Veteran Miami Commissioner Willy Gort will not get to coast into automatic re-election
after all since he now has a real challenge from a former zoning board member who is running on a single issue: Crime.
Miguel “Mike” Gabela, a real estate investor and auto parts business owner, filed to run in March but launched his campaign for real last month with a five-point crime fighting plan. He sent an email blast Tuesday with links to several news stories about burglary and shooting incidents — even a murder — in the district, which includes the neighborhooods of Allaphattah, Blue Lagoon, Flagami, and Grapeland Heights.
“The troubles in District 1 in the City of Miami continue to mount, and our current commissioner has shown no interest in addressing these issues,” Gabela wrote. “That’s why I have decided to run for Commissioner in District 1, because I want to bring a proactive approach to the problems in our District.
“The headlines dealing with our district in the newspapers and TV news reports say it all… and the crimes continue to occur at an alarming rate. In fact, Districts One’s crime rate surpasses the national average in almost every category.”
His five point plan calls for (1) more police staff, (2) new and/or enhanced bike and foot patrols in commercial zones as well as crime watch programs, (3) increased communication and coordination between departments, particularly between police and code enforcement and zoning, (4) monthly town hall meetings in each neighborhood to communicate with residents and address issues like lighting and (5) a crackdown on illegal cafeteria bars and nightclubs.
“That’s a big issue here especially in the east. Not all the cafeterias, just the ones into drugs, into prostitution, into gaming with these gambling rooms in back,” Gabela told me, and Ladra knows because she has been on raids with the Miami Police department.
Gabela, who has lived in Allapattah for 35 years, also believes his experience as a business owner will help him better represent the residents of District 1. “As a businessman, I know the importance of knowing who my customers are as well as their needs. As a commissioner, I will make sure to keep in close contact with the residents and ensure that their needs are met,” he says in the email.
But he is making crime his central issue because it is what he hears about time and time again as he knocks on hundreds of doors.
“We need infrastructure improvements and we need to fix sidewalks, too, but I don’t want to be all over the place. 
I am going to stick to the key issues that residents are concerned about — and number one is crime, number two is crime and number three is crime,” Gabela told Ladra.
“The level of fear that exist in this district is simply unacceptable” Gabela said, taking a jab at the incumbent. “The current commissioner is disengaged from this community and only reacts to, as opposed to being proactive in preventing crime.”
Case in point, he says, is the police staffing issue. There are 350 officers due to retire in the next couple of years, Gabela said. “And we have not put a new policeman on the payroll in three years.”
He served on the city’s zoning board for almost ten years and ran against Gort already once before — in 2010’s special election to replace then-Commissioner Angel Gonzalez, who was forced to resign in 2009 as part of a guilty plea to a misdemeanor charge of abusing his position to get his daughter a job. Gort, who had been a commissioner for eight years ending with an unsuccessful mayoral run in 2001, won the January 2010 special election with 55% of the vote.
But Gabela came in second in a crowded field of nine candidates, with 13 percent of the vote. Sure, it was a distant second. But he beat former commission candidates like Richard Tapia and Mike Suarez with barely two months to campaign.
And he showed he has no qualms about financing his own campaign, putting $75,000 into the almost certain second-place finish. Which is good, seeing as how he will probably have to do that again. Gort has reported raising almost $150,000 for his campaign, including $25,000 just in June, his largest month since he started taking contributions in March of 2014. And he’s only spent about $3,700.
Gabela has spent all but about $1,000 of the $6,850 he’s raised. Or, actually, of the $1,750 he raised and the $5,100 he loaned himself.
Time to write another check, Mike.
Willy Gort challenger Mike Gabela runs on one issue: Crime added by Ladra on
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