As Gov.-elect Jeb Bush ponders whether Miami-Dade County Commissioner Natacha Millan merits a position in his administration, he may first want to make sure the state’s travel budget can afford her. Millan loves to visit faraway places, especially when somebody else is paying. In the past two years she’s taken…
Lead Stories *A November Associated Press dispatch described the work of commercial leech and maggot suppliers who sell to hospitals for medical treatments. A Welsh firm, Biopharm Ltd., moves about 20,000 three-inch-long leeches a year at seventeen dollars each to suck blood through delicate, clogged veins to restore circulation. A…
Place Date Cost Madrid, Spain October 20-27, 1996 $2000 Secaucus, NJ March 15-16, 1997 $566 Tampa, FL April 3, 1997 $134 Madrid, Seville, Spain April 11-22, 1997 $4300 Cascais, Portugal April 26-29, 1997 $600 Philadelphia, PA May 27, 1997 $150 Key West, FL May 28-29, 1997 $480 New York, NY…
Go Ahead Willy, Sell Out the City! Regarding Kirk Nielsen’s “Cloistering the Commodore” (December 17), perhaps the cash-strapped city commission and Commissioner Willy Gort are so short-sighted that they only consider tax dollars these days. Maybe Willy doesn’t get out anymore for fear of being harangued by his long-suffering constituents…
Call it trickle-down corruption. After years of watching politicians and senior county officials line their pockets — a few getting caught, most not — a group of low-level, rank-and-file county employees apparently decided it was their turn. New Times has learned that a ring of eight employees at Miami International…
Obviously a Stranger in Paradise Jay Cheshes’s “The Scary Side of Paradise” (December 3) was a great story. I was born in the Bahamas, so I found it very interesting, probably one of the best articles I’ve seen that describes the situation in Nassau. At the same time, it disturbed…
Lead Stories *The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation (Alberta, Canada) announced in November that this year’s single permit to hunt an Alberta big-horn sheep was won by Sherwin Scott of Phoenix, Arizona with a high bid of $405,000 (U.S.). The foundation will use the money for conservation. Scott said he was…
Lead Stories *Calgary, Alberta, construction worker Michael Pearse, age 22, an admitted hothead, pleaded guilty to making threats in 1996 while trying to find a friend’s ex-girlfriend, but at his sentencing hearing in November 1998 he claimed to be a gentle man and had the report of a government neuropsychologist…
Less than ten minutes after the county commission voted to pass the gay rights ordinance, a stunned Miriam Alonso rose from the dais, walked solemnly to her office, closed the door, and threw an old-fashioned, wall-rattling temper tantrum. She screamed. She ranted. She raved. According to several bystanders who walked…
Michael Band: When the Clouds Clear, He’ll Shine Brightly In his article “Prosecution Complex” (November 26), Tristram Korten referred to former Assistant State Attorney Michael Band as a “ruined prosecutor.” He is anything but. I have had the privilege of knowing Michael Band for nearly ten years, since my days…
Resnick: Excellent! With reference to Ted B. Kissell’s excellent article on Ed Resnick (“A Taste for Trouble,” November 19), I’d like to note for the record that although Ed and I parted ways over the Portofino issue, we are friends today. Over the years Ed provided intelligent, logical, and articulate…
No one may be happier to see this year come to a close than Calvin Grigsby. In January the San Francisco-based bond dealer and businessman was indicted by a federal grand jury for allegedly offering bribes to former county Commissioner James Burke for a piece of Miami-Dade’s lucrative bond business…
She’s crying now. Halfway through the story of how the principal and assistant principal at the school where she teaches threatened and harassed her after learning she was a lesbian, her voice cracks and she begins to sob. She tells me she has taught in the county’s public school system…
Lead Stories *According to an October Wall Street Journal profile, Randall C. Hutchens is one jailbird making a comfortable living behind bars as he serves out a two-year sentence for tax evasion. He files $5000 stockholder-fraud lawsuits in California small-claims courts and so far has received settlement checks in various…
Hiaasen? He’s Outta Here. Dave Barry is History. The City Desk Can Take a Hike. The Investigative Team is Toast. New York Times Subscription 1-800-631-2500 Anyone know if the Miami Herald employs the same accountants Wayne Huizenga used for the Marlins’ books when they were “losing” all that money? According…
When the Subject Is Castro, Bid Farewell to Rationality As usual it is New Times that provides us with two excellent pieces about how the Cuban issue is treated: Jacob Bernstein’s article describing how Bernardo Benes’s life was destroyed by so-called Cuban patriots (“Twice Exiled,” November 12) and Jim DeFede’s…
Lead Stories *In September a Tennessee appeals court rejected a woman’s challenge to a child custody ruling that she said endangers her twelve-year-old son. According to the court: “Record does not support finding that unsupervised visitation with husband puts child in danger. (T)here is not one whisper of anything improper…
Let the Light Shine on Miami’s Haitians Finally Haitians are being recognized for their strengths and candor. Kathy Glasgow’s article on Marleine Bastien (“The Catalyst,” November 5), shed positive light on Haitians who are often depicted as mindless, AIDS-infected, voodoo-practicing refugees. I can only hope that the blatant racism suffered…
Lead Stories *In October the New York Times reported on an emerging mental health condition called “uplift anxiety,” in which Prozac users who were uplifted by the drug grieve for their former selves because, in the words of a writer who has overcome depression: “The most fundamental aspect of yourself…
Last week voters in Colorado’s Second Congressional District elected a new representative to replace David Skaggs, a respected Democrat who is retiring after serving twelve years in the House of Representatives. Ordinarily the departure of a congressman whose district is more than 1500 miles away would pass without much notice…
Lead Story *A University of California professor’s request to see FBI records on Groucho Marx was granted in September. Included in the records were reports of Marx’s friendships with other liberal Hollywood types and public quotes by Marx critical of the United States, some obviously made just for laughs. Despite…
Free Weekly Throws Election! Evil Reigns! If Jeb Bush is elected governor on November 3, it will in large part be due to the lackluster performance of New Times during this election season. As readers will presumably have noticed, New Times deliberately chose to ignore Florida’s elections until the very…
