IIaPhilip Stoddard -suggested priorities
Complete Existing Initiatives
1. Parks
Finish Murray Park pool project.
Improve drainage of paths at Dante Fascell Park.
Resolve YMCA issue and improve South Miami Park.
Pursue pocket park acquisition.
2. Madison Square
3. Charter Review
Meet imminent threats to our quality of life
1. Continue to fight FPL's plan to run high-voltage, above-ground powerlines
through the heart of South Miami.
2. Our land use and zoning codes need work to prevent over-scale development
while encouraging thoughtful development that benefits both our community
and our tax base. Let's consider promoting mixed-use along major roads.
3. South Miami risks losing its only supermarket. Work to assure that residents
with limited transportation always have a supermarket they can get to.
Safe Streets
Traffic calming in the neighborhoods creates streets that welcome pedestrians,
bicyclists and kids.
1. Extend traffic calming projects to additional neighborhoods.
2. Plant additional street trees to make shade to encourage walking and biking,
while signaling to drivers that they are entering a neighborhood.
3. Promote bicycling and walking in South Miami. Studies show that bicyclists
and pedestrians makes streets safer by slowing traffic, encouraging
neighborliness, and watching what goes on.
Sustainable Community
Strengthen water-related infrastructure now to meet the increasing challenges of
sea-level rise now hitting Miami Beach (we are next).
1. Get all remaining well-water residences onto city water before saltwater
intrusion reaches inside our city.
2. Extend sewer and drainage system to serve all residences. These processes
will take a decade, but we must start now to keep the costs within our means.
3. Implement the City's Green Plan to reduce C02 emissions, conserve water,
and protect the ecological systems that sustain us (see GTF
recommendations ).
4. Promote local energy production, local food networks, and local agriculture
that make our community and region more self-sufficient and more resilient.
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Education
We have no better long-term solution for boosting employment and fighting crime
than by improving public education here in South Miami.
1. Join and advance the Early Childhood Literacy initiative to put our kids on
the track to productive lives.
2. Work with our School Board member to devise a workable city-school
partnership program that helps local schools.
3. Work with principles of local schools to engage our educated citizenry with
the real needs of our schools and our children.
Healthy Businesses
Small businesses make a healthy community by providing services and amenities
locally, paying taxes, and creating local jobs.
1. South Miami must adopt the best 21 st century parking practices of other
cities to so we can have a more productive downtown with a more vibrant
street life. We must manage parking more efficiently so spaces are available
when and where needed. A first start would be revisiting and improving the
shared parking ordinance. Existing surface parking lots waste precious
downtown real estate while creating heat islands -let's look at replacing
them with businesses and apartments that include built-in parking.
2. We must work with businesses to upgrade the business district streetscape
to give South Miami more appeal and identity. Coral Gables just completed
enhancing Miracle Mile. We should have inviting signage and a downtown
pocket park that serves as a town square.
3. Support height-appropriate, mixed-use development in the TOD &
Hometown districts.
4. Our business district must be linked to neighborhoods with shaded
pedestrian-& bike-friendly sidewalks.
Resident engagement
1. City website is embarrassing. Needs complete overhaul.
2. Communities for a Lifetime Initiative. The city endorsed it in 2007, then
never did anything. Let's create an Elder Affairs committee to explore how
we can support this initiative in South Miami, and have our Volunteer
Coordinator engage in outreach to elderly residents in need of assistance.
3. Create email opt-in/opt-out city newsletter, and include sections for
Commission members.
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Menendez, Maria M.
From:
Sent:
To:
Cc:
Subject:
Bob Welsh [bobnoxious928@yahoo.com]
Friday, February 24,20128:05 AM
Menendez, Maria M.
Bob Welsh
Many of my priorities
1) Get the (2010?) Future land use map that lowers the height of Lee Park, S.Miami Gardens,
Red Road Apartments,Fellowship Baptist and University Christian Churches from four stories
down to two stories off the desk of Chris Brimo and delivered to the successor department of
Department of Community Affairs and I would personally like to take it to where it has to go
in Broward County and hand deliver it.
2)Pursue and document the investigation into why no affordable rents were provided by Red
Road Commons. Find out what kind of security RRC promised to provide in the 2007 development
agreement and see if S.Miami Police can collect every time our officers are dispatched to
RRC. See what is holding up the Red Road median beautification promised in their development
agreement.
3) Talk about Plan B, Plan C and Plan D for the two community pools and talk about an
alternate location ( Williamson Tennis Courts) for the affordable pool our children will
learn to swim in, play in, go to swim practice in and be rented out during hours when there
is low demand by our children. Would the Commission pass a resolution to let me talk directly
with those entities who have offered us grants?
4) Reconvene a charter review commission. Topics I would ask them to consider
l)Shall the Mayor and Commissioners have the right to go straight to Departmant Heads
without first having to ask the permission of the City Manager?
2)Shall the election to fill the seat of one member of the Commission who has
resigned to run for the seat of another that was on the Commission be held simultaneously.
(We had to pay for two elections when Mayor Cunningham died in office and when Julio Robaina
resigned asMayor to run for State office). History should not repeat a third time.
3) Shall participation in a debate (not forum) that lasts for a mlnlmum of 30 minutes
per candidate, is held within one week of the qualifying deadline, is televised live on South
Miami cable tap, is re-run each day during prime time starting at 7PM be one of the criteria
that qualifies one to stand for election to public office in South Miami?
4) Shall the Vice Mayor ( without having to stand for election ) replace the Mayor
should the Mayor resign from, die in, or be removed from office? Shall the City of South
Miami create the elected political position of Replacement Commissioner to serve for a
period of two years who will replace any of the Commissioners who may resign from, be removed
from or die in office?
5) Shall campaign contributions be posted on the Official City Website within 24
hours of being accepted by a candidate for office, shall donors be required to list their
business as well as their residential address, shall donors be required to list any family or
professional relationship they may have with an already listed donor or publish the family
or professional relationship they have with a donor that they know is donating within the 24
hour window, shall the City website group those with family or professional relations
together?
6) Shall the election result of majority (50% +1) become the criterion for election to
Public Office in the City of South Miami? Shall either of the top two vote getters in a
particular race who have not achieved 50% of the vote be required to face each other in a
run-off election so that one achieves a majority (50% + i)? Help pay for the cost of a run-
off election by reducing the # of days of early voting we pay for. Maybe make the runoff all-
absentee by sending ballots only to those that voted in the primary.
5) The twice weekly garbage truck should pick up garbage on the even side of the street in
even years and odd side of the street in odd years where the road is not divided by a median
or is a high volume road like 62 Av, 67 Av, 80 St ect.
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6) Come up with a plan for YMCA park. ( It was purchased with money from RRC. How much money
did the City spend for it's purchase? RRC and South Miami Bank needed it to be part of the
City's inventory of parks so they could meet Park Concurrency. Other developers spoke in
front of the Commission urging us to purchase it. )
7) Keep the Planning Department but consider the options if we spin off the Building
department either to Miami-Dade county or a private contractor. ( An inspector from either
the City, a private inspection company or the County is there to enforce the same provisions
of the same Florida Building Code ). Write into the contract that the City will keep permit
fees in excess of 500K/year minus the actual cost of inspection so that when a big
development pays a lot of money for permits the County or the Contractor shares that money
with us. Spinning off the Building Department would eliminate 50% of the work to be done next
year by the auditing firm .
8) Will the Commission pass a resolution asking the County to ease traffic calming criterion
and pass a resolution asking the Miami-Dade County League of Cities to lobby the County to
ease traffic calming criteria?
9) Will the Commission pass a resolution asking Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties
to not require Class A fire retardant paper to be installed under metal roofing is areas that
are served by a Class A fire department, as there is no such enforcement of the Florida
Building Code's requirement for Class A fire rating under metal roofs in the entire rest of
the State of Florida. The resolution should also ask the State to relax the rule requiring
the mechanical fastening of "tin caps" under a metal roof when the demonstrated wind
resistance of the metal roof far exceeds the demonstrated wind resistance of the tin capped
base sheet with the present number of required tin caps. The resolution should ask Miami
Dade,Broward and Palm Beach Counties to permit owner-builders of their properties to install
metal roofing on their properties as is permitted in the rest of the State. Metal roofing
offers superior wind resistance when enough fasteners are used, and white painted metal
roofing is the most reflective of all roofing systems on the market. Old metal roofing is
100% recyclable.
10) Add a section to the City Website that permits South Miami residents to tell of their
personal participation in historical events. Bob Welsh Public Servant
Sent from my iPad
2
Menendez. Maria M.
From:
Sent:
To:
Bob Welsh [bobnoxious928@yahoo.com]
Sunday, February 26,20127:57 PM
Menendez, Maria M.
Subject: Fwd: A to Z index. please forward this to the rest of the Commission
Do the rest on the Commission read the definition of Area Median income to be what the Census says that it is?
I'll take my answer at the Committee of the Whole, if we have a quorum.
Sent from my iPad
Begin forwarded message:
From: Bob Welsh <bobnoxious928@yahoo.com>
Date: February 24, 2012 10:44:17 PM EST
To: TPepe@southmiamifl.gov
Subject: A to Z index
http://flhousingdata.shimberg.ufl.edu/apps/azindex.pl?t=18
Sent from my iPad
1
Menendez, Maria M.
From:
Sent:
To:
Subject:
ASAP
valerie Newman [valerienewman09@gmail.com]
Friday, February 24,2012 12 :25 PM
Menendez, Maria M.
Priorities VNewman
3)Complete FLUM and Zoning Map to reflect last EAR
4) Establish learn to swim program transporting kids in after school program and Summer camp to available
pools. University of Miami , AD Barnes etc.
Within 1 Year
5) Entrance Signs
6) Beautification of Red Road between USI and 73rd Ct
Within two years:
1) TRAFFIC CALMING:Complete current Traffic calming initiatives. Identify other areas with traffic issues .
2) Annexation
3) Sunset Drive week-end Pedestrian Mall
Valerie Newman
(786) 351-1648
1
Menendez, Maria M.
From:
Sent:
To:
Subject:
walter harris [walterhrs@gmail.com]
Monday, February 27, 2012 11 :05 AM
Menendez, Maria M.
dream list
reconvene charter review board
create a 'business district improvement" committee
more stop signs and speed bumps where needed
madison square
buils pool
beautify downtown with flowers and decorative plants and streetlights
investigate training programs with robert morgan or miami dade college, giving partial or full scholorships, or
sponsorships
lee park investigation
doggie park
Menendez, Maria M.
From:
Sent:
To:
Subject:
one more item,
walter harris [walterhrs@gmail.com]
Monday, February 27,201211 :10 AM
Menendez, Maria M.
one more thing
obelisks on street corners with street names