Feliz Noche Buena!

The year 2012 may be coming to a close, but dirty politics in Miami-Dade County continues from year to year. Just about every day there’s a new story about yet another allegedly corrupt elected official lining his pockets or one more scheme being cooked up to re-elect the same crooks back into office. Open the Miami Herald on any given day, and chances are there will be a story about one or the other. Or both, as in the case of today’s edition.

North Miami’s mayor Andre Pierre is in the news once again. Reporter Nadege Green might as well set up a cot at City Hall just so she can keep up with his antics on a near daily basis. In addition to all his ongoing ethically questionable and downright embarrassing activities, which I’ve documented here, here, here, here, here and here (among others), today’s story reveals that Hizzoner’s connection to the infamous Biscayne Landing project is probably even more twisted than any of us realized before.

In North Miami mayor’s role in Haiti island project raises questions, the Herald uncovered previously hidden ties between Pierre and Michael Swerdlow of Oleta Partners, the developer of Biscayne Landing. According to the article, Swerdlow is an investor in a firm that is trying to develop a tourist resort on an island off the coast of Haiti called Petite Cayemite. The firm, Cayemite Enterprises LLC, is owned by the Cherubin brothers, Emmanuel and Jean, who are also “in charge of attracting minority-owned businesses to work on the Biscayne Landing project. Swerdlow, the lead developer of Biscayne Landing, is an investor and advisor to the Cayemite firm.” Although, “City rules prohibit North Miami officials from doing business with city vendors,” those silly little rules didn’t stop Andre Pierre from advising the Cayemite firm and expressing “an interest in investing in the project.” After all, in North Miami, they only make rules for the sport of breaking ’em.

While nothing will stop Pierre once he leaves office in May (assuming he doesn’t succeed in extending the election until November as rumored he might attempt) from investing in any project he damn well pleases, “ethics experts say the mayor, at the very least, should have disclosed his relationship with the [Cherubin brothers] before voting on any city business involving Oleta Partners.”

Ya think?

The Herald stated that “Pierre joined Cayemite Enterprises in 2008, one year before he was elected mayor” and “Swerdlow joined the team as an investor in 2010.” Swerdlow, however, was connected to Biscayne Landing long before that – 2002 to be exact, when North Miami first “struck a deal with developer Swerdlow to build a grand city-within-a-city,” according to a June 30, 2011 Bloomberg Business Week Magazine article entitled North Miami’s Condo Catastrophe.

Apparently, Swerdlow’s ties to North Miami, and Andre Pierre, run deep. It certainly comes as no surprise to learn that both Swerdlow and Pierre are connected in the Cayemite development deal. Who knows how many other deals the two of them are currently involved in or at least contemplating that have yet to be discovered? The ethically challenged web of deceit spun by Andre Pierre is indeed tangled.

And yet, the Teflon Don of North Miami has never been prosecuted for anything at all. I guess it really pays to be a politician in Miami-Dade County. Literally!

Speaking of dirty politics, in an unrelated (and I use that term loosely) article, El Nuevo Herald reports Despite arrests, ballot brokers get ready for 2013 election. Is anyone shocked by this? I’d be shocked if you were.

The August arrests of Hialeah ballot brokers Deisy Cabrera and Sergio Robaina have led to a lackluster prosecution by the Miami-Dade County’s Office of the State Attorney, Katherine Fernandez Rundle, who has also been implicated by private detective Joe Carillo in “benefiting from operators like Deisy Cabrera.”

In a statement that almost begs to be investigated by a federal agency, an anonymous boletera said, “But I think it’s unfair that the politicians who hire us can simply wash their hands and not one of them has been arrested.”

Again, not shocked.

We may be preparing to open our Christmas presents and say goodbye 2012, but I expect that corruption and fraud in Miami-Dade County will be the gift that keeps on giving.