Hello, North Miami, did you miss us?

It’s been a while, but we haven’t forgotten you.

Nor did we forget how angry residents were when they discovered their Mayor and Council voted to approved a fraudulent budget for fiscal year 2018/19.

It all started when a letter from William R. Armlong, Esq. to City Attorney Jeff Cazeau was circulated, alleging that his client, Assistant Budget Director Terry Henley, was fired for alerting City Manager Larry Spring and Deputy City Manager Arthur “Duke” Sorey that there was a $22 million deficit in their proposed budget.

Then all hell broke loose.

In his September 18, 2018 letter, Mr. Amlong asserted that on Tuesday, September 18, 2018, the morning after the budget was passed, his client was offered “hush-money” to quietly resign so that Manager Spring and Deputy Duke could “push through what looks like a $70 million balanced budget, but one that really conceals $7 million to $20 million in deficits.”

Mr. Amlong continued, “When Mr. Henley refused to accept the money in exchange for his silence, and attempted to return to work, police officers were called to escort him from City Hall and Joe Roglieri, the Personnel Director, e-mailed Mr. Henley a letter terminating him.”  He also demanded that his client be reinstated immediately.

In typical North Miami fashion, the City Attorney responded to Mr. Amlong on September 24, 2018 by accusing the employee of retaliating against the city because he was “written up on three (3) separate occasions and finally terminated” and that this client “is merely a disgruntled ex-employee attempting to save his job.”  Mr. Cazeau also claimed that “Mr. Henley’s termination was due to poor work performance.”

His personnel file, however, tells a completely different story.

A review of every Performance Evaluation Report since he was hired on May 28, 2013 confirmed that Terry Henley received all Satisfactory ratings and above on all of his evaluations, and received regular merit raises based on performance up until the time he was unceremoniously fired for blowing the whistle on fraud.

At the next Council meeting on September 25, 2018, residents stormed City Hall and demanded an immediate independent audit.

The Mayor and Council feigned concern, clutched their pearls, and promised complete transparency.

The smooth-talking City Manager Larry Spring managed to convince them that an “internal audit” would suffice.

City Attorney Jeff Cazeau hastily dismissed Mr. Henley’s claims and Mr. Amlong’s letter by scoffing, “Any time they get fired they run out and get an attorney.”

Considering North Miami’s history of retaliating against employees who blow the whistle on corruption, this should come as no surprise.

Councilman Scott Galvin requested that the “City put out an RFP” for “an additional, third party, nonpartisan firm to come in and complete an audit.”

Despite his directive, there has been no movement to advertise for an independent auditor, including by mayoral candidate, Councilman Philippe Bien-Aime.

Not surprisingly, it’s not included on the Agenda for Tuesday night’s Council meeting.

The Mayor and Council then promptly forgot everything they said, hoping no one else would remember.  And on September 26, 2018, they went about their business, spending taxpayer money as fast as humanly possible.

Needless to say, Terry Henley has not been reinstated, and no bid for an independent auditor was ever advertised.

Even more disturbing, although hardly surprising, William Amlong, Esq. has received precious few of the public records he has requested from the City of North Miami.

In preparation for Mr. Henley’s hearing later this month before the Personnel Board, on October 1, 2018, Mr. Amlong made a public records request for a total of twenty items in order “to demonstrate to the members of the board that Mr. Henley was telling the truth when he repeatedly pointed out to City Manager Larry Spring and Deputy City Manager Arthur Sorey II that the City’s 2018-2019 budget had a multi-million-dollar deficit.”

To date, only two items have been fulfilled in their entirety, four were partially provided, and in one instance, the City provided the wrong file.

On October 4, 2018, he made a public records request for the police report filed when Mr. Henley was removed from his City Hall office by multiple Command Staff members of the Police Department on September 20, 2018.

And finally, on October 30, 2018, Mr. Amlong made a public records request for seven additional items, none of which he has yet to receive.

So much for transparency.

William Amlong also asserted that when his client alerted the Deputy Manager of the budget shortfall, he was told to plug the hole with “$2 million from Costco’s pay-it-forward SoleMia payments and $3 million from other phantom SoleMia “buy-out” payments (Mr. Sorey’s phrase) that never materialized. The $2 million from Costco is the same $2 million about which Mr. Spring lied to the Council Monday.”

Amlong admonished that “[w]hile this kind of spending is reckless, it is also invisible,” and compared it to “the use of restricted funds that occurred at the City of Miami during Mr. Spring’s tenure as its Chief Financial Officer, which gave rise to the City of Miami’s being hit with a $1 million securities fraud judgment by the Securities and Exchange Commission.”

This statement alone should have set off alarm bells to the Mayor and Council.  Larry Spring’s involvement in the SEC scandal was certainly no secret when they hired him in August of 2015.  In fact, many believe Spring was the unindicted co-conspirator, letting his former budget director Michael Boudreaux take the fall.

In fact, blogger Al Crespo recently reported that Spring was “the CFO when the city falsified its comprehensive annual financial reports in 2007 and 2008, and sold $153 million of municipal bonds to investors.  During his years as CFO, the city fraudulently transferred millions of dollars from restricted capital project funds into the general operating fund to conceal declining fund balance that resulted in what became known as the SEC case that cost taxpayers millions in penalties and attorneys fees.”

Had the Mayor and Council properly vetted Larry Spring in the first place, he would never have been hired.  The revelation that Manager Spring and Deputy Duke similarly falsified the North Miami budget should have been cause for their immediate firing.  Instead, the elected officials stuck their heads in the sand and hoped it would all go away by the time they left office.

William Amlong told VotersOpinion that Spring is desperately hiding public records from him because those records indisputably prove that his client’s allegations are true and correct.

“If the Mayor and Council would only obtain and review the records I requested, there’s no doubt that the City Manager would be terminated immediately,” said Mr. Amlong.  “They need to know the truth!”

We believe they already know the truth.  By continuing to bury their heads in the sand and refusing to review those records, they’re hiding behind plausible deniability.

Spring and Sorey have been hoping that with the passage of time, North Miami residents will forget all about the fraudulent budget scandal and move on to the next Big Issue.

We’re here to remind them.

North Miami residents deserve better.

Stephanie