Miami-Dade County School Board Ethics

The Miami Times “The Daily Pulp” Bob Norman’s conversation with a spouse of a School Board member:

I asked Mitchell Kraft a simple question on the phone Wednesday morning. Here’s how the call went with Kraft, husband of School Board Member Stephanie Kraft:

Kraft: Hello?

kraftsteph.jpg
Stephanie Kraft
​Pulp: Hi, Mitch. This is Bob Norman with the New Times.

Kraft: [Unhappily] Oh yes. Hello, Bob.

Pulp: Yeah, I have heard you have done work for SRG Technology, which is owned by School Board lobbyist Neil Sterling. Can you tell me about your work for that company?”

[Pause]

Kraft: I’m not going to answer your questions.

Pulp: You’re not going to answer my question about SRG?

[Silence]

So can it be true that Stephanie Kraft’s spouse has worked for the representative of many important contractors? Read more and see. Can it be that South Florida style corruption continues? It can’t be true, can it?

Miami-Dade Commissioners Are Rational

The Miami Herald reports that the Commissioners of Miami-Dade County voted to hold the property taxes flat.

The 8-5 vote throws into doubt whether many programs — ranging from meals for the elderly to domestic violence counseling to grants for small businesses — can be funded under the tax rate adopted by the board.

The commission’s vote pushed the county’s budget gap to $444 million, increasing the threat of layoffs and pay cuts for county employees. Commissioners have two weeks to decide precisely how to carve nearly a half billion dollars out of a $7.5 billion budget.

The commission vote, which concluded at 4:30 a.m., calls for more drastic cuts than sought by county Mayor Carlos Alvarez. In July, Alvarez proposed a small tax increase and $427 million in cuts, including laying off 1,700 county employees and 5 percent salary reductions.

Voting for the flat tax rate: Javier Souto, Joe Martinez, Rebeca Sosa, Carlos Gimenez, Bruno Barreiro, Natacha Seijas, Jose “Pepe” Diaz and Sally Heyman.

Voting against: Chairman Dennis Moss, Barbara Jordan, Audrey Edmonson, Dorrin Rolle and Katy Sorenson.

This is an important lesson for the Commissioners of Coral Gables!

http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/letters/story/966218.html

My letter to the editor of the Miami Herald.

The approval of the Marlins Stadium — mostly financed by tourist tax dollars — is more evidence that this never will be a great city. This approval while there are 100,000 foreclosures in Miami-Dade, pathetic education achievement and graduation rates, whole populations without health insurance, an unsustainable transportation network, mismanaged city and county governments, narrowly neighborhood-focused politics, growing unemployment, an untenable tax system, broken zoning — and so on.

”Play Ball” is fiddling while Rome burns.

STEPHEN E. McGAUGHEY, Coral Gables