Mayor accused of sexual harassment by commissioner For a brief shining moment Tuesday, the Coral Gables Commission appeared ready to discuss something mundane: a reappointment to a city board. Then Mayor Vince Lago grabbed the flamethrower. And just like that, City Hall once again transformed into the most expensive live-action telenovela in Miami-Dade County — […]
At what point does a political disagreement stop being governance and start looking like, well, fixation? Because Coral Gables Mayor Vince Lago just dragged his long-running feud with Commissioner Melissa Castro all the way to Tallahassee — and in doing so, may have revealed far more about his own political instincts and ethics than hers. […]
It was only a matter of time before Coral Gables Mayor Vince Lago found someone to run against his nemesis, Commissioner Melissa Castro, in her next election, which he is trying to move up by four months. A first-time candidate named Nestor Menendez has popped onto the Coral Gables political scene with an impressively padded […]
Long, chaotic commission meeting features bickering There are city commission meetings, and then there are Coral Gables city commission meetings under Mayor Vince Lago, which increasingly resemble a telenovela written by someone who hates everyone in the cast. Tuesday’s meeting was long. It was contentious. It was rude. It was chaotic. It was — depending […]
Coral Gables Commissioner Melissa Castro has had enough of the quiet quid pro quo culture that seems to linger like cologne after a ribbon cutting. So she’s bringing a little disinfectant to the dais. Castro plans to introduce an ordinance that would make it crystal clear that no elected official in the City Beautiful can […]
After months of swearing up and down that they had the authority to move Coral Gables elections to November without asking anybody, a majority of the commission suddenly got religion this week and voted to let residents decide. But don’t be fooled: it’s not exactly democracy at work. Instead of putting the question on a […]
RTZ overlay is for a student housing project: The Mark The latest chapter in the Coral Gables zoning soap opera will play out in Miami-Dade Commission Chambers this week. It started last Tuesday when County Commissioner Raquel Regalado took her Rapid Transit Zoning show on the road — to City Hall. Regalado showed up to […]
It’s so painfully obvious she gets under their skin For almost 12 hours Tuesday, Coral Gables Commissioner Melissa Castro took the hits from her colleagues on the dais like a professional boxer who is used to being in the ring for extra rounds with opponents who don’t fight fair. And even though she was not […]
It looks like Coral Gables Mayor Vince Lago is backpedaling on his decision to move the city’s election from odd- to even-numbered years just because he wants to and is now suddenly saying that the public should vote on it after all. What a concept! At their next meeting Tuesday, city commissioners will again discuss […]
On the heels of the court ruling last week that the Miami election year change was unconstitutional because, well they skipped the pesky part about asking voters, Coral Gables Commissioner Melissa Castro has doubled down on her push to revisit the city commission decision in May to move their municipal election date the same way. […]