Do we get to pay for the building next?
Sounds like just another Nigerian scam.
When I hear stories like this, I wonder what's coming up from the Great Destroyers that need Barbara Jordan's vote. Check her tax returns to see if any more Key West real estate landed on her balance sheet.
These Commissioners are just unreal! Give away our tax dollars, our land, our museums and anything else to help their campaign coffers. Of course, give away their votes to special interests in conflict with the community!
In their thinking - tax money is free to spend along with the land owned by the community, not Barbara Jordan. I can only hope the Commissioners do not approve this give away and lose revenue we can most certainly use at the County level
What scum bags! Just think how much better spent the tax revenue would be from that property than giving it away to Nigeria? Are you kidding well that's an oxymoron when it comes to Jordan and the URM. "Are you kidding" should now only be used when they actually make decisions benefiting the Community, which are more rare than open land along the beach in this godforsaken hell hole called Dade County!
There is an African American museum in the works at Virginia Key. Why not pool resources and make a spectacular museum?
Help the aviation museum first morons. Sell the land and give them free or reasonable rent with the money. You can't build new museums with no funding to run them.
What a shame. Local tax dollars to help foreign nationals, but charge the greatest generation huge sums to maintain an existing museum. You have to wonder if anyone is thinking.
The air museum is paying $74,000 a year to the county and they want to give 2 plots of land worth near a million to a group with no track record to run a museum? Doesn't Miami Dade county care about veterans? I have been to the Wings of Miami Museum a few times and I was impressed. I had no idea they arent helped by the county. Commissioner Diaz you are our veteran spokesperson. Where are you on this highway robbery?
Commissioners like Pepe Diaz and Lynda Bell are such strong military advocates... Do they know about Wings. Juan Zapata, the commissioner that replaced Martinez is a wonderful advocate as is Commission Chair Sosa. Can they help with the aviation department...?
This sounds like just another half baked plan that seems to be the norm for county commissioners. Free public land to a group that claims it is going to build a museum (museums never make enough revenue to cover expenses) with no detailed plan of how this will be accomplished, and funded.
Who dreams this things up?
Can the county support two museums on African American history? Redundant? Maybe the Virginia Key museum can have a Nigerian wing? Do we need a Puerto Rican, Costa Rican or Peruvian museum or can we have one Hispanic museum to cover all the bases? Lets look at this whole subject in an intelligent manner. And, help that Aviation museum. I am going to go over there, never knew we had one.
We need a pot grow house museum. Nothing has made Miami what it is today more than drug money.
Tamiami pilot: well said.
They trade votes at the County Commission. Jordan gets this -- and she owes because the Nigerian Foundation helped her get elected -- and then she gives her vote to another commissioner on their pet project. They all trade-off.
Barbara how could you support this crazy idea. I am sure there are not enough Nigerian votes that you need to go along with this idea. Has someone promised you a home in Nigeria Africa or a trip to the continent. The African-Research Center in Broward County is the largest south of Atlanta which includes from African to Present. It took them years to build with world consultants. Its not fair that that Wings, Virginia Key, Holocaust, Cuban and other museums pay their way and now we are
giving something to the Nigerians. There has to be more to the story. Thank you Genius for exposing this foolishness.
Thank you, Ms. Sosa, for your remarks and perspective. With all due respect, Ms. Jordan, I think it is wonderful to engage with the public regarding these types of things - but a level playing field should, indeed, be established when we have the museum talk.
I word about that little aviation museum:
Wings Over Miami honors aviation history and veterans. Freedom is never free, and neither are museums. This valiant little museum soldiers on year after year, with little or no help from the county. Honestly, they could use some help.
One can see that with the Brothers to the Rescue exhibit that was also erected on the Tamiami Airport Sight. The juxtaposition of WWII warbirds as a backdrop to the Brothers plane is poignant. You see, one would not be there without the other. Thanks to our vets, we have protected a country where people of all persuasions and faiths can come to our shores to pursue a better life. I saw old Cuban men crying the day they dedicated it. And, Wings proudly flew a formation of war bird planes to honor THEM in a solemn underscore of red smoke that amplified their pride and grief for days gone by.
We have family that served in Iraq, you see, and another who recently entered the military. One, our son-in-law, is a Cuban American. The other, an African-American who is being fostered by our family. We are very proud of both of these young men and I am exceedingly proud of my daughter, who has also served her country by living a military lifestyle.
Wings recently honored Helen Snapp and Boots Blesse (among others). One a woman aviator in WWII and the other a fighter Ace in the Korean War who also wrote a tactical training book used for years by the Air Force. Unfortunately, both of those great Americans are no longer with us. I am so thankful that our little community museum took the time to honor them while they were still alive. I was there and there was not a dry eye in the house.
When you look overhead and see an old air bird in the sky, just know that this happens at great expense and sacrifice. These planes are jewels. We should be humbled.
Have a blessed day, folks, and thanks for staying engaged with community matters.
Thank you Jane.
I just cannot understand politics! How can they give away MILLIONS to a museum that does not yet exists and where another similar one is being constructed, while at the same time trying to drive out a local one-of-a-kind existing museum that does so much for the community? Not only is the museum a permanent memorial to our Veterans, it also provides historical education to the residents via special events and opportunities. These events bring to individuals in the community, insights to both aviation and military history.
Moreover, the availability of the museum provides a close-up educational aviation opportunity to children in our schools, colleges, children’s organizations, and various other MEMBERS of our community.
The museum through its Civil Air Patrol Squadron, contributes to the education and training of future Air Force officers as well as provides a training center for emergency search and rescue operations.
As a tourist attraction, the museum boosts the local economy by drawing visitors to the museum and businesses in the area. Through its special events, the museum creates a need for lodging, restaurants, and other bossiness services.
The museum through its community partners, creates and excitement about aviation and provides family based entertainment at a very low cost.
The Wings Over Miami Air Museum is the only one of its kind in South Florida.
Why is the county singling out the museum with such high rates and unwillingness to soften their drive to eventually close the museum? I can only wonder if the county needs the land that sits under the museum, for someone else, or for some other purpose, like to sell it and pay for the land they are giving FREE to another group, or maybe even to give the museum land FOR FREE to another group to build a different museum.
IT SADDENS ME TO NO END how little consideration is given to preserving OUR history, to our veterans, to their legacy and to the preservation of their history. Yes, everyone in the commission will probably go to a Veterans Day parade, wave the flag, make a speech, then go home and forget all about it. Out of sight – out of mind.
Well, let's try to remember the Wing Over Miami Air Museum, what they are, what they do for us, and how important it is that through it, we keep connected to our heritage.
Please consider that continuing to charge the museum such an exorbitant rate when at the same time, other non-profit groups get $1 leases and other groups get millions of dollars in FREE land, can only lead to the demise of the Museum and South Florida will suffer and great loss.
As A WW2 Army Air Corp vet I am disgusted with the criminals we elected to represent us. We all know that they are paid well to rob us. I hate it.
Withdrawn
Mover: Barbara J. Jordan
Seconder: Rebeca Sosa
Vote: 9 - 0
Absent: Suarez , Bell , Zapata , Diaz
This is the vote today on this tax payer owner land attempted give away.
NOTE TO THE COUNTY COMMISSIONERS - Public Land is owned by the Public, not the BCC. Tax Payer funds are not monopoly money, they're real hard earned dollars by the people who live here!
Well said. "C" stands for Crony, not Capitalist. This is tax-payer welfare that is handed out, Banana Republic style.
We had four missing commissioners at that meeting? What?
For those who regularly attend, is it normal to have four missing from voting on county business?
We need to raise a big stink, er, awareness about the Air Museum's situation. Count with my support.
Go over to the museum, become a member, get on the mailing list, write to your commissioner. They are having a golf tournament too, if anyone is interested. The museum is open Wed-Sun.
Hi Genius,
Thank you for pointing out Wings Over Miami Air Museum’s current circumstances. As a museum, we are unique in that our exhibits take to the air and fly in community events, such as at the Bay of Pigs memorial service and the Homestead Air Show.
The board works very hard to maintain self sustainability through a combination of keeping warbird and vintage airplanes on loan, donations and public events.
All our pilots and board members are volunteers. They donate to the museum their fuel, time, expertise and in many cases, to the museum’s sustainability via cash contributions. I am volunteering full time hours in order to help the museum; many other people work equally as hard for the museum’s benefit.
Wings is a small museum, but we do have important aviation artifacts such as one of the last F-14s retired from the Navy. We are home to the Tamiami Composite Civil Air Patrol squadron which is a combination of teens and adults who are committed to serving this community and the nation. The teens are preparing for careers in the military and the adults are pilots who provide air supported search and rescue aid to South Florida residents when there is a need for assistance.
That being said, I would like to point out some things:
JaneMiami so eloquently stated our mission and her family’s generous commitment to our military. However, the Cuban memorial that she refers to in her post is the Bay of Pigs Memorial (Cuban Pilots Association), which is a beautiful plane and location on the Tamiami Airport in memory of the pilots from that tragic event. The plane was housed for many months at our museum, before moving to its new home. They too, pay rent for the land it sits on, even though was vacant land when they created the memorial which is a wonderful asset to the Kendall Tamiami Executive Airport landscape.
As a museum, we want to be self sustainable in the long-term and we have to consider rent among other items in that sustainability plan.
Wings Over Miami is not an aviation business; we are a 503c3 that is volunteer supported. The museum cannot pay anything near the rent a flight operation which sells aviation products/fuel or that which a similar business would pay.
The museum board has not requested to have the rent go away.(However, we would not turn such an offer down!)
Wings Over Miami wants the aviation department to share in our successes and be proud that we are housed on their airport, but we cannot do that without a partnership with them.
And finally, I want to make sure that everyone knows that we strive to work with community organizations and support the work of our fellow museums.
We are proud of our Great Nation’s history and fly the military/vintage aircraft for the community as community volunteers.
Our museum simply needs some help and encouragement.
Thank you,
Suzette Rice
President
Wings Over Miami Air Museum
www.wingsovermiami
www.facebook.com/wingsovermiami
The New Private Corporations non Profit 501c3s to big to fail, Corporate Welfare, Entitlement benefits ie natacha seijas milan Young mens Christian association.
Also Miami marlins, Miami American Arena heat, Miami Sunlife dolphins
I always wonder about the nonprofits... Some of them r more like IBM ... They need to run like businesses, but when they go the way of united way and YMCA they lose touch with the community. You have hundreds of nonprofits that just break even and live to serve the community. Wings sounds like one of those. The train museum is another. They work in the shadows of the fancy museums. In the social service world, u have the little guys in the shadows of the the mega organizations and the little guys are fighting to survive for a different reason than the big guys.
The children's trust is in turmoil. They got a performance review done by FIU that said 25% of their funded nonprofit CEOs thought that the trust did a poor job. Remember the trust is state tax driven.
The trust was forcing the small nonprofits to form coalitions to get funding... In other words, become big like them and united way. Smaller nonprofits always form relationships to achieve their goals... They don't need FORMAL paperwork and a funder telling them how to run their charity. The trust became the director of the charities mission, management style and even the way they worked day to day. That is not any funders job.
So, yes, the county needs to love and support the goals of all little nonprofits and museums, they are the ones truly serving the communities without the glamour and glitz.
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