Tag Archives: Marc D. Sarnoff

When Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff Lied To My Face

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Just like on Batman, the lair of the criminals is crooked.

Mea culpa. I should have written this up in December, when it happened, but that would make me merely another reporter to whom [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff lied. That’s hardly news, but better late than never. 

A bit of background. On December 9th I attended the Douglas Park Soilgate Dog and Pony Show. This was merely the latest, fancy, multimedia production, mounted at taxpayers expense by [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff in another frantic effort to mollify constituents after they realize they’ve been hoodwinked, as opposed to the elected representative being upfront with his constituents in the first place.

Read about a previous Sarnoff Dog and Pony Show:
The Trolleygate Dog And Pony Show

I didn’t write about Douglas Park Soilgate Dog and Pony Show because: 1). It was a total yawnfest, even though at the end of the meeting [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff lied to my face; 2). I really had nothing new to say on the topic after I shot my wad posting Marc D. Sarnoff ► Everything Old Is New Again in November. That post documented the Sarnoff Skulduggery™ that slicked through Brownfield designations against 6 Miami parks, and 6 adjacent neighbourhoods, before anyone could notice. To quote myself:

[Michelle] Niemeyer is the lawyer who has been advising and working with the Friends of Merrie Christmas Park. She’s managed to help them understand and negotiate the extremely complicated thicket of Miami, Miami-Date, Florida and U.S. environmental laws that go into effect once a neighbourhood has been designated a Brownfield site.

According to Niemeyer, the entire process for designating the 6 neighbourhoods around the toxic parks Brownfield sites was flawed from the get-go. The Brownfield designation was slapped on these neighbourhoods without the proper notification, no matter how many publications in which the city claims it was published. There are supposed to be public meetings before any decisions made and none were held.

During the Douglas Park Soilgate Dog and Pony Show Deputy City Manager Alice Bravo refered to this flawed process in an oblique way and I wanted to get [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff on the record. That’s why right at the end of the Douglas Park Soilgate Dog and Pony Show, I raised my hand to ask a question. Unfortunately, because I had already written about the Sarnoff Skulduggery™, he was prepared for my question. I had barely begun before he cut me off to tell me there had never been a Brownfield designation.

“Does that answer your question?” he challenged.

“No, not really.” And, so I started to ask the question again in a slightly different manner. Once again he cut me off to say there had never been a Brownfield designation.

As I started to ask the question a third time, [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff cut me off again to say the same damned thing. That’s when I gave up. The meeting was breaking up, it was getting loud in the room, and no one really cared about the answer but me. And, even I didn’t care that much because the record shows he is duplicitous liar every time he opens his mouth. However, at least I had him on the record that there was no Brownfield designation, just another lie to a reporter and his own constituents.

[Maybe I didn’t write about the meeting because I’m embarrassed that I allowed [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff to bully me off my question. I kicked myself over and over on the drive home. However, as I have clearly demonstrated, he’s not inclined to answer any questions from me anyway.]

I was reminded of all of this Tuesday when I got an email from Ken Russell announcing Merrie Christmas Park is almost ready to reopen. To remind you, Russell led the neighbour revolt that got the toxic soil removed from Merrie Christmas Park. He’s also recently teased that he’s considering challenging Teresa [is it too early to call her corrupt?] Sarnoff, wife of [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff, in the Miami District 2 race, already crowded with 6 people vying to topple the Sarnoff Dynasty.

FULL DISCLOSURE: This reporter runs a kidding-on-the-square Facebook page called ABT – Anybody But Teresa. Come join the fun.

Russell managed to get the park cleaned up to the neighbours’ satisfaction despite the best efforts of [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff to present them with a fait accompli, a bizarre take-it-or-leave-it deal that would have had the neighbours chipping in for the cost of removing the toxic soil.

Yes, you read that right. For some reason [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff thought the residents should pay to remove the toxic soil the city dumped in their local park. As it turned out an anonymous donor coughed up the dough for the toxic soil
remediation and the work went ahead. That’s just another [possibly
illegal] deal [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff
cooked up behind closed doors. So far he has refused to name the
anonymous donor, which pisses all over the Florida Sunshine Law. But, I digress.

In his email Russell reminds his neighbours: 

Brownfield Designation:
Several months ago, the Commissioners quietly voted to declare this and 5 other parks as Brownfield Sites so that they could get money from the State and [be] release[d] from liability after the cleanup.  Through research, we learned that proper notification wasn’t given to residents and that this particular use of the Brownfield [law] wasn’t appropriate.  So the State is not recognizing the City’s ordinance.  However, for us, it’s important that the City officially reverse their decision to declare our neighborhood parks as Brownfields so that there would be no future confusion or stigma.  I received a call from Deputy City Manager Alice Bravo confirming that at the next Commission meeting (not this week), that the Commissioners would bring it back up for a vote to reverser [sic] their earlier vote.

How can a city reverse a vote that [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff tried to tell me to my face had never been made? Because, you see, it’s not just a game of semantics. This affects people’s lives and property values, something that [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff doesn’t seem to understand as he moves all these chess pieces on a board, playing both sides without any oversight.

At the Friends of Merrie Christmas Park Facebook Page Russell elaborated on this Sarnoff lie:

If anyone tells you that the City never designated the 6 parks as Brownfields, ask them about this attached signed approved memo from the City Manager’s office. I have been promised by Alice Bravo (City Deputy Manager) that Sarnoff has promised to un-do the designation through a vote at a Commission meeting later this month.(even though the State never recognized the designation, it’s important that the City withdraw their intention to designate).

If you go to the Friends of Merrie Christmas Park Facebook Page. you will see that Ken Russell has helpfully posted the minutes of the July 24, 2014, Miami City Commission meeting. Because of Sarnoff’s failure to adequately notify the residents around 6 parks and to provide public forums prior to any city vote on Brownfield designations, the motion passed will not be recognized by the State of Florida and now has to be undone. 

This District 2 race is shaping up to be a lot of fun for the Not Now Silly Newsroom.

The Coconut Grove Playhouse Trojan Horse; Part II

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Gate [H] left open for the valet parking allowing traffic to
go out onto William and Thomas Avenues. Note the arrow
on the ground directing traffic out onto Charles Avenue.

Part I of The Coconut Grove Trojan Horse presented a capsule history of the Coconut Grove Playhouse, the surrounding area, and how a good neighbour’s complaint to City Hall led to this long investigative article. 

After researching the parking issues around the Playhouse for the last year and seeing how the residents were being abused by these valet companies, especially following a night of havoc they created on Charles Avenue in December, this reporter emailed [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff a series of questions which have yet to be answered:

FROM: Headly Westerfield
TO: msarnoff@salawmiami.com, rnelson@miamigov.com
Fri, Dec 19, 2014 at 3:36 PM
SUBJECT: ON THE RECORD – PLEASE RESPOND

For
the past year I have been quietly researching the parking lots
surrounding the Coconut Grove Playhouse. This week I was forwarded an
email chain in which your name appears. This seems like a good time to
write up the result of some of that research. My forthcoming article
concerns more than the illegal parking last Friday night on the empty
residential lot on the north side of the Historic Roadway of Charles
Avenue.

Since this is not the first time this lot has been used
for overflow valet parking — just the latest and most egregious — the
denials by Daniel Radrizzani ring hollow. I have witnessed this
residential lot being used on many Friday and Saturday nights and have
taken pictures of it. The neighbours will confirm that this has been an
ongoing problem. And, Coconut Grove Village Council Chair Javier
Gonzales will no doubt remember the several nights I interrupted his
evenings to tell him he should rush on over there to see it for himself.

Consequently,
I have a series of questions about *ALL* the parking surrounding the
Coconut Grove Playhouse, of which this residential lot is only one piece
of the entire puzzle.

1). Why did Charles Avenue resident
Cynthia Hernandez have to insist that the police do something after they
first tried to tell her that there was nothing they could do since the
property owner hadn’t made a complaint?

[To their credit, but
only after additional phone calls, the police finally ordered the
residential lot to be emptied of cars; a process, I am told, that took
45 minutes and created the 2nd traffic jam of the night on Charles
Avenue. The first was filling the empty lot with some 40-50 cars in the
first place.]

2). When neighbours complained previously that the
45 valet parking spots rented from the MPA would bring additional
traffic, they were assured there would be no additional traffic on
Charles Avenue as a result. This is clearly false. Why has this been
allowed to continue for the past year despite occasional complaints by
the neighbours?

3). If there was to be no additional traffic on
Charles Avenue then why did the MPA, when it resurfaced the Main Street
parking lot, paint a giant arrow on the ground immediately BEHIND the
Playhouse directing cars to exit onto Charles Avenue?

4). Some of
these 45 spots rented from the MPA are now being used several days a
week as a drive-in movie theater. How is this being done? Is there a
sub-lease? A contract? A gentleman’s agreement? Is the MPA involved?

5).
What permits were needed to run a drive-in theater in that parking lot?
What are the insurance requirements and who is paying for it?

6).
When these 45 spaces are full of cars and/or drive-in movie patrons,
where does the overflow parking go now that the gate on the residential
lot has been locked again? [It’s been locked and unlocked as needed for
overflow parking until now.]

7). At the far west end of the MPA
parking lot on Main Highway there is a chain-link fence with a
double-gate that feeds onto William Avenue. Why is this gate locked most
daylight hours, but quietly unlocked and left wide open on busy nights
in Coconut Grove, when the Playhouse parking lot is full?

8). What will the City of Miami do about monitoring these valet parking infractions going forward?

9).
What will the City of Miami do to reduce all the added traffic these
parking lots have caused on Charles and William Avenues?

10).
Considering Gino Falsetto is one of the owners of Aries; and considering
he also has financial interests in the empty residential lot being used
for the last year as overflow parking to the 45 spaces rented from the
MPA; and considering he is also part owner of Paradise Parking; and
considering it’s his 3 restaurants that use the valet parking; and
considering that his brother Andrew Falsetto is a part of South Park,
the company that took the fall for Friday night’s parking fiasco; isn’t
all this circular finger-pointing just a little too convenient for
everyone to duck responsibility by blaming this ongoing situation as a
one-time event?

11). And, most important of all: Considering all I
have uncovered and written about Gino Falsetto’s shenanigans — his
Demolition by Neglect of the 120-year old E.W.F. Stirrup House; the
destruction of the old trees on that property without the proper plans
and permits; the interior demolition of the E.W.F. Stirrup House without
permit or historic plan on file; the destruction of the wall that
separated La Bottega from the current construction zone of the E.W.F.
Stirrup lot without the proper permits; the removing the roof of the
Bicycle Shop without a demolition permit; his alleged squatting on the
Playhouse parking lot for several years; etc., so forth, and so on —
isn’t it time that Falsetto, and the series of companies he hides
behind, are held responsible for the downgrading of the quality of life
of your West Grove constituents who live around his fiefdom?

I will publish when I think my story is ready and would like to include your response. A prompt response ensures that.

My questions to [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff
were punted to the Miami Parking Authority, which has still yet to answer.

The area surrounding the
Coconut Grove Playhouse
[Click map to enlarge]
LEGEND:


A). Grove Gardens Condominiums;
aka The Monstrosity;
B). Regions Bank;
C). The E.W.F. Stirrup House;
D). Zoned residential lots, used
for illegal parking;
E). Part of the 45 parking spaces
leased for Valet Parking;
F). Blue Star Drive In & remaining 45
spaces leased to Valet parking;
G). Playhouse Parking Lot
operated by the MPA;
H). Unlocked gate directing traffic
onto William and Thomas Streets
and location of arrow directing cars
to exit onto Charles Avenue;
I). Main entrance/exit for main
Playhouse parking lot;
J). The Bicycle Shop;
K). The Barnacle, now a State Park,
once belonged to Commodore Ralph
Monroe, a contemporary of E.W.F.
Stirrup;
L). Rich people in gated enclaves;
M). Far less well off people in West
Grove, which has remained
predominately Black and depressed
during the last 125 years;
N). Commodore Plaza, named after
Ralph Monroe, is lined with pricy
eateries and more expensive art
galleries, meant for people with
more disposable incomes than
those on the surrounding blocks.

In the meantime, I emailed back [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff to
re-ask questions 1, 2, 8, 9, 10, and 11, since those questions could ONLY
be addressed by an elected representative on behalf of his
constituents. The response from Sarnoff’s office, paraphrasing, “As we
told you before, the neighbour is satisfied her complaint was resolved
within 2 business days. We’re done here.”

While I didn’t get a response from people paid by the City of Miami to answer questions, I did get a response from Regions Bank [B],
which is treating this issue seriously.

The Regions Bank parking lot is
another small piece to the parking puzzle. On many occasions I watched the valets zip cars in and out of the bank parking lot after hours. After asking a few discrete questions I was told the local Regions manager had an informal
agreement with the valet parking company to use the bank’s parking lot
at night. Consequently, I contacted Regions’ HQ and asked several questions about its
Coconut Grove branch:

1).
Is Regions Bank aware of any arrangement between the manager of your
Coconut Grove branch and the manager of the 3 restaurants next door
(Calamari, La Bottega, The Taurus) to use the bank parking lot for the
restaurant’s valet parking during the bank’s off hours?

2). Is there an [sic] written agreement on this arrangement or is it just an understanding?

3).
The valets get $6 per car. I have counted more than a dozen cars at any
given time in this parking lot, with cars constantly being brought in
and out as I watched. These valet fees represent several hundred dollars
on the busy Friday and Saturday nights that I have witessed [sic]
myself. Is any of this money shared with Regions Bank? With the Coconut
Grove Regions Bank manager?

4). Has liability insurance has been
arranged for the shunting of cars in and out of this parking lot? If so,
who is the provider and who pays for the insurance? If not, who would
be responsible were there to be a fatality as cars zip in and out on
this residential street?

5). Why is your parking lot being used
to secure profits for a valet company, and customers for 3 restaurants,
who would otherwise eat elsewhere were it not for the valet parking?

Please
respond as soon as is convenient because I plan to post my story when
it’s finished and would like to give Regions Bank the opportunity to
respond.

Once I started asking questions about this arrangement, it was formalized: 

Headly,

You can attribute the following to me:

We do have a license agreement between Regions and the valet parking company.

We do not receive any financial compensation.

What
Regions and our customers do receive is that the parking company helps
manage the lot after hours.  Before this agreement, there was an issue
with cars parking in the lot after hours and blocking access to the
night drop and ATM.  This kept customers from being able to access their
funds – or make deposits in their accounts – in an efficient manner. 
The agreement was developed to help remedy that issue and to help people
in the community access the ATM and night drop as needed.

You would need to consult with the valet company regarding insurance arrangements covering their activities on the lot.

Thank you.

Jeremy D. King
Corporate Communications
Regions Financial Corporation
205-XXX-XXXX
jeremyd.king@regions.com

So
… While Regions Bank has seen fit to reply to me, neither [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc. D. Sarnoff, nor the Miami Parking
Authority have answered any of my questions. Which brings us to this:

The Parking Problem at Charles Avenue and Main Highway
~~or~~
Why Is The Playhouse a Trojan Horse for a Huge Parking Garage?

A sign on the Regions Bank parking lot.

If you want to see some hard-working men and women, wander on over to Main Highway and Charles Avenue and watch the valets at work.

Diners pull up in their cars
in front of The Monstrosity [A] because they are going to one of the 4
restaurants on the property: The Taurus; Calamari; La Bottega; and the
member’s only, private wine club, La Cava. These restaurants were forced
to offer valet parking because they were struggling from a lack of
customers. Blame it on the Broken Window Syndrome; people were loathe to walk
past the boarded-up Coconut Grove Playhouse to get to Falsetto’s
restaurants. In fact, you will rarely see pedestrians walk any further
south on Main Highway than The Greenstreet Cafe, Falsetto’s biggest competitor just up the block. Everything south of that is a virtual No Pedestrian Zone.

When cars pull up the valets collect $6.00, give it a parking tag, and zip them on over to parking lots [B], [E], or [F]
as quickly as possible. Then they run back for the next diner or to
retrieve a car for a satiated diner. At the end of a hot night the valets are drenched in sweat. I have absolutely nothing against these
people and actually admire their work ethic. [In fact, some of them have
become quite friendly and provide me with background information even though
they know I am working against their boss’ interests.] However, there is no denying these valet companies are destroying the quality of life for the residents on Charles,
William and Thomas Avenues.

Recently I was SHOCKED to learn something I
hadn’t discovered in the 6 years I have been researching West Grove: The Monstrosity
has 2 underground levels, one a parking level and
the other the private, members only faux wine cave known as La Cava.

I
can hear a gigantic “So what?” to that news, except this is Florida.
Dig a small hole in the ground with a spoon and it fills up with water. That’s why basements are not built here, as dry basements are hugely expensive in South Florida.

When The Monstrosity was built there were obviously concerns about residential parking, as is standard for any project. To that end the building was designed with an underground
parking lot for the residents in the condos above. Not having to share any above-ground space for parking allowed Aries to build a structure with more residential and restaurant space for the footprint and height for which it was zoned. However, it’s clear that the City
of Miami, or anyone else, did not anticipate sufficient parking for the building’s multi-use — the restaurants — which
is why the valets are forced to use every available parking space in the area.

Last
year, when Miami-Dade County Cultural Czar Michael Spring cut the deal that gave Aries Development the
Bicycle Shop [J], another part of that deal was that the valet companies
could rent 45 parking spaces [E & F] at $6.00 p/day p/space from the Miami Parking Authority.

The Blue Star-lite Drive-In at night

There’s one last player to be introduced into this story and that’s the Blue Star-Lite Drive-In, which uses parking lot [F] several nights a week to project movies onto a screen attached to the back wall of the Coconut Grove Playhouse.

When
I first heard about this new use of the parking lot, I thought it was a
great idea to help revitalize the neighbourhood, not only bringing movies back to that corner, but creating a fun event for the neighbourhood. However, I have since
changed my mind for the following reasons:

1). To begin
with, this is an expensive night out. Just like the rest of Coconut
Grove, to be honest. A normal night out at the megaplex is barely
more
expensive than the Blue Star-Lite Drive-In and you don’t have to bring
your own lawn chairs or cars or bug spray. This is not priced for the
families that live in the areas marked [M].

I’ll take a Sliders Basket and a Hot Dog Basket, please.

2). My next thought, because I know how these things work, was, “How does Gino Falsetto make money off this deal?”

Falsetto’s
valet parking company rents these spaces from the MPA. Is the Blue
Star-Lite Drive-In paying any rent to Paradise Parking or the MPA? I
still don’t have the answer to that question from the MPA, but I didn’t
have to search very far to see at least one way that Falsetto is making
money off the drive-in. He’s selling overly expensive hot dogs and
hamburgers to the people who have enough disposable income to pay these
crazy rates for a movie in a parking lot.

The Blue Star-lite Drive-In during the day
The Blue Star-lite Drive-In during the day

3). Josh Frank, owner of the Blue Star-Lite, has
turned his portion of the parking lot [F] into a junk yard, complete with
rust imported from other locations. Admittedly, all this junk gives
the drive-in a funky, street- level feel, despite its sky-high prices. However, if any of the homeowners along Charles, William, or Thomas
Avenues [M again] loaded up their property with this junk, they’d
be cited by the city for creating a hazard and/or an unsightly mess.
The Blue Star-Lite Drive-In is allowed to load up this property with
everything from camper trailers to porta-potties. The only thing missing
is the junk yard dog.

The fine facilities at the Blue Star-Lite Drive-In

4). The first time I met Josh Frank I gave him my
card and he was friendly, quite open, and willing to talk. The second time I tried
to talk to Frank he was not only rude, but told me where I could line my
car up to pay an admission to see a movie. I declined the offer.
However, I couldn’t help but wonder whether he had seen any of my posts
on Falsetto posted here in the interim.

I have now
spent many hours over the past year just observing these various parking
lots and the traffic patterns along these streets. As well, I have interviewed valets, security guards, and neighbours at properties
surrounding the Coconut Grove Playhouse. Consequently, I now have answers to some of my questions. 

The answer to
Question #7 above is this: This gate is opened to traffic on Friday and
Saturday nights so the valets working the restaurants on Commodore
Plaza [N] — which I never knew about until this all blew up — can zip in and out the back way [H and pics above and below] without having to drive out onto
Main Highway. Therefore, the valets are entirely responsible for the
added traffic onto William and Thomas Avenues because they are the only reason
that gate is left opened on busy Friday and Saturday nights.

IRONY ALERT: It
was actually the valets on Commodore Plaza [N] and not The Monstrosity
[A] that caused the mess on Charles Avenue which led to the neighbour
outrage. [Which is a distinction without a difference because all these
valet companies are owned by Falsetto and/or companies owned, in part,
by Falsetto.]

On December 12th there was a big event at the Cruz Building — the fake New
Orleans structure on Commodore Plaza [N] rumoured to have been built with cocaine money — and
the valets needed a place to park all those cars. Gino Falsetto
graciously lent the 2 residential lots across the street from the E.W.F.
Stirrup House that had been used for overflow parking for the last
year. They had been getting away with it for so long, but they finally overplayed their hand by trying to park that many cars at once.

And so
finally we come to how all of this leads the Not Now Silly Newsroom to
conclude that the Playhouse rehab is really the cultural Trojan horse to
build a huge, misshapen glass and steel parking structure — the kind Arquitectonica is best known for — with a 300-seat
auditorium attached.

An artist’s rendering of a massive development on Main Highway at Charles Avenue hiding a parking garage, possibly 2 theaters, and what could turn out to be condo-style residences for thespians and others who might eventually work in the theaters. A secret source tells me I can discount the rumour that there will be retail on the premises because it’s all State of Florida land, despite Miami-Dade County running all the backroom deals, and the charter prevents retail. However, that’s assuming a gift shop doesn’t count and the rules don’t change.

Another view of the arrows on the ground directing
traffic out to Charles Avenue. Picture was taken from
the approximate location of the unlocked gate [H].

To begin with all of the valet
parking machinations have proven 2 things: 1). Parking is the only thing
generating money at Charles and Main Highway; 2). There’s a growing
need for parking surrounding the Playhouse. [I don’t want to get too
deeply in the weeds, but there’s also a plan for nearby Ransom School to use
these parking lots for overflow.]

Second, it always
struck me as odd that the MPA was on the committee making decisions
about the future of the Playhouse. It had a place at the table by virtue
of [G], the parking lot it wrestled away from the squatting Paradise Parking.

I
was recently able to get my hands on the Notice to Professional
Consultants, the document that lays out the criteria to which anyone bidding on
the project should adhere [emphasis added]:

Providing
a master plan which may include both immediate and future development
based on the existing property’s historic designation, programming goals
for the facility, and the available funding. The components envisioned
for the site include a state of the art theater (target capacity:
300-600 seats), including all required front-of-house and back-of-house
spaces necessary for the successful operation of the theater, parking, and future compatible development that may address the need for additional parking, a second theater (target capacity 600-900 seats) and complementary site amenities such as retail, restaurants, etc.;

No
sooner had I acquired that document than Cultural Czar Michael Spring
announced that Arquitectonica won the bid. In an email to Javier
Gonzales, Chair of of the Coconut Grove Village Council, Spring put the
best shine on all the backroom machinations. One paragraph stuck out
[emphasis added]:

The
5-person CSC appointed by the Mayor to evaluate the teams included: the
Executive Director of the Black Archives (who has overseen the
renovation and expansion of the historic Lyric Theater in Overtown and
who currently serves as a member of the City of Miami’s Historic and
Environmental Preservation Board, and was its chair from 2007 to 2009); a
representative from FIU, the co-lessee of the Playhouse property (a
senior university executive who has expertise in finance and served on
the committee that negotiated the eventual contract with
Arquitectonica); the CEO of the City of Miami’s Parking Authority
(who will be involved in assessing the potential for a parking garage on
the site and who has extensive experience managing and improving
Gusman Center for the Performing Arts); the capital projects manager
from my department who will be the lead in managing the architectural
process (who has a background in architecture and extensive experience
in building and renovating theaters); and myself.

When I talk about backroom decisions, I am not talking about the selection process that just ended. I am talking about all the backroom decisions that were made before the process was set out for tender. Even
before any designs were considered Michael Spring downsized the
size of the theater from 1100 to 300, and added a possible second theater. The presence of the MPA assures there will be a giant parking structure on the property and the choosing of Arquitectonica,increases the likelihood that it will be some gigantic glass and steel structure that will look totally out of place viewed from the quiet residential neighbourhood marked [M] on the map.

And, I am willing to place a bet that when this new monstrosity is being argued in front of whatever baords are going to vet it, they will point to Gino Falsetto’s Monstrosity as the thing that opened the door to this kind of over-development at Main Highway and Charles Avenue and, OH, BY THE WAY, we just gotta solve the parking problem around the Coconut Grove Playhouse if it is ever to be taken seriously as a tourist destination for the kind of folks who have the kind of money it takes to live in Coconut Grove.

And that, dear readers, is why I believe the Coconut Grove Playhouse renovation is a Trojan horse for a big, huge, honking garage. I would love to be proven wrong.

Another rendering of a potential structure to replace, not renovate, the Coconut Grove Playhouse.

Save The Coconut Playhouse
is a Facebook group not affiliated with the Not Now Silly Newsroom. It
has far more detail about the backroom machinations of the current plan
to renovate and/or tear down the Coconut Grove Playhouse.

Please join if you care about historic preservation.

The Coconut Grove Playhouse Trojan Horse; Part I

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Some of the parking lots described in this post.
[See map legend below for matching location.]

Background: Looking south towards [C] the E.W.F. Stirrup
House, dwarfed by [A] The Monstrosity, aka Grove Gardens
Condominiums. Foreground: Looking across [F] The Blue
Star- Lite Drive-In and [E] the 45 parking spaces leased from
the MPA for Valet Parking. Behind the fence at right are [D]
the two vacant residential lots used illegally for parking rich
folk. Immediate left: The back wall of the Coconut Grove
Playhouse, the Blue Star-Lite Drive-In screen, and some junk.

Events have been moving quickly this week. Just as I was finishing a blog post writing up a full year’s worth of research on the parking lots
surrounding the Coconut Grove Playhouse, Miami-Dade County selected Arquitectonica to restore/ renovate/raze the structure (depending on who you ask). That forced a drastic rewrite to what follows.

Get comfortable, kiddies, because this is a long one. It needs to be long so I can develop the thesis in the headline: “Why is the reno of the Coconut Grove Playhouse really a Trojan horse for a gigantic glass and steel parking garage with a small theater attached?” It’s a sprawling Michener-like story — so long I’ve had to chop it up into 2 parts — covering almost a century and a cast of characters that number in the tens. Like Michener, lets take a quick look at who you will be meeting:  

  1. First and foremost, E.W.F. Stirrup, one of Florida’s
    first Black millionaires, who had more to do with the creation
    of Coconut Grove and the building of West Grove than anyone else you can
    name. Almost with his own hands he built an entire, cohesive Black neighbourhood in the Jim Crow south that lasts to this day. His house and his legacy have been allowed to undergo Demolition
    by Neglect; 
  2.  Commodore Ralph Monroe, a contemporary of Stirrup’s whose house The Barnacle, only a few thousand feet away from Stirrup’s, is now a State Park [K] and polished within an inch of its life, for whom Commodore Plaza [N] is named, and who gets most of the credit for creating the early Coconut Grove;
  3. Aries Development in the Snidely Whiplash persona of Gino Falsetto, who built The Monstrosity that changed the entire character of West Grove, has allowed the  E.W.F. Stirrup House to go to wreck and ruin through nearly a decade of Demolition by Neglect, and who, through several of his valet and parking companies, is destroying the quiet enjoyment of his neighbours; 
  4. The [allegedly] corrupt Miami District 2 Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff, who refuses to answer any questions posed to him by this reporter and is now running his puppet wife for his seat, now that he’s been term-limited off the City of Miami Gravy Train; 
  5. Miami-Dade Cultural Czar Michael Spring, who recently defended the legitimate “cone of silence” during the Coconut Grove Playhouse selection process, but doesn’t mention any of the backroom deals and decisions that were made prior to starting the selection process and dropping the cone of silence; 
  6. Arquitectonica, chosen by Michael Spring’s selection committee to oversee the Coconut Grove Playhouse destruction, or renewal, depending on which side of the fence you sit;
  7. Luis Choter, of The Miami Parking Authority, who has likewise refused to answer the questions forwarded to him by [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff, despite his email to me of January 27th apologizing for his lack of attention and promising he will be “looking into all the concerns and responding accordingly within the next couple of days.”;
  8. Cameo appearances by Sharie Blanton, of [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff‘s office; Ron Nelson, of same; Arthur Noriega, CEO of the Miami Parking Authority; Alejandra Argudin, who does something or other with the MPA; and Rolando Tapanes, another MPA employee; all of whom are in the email’s CC: field dodging my questions;
  9. Entrepreneur Josh Frank and his Blue Star-Lite Drive-In; 
  10. Jeremy D. King, a media flack at Regions Bank’s HQ; 
  11. The Movers and Shakers of Coconut Grove, both now and then;
  12. 1920s architect John Irwin Bright who designed the Coconut Grove Playhouse; 
  13. Several valet companies with dozens of valets;
  14. A number of private parking companies;
  15. A number of different parking lots;
  16. And, neighbours both good and bad.

Let’s begin:

After a years research — and a lack of clear answers from the city of Miami — Not Now Silly concludes the small 300-seat theater being proposed as a replacement for the Coconut Grove Playhouse, is nothing more than a cultural Trojan Horse being used to sneak a huge parking structure onto the corner of Charles Avenue and Main Highway.

I started researching the parking problems around the Coconut Grove Playhouse a year ago as a natural outgrowth of my research on the E.W.F. Stirrup House and The Colour Line in West Grove. Six years ago, when I first started researching Ebenezer Woodbury Frankling Stirrup, I could have hardly imagined that his house, The Coconut Grove Playhouse and the Playhouse parking lot were interconnected in a very complicated ways, both now and historically.

The Bright Plan shows the proposed city hall and golf course,
with “Colored Town” moved to “the other side of the tracks.”

A QUICK HISTORY LESSON: Prior to the illegal annexation of Cocoanut [sic] Grove by Miami in 1925, the town’s monied interests — the Movers and Shakers — of The Grove envisioned turning the small, nascent tourist village into a big tourist destination. So they hired Philadelphia architect John Irwin Bright, who came up with The Bright Plan in 1921, the very first of an untold number of urban renewal plans for Coconut Grove over the years.

The Bright Plan called for a fancy hotel; a golf course across most of West Grove, from Main Highway to Douglas; and a city hall approximately where Cocowalk now is. A wide boulevard ran from city hall to Biscayne Bay with a reflecting pool down the middle. The entire Bright Plan was based on Mediterranean-style architecture and would have been beautiful. However, it never got built. The bottom fell out of the Florida real estate market almost before the ink on The Bright Plan had dried.

However, there was one item on the Bright Plan that eventually got built: The Coconut Grove Theater (now the Coconut Grove Playhouse) was erected in 1927 and was based on Bright Plan drawings, which is why the building has a faintly Mediterranean feel. It first showed movies, but was later converted to live theater before it closed in ignominious bankruptcy 2006.

This is just one rendering of a potential gigantic development on Main Highway.
Don’t be fooled. The facade will be a facsimile. There is no plan to save it.

Save The Coconut Playhouse is a Facebook group not affiliated with the Not Now Silly Newsroom. It has far more detail about the backroom machinations of the current plan to renovate and/or tear down the Coconut Grove Playhouse.

Please join if you care about historic preservation.

Another rendering of a potential glass and steel parking garage hiding a tiny theater..

Back in 1927 monied interests — the Movers and Shakers — got together to built the movie house to bring culture to Coconut Grove. However, before the theater could be built the land had to be acquired from E.W.F. Stirrup, by then one of the largest landholders in Coconut Grove. It’s still an open question whether Mr. Stirrup, who was Black, could even go into the movie theater just 200 feet from his front door. At the time movie theaters were heavily segregated. The Ace Theater, on Grand, was later built for the Black folk of West Grove.

Back in 1927 parking cars wasn’t a big issue, but there are times these days when it seems like the parking of cars is the only issue.

When Miami developers present plans for new buildings one of the first questions that needs answering is “Where’s the parking?” Providing adequate parking often seems more important than an eye-catching design or quality of life considerations. This is especially true of Coconut Grove, where residents are howling over the fact that Cars2Go and Citi Bike are taking up precious parking spaces in The Grove because parking for their precious cars is more important than taking a chance on new, alternative forms of transportation.

A year ago Miami-Dade Cultural Czar Michael Spring untangled the Gordian Knot of the Coconut Grove Playhouse in an attempt to revive and renovate it. In other words: Bring culture back to the corner of Main Highway and Charles Avenue.

And, that’s when today’s monied interests — our modern day Movers and Shakers — got involved to screw the taxpayers behind closed doors. 

The backroom Playhouse deal had many moving parts. One part of the deal was to give to Aries Development the former-Bicycle Shop [J on map below] and $15,000. This was done because Aries floated a loan [in an amount I’ve never been able to determine] to the former-Playhouse board before it went belly up. At the time Aries was given a lien on the Bicycle Shop as collateral. That’s not that unusual. What is unusual is that Paradise Parking (another tentacle of the rapacious developer Gino Falsetto, aka Aries Development) is said to have squatted on the Playhouse Parking lot in order to satisfy the loan.

In my exposé from last year, The Coconut Grove Playhouse Deal begins to Unfold, I speculated that a possible future use of the Bicycle Shop could be a restaurant:

[T]urning the Bicycle Shop into a restaurant makes sense because
that’s another cash business. Gino Falsetto [allegedly] learned how
lucrative restaurants can be when he (and his brothers) bankrupted four
of them in the Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, area. When the government
finally moved in to seize the assets (cash in the till and the cutlery,
essentially), Canadians lost an estimated $1,000,000.00 in unpaid taxes.
However, that’s chump change compared to what Falsetto’s investors
lost. That figure is estimated to be upwards of ten million dollars. And
then, next thing you know, Gino Falsetto has enough resources after his
business went bankrupt to buy his way into the hot Miami real estate
market.


Of course, it has to be said, that there are many honest and reputable
restaurant owners. In fact, the vast majority are. However, that doesn’t
mean that restaurant ownership has not been known as a source of illegal profit skimming. Just sayin’.


Speaking of cash businesses, that brings us to the Playhouse parking
lot. On March 1st the Miami Parking Authority (MPA) will take over
control of the Playhouse parking lot. On February 25th the new signage
was being erected. However, most of the old signs hadn’t been removed
yet.


Who had the parking concession until now?


Double Park, Paradise Parking, and Caribbean Parking. Bring Truth To Light
has written extensively about Gino Falsetto; his several various
partners in several various companies; Aries Development Group; shady
Coconut Grove real estate deals; and this particular parking lot. It’s worth quoting extensively: [Click the link to read more of this alleged nefariousness.]

How much money did these companies collect from parking fees in the
time it [allegedly] squatted on the Playhouse parking lot? Was it forced to
return any of that money to the MPA, or was it all just gravy on top of getting the Main Highway frontage, potentially worth millions? And, while I’m asking questions: How much money did these companies report on their income taxes for the years it allegedly squatted on the parking lot?

When I learned these parking companies may have been squatting on the
Playhouse Parking Lot for who-knows-how-long?, I began desultory research on the issue of parking in West Grove, but I had no real reason to write it all up into a post until December 12th.

The area surrounding the
Coconut Grove Playhouse
[Click map to enlarge]
LEGEND:


A). Grove Gardens Condominiums;
aka The Monstrosity;
B). Regions Bank;
C). The E.W.F. Stirrup House;
D). Zoned residential lots, used
for illegal parking;
E). Part of the 45 parking spaces
leased for Valet Parking;
F). Blue Star Drive In & remaining 45
spaces leased to Valet parking;
G). Playhouse Parking Lot
operated by the MPA;
H). Unlocked gate directing traffic
onto William and Thomas Streets
and location of arrow directing cars
to exit onto Charles Avenue;
I). Main entrance/exit for main
Playhouse parking lot;
J). The Bicycle Shop;
K). The Barnacle, now a State Park,
once belonged to Commodore Ralph
Monroe, a contemporary of E.W.F.
Stirrup;
L). Rich people in gated enclaves;
M). Far less well off people in West
Grove, which has remained
predominately Black and depressed
during the last 125 years;
N). Commodore Plaza, named after
Ralph Monroe, is lined with pricy
eateries and more expensive art
galleries, meant for people with
more disposable income than
those on the surrounding blocks.

Not Now Silly has often highlighted the Bad Neighbours on Charles Avenue. For a change of pace let me introduce you to a good neighbour.

Immediately west of the E.W.F. Stirrup House [C] lives Cynthia Hernandez, her husband, and their 2 children. I knew little about Cynthia’s credentials until a recent exchange of emails. That’s when I realized she is a Senior Research Associate, Instructor, & Director of Internship Programs, Research Institute on Social and Economic Policy, Center for Labor Research & Studies, at Florida International University. That’s a mouthful.

I first met Hernandez while photographing the Bicycle Shop for last year’s story. We started talking and, as always, I started pitching the history of the area, especially the E.W.F. Stirrup House. That’s when I learned she lived right next door to the Stirrup House, designated a historic site by the City of Miami, which hasn’t prevented it from undergoing nearly a decade of Demolition by Neglect.

Why is preserving the E.W.F. Stirrup House so important to the cultural history of Coconut Grove? Read: Happy Birthday Coconut Grove!!! Now Honour Your Past

Since then we’ve exchanged information on the house and Charles Avenue whenever I’m visiting. Hernandez couldn’t care any
more about what’s going on if she were an actual home owner. Unfortunately, she just
rents. One of the issues we’ve talked about extensively over the past year is the valet parking business that operates out of the Grove Gardens Residence Condominiums, aka The Monstrosity [A]. She feels her complaints about the additional valet car traffic on Charles Avenue have fallen onto deaf ears.

ANOTHER QUICK HISTORY LESSON: Across the street from the Stirrup House, are 2 residential lots [D] devoid of residences. They once had residences, of course: 2 cute little Conch-style houses. In the same complicated swap that gave Aries Development a 50-year lease on the Stirrup House, it acquired ownership of these 2 lots. The first thing Aries did was knock the houses down to use as a marshaling yard in order to build The Monstrosity in 2006.

The Monstrosity is the mixed-use, 5-storey condo complex, with 3
restaurants offering valet parking. While it fronts onto Main Highway,
it’s immediately behind the Stirrup House and dwarfs the modest 2-storey structure. While Zyscovich Architects did its best to design a building with a Key West/Bahamian feel, The Monstrosity looks totally out of place and out of scale when viewed from Charles Avenue, designated a Historic Roadway as the first street in Miami.

After these 2 lots were no longer needed to build The Monstrosity, they remained empty and poorly maintained. The property has been cited several times for a lack of upkeep, when the weeds were more than knee-high in some places. I have been told off the record, by someone in the know, that these two lots can NEVER be zoned for anything other than Single Family Residential use. However, the same thing was once said about the E.W.F. Stirrup House before the developer managed to get its zoning flipped to Commercial in anticipation of turning it into a Bed & Breakfast.

In mid-December I got an out-of-breath phone call from Hernandez about new parking shenanigans on Charles Avenue. While we had spoken many times over the last year, she had never phoned me before.

I took these pictures of residential lots [D] being used illegally for overflow
parking on November 8, 2014, long before the December kerfuffle. [There
are several cars parked to the right of this open gate which can’t be seen.]

Coconut Grove Village Council Chair Javier Gonzales may remember
me calling him that evening to suggest popping over to check it out for
himself; one of several times this reporter alerted him to this problem.

Hernandez’s concern was that the two residential lots across the street were ONCE AGAIN being illegally used as overflow
parking to the 45 spaces the valet parking companies rent from the Miami Parking Authority behind the Coconut
Grove Playhouse [E & F]. She described to me how there were some 40 cars parked on these residential lots, with the valets zipping cars in and out, and creating a traffic jam Charles Avenue, a residential street.

What made her even angrier was that when she called the police to complain she was told nothing could be done about it because — get this — the property owner had not complained. However, the property owner, through a complicated series of companies and familial relationships, also owns the valet parking outlets and the restaurants in The Monstrosity. He benefits financially by illegally parking cars on these residential lots. Why would he complain?

That’s when she called me. I told Hernandez to take pics and video. I also advised her to call the police back and ask, if they couldn’t do anything, would they at the very least make a written report so that there was proof a complaint had been made because previous complaints to the city fell upon deaf ears.

To their credit, after her second call Miami Police sent out a higher-up, who actually ordered the lots cleared. That took some 45 minutes and led to the 2nd traffic jam of the night on Charles Avenue.

I also advised Hernandez on a list of people she should send the pictures to come Monday morning, which she did. She then forwarded me the entire email chain generated by her complaint. That’s when I decided to collate my year’s worth of parking research for a Not Now Silly article. However, I needed some questions answered to adequately flesh out any such article. Consequently, I shot out an email to [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff asking 11 pointed questions in order to finish my article.

READ MORE . . . 

PART TWO of ‘The Coconut Grove Playhouse Trojan Horse quotes my email to [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff, his lack of adequate reply, and outlines why the Coconut Grove Playhouse is the Trojan horse for the gigantic Coconut Grove Parking Garage, coming soon to the corner of Main Highway and Charles Avenue.

Jammed For Time ► Unpacking The Writer

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Lately, it seems, I’ve spent more time in the car than writing.

Welcome, dear readers. Returnees know this as the regular post pulling back the curtain — AUNTY EM!!! AUNTY EM!!! — to reveal the work process of the prefrontal cortex of a writer’s brain.

My biggest problem is I have far more ideas for Not Now Silly articles than I have time to write. I also seem to have less time to write. F’rinstance, usually I start crafting Unpacking The Writer around the 15th of the month. Then, over the next 5-6 days I come back to it from time to time and add and subtract a paragraph here, or there. I don’t really work on it as much as let it evolve slowly. However, this month’s Unpacking The Writer will be started, and finished, on the same day. I’m jammed for time. That’s why I’m going to quote a long thing I already posted on the facebookery. You can skip right to it, if you are so inclined.

For those who are still with me: I continue to research one particular Coconut Grove story. As I collate my research and write up what’s already known, I’m still awaiting some replies to a few outstanding emails which now appear lost in the cyber spaces between here and there. I can’t imagine why [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff has yet to reply. I suppose it’s time to give him a gentle nudge that his constituents are still looking for answers.

Speaking of Sarnoff, his wife Teresa made it official: She’s running to replace him in District Two because he’s term-limited and they believe in political dynasties. She’s never shown an inkling for public office until recently. That’s when her [allegedly] corrupt husband realized they’d have to get off the government gravy train — and the fat skimmed off the gravy — once he had to go back to being just a simple country bumpkin lawyer.

Not Now Silly has never directly engaged in a political campaign before. However, this year the stakes are too great to just sit back and let events take their course. This is the year the Not Now Silly throws its editorial staff into the Miami District Two Commissioner race. Miami District Two is where West Grove sits, where The Colour Line exists, where Trolleygate and Soilgate are still unresolved issues. After 6 years of researching and writing about Coconut Grove, I can tell you without fear of contradiction that this community — also known as Black Grove — has gotten the short end of the stick for the last 125 years. That’s why the Newsroom is jumping into the fray.

To that end the Newsroom launched a page on the facebookery: ABT – Anybody But Teresa. The official position of this vast media enterprise is that even Rob Ford would be a better candidate for District Two than Teresa Sarnoff. Is it too early to put the “[allegedly] corrupt” in front of her name? Or, far too late?

Also running in District Two is Mike Simpson, a gent I’ve never met and am slowly learning about; Rosa Palomino, who helped host me on Miami After Dark to talk about the E.W.F. Stirrup House; and Grace Solares, which leads to a funny story.

Arriving at Grand Central Park at sunset,
after driving 35 miles in rush hour traffic.

Transferring into the 3rd person: It’s noted that Brad Knoefler*, owner of the nightclub that hosted the Official Solares Campaign Kickoff, railed against “elitist, exclusivist policies with closed door deals with our tax money.” Funny story about that. The Newsroom sent its head writer, Headly Westerfield, to the Official Solares Campaign Kickoff. He posted of this GIANT MEDIA FAIL on his facebookery, but it deserves further dissemination:

I have to say I am VERY unimpressed with the Grace Solares campaign for Commissioner in Miami’s District Two. I went to her OFFICIAL CAMPAIGN KICKOFF tonight. Here is my report:

I learned of the Grace Solares 2015 campaign kickoff from a posting
on Facebook. Since she’s a community activist, I thought I’d see what a
community activist sounds like on the campaign trail. I even sent a
facebook message to the campaign earlier in the day to say I’d be there.

I arrived about 20 minutes early and a guy introduced himself to me
(and I promptly forgot his name). I introduced myself back to him. He
asked if I had met Grace before. I said, “No, but the more important
question is. ‘Where’s the washroom?’ ”

Keep in mind I had just driven 35 miles on a tank of coffee.

After I took care of the important business I went to the back of the
campaign room (in the Grand Central nightclub), set up my camera and
tripod and sat down to wait.

A guy came up to me and asked if I was taking video or stills.

“Stills, but what difference would it make?”

“None, but I’m the tech and need to know.”

Well, that made absolutely no sense at all. But, surprisingly, it made far more sense than what followed.

Right at the stroke of 6PM a very large security guard came up to me
and asked to see my invitation. This is our approximate conversation:

“An invitation?”

“Yes, this is an invitation only event.”

“I read about it on facebook. It was announced on facebook. How is it invitation only?

“I don’t know, but you need an invitation.”

“I’m with the media.”

“I don’t care. You need an invitation.”

“Okay. Just give me a minute to pack up my stuff.”

“No problem.”

So, as I’m packing up my stuff I keep talking to him. “Look, I drove 35
miles to get here to cover this. Is there someone I can talk to?”

“You can talk to anybody you want…after you leave.”

“How is that going to help me? I just want to talk to someone from the campaign.”

“You can talk to them outside.”

I got all my stuff packed up and picked up my knapsack to leave when
another, even bigger, security guard showed up and blocked my way. He
leaned over and whispered something in the first security guard’s ear.

That’s when the first security guard said to me, “It’s okay. You can stay.”

“I can stay?”

“Yes, you can stay.”

“Without an invite?”

“Without an invite.”

“Can you tell me who threw me out and then who changed their mind and allowed me to stay?”

Driving home alone <sad trombone> I noted that I could have paid $10.50 to zip along
the Express Lanes, However, I was stuck in bumper-to-bumper, stop-and-go traffic. That’s
why it took me more than 2 hours to get home. <sadder trombone> I had all that extra time
to think and I couldn’t help but wonder if this kind of disparity between the haves and
the have nots is something a community activist like Grave Solares might talk about.

He smiled a big shit-eating grin and said, “You know I can’t tell you that.” Then he left me alone.

So . . . I set up my tripod all over again and put the camera back on
it and waited. As I waited I realized that this was going to be,
essentially, a cocktail party and Grace Solares would be moving around
the room, glad-handing her backers. I presumed she’d give some remarks
at the end. So, I settled in for the long, boring wait to hear her
speechifying.

After about 20 minutes another guy came up to
me. He was dressed in a sports jacket and was one of the few people
already there when I arrived, so I suspected he was with the Solares
campaign. He said HELLO and then asked, “Who are you and who are you
with?” There was an edge to his question that rubbed me the wrong way.

Normally “Who are you and who are you with?” is a perfectly legitimate
question under these circumstances. However, what I had just gone
through with the security guard already had me on edge.

So I said, “Who’s wants to know?”

He said, “The guy who’s asking you who you are and who you’re with!”

I stood up and started to take apart my tripod all over again.

“I’m the guy who is leaving right now.”

And, I walked out without meeting the candiate, without hearing her
speech, without learning what makes her qualified for running for
Commissioner in District Two.

Here’s the punchline: As I left
the building the first security guard was outside, checking people as
they came in. A couple arrived and the guard said, “For the
Commissioner?” They said, “Yes” and the guard ushered them right in
WITHOUT ASKING FOR THEIR INVITATION.

So, while I’m telling people I was thrown out of Grace Solares’ campaign event, the gospel truth is I threw myself out.

While on the twin topics of Elections and The Facebookery, have i mentioned I’m running for political office? Join Westerfield/Lengyl 2016 and see what all the bribing is about.

Last facebook plug: Now that I’ve unilaterally declared victory in The Johnny Dollar Wars, I’m pondering a name-change for The Johnny Dollar Depreciation Society. Drop on over and let me know what suggestions you may have. I’ve been pondering variations of frases [see what I did there?] of words that all start with the letter “F” because of the alliteration of the Friday Fox Follies I write every … err … Friday for PoliticusUSA. May as well tie into that. I think they call that synergy these days, or is it vertical integration?

And, that’s how I can start a post and publish it on the very same day. See you next month, kids.

* It was not Brad Knoefler who approached me. I only know him from the pictures people sent to ask, “Whuzzit this guy?” Nor was it any of the other people whose pics were sent to me.

It’s All Nothing But Words ► Unpacking the Writer

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Hello again, dear readers. For newbies: Unpacking the Writer is the monthly series in which I expose some of the wrinkles of being a Writer for Hire.

I’m excited about a new (potential) series I started just this week. I almost called it “Pastoral Letters,” but opted to slot it under the ongoing rubric Unpacking My Detroit instead. Finding An Old Friend is an innocuous title for what could turn out to be an important exchange of ideas, especially for me as I grapple with my place in this world in my 6th decade. If it continues it could be far more revelatory than these monthly Unpacking the Writer episodes. While writing Finding An Old Friend I was conscious that in my head, where I do most of my living, the concept felt like Tuesdays With Morrie, the memoir by another Detroit writer, Mitch Alborn. However, the biggest difference is that Kenny and I are contemporaries. Other differences may reveal themselves.

I was also conscious of how we, as a society, have lost the art of letter writing. I’m no different or, maybe, I’m the worst. I’m terrible at answering letters and email. When I’m not writing the last thing I want to do is write, yannow, so I don’t. Taking coals to Newcastle. Busman’s holiday. Preaching to the choir, Kenny? Whatever you want to call it, it’s a bad habit I’ve developed in my life that has allowed old friends to slip out of the berth of my life.

I’ve already heard back from Pastor Kenny. He sent a one-liner to say that he will be more forthcoming with a reply suitable for publication. He did say my email made his day so I can’t wait to read his reply. And, while he included his phone number and asked me to call, I think I’ll wait for his response, so as not to taint his reply.

If you’re reading this, Kenny, I’m waiting.

It’s been a month of near-frantic writing as the Not Now Silly Newsroom makes its deadlines. Most of those deadlines are self-imposed and loosey-goosey. They can always be pushed off if needs be.

But not all deadlines are so fluid. Just before our last exciting episode Head Writer Headly Westerfield arranged a new leisure time activity for the Not Now Silly Newsroom. It has a hard deadline that can’t be pushed no matter how much of the staff has called in sick. Every week for the last 7, he’s had the entire news team pumping out a new edition of Friday Fox Follies for PoliticusUSA. They are meant to be funny and informative. Your mileage may vary.

The Friday Fox Follies are not the first articles by Westerfield published there. Detroit is the New Conservative Wet Dream and Why Florida’s Stand Your Ground Law Has Got To Go are more than a year old, but as true today as they were when written.

But, it’s not just been Friday Fox Follies keeping the Not Now Silly Newsroom busy.

As long time readers of Not Now Silly will attest, I have been trying to Save The E.W.F. Stirrup House from Demolition by Neglect ever since the first time I laid eyes upon it. After I learned the amazing history of the man who built the house, saving it became an obsession. It should be something other than a Bed and Breakfast for tourists to Coconut Grove. The legacy of E.W.F. Stirrup is too deep and rich for his house to become a commercial enterprise enriching a rapacious developer. It’s the oldest house on Charles Avenue, the oldest street in Miami, and the 2nd oldest house in Miami.

November 17, 2014 – What Demolition by Neglect looks like up close

I’ve been at this for several years without making any discernible progress. Worse yet, there’s been no discernible progress on the house in the entire time I’ve been documenting how it is has been undergoing Demolition by Neglect for nearly a decade at the hands of a rapacious developer. However, between times of research and activity, I get dejected. My campaign to Save the E.W.F. Stirrup House is limited only by my inability to to make my campaign go viral.

Recently, I was energized all over again when I learned there were FINALLY plans on file of the E.W.F. Stirrup House at the City of Miami’s Historical Preservation Office. It took a FOI request to get access at the file. Imagine my disappointment to discover these plans are totally inadequate for historical preservation.

However, having been energized, I wrote a number of posts this month about Coconut Grove, the E.W.F. Stirrup House and Infamous Rapacious Developers:

I have a brand new one coming under the “Bad Neighbour” banner, but this time it’s an entirely different neighbour. It may take another week, or so, to put that one together.

Earlier this week I showed up at the stroke of 8AM and spent
several hours on the public City of Miami computer system researching
several of the Coconut Grove threads I’ve been pulling at for the last
few years to see what can be pulled out of the official records.

Oddly enough, there is only one computer in the entire city
that a member of the public can use to research all the files,
documents, and PDFs collected by the City Clerk. It’s in the City
Clerk’s office, which seems like a very public place to do my very private research. How long before I bump into [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff while using the washroom?

Now that I have been able to read and absorb what I
collected on my 1st visit, my appetite has only been whetted for more. I
think the answers I seek are in that infernal machine somewhere. All I need to
do is stumble upon the right search terms.

Meanwhile, tonight I will be on Miami After Dark, AM880, talking about the E.W.F. Stirrup House and historic preservation. When the podcast is posted, I’ll share it with you all.

At one point I was thinking of this as the new logo. This animation
is merely a proof of concept. Had I not decided against it, I would
have also animated my face in the screen. Maybe I still should.

The other thing that’s still taking place behind the scenes is building the NEW, IMPROVED Not Now Silly Newsroom. With fingers crossed it will launch soon. My web designer in Northern Ireland and I have scheduled a weekly Skype meeting as the pace picks up. I’ve seen the templates and mock-ups. This week I locked in the menus and ordered up a few changes. Meanwhile, my graphic designer is working on a new logo. She’s responsible for the logo at the top of the page, based on an archival picture I found of a Depression Era camp.

This time I’m giving her far more leeway. All I’ve told her is that I prefer a serif font with NOT NOW SILLY on 1 line and NEWSROOM on the next, with both lines taking up an equal width. I have also said it should have gravitas, because this is a fucking newsroom, dammit!!! In order to pretend to be more serious I may also retire the 2 slogans “Home of the Steam Powered Word-0-Matic” and “Your Rest Stop on the Information Highway.” 

However, on second thought, I’m really thinking of keeping the second one.

That’s it. That’s all. See you next month with another exciting episode of Unpacking the Writer, brought to you by The Steam-Powered Word-0-Matic, the only machine of its kind on the innertubes.

The Steam-Powered Word-0-Matic is a labour intensive device, which takes 2 people to operate, but it’s worth it for my readers!!!

Marc D. Sarnoff ► Everything Old Is New Again

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I’ve managed (mainly) to avoid writing about [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff, except as it related to Trolleygate.

However, that doesn’t mean Sarnoff was totally off my radar. While I’ve been busy writing about things which interest me far more than a term-limited local politician, I still kept one eye on him, amazed at the crap he gets away with in plain sight. Therefore, I can’t help but wonder what he’s getting away with behind the scenes. Lately that has had a habit of sneaking out, mostly because he’s having trouble keeping his lies straight. You can’t tell one community group one thing and another community group the opposite and not expect them to compare notes. That’s why in so many recent off the record conversations the sentiment was expressed, “No one with the Sarnoff name will ever be elected to office again.”

Granted I was the one saying it, but only because I truly believe it.

I started researching this post, in a desultory manner, when the notice above came in through my electronic transom. “Oh!” I thought. “I really need to go to this to see if [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff says anything stupid or incriminating.”

I hadn’t forgotten how he used $200,000 of Astor Development’s money to bribe the folks at Ambrister Field to oppose the folks fighting to keep Sarnoff from shoving a polluting diesel trolley bus garage into their neighbourhood, contrary to zoning ordinances. I fantasized that Astor Development would be there to help Sarnoff cut the ribbon.  [At the time Armbrister Field was thought to be contaminated due to being right next door to Old Smokey, the incinerator.]

LONG STORY SHORT: In the end, after multiple lawsuits, the bus garage that got built BECAUSE of meddling by [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff will never be used as a bus garage. Now the dickering is over what adaptive use it can be converted to for the benefit of the neighbourhood and how much money Astor Development wants to get rid of this white elephant [pun intended]. The last figure I heard, that people are still laughing at, was $4,000,000.

ANOTHER LONG STORY SHORT: Sarnoff didn’t say anything stupid or incriminating at the Armbrister Field ribbon cutting and — amazingly — he didn’t even try to grab credit for all the renovations. While it amused me he pulled a muscle in the first inning of the Police vs Politicians softball game, it wasn’t enough to sustain a whole post. So I never wrote it up.

Even before the Armbrister Field ribbon cutting I had been thinking of Sarnoff because his name kept cropping up in the media on the issue of Soilgate. I joined a Facebook community group called Friends of Merrie Christmas Park, formed by Ken Russell who lives across the street from the park. Russell was blithely unaware he was living across the street from a toxic park until the park was suddenly closed. He was unaware a remediation plan had been put into effect until the bulldozers arrived. After he delved deeper into the city’s plan for
the toxic soil remediation, and found it wanting, Russell started to organize his neighbours.

Merrie Christmas Park is one of the Miami Parks — most of them in Coconut Grove — closed due to the discovery of toxic soil. The toxic soil comes from ash from Old Smokey, which was used as fill in the earliest days of Miami.

Are these parks merely the tip of the toxic iceberg?

Courtesy John Dolson

The dirty secret that almost nobody is talking about — concentrating on just the parks instead — is that toxic landfill from Old Smokey is scattered all over Miami.

Most of South Florida is built on fill of one sort or another. Keep in mind, just 100 years ago this entire region was little more than a swamp. Slowly, as infrastructure was added in the form of roads, railways, and bridges, vast swaths of land in between was still waterlogged. Digging the canals that crisscross South Florida helped drain the swamp and it also provided the earliest fill to build upon. However, it was never enough. Back in the day Old Smokey was simply giving it away. The du Ponts used approximately 100,000 tons of it to build their estate on St. Gaudens Road. 

What seems to have bothered Friends of Merrie Christmas Park most was the lack of public notification. Notification might have allowed them to have input into any eventual remediation plan. Or, at the very least, an understanding of the stakes before [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff cut all his backroom deals. Yet, as much as this fight is about toxic soil, it is also about property values. The decisions that Sarnoff shoved through city hall without public input forced Miami-Dade County to declare every home within a 1/4 mile radius a Brownfield site. No one knows for sure, but it’s estimated that having one’s home declared a Brownfield site devalues a property by 10% to 20%.

Once Sarnoff caught wind the Friends of Merrie Christmas Park was going to hold a neighbourhood meeting, he sprung into action!!! First he scheduled a Dog and Pony Show at Miami City Hall and then he crashed the neighbourhood meeting in Merrie Christmas Park to obfuscate. Watch:


Video courtesy Al Crespo of The Crespogram Report
IRONY ALERT: It was the earlier lawsuit against
Sarnoff’s previous fiasco, Trolleygate, that uncovered a 2-year old memo
indicating Miami was already aware of poisoned parks, but buried the
results. [Pun intended.] This led to the testing of all the parks, which led to the
closure of 6 of them for remediation. The biggest parallel between Soilgate and Trolleygate is how all of those decisions were made in backrooms, without proper neighbourhood notifications.

In Trolleygate that led to all those lawsuits, which cost the city of Miami a bundle to defend. That was taxpayer money wasted by Marc D. Sarnoff, who was protecting the interests of an out-of-town developer building an out-of-town diesel bus garage, over the interests of his own constituents.

No lawsuits have been filed in Soilgate . . . yet, but it seems inevitable. And, every dollar spent on lawsuits can be blamed on [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff making decisions in backrooms, as opposed to under the light of Florida Sunshine Laws.

IRONY ALERT II: A Marc D. Sarnoff Dog and Pony Show should be trade-marked and patented. They all follow the same pattern. First Sarnoff ignores his constituents, making backroom deals without benefit of Florida’s Sunshine Laws. Once the taxpayers and his constituents have learned they were sold down the river, they start to agitate. If they agitate loud enough, Sarnoff spends taxpayer money to create a Dog and Pony Show and then calls a public meeting to sell the neighbours on the plan that’s already a fait accompli.

In other words: The Dog and Pony Show is the public meeting that MORE PROPERLY should have taken place before any decisions were made so that the stakeholders — the neighbours — the community — the taxpayers — his own constituents — understand the issues. However, Marc D. Sarnoff prefers people are kept in the dark until it’s too late.

As Miami New Times writer David Villano tells us in his groundbreaking story City Quietly Labels Toxic Parks “Brownfield Sites,” Limiting Neighborhood Input In Cleanup:

Ken Russell of the Friends of Merrie Christmas Park, is outraged that he and other nearby residents were not notified of the proposal to re-label the park as a Brownfield — a move he believes could greatly impact property values.

“It’s hard to believe they didn’t make an effort to tell anybody,” he says.

[…]

City officials say an ad publicizing the hearing was placed in three local publications — the Miami Times, the Daily Business Review, and Diario Las Americas.

You might be forgiven if you don’t understand this notice. In
fact, it’s what [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D.
Sarnoff was hoping. Image swiped from The Crespogram Report

How could the city say it notified the residents when no resident remembers being notified?  Al Crespo of The Crespogram Report, shows how this hocus pocus was performed. In a story called The Miami City Commission Will Always Try To Screw You In July, he reports the city did this by deliberately NOT naming the parks, just listing the various addresses:

Skimming through the agenda, or skimming through the notices published in the Public Notice section of Miami Times, The Daily Business Review and Diario Las Americas, one’s eyes could easily have slid over a bland notice listing a handful of addresses.

Further proof that this was intentionally done so as to minimize the ability of the residents living close to these parks to speak at the Public Hearing, was the failure of the City to post notices around these Park properties, thereby minimizing the possibility that the residents would find out and attend the Public Hearing.

A dollar to a donut says that all of this can be attributed to decisions and instructions issued by Commissioner Sarnoff to Assistant City Manager Alice Bravo.

Why Sarnoff?  First, because 4 of the 6 parks included in this agenda item are in his District, and secondly because he, along with Alice Bravo, his ever present sock puppet on all of these kinds of issues have been at the center of all issues and schemes dealing with how the city dealt with the discovery, testing and now with the clean up of the contamination in these parks.

Sarnoff again!!! He keeps turning up like a bad penny.

IRONY ALERT III:  The Marc D. Sarnoff Memorial Dog
Park, also known as Blanche Park, was also found to contain toxic soil.
This is ironic because Sarnoff not only lives across the street from the
park, but the park had been renovated SEVERAL times prior to the toxicity becoming known. One of those previous renovations was to take 2/3rd of the
park away from CHILDREN and letting it go to the dogs, literally, by turning it into a dog park.
Sarnoff has no children, but he does have dogs. And, he managed to ram a
dog park through across the street from his house, before anyone knew
what happened, children be damned.

IRONY ALERT IV: The Marc D. Sarnoff Memorial Dog Park is the only park closed because of toxic soil that has ALREADY been remediated and reopened. How about that? I’m sure it has nothing at all to do with the fact that [allegedly] corrupt Marc D. Sarnoff lives across the street.

However, and this is DAMNED important, it was closed, remediated, and reopened SEVERAL TIMES!!! What was wrong with the first remediation? What was wrong with the second remediation? What did all those children — and, okay, dogs, too — ingest in the various times the park was open before and between various remediations?

TRYING TO MAKE A VERY LONG STORY SHORT: What’s happened at Merrie Christmas Park since the latest Sarnoff Dog and Pony Show is almost a repeat of previous Sarnoff Comedy Capers. First he tries to set one neighbour off against another, by blaming the activists (who hired a lawyer to make sure their rights are not further abrogated by the meddling of Sarnoff) for the project being stalled. Once he saw which way the toxic wind was blowing, Sarnoff agreed to remove ALL the toxic soil, but only if the nearby residents would kick in a portion of the clean-up costs.

I need to repeat that because it’s so outrageous:

Marc D. Sarnoff thinks the residents should help pay the cost of removing the toxic soil that the City of Miami put in the park in the first place. 

Once the idea that residents pay for their own remediation was rightfully laughed at by all intelligent people, Sarnoff still got his way. In the end, an angel ponied up the private costs of removing the toxic soil. All that is know about this anonymous donor so far is that it is a male, he lives in Coral Gables, which is just on the other side of Le Jeune Road from Merrie Christmas Park, and has fond memories of playing in the park as a child.

However, the remediation appears to be stalled, despite several promises by Sarnoff that it would be cleaned up by now.

And, that’s just one park. 

There were 15 people at this meeting. Two were reporters. One
was a rep from the Coconut Grove Village Council. At least 2
live in other neighbourhoods.That leaves 11 concerned citizens.

SKIP AHEAD TO LAST SATURDAY: One of my sources sent me a notice of a Douglas Park Meeting on Clean-up and Re-Opening. Because the issues are virtually the same as those at Merrie Christmas Park, I thought I’d attend.

This meeting provided good news and bad news for [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff. First the good news: It was poorly attended. It was so poorly attended, Sarnoff didn’t even bother showing up, like he had the better-attended Merrie Christmas Park Meeting. The bad news? One of those that showed up was lawyer Michelle Niemeyer.

Niemeyer is the lawyer who has been advising and working with the Friends of Merrie Christmas Park. She’s managed to help them understand and negotiate the extremely complicated thicket of Miami, Miami-Date, Florida and U.S. environmental laws that go into effect once a neighbourhood has been designated a Brownfield site.

According to Niemeyer, the entire process for designating the 6 neighbourhoods around the toxic parks Brownfield sites was flawed from the get-go. The Brownfield designation was slapped on these neighbourhoods without the proper notification, no matter how many publications in which the city claims it was published. There are supposed to be public meetings before any decisions made and none were held.

Another concern expressed at the Douglas Park meeting was one I hadn’t heard before. Folks are not much happier with the artificial turf and rubber mulch the city proposes to use to cap, but not remove, the toxic soil. More and more communities are waking up to the dangers of artificial turf. The Poughkeepsie Journal is just one paper around the country reporting Fake Turf Poses Health Risk: 

Four of the constituent chemicals in these “tire crumbs” (or “tire mulch”) as they are called — arsenic, benzene, cadmium and nickel — are deemed carcinogens by the International Agency for Cancer Research. Others have been linked to skin, eye and respiratory irritation, kidney and liver problems, allergic reactions, nervous systems disorders and developmental delays.

While the risk came to light recently when a University of Washington women’s soccer coach began to think it might be more than a coincidence that two of her goalies were stricken with cancer, researchers have known about such potential links for years. A 2007 report by the Connecticut-based Environment & Human Health Inc. looked at several scientific studies and found definitive connections between various health problems and exposure to synthetic turf.

Environment & Human Health Inc. also reported that kids on playfields are likely to face similar risks as line workers in the rubber fabrication and reclamation industries, where they say health reports show the presence of multiple volatile organic hydrocarbons and other toxic elements in the air. “Studies at tire reclamation sites report leaching of similar sets of chemicals into the ground water,” says the group.

Yet, the city of Miami, is gung-ho on the use of artificial turf, such as they used for Armbrister Field.

When I went to the Armbrister Field Ribbon Cutting, I took note that the BRAND NEW artificial, rubberized cap over the children’s playground was already flaking. I was able to pick pieces of it up. Some of the small pieces are brightly coloured. I could easily see toddlers picking them up and putting them in their mouths, which is how toddlers sample their world.

HERE’S THE PUNCHLINE: Just as people were leaving the Douglas Park meeting someone passed out the flier at right, which looks almost exactly like the flier that called for a meeting on the toxic soil at Merrie Christmas Park.

Someone said, “Oh look. Sarnoff is holding another Dog and Pony Show.”

Someone else replied, “I hope he saved his script from the last one.”

And, this time, neither of those someones was me.

A Grand Day For Grand Avenue ► Gibson Plaza Groundbreaking

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Artist rendering: Grand Avenue and Gibson Plaza

A gala day on Grand in The Grove, for the Gibson groundbreaking. This mixed-use, residential-educational building is the first all-new affordable housing built in West Grove in almost 50 years.

Gibson Plaza has been in the planning stages for many years. However, it took a unique and unlikely group of partners to move this project forward, including the Theodore Roosevelt Gibson Memorial Fund, the Coconut Grove Collaborative Development Corporation, Miami-Dade College and the Mitchel Wolfson, Sr. Foundation. Miami-Dade County kicked in $9 million dollars, and Pinnacle Housing Group will construct the Bahamian-styled building that pays homage to West Grove’s original inhabitants.

Thelma Gibson’s 1st shovelful at the project she helped spearhead

Gibson Plaza, named for Reverend Theodore R. Gibson and Thelma Gibson, will be geared to the 55-and-up demographic, with 56 one and two bedroom units. Among the common amenities will be an exercise room, community center, library and computer lab. However, what has the neighbourhood excited is what’s slated for the ground floor. It is dedicated to providing continuing education, job training and after school programs for the neighbourhood at large.

“It has always been a dream of ours to have affordable housing, continuing education and after-school programs for children running side by side,” the 88-year old Ms Gibson said.

Every speaker who came up to the dais to say a few words (under the white tent in the 89 degree heat) spoke of how this project will lead to a neighbourhood revitalization of a sorely neglected area of Miami. That’s why residents were so upset about Trolleygate when they learned about it. This is a neighbourhood struggling to overcome a century of racism and neglect.

While east Grand Avenue got revitalized with CocoWalk, restaurants, and fancy hotels, the west end of Grand — Black Grove, or Kebo, as the original Bahamian residents called it — has struggled and become blighted over the decades. The non-conforming diesel bus garage is just a few very short blocks away from this development. The reason people were so upset with the trolley garage is because it does not comport with the vision of those who want better for the neighbourhood. Gibson Plaza is the beginning of that revitalization plan.

The two people who came in for the most praise and sustained ovations at yesterday’s ceremony were the two people who everyone acknowledged deserved the most credit for seeing this project through to fruition. First and foremost is Thelma Gibson, who, though the Foundation named after her late husband, helped aquire the 1 acre site, parcel by parcel, and who insisted that any project of this kind simply had to have an educational componant; and Jihad Rashid. President of the Coconut Grove Collaborative Development Corporation, who worked tirelessly to bring all the partners to the table and see that they all understood the vision.

One of the politicians mentioned over and over, by speaker after speaker, is Miami-Dade Commissioner Xavier Suarez, who fought to get County Commissioners to allocate the $9 million. “On behalf of the Miami-Dade County Board of County Commissioners, and as Commissioner of Miami-Dade District 7, it gives me a great deal of pleasure to be associated with a project that I believe will spur the re-birth of the long neglected segment of our community – The Coconut Grove Village West.” Yet, that wasn’t just promotional bumf.

Thirty years ago Suarez helped set up the Gibson Memorial Fund and he’s been behind this project from the get-go.

How close is Trolleygate to Gibson Plaza?

IRONY ALERT: Another politician got short shrift in all the speeches. That’s just as well because [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff arrived 10 minutes late and missed the shovel photo-op. His West Grove constituents accuse him abandoning them for monied interests and out of town developers.

Further reading: Is Marc D. Sarnoff Corrupt
Or The Most Corrupt Miami Politician?

Last year when Trolleygate erupted in controversy, Sarnoff staged The Trolleygate Dog and Pony Show to protect the profits of Astor Development and Coral Gables against the interests of his own constituents. After Sarnoff insisted he couldn’t talk about Trolleygate because it was before the courts, he presented a one-sided slide show to insist diesel fumes and bus traffic on residential streets is perfectly safe. However, it’s what he did in the middle of the meeting that Sarnoff demonstrated his despicable side. At one point in this contentious meeting this reporter heard Sarnoff covertly threaten to withdraw support for Gibson Plaza (and other projects) if the community continued its fight against Trolleygate.It was slyly done, but was not lost on anyone in the room.

So, colour me thrilled that Sarnoff missed his photo op — another way to grab credit. Judging from the sotto voce murmurings when he gave his short speech, he’s lucky he wasn’t booed.

Even as the Collaborative’s Jihad Rashid celebrated
this achievement, he warned against gentrification.

The slogan on the banner in front of which every speaker spoke read CATALYZE • REVITALIZE • TRANSFORM, which is everyone’s hope for this stretch of Grand Avenue. Immediately across the street from Gibson Plaza is the Collaborative offices. Just to the east of that is the brand new KROMA Gallery, which hosted a lunch for attendees after all the speakers were finished.

While everyone hopes Gibson Plaza leads to a revitalization of the west end Grand Avenue, the fear is that this is just another step along the process of slow gentrification that has been eating its way into West Grove. Even Rashid recognizes the danger. As Nick Madigan in the Miami Herald notes:

After waiting for a standing ovation to die down, Rashid reminded the crowd that there had been a “history of disinvestment and disenfranchisement” in the West Grove, and remarked on the irony of expensive hotels and condominiums perfectly visible only a few blocks to the east. Rashid also cautioned against the danger that the neighborhood’s longtime residents will be pushed out by construction projects and investors looking for profits.

“If they get gentrified out in the name of progress, I don’t think that’s progress,” Rashid said. Still, he concluded, Gibson Plaza is a huge step forward.

Those in the know tell this reporter that due to property speculation along Grand Avenue, nothing less than 5 stories will pay for itself. Nothing taller than 5 stories is allowed by the Miami 21 Plan. This means that only 5-storey high condo buildings will be built along Grand, making it a new canyon for colonization and gentrification. Otherwise, West Grand will continue to undergo Demolition by Neglect, which passes for progress in West Grove. There appears to be no room left for anything in between.

View pictures of the groundbreaking in this Facebook album.
View raw footage at this YouTube Playlist.

Unpacking The Writer ► Unpacking The Readers

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If you’re relatively new to Not Now Silly, and/or my Unpacking The Writer series, let me hip you to one salient fact right now, so you don’t feel foolish from here on out: 

Long-time visitors are already clicking on every advert they can find on this page and the next. “Why?” you might ask. Go ahead. I’ll wait.

Where my readers are from and the browsers they use? Wait! China?

Ready? Because this is the series in which I ask — either subtly or blatantly (and this month I’m going with blatant) — for you to help me pay for some of the costs of this blog by clicking on an advert, or 10. Believe me when I say the pennies I get from your clicks don’t quite cover the storage costs for all the images I use. So, if you’re reading, this you should be clicking that. It’s only fair.

Meanwhile, as I was prepping this blog post I took a glance at the latest Not Now Silly statistics. The Blogger platform doesn’t give me a whole lot of info about my readers, which is why I go over the little I do get like a Vodou bokor divining over freshly-killed chicken entrails. One stat that I find eminently fascinating is what search terms caused visitors to take the off ramp to my rest stop on the information highway. I check it regularly looking for surprises. Here’s today’s chart of search terms:

Because this screen grab was taken early in the day, that’s the only search term that brought a reader to my doorstep so far. The search terms are always truncated to around 40 characters, so there are times I’m forced to infer what these people were looking for. While I’ve written about Bob Marley, I doubt this inquisitive person was looking for anything that I could supply. The same can be said for Researcher #6 on the weekly list [below] who got here twice — or there are two guys (gals?) out there searching for exactly the same stuff:

While I believe in giving my readers what they want, I simply can’t fulfill every request

Googalizer results for “free video sex gay
negro black blog.” Who knew there were
that many people looking for Black gay porn?

I’m baffled that that string of words would bring someone here, as opposed to other web sites, far more on topic, on much busier thoroughfares on the information highway. These people must be really drilling down deep into the search results because when I plugged “free video sex gay negro black blog” into the Googalizer, Not Now Silly didn’t pop up until Page 9. You’d think they would have been satiated at the end of page one, doncha? And, just imagine their disappointment when they arrive here. [It occurs to me that using the search term in this paragraph is sure to bring more puzzled visitors, which are my favourite kind. And, I’ve probably just ensured that Not Now Silly ranks higher than Page 9 from here on in on THAT search term.] 

People who are searching Not Now Silly for something very specific are represented in the chart’s #1 position above. The truncated string ‘“coconut grove playhouse” (site:blogspo”‘ indicates that someone was searching this particular site for a very specific specific term, 5 different times. I sure hope it wasn’t a libel lawyer.

Drilling down into the monthly results brings a few surprises:

The monthly stats is where [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff appears. That means someone has found there way here using that search term in the last month, but not within the last week. I hope it wasn’t a libel lawyer. That used to be a much more frequent search term, but I guess Sarnoff’s office got tired of checking. TO BE FAIR: I’ve not really written much about him lately. I wonder whether this mention will warrant a visit.

Meanwhile, the same Coconut Grove Playhouse search from the weekly chart is also on the monthly, which means it’s more than a week old, but less than a month. At the #1 position on that chart is my post on Josephine Baker, of which I am far more proud than all those times I poked the [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff with a stick.

However, the chart I always find the most interesting is the All Time results, tabulated since I launched Not Now Silly on April 19, 2012:

What I find most amazing about this last chart is that 258 people arrived at Not Now Silly by searching for one variation or another of Three Stooges. Who knew they were so popular? What I like about this list is that it’s fairly eclectic list of topics because Not Now Silly is a fairly eclectic blog.

Just a few more agenda items before I sign off on this exciting episode of Unpacking The Writer:

I totally underestimated how long it would take to kick Chapter Two of my book, Farce Au Pain,
into shape for publication. I am narrowing in on it and really hope to
publish it for you on March 1st. You may wish to reacquaint yourself by
heading on over to the front door of Farce Au Pain. If you haven’t read it yet, boy are you in for a treat.

There’s
been a slight bit of news on Trolleygate, which I hope to write about
within the next week. I’ve been reading some legal documents and I need
to interview a few people to make sure I’ve interpreted them correctly. I
also want to see if I can get official comment from: 1). The City of
Miami; 2). The City of Coral Gables; 3). Miami-Dade County; 4). Astor
Development; 5). Anyone else who will take my calls. This could be a
busy week on the phone.

I continue to research the E.W.F. Stirrup House. While I have discovered some interesting information, I’m still closing in on the real history I’ve been seeking. In the meantime, in an effort to get more people interested in saving the E.W.F. Stirrup House from Demolition by Neglect, I’ve fired up a facebookery called, appropriately enough, Save the E.W.F. Stirrup House. If you’re a facebooker, please join the group. It’s jam-packed with info about the Stirrup House, Coconut Grove, and other instances of Demolition by Neglect.

I read all your correspondence.

A big hat tip to JN & DO for your suggestions concerning Headlines Du Jour. You’ll note I incorporated both your ideas, but just not both at the same time, if that makes sense. Oh, and AG: Your idea would have taken the focus away from the Headlines Du Jour, so . . . Never mind. However, there may be another way to use that idea at Not Now Silly, so stay tuned.

I had hoped that this month I would be announcing my contributions to a local franchise of a respected country-wide web operation. However, I’m awaiting a response to my first contribution ordered up by the editor.

Back in the day, when I used to write regularly for magazines, the final draft was sent to my editor by First Class Mail. If I didn’t hear back for several weeks, it was understandable. However, in this cyber-universe in which we now live, I can shoot a 1,000,000 word article to the other side of the world faster than I can type that old saw about the swift brown fox. It’s just possible I’m being impatient. Either that or I’m just nostalgic for the old days when editors were collaborators in shaping the final product. I need to curb my enthusiasm, in case things don’t work out.

I have learned that they squeal the loudest when you make fun
of Loofah Lad, but The Falafel King would know all about that.

Additionally, lastly — and most gratefully — things have been relatively quiet on the cyber-bully front lately. The Flying Monkey Squad has not been as obsessively stalkerish this past month as usual. However, that doesn’t mean they’ve forgotten about me totally. They’ve only mentioned me enough to remind me to schedule some more timed tweets about them, not enough to warrant writing another full post about them. I’ll let all my previous posts about those psychotic miscreants stand for the time being. For the day to day hilarity, you could check The Johnny Dollar Depreciation Society over at facebook.

A clue for the clueless: If you ever did forget about me, I promise to stop writing about you. I would have thought you would have figured that out by now. And, I know whose reputation is being hurt by this continued feud and it’s not mine. Your move, Chicolinis.

Dear readers: If you’ve read this far without clicking on an advert by now, you’re a poopyhead.

An Open Letter To Miami Media

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The White Elephant completed and awaiting the end of lawsuits
I sent a variation of this letter to a local reporter. Because I worked on it for so long, and because every word I write is deserving of immortality, I am reprinting it here as an open letter in an amended form. Ahem. Testing . . . one . . . two . . . three . . . Ahem.

Dear Miami Media At Large:

Have I got a story for you. It’s a great story, one you can sink your teeth into and make your investigatory bones. It’s about waste and corruption within the City of Miami. I’d love to do it myself, but I’m just a little guy with a blog, yannow? I don’t have the resources you do, Miami Media, and I’ve been chasing this story for a year. 


I was alerted to Trolleygate right around this time last year, so I wrote “An Introduction to Trolleygate.” That’s when I really started
investigating this story. From the very beginning I
said the siting of the bus garage was, straight up, Institutional
Racism. It was not dissimilar to the racism that allowed West Grove to be gifted with Old Smokey all those decades ago. Therefore, it was heartening when
the USDOT agreed with me, which is the thrust of a recent Miami Herald article “How fed dollars for trolleys in Miami-Dade, local cities spurred civil rights investigation.” 

The article is correct, as far as it goes. However, it’s missing the entire point, as far as I’m concerned. It never asks:

“How did West Grove get stuck with
this white elephant in the first place?”

The deal between Astor Development and Coral Gables aside, there appears to have been a concerted effort within the City of Miami to get Astor’s dealie done with as little public input and awareness as possible. One of my off-the-record sources, an architect who has attended dozens of development meetings in several cities, tells me they’ve never seen a project approved so quickly in Miami. “A hot knife through butter” was the way it was described. Why? How? These are questions worth exploring, Miami Media.

From the very beginning of this project [allegedly] corrupt Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff seemed to be interested in making this happen on the QT, with as little muss and fuss as possible. Why? He allegedly helped Astor Development pit one West Grove community group off against another, which culminated in a huge lump sum of money ($250,000, apparently) being proffered by Astor Development for soil remediation of Armbrister Field. According to Miami Herald reporting, those people who were offered the money felt it was a bribe to get their approval for the maintenance garage, but considered it better than nothing if the garage was going to be built anyway. Why was Astor Development suddenly so magnanimous? How did Astor think to offer money to the community group in the first place? Who brokered this soil remediation deal with the community? Was Sarnoff a party to these negotiations? More questions you may wish to explore, Miami Media.

REMEMBER: This was before word broke that there was toxic soil all over Miami. What did Sarnoff know about toxic soil and when did he know it?

While those are all questions that need answers, Miami Media, there is one bigger question that might answer everything:

“Who is responsible for ignoring The Smoking
Gun email in the Miami Development Office?”

I wrote about this last September in “BLOCKBUSTER!!! The Trolleygate Smoking Gun Surfaces.” Follow the bouncing ball. To paraphrase my own reporting:

As the wheels were being greased to get this project through Miami City Hall quietly, Dakota Hendon — Miami Building and Zoning Department — noted something VERY inconvenient. The Astor/Coral Gables/West Grove trolley garage project they had been about to approve DID NOT comply with the Miami 21 Plan. Hendon should know. He helped write the Miami 21 plan. To that end he sent an email to Miami Planning Director Francisco Garcia [embedded here] to say this garage would be non-conforming because vehicle maintenance is an industrial use, which was prohibited on Douglas Road. [Not to mention that the Miami 21 Plan specifically prohibits things called “government operated vehicle maintenance facilities” on the Douglas Road corridor.]

At this point the City of Miami paper trail seems to go cold, except for one curious thing. Astor Development resubmitted its application to the City of Miami. This second, replacement, application was virtually identical to the first one, except this new one removed the word “maintenance” from the intended uses of the building.

Let’s be clear. The intended use of the building never changed. It was just a massaging of the wording on the original application once Hendon discovered there was a problem. And, on the basis of this amended application, the project was approved faster than “a hot knife through butter.”

The former Pan Am air clipper terminal has been restored beautifully
to become Miami City Hal. It’s where the alleged corruption now happens.

MORE QUESTIONS: Who told Astor to change its application? When Miami learned the project was non-conforming, why was the project not stopped dead in its trolley tracks? Why did Marc Sarnoff — only after the controversy erupted in the community — mount a Trolleygate Dog and Pony Show in a futile attempt to placate the West Grove community?

Where was the Miami Media at this laughable Town Hall Meeting? It was the kind of presentation that is usually given to taxpayers and stakeholders BEFORE a project is approved — in order to get it approved — not afterwards. Why was Sarnoff so concerned? Why was Sarnoff so involved? Why did Sarnoff spend taxpayers’ dollars to mount the Trolleygate Dog and Pony Show if it was already a done deal that couldn’t be changed? Who shepherded this project through the rough shoals at City Hall (to mix metaphors)? How did it get past goalkeepers Henden and Garcia? How much taxpayer money is now being spent by Coral Gables, Miami, and Miami-Dade to defend these [allegedly] corrupt backroom deals in the various legal forums that have erupted? (Astor pays its own freight, of course, and the West Grove community has been getting its legal services pro bono.) See, Miami Media, this story practically writes itself.

Miami Media, trust me on this one: You really won’t have much work to do in order to lay this entire fiasco at the feet of [allegedly] corrupt Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff. You’ll be hailed as a hero, too, because it will come right out of the blue. Sarnoff is rarely mentioned in stories about Trolleygate, despite the fact that he seemed to have his hands in almost every stage of this boondoggle in which Miami doesn’t even receive tax dollars, let alone a fake trolley stop.

Sarnoff’s interest in getting this disaster approved appears to have gone well beyond the basic fact that this polluting garage is in his district. Ask yourself this, Miami Media: If he was truly looking out for the interests of his constituents, Sarnoff could have interpreted every ambiguity in the zoning by-laws in favour of the West Grove community, as opposed to the OUT OF TOWN developer. However, Sarnoff said over and over at the Dog and Pony Show that his hands were tied because the project met all city standards, something we now know is not true.

If Sarnoff was truly looking out for the interests of his constituents, he would not have threatened them at the Dog and Pony Show. It was shocking to hear him casually claim that the West Grove lawsuit not only put in jeopardy the Arbrister Field bribe, but might cause him to withdraw HIS support for a redevelopment project currently in the planning stages for Grand Avenue. It was the most blatant example of Modern Day Colonialism I have ever witnessed. The naked political power dropped casually, as if he could not care less whether these projects go ahead, reminded me of Jim Crow. See, Miami Media? This story is really as old as the hills, if South Florida had any.

The Dog and Pony Show was my first contact with Sarnoff and I saw a bully in action. I’m surprised the Miami Media doesn’t write more about this aspect of his character, before he starts closing down the bridges in Miami.

The Marc D. Sarnoff Memorial Dog Park sculpture, which I have
nicknamed Marc. If Sarnoff had any empathy for children and
families he would not have allowed two-thirds of Blanche Park
to go to the dogs at the expense of a children’s playground.

And, just to put a fine point on this whole dealie: if Marc Sarnoff had any empathy for his constituents in West Grove, he would not have lined the back wall of the Dog and Pony Show with a largest police presence anyone can ever remember at a public meeting in Miami.

Could this be one of the [several] reasons my West Grove sources call him racist? Could this quiet racism be what allowed him to not even think about the residents of West Grove when approving this project, except on how to bamboozle them?

Would Marc D. Sarnoff have approved of this garage at, say, Shipping and Virginia, on the site of The Marc D. Sarnoff Memorial Dog Park, right next to The Marc D. Sarnoff Memorial Traffic Circle. Would he have pushed for this in any other residential neighbourhood outside of West Grove? Would it have gone through like “a hot knife through butter”?

So, you see, Miami Media, I think there are a lot of unanswered questions concerning Trolleygate, the least of which concerns the Department of Transportation’s objections concerning the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Which is ironic because Institutional Racism informs the whole project at every level, from the ground up. Ask this basic question, Miami Media, and spread out from here: Why was Astor Development able to find the cheapest land in West Grove?

So, there you have it, Miami Media. It’s a story of naked corruption and racism hiding in plain sight. It’s one you’ve pretty well been ignoring for a year. But, I’ve made it easy for you. I’ve wrapped the entire package with a pretty bow just for you. Start pulling at that ribbon, that leads to all these unanswered questions, you might just discover corruption at Miami City Hall. To paraphrase Captain Renault in Casablanca, “I’m shocked, shocked to find that corruption is going on at Miami City Hall.”

So, Miami Media, you may want to do your job and investigate these acute angles surrounding Trolleygate. And, let me remind you, Miami Media, reporters win Pullet Surprises writing about government corruption.

With all my love,
Headly Westerfield
[aka Aunty Em]

Looking Back ► Unpacking The Writer At The New Year

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From time to time I peel back the curtains — AUNTY EM!!! AUNTY EM!!! — and reveal what goes on behind the scenes here at Not Now Silly. The first day of the new year seems an appropriate time to sum up the previous one, doncha think?

Since starting this blog I have published 420 posts, 207 of them in 2013. When I started this blog I swore I’d post something every day. Little did I know how hard that would be. This past year I took a few weeks off here and there to recharge my batteries, research some bigger articles, and go on a road trip for research.

A year ago I was still doing regular Fox “News” snark with my 3 weekly series, Fox “News” Spin Cycle, Judge Not, and Chow Mein and Bolling. However, I got bored of those. Not to mention that compiling and formatting them was very time consuming. Which is the biggest reason I dropped ’em. I found meatier things to research and write about.

Such as Trolleygate. My first post on that topic came on January 27, 2013, with An Introduction to Trolleygate. I first learned of this story through a secret source, my Coconut Grove Deep Throat, who has tipped me to several stories now. However, I would never have won their trust had it not been for all my previous writing on Coconut Grove, and more specifically West Grove. When I learned of Trolleygate I called it racism, straight up:


As much as Coconut Grove is used to being ignored by Miami City Hall — which ironically is in Coconut Grove — Black Coconut Grove is used to being ignored by everybody. […]

Meanwhile, Black Coconut Grove gets stuck with all the negatives of a diesel bus garage from a neighbouring city. Furthermore, while it gets the increased traffic and pollution, the residents will not even get what is normally a benefit of a bus garage: a bus stop. Having a bus stop might allow Black Grove to get on the bus and ride to Merrick Park, or Miracle Mile, or any of those other swank places, including any multimillion dollar project by developers named Astor. It reminds me of how Robert Moses, who built the Long Island Expressway, purposely built all the underpasses too low to allow for buses. That’s so the ‘great unwashed’ couldn’t go to his beaches at Fire Island and Jones Beach.

Skip ahead to November: None other than the U.S. Department of Transportation confirmed what I had been saying all along. According to the US DOT, the lack of public notice and input contravenes the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It has ordered Coral Gables, the city of Miami and Miami-Dade County to come up with a plan for retroactive consultation with the affected communities. I don’t know how that’s going to work, but those three entities are going to submit a plan.

Meanwhile, just to wrap Trolleygate up in a nice bow: Coral Gables is currently suing Astor Development to get out of the deal it struck that resulted in Trolleygate in the first place. The residents of West Grove, who lost their first round in court, are planning to appeal. With the US DOT now involved it’s become one of the most confusing series of intertwined lawsuits that you can imagine.

Miami taxpayers owe it all to [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner Mark D. Sarnoff. Sarnoff seems to have skated away from all responsibility [so far] for sticking the city, county, and Coral Gables with this White Elephant that will never be a “government operated vehicle maintenance facility.” There’s still the Smoking Gun email that was discovered and people continue to investigate who was responsible for telling Astor Development to remove the word maintenance from its 2nd application to build this garage. Speculation says it leads directly to Sarnoff.

Bring on the depositions!!!

Another brag: As 2014 closed, Not Now Silly had its best month ever. The blog had 13,719 clicks in December, which is an average of 442.5 a day. That beats my previous record of 12,067 from August, 2013. I don’t know where all those people come from, but I wish they’d leave some comments. As you can see on the graph above, the monthly numbers go up and down, but I’m happy with the steady progression of onwards and upwards.

This is also the year I broke the lid off a Watergate story hidden in plain sight all these years. It began with my post Aunty Em Ericann’s Bun Fight With James Rosen of Fox “News” and continued with a review of Rosen’s book in Did Roger Ailes Dupe James Rosen, Or Did Rosen Dupe ‘Merka? To be BOTH “fair and balanced,” I also told the other side of the story with James Rosen Responds To Me, Sort Of and with the follow-up Serial Liar James Rosen Responds To Me Again. Long story short: I have rejected his explanations until he produces some evidence. My theory is on the table. He has yet to disprove it.

Another media bun fight I kept alive was versus the Coconut Grove Grapevine. I’m finally willing to admit that some of my feelings is sheer jealousy. Tom Falco gets advertising dollars for producing his reviews, event listings, and promotional bumph. While I have some Google averts here — AND CLICKING ON THEM WILL BE A GOOD THING! GO AHEAD — they produce pennies per post and my storage fees for the pics are higher than that. However, the other part of my frustration with the Grapevine is that it has a very large readership. Falco could be writing and/or researching and/or publishing news of importance to the people of Coconut Grove instead.

Mark Koldys during happier times

Sadly, I’m still fighting The Johnny Dollar Wars, a feud I never started and only kept alive by The Flying Monkey Squad.

Believe me, I would have ended it with Johnny Dollar Has Proven Himself To Be A Very Dangerous Person, posted 20 months ago. However, for reasons that only a psychiatrist and powerful psychotropic drugs would be able to determine, Mark Koldys and Ashley Graham (@JohnnyDollar01 and @Grayhammy on Twitter) have continued to cyber-bully me long after it made any real sense.

Dr Keith Ablow, whose motto is NORMAL OR NUTS, would have a field day with these wackos because they are still carry on this crazy
cyber conflict more than 3 years after they began it.

They latched onto me merely because I was a writer at NewsHounds — the motto of which is WE WATCH FOX SO YOU DON’T HAVE TO — and I refused to slink away like all the others they’ve cyber-bullied over the years.

Johnny Dollar’s site has a motto, too: CABLE NEWS TRUTH. I’m strill trying to get someone to explain what part of my alternative lifestyle came under that bullshit rubric.

I have a motto as well: READ THE TRUTH ABOUT JOHNNY DOLLAR. My last three J$ posts are, I believe, the ones that best sum up these crazy MoFos. If you’re going to read them, read them in this order: The Smoking Gun ► UPDATED! followed by Does Fox “News” Support Johnny Dollar? with Anatomy of a Cyber-Feud bringing up the rear.

To make a long story somewhat shorter: Nearly every day Mark Koldys and Ashley Graham spend hours on Twitter smearing me with lies and half-truths or having cute little circle jerks all about me.  The time they devote to it is legendary. Meanwhile, once a month I dash off a post about their mendacity that makes me laugh and, hopefully, entertains my readers. It seems to be working.

A moment in time: The All Time Top Ten with J$ at #8
with a bullet, and another J$ post bubbling under at 307 hits.

I’m building my reputation off Johnny Dollar’s back, one click at a
time, and it feels great. The first Mark Koldys post has recently
entered my All Time Top Ten and is moving up fast. [Check the current
All Time Top Tell in the column on the right.] The next highest is
bubbling under at 307 clicks. I’m content to continue writing about
Johnny Dollar, especially if it keeps getting those kinds of numbers.
The more people who read about Johnny Dollar the better, as far as I am
concerned.

You might have thought that some logic would have penetrated. You’d think they would have figured out by now whose brand is being tarnished by this silly Cyber War they started. Not Now Silly, as a brand new Rest Stop on the Information Highway™, had nowhere to go but up. J$’s reputation had nowhere to go but down. You really would think they’d stop already.

Last but not least: When I launched the serialization of my book Farce au Pain, I never anticipated how much work it would be to format the chapters in a way that pleased the eye and my exacting standards, especially within the limitations of the Blogger platform.

I thought I’d manage to post a chapter every month, but now it’s looking like every 45-60 days for me to get it all right. Here’s the way I figure it, to look at the glass as half full: If you are willing to wait that long for the next exciting episode after the cliffhanger, then I’m doing my job as a writer. If not, then I’m not sure it would have mattered had I posed the whole thing at once. But, we’ll never know, will we?

So . . . as we end this exciting episode of Unpacking The Writer, we have a brand new year to look forward to. Here’s to all the political muckraking, fights, and feuds to come in 2014!!!