The paint has long dried on the victory signs declaring billionaire Norman Braman's success in his drive to recall Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Alvarez, and yet it's hard to discern any meaningful policy change that has occurred in Miami-Dade since then. So, it's not surprising that Braman is now threatening further recall efforts against sitting county commissioners.
"You have the same group of commissioners -- Commissioner [Joe] Martinez, Commissioner [Jose] 'Pepe' Diaz and some of the others -- that just do not want change," Braman said this morning on radio station WQBA according to Naked Politics. "They want to hold on to their power and not give the voters here, the people here, the type of change that's necessary, that we all voted for. They haven't learned."
"I would be very tempted to see if Commissioner Martinez and Commissioner Diaz are right as far as how they felt their voters feel about them," Braman continued. "There may be only one way to find out -- and that is to place a recall for some of them to find out exactly how the people in their districts feel about their performance."
Braman had originally toyed with the idea of recalling commissioners along with his effort to recall Alvarez. He ultimately dropped the idea, but it was taken up by the Miami Voice group, which collected enough signatures to eventually recall Natacha Seijas.
Braman also has been pushing change in the county charter, but the commission has only moved to put moderate changes before voters next January. Voters will be asked to limit commissioners to only two four-year terms with no outside employment while boosting their salary to more than $90,000 from the palty $6,000 they take home today.
