Tuesday, September 24, 2013

How Churches are Extensions of Agriculture in South Florida: the Guillermo Maldonado empire grows ... by guest blogger

For decades, the Dade County Farm bureau found back door ways to open up urban uses outside the UDB. They did this for their large parcel owner/ board members, not the involuntary members of the "Farm Bureau" who have to become members to buy Farmer's insurance policies through them.

The insiders at the Dade County Farm Bureau did a lot of damage to the farming community by lobbying the county commission to permit an excessive amount of farmland to be deemed "ancillary" when it was not by any stretch of the imagination. The big land owners have always been connected to the lawyers and downtown lobbyists and bankers who extend mortgages, often based on the developable value of the land and not its use as agriculture. It is a witches' coven that transformed the beautiful South Florida landscape from trees and fields and farms into whatever made the most money, quickest.

South Dade couldn't wait to become Kendall: featureless and dominated by strip malls.

There is a new tidbit of a few words in a recent Land Use Element change in the EAR which basically say's Churches have more rights than Jesus! All of the sudden, appearing out of nowhere, religious facilities are written in a Land Use amendment as "Ancillary to Agriculture".

This is problematic for a whole bunch of reasons, including actual farming going on inside the Ag areas, outside the UDB. There are religious groups, well one really huge one, buying land outside the UDB. This will allow them to operate let's say on the low end, a 5,000 member or upward mega church in the middle of a Redland or near west of Krome Avenue abutting the Everglades north of there.

Take for example this group run by the Maldonado empire: 100's of acres of productive Agriculture, farming going on around it, out pops a massive religious building, the traffic and noise follow.

Outside the Urban Development Boundary is just that: there should be no urban uses. Period. No street lighting, a lot of roads are not paved, and it is a way of life people who live there love. Talk about taking away one group of property rights in plane sight to allow something that is not by any definition "ancillary".
Apostle Guillermo Maldonado

So which county commissioner put this in the proposed Land Use changes? Does his or her photo appear as a dedicated worshipper on Sundays during political season at Guillermo Maldonado's Ministerio Internacioal El Rey Jesus? It is absurd. Religious facilities are allowed by right in residential areas and other zoning. To say Religious Facilities are now "ancillary to agriculture" isn't appropriate. It is a smoke screen for building a constituency for moving the Urban Development Boundary. Jesus!

In addition to destroying the farming communities, Churches are tax exempt, so we get to pay for their damage as well since they, by law, don't have to do that either! If this change to the county land use plan is allowed, next will be the need to build roads, etc. in an area they are not supposed to be in the first place.

We have crumbling infrastructure all over Miami Dade County. We don't need new problems, which this will create a whole bunch of very expensive messes and probably litigation for years when the Ag interest (I mean those who actually farm) revolt against the land use give away currently taking place in plain view.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good blog. Maldonado diddles with zoning applications too. Not sure if he is for hire. Isn't that the guy who was arrested for cocaine trafficing in Jersey about 13 years before he started the church?

Thanks for a good article. It spells it out. Im not a Jesus hater, by any means, but I sure do like to eat. Farm land is for farming.

Have a nice day.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, farmland is for farming unless you are Greenberg Traurig, Bill Losner or Steve Shriver.

Anonymous said...

These "JESUS CAMPS" is just a sneaky way to make money for these so call preachers. They need to be taxed like businesses.

Anonymous said...

Farmland and the Everglades are for Rock Miners too! Don't forget Holland & Knight's any application outside the UDB go to guy Juan Mayol!

Anonymous said...

Ladies and Gentlemen the Apathy is effervescent, rooted in our collective arrogant ignorance. The real farmers are savvy businesses and are pressured by a challenging ROI. Along comes a Mexican Cartel and a Messiah! The last stand is the Gentry farmers( mom and pop small acreage types that live on their land) and the ever vigilant Eye On Miami...
David Vs. Goliath Mexican Messiah.
Good wins over Evil? or Rock Pits and Churches for everyone!!

Anonymous said...

The Catholic Church also owns much land outside the UDB. Does the re-write of the Comp plan also do away with the requirement that non-ag activities must serve only the local community? Was this Linda Bell?

Anonymous said...

I have a copy of the Master Plan from 2008. The section this "house of worship" stuff appears to be added to is under Objective LU-8. It was not there in this objective in 2008. This had to have been added sometime after the 2010 EAR was originally proposed because I have a copy of that too and it's not in there either. Bell was elected in 2010 and the final EAR wasn't adopted until late 2011 or maybe even early 2012, I didn't really follow the timing of it all. I guess I can call Planning & Zoning or whatever department they're calling themselves. Now I'm more curious then ever.

Anonymous said...

He diddles in Aviation department politics too. With his airplanes.

Anonymous said...

Maldonado charges $100,000 for a speaking engagement and travels on private planes with body guards. Kind of creepy.

As far as the farmers being good businessmen, OK, but that does not take away from the notion that farmland should be preserved. It should and we should not leave it to the farmers to decide that either.

Anonymous said...

Where is the over paid, over stuffed Ag Manager? Does he do anything to actually preserve our Ag area? I know he didn't do anything when Bell dismantled DERM. I know he did nothing when Pena cried fowl (pun intended) in the 8 1/2 sq mile area.

This is one position which can save the taxpayers about 1/4 of a million per year if it's eliminated because the person who's supposed to be helping the Ag area is mute to it's destruction for his job security!

As to the Land Use issue, how and when did this get added? This is absurd in addition to the stupid UEA's the lobbyists and developers want included.

There is a hearing on October 2nd. Write your commissioner. Tell them to leave the Ag areas alone and remove this language stating that "houses of worship" are ancillary to Ag. They are not. Houses of worship should be ancillary to the community, serving the immediate residents in the area, not vice versa

Anonymous said...

No politician in their right mind would touch a church.

Jitt said...

As anyone here been to El Rey Jesus? Works like a cult.