Miami-Dade County is home to more than 2.2 million people. There are a thousand voices to the question, how has Miami-Dade changed in twenty five years or the time you've lived here? I'm curious about answers.
Is this a better place to live?
How has your quality of life changed?
Do we have more or less economic opportunity?
Is your voice as a taxpayer and voter represented better today than before?
Is the corruption any different than it was, a quarter century ago?
Is Miami-Dade more or less Balkanized, compared to then?
Are our schools better? Our roadways and infrastructure?
Is the quality of information we get about our communities, better or worse?
No doubt there are many other metrics to address the question. Readers, fire away.
Is this a better place to live?
How has your quality of life changed?
Do we have more or less economic opportunity?
Is your voice as a taxpayer and voter represented better today than before?
Is the corruption any different than it was, a quarter century ago?
Is Miami-Dade more or less Balkanized, compared to then?
Are our schools better? Our roadways and infrastructure?
Is the quality of information we get about our communities, better or worse?
No doubt there are many other metrics to address the question. Readers, fire away.
11 comments:
The new City of Miami District 5 Commissioner is still shaking down developers and other commissioners to funnel money to his (her) "friends and family". District 5 is same old, same old.
1) No. 2)It has worsened. 3)Less. 4) No. 5) Yes, it is arrogant, deeper, and more pervasive. 6) More Balkanized. 7) The schools are not better. Our roadways and infrastructure are pathetic. 8) The quality of information we get about our communities is worse and woefully inadequate.
I was born in Miami many years ago. I have viewed the county's recent precipitous decline with alarm.
County government has become dysfunctional, corrupt, paternalistic, and a playground for special interests. Many believe that the county is working against its residents as witnessed by recent issues associated with Value Adjustment Board, those pathetic stadium deals, etc.
The general populace is disenfranchised as a result of voter fraud and state-driven Republican policies crafted to prevent minority, principally Democrat, voting.
The body public must articulate its interests and pressure county government to respond by overt activism and voting.
So much corruption and unfortunately the corrupt deals are larger...
Marlins $3 Bil scam
Miami Heat lease and extension
Bayside lease extension
SkyRise lease
Illegal billboards
Fake public private partnerships that only
benefit private connected crooks.
Checkbook Zoning
No code enforcement
the only question i can answer in the affirmative is the last one, we have incredible blogs keeping us very well informed of the continued decline of miami dade.
The city is easily better from 20 years ago. But the upgrades have come at a cost.
I am a fan of the baseball stadium. The stadium adds a unique aspect to this city. The only reason Alverez got voted out is because a llloootttt of money was spent by one individual to see to it he was.
The 1/2 penny tax, even abused, improved public transit immensely.
Corruption is as bad as ever. Poor are balkanized. Wage gaps between rich and poor blow worse now. Miami still has plenty of problems.
Even so, overall it is hard to say the city isn't better today in almost every way.
1-No, too little resources and low paying jobs, higher tasxes.
2-Roads are full of potholes, parks are closed due to toxicity, traffic is awful.
3-Less economic opportunity unless you are a connected developer, exports are down, no industry.
4-Same old same old
5-Corruption permeates every level of society
6-Worse, we have the Cuban block and the white block trying to get a piece out of one another in the political arena.
7-Some improvement in schools. Roads and infrastructure like the airport are awful.
8-Herald and most TV news is controlled by politicians. Only blogs have important and relevant information.
Corporate corruption is stronger then ever. Now the real estate moguls running FIU are trying to take away our fair grounds.
It all depends on your financial situation !
Everything bad is bigger and better organized. Everything good is sequestered for current and future exploitation. The public hasn't been smart enough to understand how the law and regulations to protect the commons are really shifting baselines; the insiders who do the shifting -- in the "grey zone" -- are insulated and protected by privilege more now than ever. I mean hell the hubris of naming the art museum for Jorge Perez is just rubbing it in the public's face. Twenty five years ago the battle hadn't yet been locked down. The common refrain from the Chamber of Commerce: "We need to grow the tax base to pay for infrastructure" has now been proven in spades to have been a cruel joke on taxpayers. But the Tea Party that started down the road to reconciling truth from fiction is now firmly rooted in exactly the wrong camp. Unfortunately we deserve the democracy we have and if voters aren't careful the GOP freak show could be even more solidly entrenched after the November elections.
I miss the Miami News. There is something about having two daily newspapers that helps in the body politic. What one newspaper doesn't cover the other one will, and with that dynamic it keeps the pressure on to do right.
Agree. The shrinkage of real newspapers and investigative journalism on the local level has been a disaster. Where can readers go? To blogs like this one … but the people who need to hear and to read: the voters … how many of them are reading blogs OR newspapers?
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