by Dennis Reeves Cooper
We were reminded again
this week that history often
repeats itself. Former City
Commissioner Jimmy Mira
came to see me and brought in
a news clipping from the Miami
Herald, dated November
17, 1985.
The headline screamed
“Officials say developers offered
illegal checks.”
In the story, City Commissioners
Mira and Joe Balbontin
were quoted as saying that
they were offered $2000 each
by hotel developers just before
the commission was scheduled
to vote on the developers’
project.
In sworn affidavits, Balbontin
said he refused to accept
the check. Mira said he initially
took the check, thinking it was
a campaign contribution.
“But when I looked at
the check and saw that it was
more than the legal amount of
$1000, I immediately returned
it,” Mira said.
What makes this story
timely today is that the attorney
for the developers was Jim
Hendrick. You probably know
that Hendrick was recently convicted
of conspiring to obstruct
a federal grand jury and witness
tampering. Those charges stem
from the indictment of former
County Mayor Jack London
after he accepted a $29,000 bribe
from a real estate developer.
In the 1995 story, Hendrick
is quoted as saying the
developers offered the checks
in an attempted sting to catch
the two commissioners taking
bribes. He called the affidavits
“absolute garbage.”
In the article, Hendrick
said the idea of passing the
checks as bait to the two commissioner
was discussed at a
meeting with State Attorney
Kirk Zuelch. Hendrick said
he went to Zuelch after his
clients— the hotel developers—
told him that they thought Mira
and Balbontin were soliciting
money and other favors.
But when the Miami
Herald reporters questioned
Zuelch, he denied that he had
discussed any kind of sting with
Hendrick. Zuelch said he didn’t
know anything about checks
being offered to the commissioners
until he read about it
in the affidavits.
PAGE ONE COMMENTARY: Mayor McPherson Instrumental in Fixing Vote at College
September 25, 2009 — kwtnHE TELLS KWTN, “I NEVER
TALKED TO THE GOVERNOR
ABOUT APPOINTING MY SISTER
TO FKCC BOARD.” HE DIDN’T.
HE ASKED AN INFLUENTIAL
FRIEND TO DO IT
by Dennis Reeves Cooper
What can we say about
what happened at our little
college this week? The young
and beautiful president, hired
only a little more than two years
ago with much fanfare and
high expectations, was forced
to accept a nine-month paid
sabbatical (until the end of her
contract) to avoid being fired
by what would have probably
been a 3-2 vote of the college’s
board of trustees. Those three
trustees appear to have been
persuaded to fire the president
by a relatively small number of
college staff members. These
staff members complained
that the president was “really
mean.”
Note that we said staff,
not faculty. The faculty— those at the college who teach the
students— overwhelmingly
supported the president. And
they did it in writing. After a
faculty meeting last week the
full-time faculty submitted
to the board of trustees a formal
vote of confidence in the
president.
Students past and present
have also been very vocal in
their support of the president,
which make sense since her
highest priority was known to
be transforming Florida Keys
Community College (FKCC) to
a student-focused institution.
Makes perfect sense at a college,
right? But that had not been the
case at FKCC for decades.
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