In April Vila, armed with two decades of experience in federal agencies, private corporations, and academia, made public her concerns. She maintains Padrón improperly appropriated public tax money for the Freedom Tower deal and then fired her after she had raised questions about it and other matters. "I do not follow the president's or anyone else's direction if doing so bends ethical or legal principles," she declared to the MDCC board of trustees in a six-page memo that also found its way to the press.
It is the latest episode of strife at one of the nation's biggest two-year institutes of higher learning, where administrators and faculty decry the secretive, autocratic manner in which Padrón rules but are afraid to speak for fear he will fire them. Vila says that after her departure from the college, Padrón sent an "emissary" asking her how much it would cost to keep her quiet. After she rejected the offer, Padrón sent another, who warned her she would never work in this town again.
Vila's troubles began last November. She began to question Padrón's strategy for buying the Freedom Tower, including the use of $9.5 million from a tax fund that was never supposed to be used for real estate. The president was going to move the money to the MDCC Foundation, the college's fundraising arm, where it would be redefined as a "private contribution." She also raised concerns about Padrón's decision to hire a lawyer who had worked for Mas Santos previously and was a close friend of an MDCC board member.
"My life became hell after that," Vila sighs.
The fund is called the Community Endowment and was created a decade ago with proceeds from a special county property tax. According to the 1992 voter referendum that authorized this fund, it was intended for "the maintenance, improvement, and expansion of occupational, vocational, and educational programs." Campaign literature and MDCC memoranda that circulated prior to the election specified the tax levy would not be used for the construction of buildings. After the ballot initiative passed, college lawyers reiterated throughout the Nineties that the endowment funds could not be used to construct or buy buildings.
But Padrón has been attempting to expand the meaning of "programs" since 1998. That year he tried to include "garage" as one of its definitions, because he wanted to use Community Endowment monies to build a parking facility at the Wolfson Campus in downtown Miami. That project never went forward because his legal department again told him the endowment couldn't be used for real estate. But last year, when the president learned that the Freedom Tower was for sale, he once more began to covet the endowment. The only things that stood in his way were eleven years of MDCC legal opinion and the meticulous attorney who was now his vice president for external affairs.
Vila thinks she also lost favor when she and college attorney Fleta Stamen informed Padrón the college may have illegally approved a no-bid $180,000 advertising contract with Zimmerman Partners Advertising. State law requires bids from at least two other companies.
In the end, the president called her to his office on March 13, informed her he was not renewing her one-year contract, and placed her on leave until it expires in July. "He had associate vice provost for human resources Bettie Thompson take me to my office," Vila says. "They would not even let me take my Palm Pilot, which I explained to them was my private property. They made me give them the key to my office, my phone, everything. They never allowed me to get another e-mail out of my computer." March 13 was also the day the chancellor of community colleges at the Florida Department of Education recommended that the state legislature match MDCC's $9.5 million. If the legislature approved, Padrón would be able to spend at least $19 million on the tower, his top real estate priority.
Vila's dismissal was not the end. She had resolved to move on rather than fight Padrón, but Vila changed her mind while reading an April 12 newspaper article. "The Herald did a story saying that the building was valued at between $25 and $27 million," she says. "My undergraduate degree is in math. So I said to myself, 'Aha, nine-point-five and nine-point-five, well, that's nineteen. And seven million that [House Speaker] Johnnie Byrd has put in the House for a special appropriation for the purchase of the Freedom Tower, that's 26. They're going to pay 26 million for this damn building!' And that's when I said, I've got to speak up."
Four days later she sent her six-page memo to the MDCC board of trustees. She was concerned that the college had misled the State of Florida, improperly transferred funds from the Community Endowment, and engaged in "questionable procedures in the real estate acquisition process," she wrote. "The president's response was to isolate me initially and eventually to not renew my contract. In less than six months I went from a bright star in the MDCC constellation to an obstacle to the president's plan to acquire the Freedom Tower."
And that was just for starters. On page four: "Fear and alienation are epidemic among administrators since all are on one-year renewable contracts. No one dares express even the most sincerely held views if these would be critical of the president's position."
Page six: "No organization in which I have worked has a less healthy organizational climate than [what] I witnessed at MDCC."
She fired off a similar letter to Senate President Jim King in Tallahassee, notifying him of her concerns. Something crazy was busting out again down in Miami.
Normally it would be a college's board of trustees who would rectify the situation, or preferably prevent it from becoming a statewide embarrassment. So far, MDCC's seven board members, all appointees of Gov. Jeb Bush and led by former U.S. Attorney Roberto Martinez, have rallied behind Padrón. Martinez was once Gov. Bush's general counsel.
Vila is not the only advocate of "good corporate governance" who has outed Padrón on the $9.5 million Community Endowment transfer, only the most visible. "You know, I'm Cuban too, but some of these guys, they run things like a banana republic," chides an angry MDCC accountant, referring to Padrón and the group of administrators and trustees who do his bidding. "It's like a small mafia." Despite the president's fearsome regime of tight administrative control, other staff members have "leaked" public records to help bolster Vila's cause.
Eduardo Padrón once loved Adis Vila, and she at least liked Padrón's idea of buying the Freedom Tower.
About a year ago, while Vila was contemplating leaving her home in Hollywood, Florida, for parts northward, Padrón caught wind of his Cuban compatriot's sterling résumé: a lawyer with an MBA in marketing and business policy from the University of Chicago, twenty years of executive experience at multinational companies, the State of Florida, and the federal government. He quickly wooed her to become his vice president for external affairs. The position put her in charge of government relations, resource development, cultural affairs, real estate acquisition, and the legal department at the nation's biggest community college. Padrón raved about her in a July 2002 press release: "Ms. Vila brings a wealth of leadership, management, and strategic alliance-building experiences to the College. Her tenure with the U.S. Departments of State, Commerce, and Agriculture, coupled with her career experiences with Nortel, Vigoro, and Nestle will no doubt serve her well as she carries out her responsibilities at the College."
Last November, on behalf of MDCC, Vila offered Mas Santos ten million dollars for the Freedom Tower. It was the college's top priority for alleviating what Padrón describes as "serious overcrowding" at the downtown campus. In a memo to the legal office she wrote that buyer and seller wanted it to remain "a beacon of hope for people everywhere." But she made clear that any deal would be contingent on the college's receipt of two independent appraisals, as required by state law. At the time she did not imagine that Padrón would use the Community Endowment, given its legal history. But she soon had qualms about something else. One was that Padrón had hired Rene Murai, a private real estate lawyer, to negotiate the Freedom Tower deal. "We had plenty of legal experience, four lawyers in house, to do this," Vila says. Moreover, she thought Murai's prior work for the Mas family posed a possible conflict of interest. "I didn't think that had the appearance of propriety," she asserts. "And I thought that it would lead to issues of whether he was doing the most diligent negotiation on behalf of the college. Even if he were, my thought was the appearance alone would make it questionable."
Vila aired these concerns at a December 18 meeting of the MDCC board of trustees' real estate committee. (According to MDCC memos and employees, this 4:00 p.m. public meeting was advertised four days in advance, not seven as required by state law.) The panel consists of two of the board's seven trustees: real estate lawyer Armando Bucelo and Hank Klein, head of the commercial brokerage division at the Codina Group. (Jeb Bush was a Codina partner before becoming governor.) Others at the meeting, which was held at Bucelo's law office in Coral Gables, included Padrón, vice provost for facilities Chris Moran, legislative analyst Maggie Manrara, and college attorney Fleta Stamen, who reported to Vila. Murai was also present.
"They were talking about paying three million more dollars than what the tower was worth to get a kickback for the [MDCC] Foundation. So in other words the idea was that the Mas family -- let's say we paid 18 million [dollars] -- would then turn around and give a three-million-dollar gift to the foundation," Vila recounts. "At that meeting, in front of all those people, I said that that was inappropriate, that as stewards of state funds we had to be very careful how we had to use funds and that we could pay only what that building was worth." Sources who attended the meeting say Manrara and Stamen expressed support for her concerns. (Manrara and Stamen declined or did not respond to requests for interviews.)
Vila had thought it was also part of her job description to question Padrón's instructions that Murai be paid his regular rate, which was more than what Vila had instituted. "I had spoken to Rene Murai and told him we paid outside lawyers $175 an hour. He turned around and called the chairman of the board, who then called the president, who then called me and told me to pay him whatever his billing rate was. I explained to the president that that posed problems because he had directed me to save money and here we were doing just the opposite."
Vila and Murai agree that the use of Community Endowment funds for the Freedom Tower did not come up at the meeting. But Murai insists Vila did not raise the matter of his past work for Mas Santos. "That she never raised with me at the meeting," he says. Murai says he couldn't understand why Vila would make an issue out of it and suggests that perhaps she had been a "government lawyer" too long.
Klein, the MDCC board vice-chairman, couldn't recall if Murai's work for the Mas family came up at the meeting, but asserted "that's not an issue," when New Times caught him on his cell phone. "Things like that happen all the time. He had done work for them previously, and it had nothing to do with this transaction. Rene Murai is an excellent lawyer, very well respected."
Murai also acknowledged two of Vila's claims: Yes, he is "very good friends" with MDCC board chairman Roberto Martinez; and yes, he represented Jorge Mas Santos in a real estate sale two years ago. But Murai said he doesn't believe any of those facts raised ethical concerns. He had "no opinion" regarding the use of Community Endowment funds for the Freedom Tower. (Martinez and Padrón did not respond to requests for comment.)
This past January 30 Padrón issued an e-mail decree to the board notifying them that in order to get a matching state grant for real estate purchases, he was moving $9.1 million in Community Endowment funds to the MDCC Foundation. Without the transfer the foundation would have had only $63,000 in "unrestricted" money it could put up for matching grants for buildings, according to college documents.
The transfer took place on the morning of January 31, but it was in the amount of $9.5 million. It caught Vila and the MDCC legal affairs office by surprise. "You would think that a transfer of this size, given that it may be controversial, would have been discussed openly in a board meeting of the trustees of the college," she offers. "It wasn't at all."
What made Padrón do it? "He was always trying to find ways to participate in the facilities matching [grant program]," reveals one MDCC administrator who insisted on anonymity out of fear of being fired. "We have always had the Community Endowment and he had never done it before. So, the only thing different this year from other years was ... the Freedom Tower."
Padrón responded to Vila's six-page memo to the MDCC board and the similar letter to Florida senate leader King with a thirteen-pager. The president backed it up with an inch-and-a-half pile of documents including e-mails, board meeting minutes, and other items regarding the Community Endowment. The memo was addressed to: "All Interested Parties."
All except Adis Vila. She was extremely interested, but had to get a copy covertly from one of her ex-MDCC colleagues.
Padrón's response was as unconvincing as the back-up materials were thick. Most of the documents in it seem to support Vila's position. His narrative had two basic themes: Vila's statements were "categorically" false; and transferring $9.5 million in Community Endowment tax funds into a "private contribution" held by the MDCC Foundation was clean as a whistle. In it Padrón refers to Vila as "the Administrator."
"It would be easy to simply deny and dismiss the Administrator's recent allegations as the baseless complaints of an employee disgruntled after being advised her annual contract would not be renewed," Padrón wrote, then added paradoxically: "We will not do so." Instead, the president continued, he and his staff had begun to investigate Vila's allegations. He noted the inquiry was ongoing, then summarized the findings to date.
In his massive memo Padrón does not reveal what his motives for firing Vila were -- just what they weren't. "The Administrator stated that she raised concerns about a possible purchase of the Freedom Tower," the president continued. "She stated we ignored those concerns and terminated her for raising them. These statements are categorically untrue. The Administrator did not raise any concerns about the Freedom Tower with me while working at the College. She never raised any such concerns at the Board meetings she attended. The minutes of those meetings, all of which were public, reflect no concerns raised by her." In his back-up materials, he included a copy of those minutes, which Vila disputes because they reflect no concerns by her.
Padrón justified the hiring of Murai, saying the board has a "longstanding practice of engaging specialized legal counsel for complex transactions." Then he added: "The Administrator did not question or challenge Mr. Murai's ability to represent the College."
(At least one board member present at the December 18 meeting is less categorical. When New Times asked Hank Klein whether Vila's assertions were false, he declined to answer yes or no. "I don't want to get into all that," he replied, then refused to answer any more questions.)
Then Padrón attempts to bury Vila's contention that Community Endowment funds may not be used for real estate acquisitions. "I do not know of any other person who has reviewed the ballot language and read the pertinent documents and then reached a similar conclusion," the president added.
It might have been more precise to say "any other person besides several of my most senior administrators and former MDCC attorney Carol Zeiner." In a November 14, 2000, memo to the president regarding the use of Community Endowment monies, Zeiner wrote: "You have posed the following question: Whether the interest or other earnings from the Referendum can be used for capital expenditures, such as the construction of buildings, purchasing land, etc.... Using earnings from the Community Endowment Fund for such purposes would not be appropriate," she wrote. "Summary Answer: No."
Campaign literature circulated by Friends of Miami-Dade Community College at the time of the referendum assure voters that the money will not be used for new buildings. A January 9, 1992 memo from then-MDCC president Bob McCabe to "All Miami-Dade Employees" states that the proceeds would go "for college operations rather than construction of facilities."
The odd thing is that Padrón included Zeiner's memo in his inch-thick binder. But he preferred an earlier memo of hers from 1998 in which she states, "It is not clear as to whether the money can be used for constructing buildings." He craftily adds that Zeiner "reached a similar conclusion" in her November 14, 2000, memo, even though she hadn't.
Padrón's packet did not include one important document, obtained by New Times, showing that as recently as January of last year vice provost of business affairs E.H. Levering still deemed the Community Endowment off-limits for real estate purchases and "stipulated for operating use only." Nor does the president explain the process by which this stipulation disappeared a year later without Vila's or the college attorney's knowledge.
Padrón's missive does contain evidence, however, that at 4:42 p.m. on Thursday, January 30, he e-mailed the seven MDCC board members informing them he was seeking a state matching grant to buy the Freedom Tower. He refreshed their memories of the Community Endowment, but left out those complicated details about what the money can be used for. "As you know we have a fund which was created as a result of a public, local referendum and has been invested wisely, thus providing a yearly stream of dollars to support our annual budget." He noted that the 2002-03 budget, which the board members approved, includes a "draw" of $9.1 from the endowment. "I feel we are in a position to allocate the entire amount for matching purposes and receive the benefit of an equal amount from the state matching funds."
Padrón then alerted the board members the application deadline for state matching funds was just three days away. He gave them 24 hours to reply. "I am excited with this opportunity," he concluded, "and I'm proceeding to apply for the funds unless I hear objection from you."
Peter Roulhac e-mailed back twenty minutes later: "No objections from me, Eduardo! Go for it." Martinez echoed that sentiment at 5:30 p.m.: "Absolutely. I AGREE WITH YOUR RECOMMENDATION." Carolina Calderin sent her reply later that evening: "Go Fo it."[sic] By the time Helen Aguirre Ferre's e-mail response arrived the next morning, $9.5 million had already been transferred to the foundation. An MDCC document surreptitiously supplied to New Times indicates the transfer took place seven minutes before Ferre's note came in. "Thank goodness SOME good news is coming from Tallahassee! Please proceed," Ferre wrote.
Padrón did not provide e-mails from the three other trustees, Hank Klein, Armando Bucelo, and Denise Mincey-Mills. Klein and Bucelo told New Times they had no concerns about any decisions Padrón made regarding the Freedom Tower deal. At press time, Mincey-Mills had not commented.
Levering underwent a conversion. On February 14, unbeknownst to Vila, he fired off a letter to the Florida Department of Education's Division of Community Colleges, assuring them "usage of these [Community Endowment] funds for capital facilities ... appears to be met by the original referendum language."
Vila and others were livid. "The bottom line is it has always been, since the tax referendum, that those funds can only be used for operating expenses," says the anonymous angry accountant. "E.H. Levering knows." (As of press time, Levering did not respond to requests for comment.)
According to Padrón's narrative, in March he reported back to his board members with good news and bad news. Regrettably, a $3.8 million request to help launch his dream of a four-year bachelor's degree program didn't make it into either the House or Senate budget proposals. "On the bright side, however, MDCC's request for $9.5 million in matching funds for facilities enhancement has been recommended," he enthused. Curiously, he did not mention a separate request entered into the House budget by Speaker Johnnie Byrd, for an additional seven million dollars to help MDCC buy the Freedom Tower.
Padrón also omitted two documents indicating some of MDCC's most seasoned administrators had sided with Vila. One is a memo dated March 20, 2003, from college attorney Fleta Stamen to provost for operations Kathie Sigler. "No data could be located that specifically authorizes the college to use the Endowment Fund for capital improvements (i.e. buildings, facilities, property purchases, etc.)," Stamen wrote. Her memo also reveals that she had been kept out of the loop regarding Padrón's decision to transfer the $9.5 million. "Our office has not been involved in the transaction and is not familiar with the details," she wrote.
MDCC sources provided New Times with a copy of an April 22 e-mail to Levering from his predecessor in that position, Maggie Manrara, a CPA who has worked at the college for nearly twenty years. Manrara's e-mail concerned their efforts to gather documents for a public records request regarding "Use of funds from the Community Endowment." In 2000, "the college attorney [i.e. Zeiner] ruled that the earnings could not be used for facilities acquisition," Manrara reminded Levering.
But a decade of in-house legal opinion had suddenly become moot. Padrón was ruling by fiat. "It is correct that the county resolution [establishing the Community Endowment] does not mention buildings. However, the county resolution also does not mention salary increases for employees; it does not mention computers, trucks, and the like," Padrón figured. And yet the endowment had been used to support these needs, he added. "It is my professional judgment that the use of these funds for facilities acquisition and enhancement is not only proper, but is absolutely necessary to the continued expansion of occupational, vocational, and educational programs here at MDCC." Thus it was decreed.
Officials at the Florida Department of Education had done their best to keep Padrón's Freedom Tower hope alive. On March 13, FLDOE's chancellor of community colleges, David Armstrong, had recommended that the legislature match the MDCC request in a letter to Senate President King. The chancellor noted that the department's general counsel "has advised us that the use of the funds from the county for matching ... meets the spirit and intent of the law." Then he deemed: "It is in the best interest of the state to recommend this project."
By mid-April, however, a growing number of Florida legislators and appropriations committee staffers were thinking perhaps it was not in theirs. They had been reading Vila's letter. "I am concerned the Senate would rely on the misrepresentations of the College, match the funds from the [Community] Endowment, funds restricted for operational purposes, and appropriate $9.5 million ... for the acquisition of the Freedom Tower," Vila proclaimed. "At a time when our state can barely meet the needs of its most vulnerable citizens and when MDCC students may be asked to pay higher tuition rates, it is reprehensible that $19 million would be made available to purchase the Freedom Tower." She noted that the Miami Herald article had provided "no basis" for the statement that estimated the building's market value between $25 and $27 million.
"It is unconscionable to prey on the meaning the Freedom Tower has for the people of this state by giving them a false sense of its market value," she chided.
Even the state DOE's general counsel, Syd McKenzie, is having second thoughts about the recommendation. "That's probably a local issue that ought to be resolved at the college," McKenzie surmised on his cell phone about two months after he had reviewed the MDCC proposal for the match. He had not known of the dispute at the time. "We've been aware of it since then. As has everybody," he admits with a chuckle. "We assume that what comes to us is accurate."
But Jeb Bush's chancellor of community colleges is holding firm. "They've met my criteria," Armstrong says of MDCC's matching grant applicants, then in the same breath acknowledges there are "local things" that need to be worked out. "If the college tells us that they're going to use the funds for legal purposes, which they did, and if they tell us that it comes from a source of funds that the state government allows ... for matching purposes, that's my only role."
Armstrong says he has "no idea" whether the Freedom Tower is a sensible purchase for MDCC. "I don't get into that level of detail," he explains. "We review how much space the college needs and then it's their job to use their local flexibility to find what the best bang for their buck is." But he expressed great confidence in the president and his trustees: "They have no motivation other than to try to find space to accommodate students, and I trust that the board and Dr. Padrón are doing their best to do that."
Unfortunately some folks at the college are less trusting. "That son of a bitch. He's fucking with the wrong people," the MDCC accountant declares. "Why does he have to do that?" he asks plaintively, referring to the transfer of taxpayers' money. Then he answers himself: "Greed."
In the end the Freedom Tower deal and the matching grant became academic. The legislature's final budget for the new fiscal year contained no matching grants for MDCC or any other community college for real estate. The seven-million-dollar proposal also failed. But the $9.5 million remains real, as does the question of what Padrón and the MDCC Foundation will do with it. Perhaps a public referendum is in order on whether it should return to the college's Community Endowment fund. (As of press time the college's next board of trustees meeting was scheduled for 8:00 a.m. Tuesday, June 24, at the downtown campus.)
Vila now wonders if Padrón monkeyed with the minutes of the December 18 meeting. None had been distributed by the time Padrón fired Vila on March 13, she and other administrators maintain. "I never received a copy of those minutes to see if I was in agreement with what transpired. None of the issues that I raised are summarized in these minutes," she observes, referring to the Murai hire and the idea of inflating the sale price of the Freedom Tower in exchange for a "kickback" donation to the college foundation. Vila first saw the minutes in Padrón's rebuttal to "all interested parties" a month and a half after she was fired and four months after the meeting took place. She suspects Padrón wrote the minutes after he fired her, to support his portrayal of her as a disgruntled employee who was now making things up.
Padrón contends that Vila's issues aren't in the minutes because she didn't raise them at the meeting. It was not taped, so all that officially remains of the two-hour meeting is one scant page of minutes. New Times requested documents to clarify how and when the minutes were written. MDCC issued this response: "Dr. Eduardo Padrón is the Secretary to the Board for these special meetings. As such, Dr. Padrón took handwritten notes at this meeting, from which the ... minutes were produced. Following the production and personal proofreading of the minutes, Dr. Padrón discarded his notes." The college failed to establish an approximate date that the minutes were produced.
There are also allegations that the minutes of a February 13 meeting of MDCC's investment advisory committee were falsified. The committee oversees the investment and use of the Community Endowment funds. The problem arose when committee members learned about the February 14 letter E.H. Levering wrote to the FLDOE's Division of Community Colleges. In it Levering declares that at its February 13 meeting the investment committee had "ratified" the transfer of the $9.5 million from the Community Endowment to the foundation. Padrón reiterated the statement in his April 28 chronicle to all interested parties. Padrón also backs it up with a copy of the minutes, which state, "the Committee ratified this action."
But the investment advisory committee did no such thing, according to Juan Galan, one of its members. It was another case of mysteriously appearing minutes. "Dr. Padrón, in responding to Miss Vila's letter, included the minutes of the February 13 meeting at a point in time when none of us [on the investment advisory committee] had ever reviewed them nor had we even approved them," Galan says. "There's been a lot of, should I say, unusual governance procedures," he added. Last month, the advisory committee asked Padrón and Levering to notify "all appropriate (and interested) parties, including the Division of Community Colleges" that the panel had not ratified the $9.5 million transfer.
The Padrón-Vila fight has just begun. Jesse Alvarez, Padrón's vice provost for employee development and quality enhancement, warned Vila in an April 28 letter: "Your allegations are malicious, false, and damaging to the College and Trustees, as well as to the College President and his staff." Alvarez also mentioned that although Padrón had opted not to renew her annual contract when it expires at the end of June, she was still "required to continue to perform the assigned duties and responsibilities prescribed by the board." All of which struck Vila as quite absurd, because it was her attempt to carry out those duties and responsibilities that had gotten her in trouble with Padrón in the first place.
Vila responded by filing a whistleblower complaint with the Florida Commission on Human Relations, the state agency responsible for investigating whether employers unlawfully retaliate against employees.
Rene Murai confirmed MDCC is still retaining him in connection with the Freedom Tower matter, although he referred to the deal as "dead." He said the college never ordered appraisals of the building and would not offer an opinion as to whether it was worth more than $20 million.
