Ken Russell’s about face on Miami Freedom Park vote seals political fate

Miami Commissioner Ken Russell lost the U.S. Senate race Thursday.

No, the election didn’t come early. It’s still in November. And maybe he would have lost anyway. But Russell’s sudden and unjustifiable switch on the Miami Freedom Park lease agreement — even with amendments made on the fly — is going to haunt him in the race. Or any future election.

Forever. This is not something he can solve by jumping into a congressional race, instead.

He may as well go back to selling surfboards.

Russell was the swing vote Thursday at the special commission meeting for the no-bid, 99-year lease of the city-owned Melreese golf course to the owners of the InterMiami soccer team to build Miami Freedom Park, a real estate complex of offices, a million square feet of retail, a 750-room hotel and — oh, yeah — a 25,000-seat stadium that could grow, maybe, to 40,000 or 50,000 seats for University of Miami football games. It passed 4-1, with Commissioner Manolo Reyes voting no.

Commissioner Russell was supposed to be a no vote as well. He kept telling everyone that the developers had not met his “laundry list” of demands and he was not comfortable supporting it. He was particularly concerned with the no net loss of park space. And was prepared to vote against it, he said.

And he almost did. Almost. Because Russell said he was a no at the meeting right before they took a recess. It almost seemed like they were voting and he interrupted the vote saying he was a no. Wasn’t that voting no?

When they came back, they had magically decided to divide the $20 million in parks funding that the developers would give to the city between the other four districts, and not just spend it in District 1. That was all he wanted? That was enough for Russell to switch sides.

But it seemed like an excuse. Because he was already softening up. Early in the discussion, the twitterverse of political observers had noted that the commissioner — who came into office after becoming an activist fighting contamination at Merrie Christmas Park — was praising the “very sophisticated” clean up that the developers were paying for and cooing about the “really good jobs.”

It was like laying out his defense. And while he looked like a scared, wounded puppy at the victory press conference put on by a very energetic mayor and exuberant Mas after the vote, Russell spent most of Friday doing damage control in the media, giving interviews to justify his decision and tweeting with a righteous and arrogant tone, blaming the voters who passed the 2019 referendum authorizing the negotiation for the lease.

“Some wanted me to kill the deal just to keep the contaminated country club. But the voters chose overwhelmingly to move from golf to soccer,” he started. “So my commitment was to improve the deal or vote no. Yesterday was the moment of leverage to achieve the improvements in the lease.”

He said he got soooo much in the dais negotiations:

Funding for the sports fields on 116 acres of land in Virginia Key
20% of the stadium construction done by organized labor
The Responsible Wage in Construction ordinance to apply.
The signing of a “peace agreement” with labor to ensure that stadium and hospitality jobs “would take care of people and not take advantage.”
Rent to be based on an appraisal of the “clean” site after decontamination

Like, seriously? Does he not know about the broken promises in Broward? And he wasn’t the only one who advocated for the “clean” appraisal.

“This is a major win for green space and Miami,” Russell tweeted in a series of more than a dozen posts. “The No Net Loss of green space was a joke originally. They offered 20 acres unimproved to make up for 70 acres they would develop. I fought to make sure that the $25 million would go toward an additional 10 acres of new Baywalk and 116 acres of new sporting fields on Virginia Key.”

Baywalk Greenway was a done deal until Diaz de la Portilla threatened to take it away. Maybe that’s all that Russell got with his vote Thursday. He got to keep the $5 million set aside for the Baywalk Greenway linear park.

“Those who just wanted the deal killed will be disappointed. However, a transparent and democratic majority of Miami voted to have us negotiate this deal,” he said, falling back on the referendum as if it were a mandate, same as the developers.

The referendum was for the city to negotiate a lease. That doesn’t mean it has to accept this deal. Frankly, an office retail complex and hotel wrapped around a soccer stadium with plazas and an open park might not be such a terrible idea if the economy is there to support it (Amazon warehouses may be smarter). It could really be a “transformative” development, as the mayor has said, and a new entertainment destination. The project will clean the whole contaminated site and put 73 acres on the tax rolls. It will provide the city with more than $2 billion in revenue over the next 99 years and provide the community with thousands of decent jobs.

What’s terrible is the way this happened. Under the cloak of darkness and behind closed doors. Giving special favors for special people. Like every other inside deal that has screwed the taxpayers of Miami and the arounds.

The question isn’t if it’s a good deal. It’s: Is it the best deal? Is the city giving away too much because it’s a special deal for special people?

And Ken’s failure isn’t that he couldn’t stop it. He is right when he says that nobody could have stopped this. But he was in a very unique position to use the leverage he had as the swing vote to get more — whether it was something for his district, which already lost its cohesiveness during the redistricting process, or something for the whole city.

Because as it stands, the deal is definitely better for Mas than it is for Miami.

Russell says he did all he could.

So what makes anyone think he can carry our water in D.C.? If he gets rolled over by amateurs like Commissioner Joe Carollo on a regular basis, how is he going to handle professional bullies like Mitch McConnell or Lindsey Graham and the like?

He would get eaten alive.

Ken Russell, Miami Freedom Park

Ken Russell’s about face on Miami Freedom Park vote seals political fate added by Ladra on May 1, 2022
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