The referendum's petition drive was well under way when its sponsoring organization, the Miami Business Forum, unceremoniously aborted it. As a result the airport remains a snake pit, venal politicians desperate to maintain their grip on MIA are gloating, and county manager George Burgess has taken the occasion to smack down aviation director Angela Gittens, who had the audacity to sign the petition and whose professional demise is now only a matter of time.
Many people are appalled that the forces of evil on the county commission seem to have prevailed yet again. How could this happen? In one form or another, I've been hearing that question a lot over the past couple of weeks.
The answer: It's been two full years since a county commissioner was arrested.
In this town that qualifies as a landmark moral victory. But it also has had the effect of lulling the populace into a complacent civic slumber. The airport authority fiasco, however, has been a harsh reminder that our famously wicked commission is still in charge, still Miami's most potent political force.
The failed MIA referendum also revealed the Miami Business Forum to be a pitifully naive crew that, in its first major bid to affect public policy, performed miserably and squandered what credibility it may have had. Formed in 2000 as a successor to the notoriously secretive and exclusionary Non-Group, the Business Forum is a collection of 40 prominent men and women who are still somewhat secretive and exclusionary, but markedly more diverse than their good-old-boy forefathers. (See sidebar for a membership list.) As the airport petition drive demonstrated, they are also political neophytes.
This past January the county commission's transportation committee, led by Commissioner Dennis Moss, shot down an opportunity for Miami-Dade voters to decide whether they wanted an airport authority -- the fifth time in four years politicians successfully blocked reform attempts. Moss in particular was insultingly dismissive of the notion that MIA's future should be of interest to the general public.
In response the Business Forum vowed to circumvent the pols altogether and use the initiative process to put a measure on this November's ballot. Mario Artecona, the group's energetic executive director, was refreshingly blunt in his assessment of the situation. "If the commission doesn't have the guts to [place the issue on the ballot], the business community will," he told the Miami Herald. "Turning down an aviation authority is one thing, but turning down the voters' right to say for themselves just stinks to high heaven."
Artecona and his Business Forum bosses sounded like they were ready to rumble. A good thing, too, because surely a vicious street fight lay ahead. Commissioners regularly bellowed that an airport authority represented an attack on their integrity -- a line that was always good for a laugh. Those of us gleefully watching the Business Forum from the sidelines had no doubt it was going to get nasty and personal. After all, that's politics in Miami.
The push for an independent authority over MIA enjoyed widespread support among many business and community groups, from the Beacon Council to the chamber of commerce to political pros like Sen. Bob Graham. Early polling showed the measure passing by a huge margin. Success seemed assured.
But then reality caught up with the leaders of the Miami Business Forum. They may have had the public on their side, but they seemed blind to the fact that county commissioners still controlled the machinery of government, and wouldn't hesitate in using it to crush what Commissioner Javier Souto endearingly referred to as the downtown "wine and cheese crowd."
The Forum had 60 days to collect some 40,000 valid signatures. With their collective resources, members could have and should have showered the petition drive with money, enough to collect 100,000 signatures in 50 days. Call it political intimidation -- the wine and cheese crowd would look more like a lynch mob. Instead the approach was lackluster. Records show that some members -- Adolfo Henriques, Leonard Abess, Ed Williamson, Chuck Cobb, Philip Blumberg, George Feldenkreis -- ponied up cash of their own, but overall the Forum did not spend money like they really meant it.
That may have been a tactical error, but it was soon dwarfed by a colossal strategic blunder. Somehow Forum members had not taken into account the fact that their airport initiative would be sharing the November ballot with the biggest county bond measure of the past 30 years, a $2.75 billion behemoth. Of course, the political animals crouched on the county commission dais sniffed out that oversight immediately -- and then pounced. Forum members didn't know what hit them.
A fine, upstanding organization like the Miami Business Forum would naturally want to promote the general-obligation bond, right? Rebuilding infrastructure, priming the economic development pump, filling potholes, patching sidewalks, beautifying parks -- the classic civic-group agenda. One problem, though. According to the county hall crowd, there was a conflict. How could voters hold these two thoughts simultaneously -- county commissioners cannot be trusted to manage the airport, but they can be trusted to wisely manage billions of dollars in bond money.
The truthful answer: Most people believe this batch of commissioners cannot be trusted, period. Poll after poll has shown this, including one conducted by Bendixen & Associates in conjunction with New Times ("Tell Us What You Think," September 18, 2003). Had the Business Forum planned ahead, and had its members been honest with themselves, they would have had to agree with the public: No bond issue until the scoundrels on the commission are replaced by somewhat more trustworthy scoundrels.
But that kind of brutal honesty would have presented serious problems for several Business Forum members who had a pressing interest in the bond measure. One of them, attorney Aaron Podhurst, is chairman of the board of the Miami Art Museum. Forum members Cesar Alvarez and Paul Cejas, as well as the wives of members Woody Weiser and Herald publisher Alberto Ibargüen, also sit on MAM's board. If the bond were to pass, MAM would stand to reap a whopping $100 million to build a new home in Bicentennial Park. Between the Miami Museum of Science, Metrozoo, and the Vizcaya Museum and Gardens -- all slated to be bond beneficiaries -- even more Business Forum members would have had difficulty facing the facts.
So they chose hypocrisy over honesty.
During a June 8 dinner meeting at the Coconut Grove Ritz-Carlton, the Business Forum wrestled with the issue and decided to punt on the airport, fearing that a commission-bashing election campaign would endanger the bond issue, which they (hypocritically) were willing to entrust to county commissioners.
Jorge Hernandez-Toraño, chairman of the Forum, explains it this way: "Airport changes are necessary. Our desire to see that happen has not waned, it's just been postponed. By the same token, the infrastructure improvements destined to take place if the bond passes are also of concern to us, as they should be for the entire community.... The bond issue is a long-term program. Commissioners are only there for their own terms."
As well-intentioned as Hernandez-Toraño and his Forum colleagues may be, they emerged from this political fight as losers, battered and bruised. Worse still is the perception they were compromised by the self-interest of a few members. Not exactly an auspicious activist debut for a group that has ambitions to leadership, and definitely not the kind of outcome that inspires confidence in future endeavors.
One observer familiar with the Forum's referendum debacle, who asks not to be named, draws a gloomy conclusion. "Their unwillingness to take on this battle was very revealing of how weak they are," he says. "In other communities in this country, the öestablishment' isn't so dependent on a political body like the county commission to fund cultural institutions, art museums. Elsewhere there's more commitment, funds are raised privately. But here in Miami, people have to go hat in hand to the politicians."
Meekly approaching Miami-Dade's county commissioners, hands outstretched, beseeching them for financial assistance on behalf of your needy cultural group? Now, that stinks to high heaven.
Leonard Abess
Chairman and CEO, City National Bank
(executive committee)
Henry Adorno
President and CEO, Adorno and Yoss
Cesar Alvarez
President and CEO, Greenberg Traurig
Micky Arison
Chairman and CEO, Carnival Cruise Lines
Adrienne Arsht
Chairman, Total Bank (executive committee)
Philip Blumberg
President and CEO, American Ventures Corporation
(executive committee)
Paul Cejas
Chairman and CEO, PLC Investments
Charles Cobb
Chairman, Cobb Partners
Armando Codina
Chairman and CEO, Codina Group (executive committee)
Peter Dolara
Senior vice president, American Airlines
Albert Dotson
Partner, Bilzin Sumberg Dunn
Richard Fain
Chairman and CEO, Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines (executive committee)
T. Willard Fair
President and CEO, Urban League of Greater Miami
George Feldenkreis
Chairman and CEO, Perry Ellis International (vice chairman)
Mehdi Ghomeshi
President, Great Florida Bank
Adolfo Henriques
CEO, Southern Banking Group, Union Planters Bank (executive committee)
Jorge L. Hernandez-Toraño
Partner, Holland and Knight (chairman)
Alberto Ibargüen
Publisher, Miami Herald
Brian Keeley
President and CEO, Baptist Health South Florida
Joseph Lacher
President, Florida, BellSouth (executive committee)
Miriam Lopez
President and CEO, TransAtlantic Bank
Modesto Maidique
President, Florida International University
Albert Nahmad
CEO, Watsco, Inc.
Susan Norton
Managing partner, Allen, Norton, and Blue
Jeanne O'Laughlin
President, Barry University
Armando Olivera
President, Florida Power and Light
Marvin O'Quinn
CEO, Jackson Health Trust
Eduardo Padrón
President, Miami Dade Community College
R. Donahue Peebles
President, Peebles Atlantic Development Corporation
Aaron Podhurst
Chairman and managing partner, Podhurst Orsek Josefsberg Eaton (executive committee)
Ray Rodriguez
President and COO, Univision Network
Peter Roulhac
VP/dir. of community development, Wachovia Bank
Carlos Sabater
Managing partner, Deloitte and Touche
Carlos Saladrigas
Chairman, Premier American Bank
Robert Strauss
President, CEO and chairman, Noven Pharmaceutical
David Weaver
Chairman and CEO, Intercap Investments
Dorothy Weaver
President, Intercap Investments
Sherwood Weiser
Chairman and CEO, Continental Hospitality Holdings
Ed Williamson
President, Williamson Cadillac Co.
