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mn BLUMBERG ALTERING FOCUS OF BEACH CHAMBER 07/06/1988
THE MIAMI NEWS
Copyright (c) 1988, The Miami News
DATE: Wednesday, July 6, 1988 EDITION: THREE-STAR
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: 9A LENGTH: 112 lines
ILT,UJSTRATION: Blumberg
SOURCE/CREDIT LINE: MERWIN SIGALE Business Editor
BLUMBERG ALTERING FOCUS OF BEACH CHAMBER
Stuart L. Blumberg is trying to perfect a balancing act -- making
distinctive footprints of his own while filling someone else's shoes.
No, he is not a circus high-wire performer, although Miami Beach's
political atmosphere has been likened at times to a circus, and achieving a
consensus in the oft-contentious island city may well be akin to lion-taming.
Stu Blumberg is vice president of The Muss Organization and of Muss-owned
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! 'Seacoast Towers, a hotel and rental-apartment complex. He is also the new
president of the Miami Beach Chamber of Commerce.
As the chamber's president-elect, he expected to step into the unpaid job
this Oct. 1. But the death of Robert L. Blum on May 22 thrust Blumberg into
that role early. Now he is trying to carry on Blum's work while introducing
his own agenda.
The Miami Beach chamber used to be a major influence in county affairs
and the main vehicle for the city's business community to express itself and
get things done. But that changed as the city's luster faded.
"It was an organization that was having tough times in a city that was
having tough times, " said Blumberg.
Now there is a dilution of power. The hoteliers in particular -- the most
vocal and involved force in Miami Beach's private sector -- pursue their main
objectives through an expanded Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau.
Moreover, a number of Miami Beach civic groups with specialized interests
have popped up in recent years, producing multiple voices that are not always
in concert with one another.
Bob Blum had talked about bringing those diverse groups together under
the chamber's umbrella, but he didn't get very far with it in his 7 1/2-month
tenure. What he did, according to Blumberg, was give the chamber exposure,
"put it on the map, " through the force of his energetic personality.
"Bobby was events-oriented, " said Blumberg, citing such activities as
Trick or Treat Street, the Fourth of July celebration and Bite of the Beach.
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❑While continuing special events, Blumberg wants to expand the chamber's focus
to weightier matters. He wants to "get behind the efforts of development --
the hotel situation, the light rail, the Public Facilities Trust. "
On those issues, Miami Beach hopes to attract more first- class hotel
rooms to support the expanding Stephen Muss Convention Center; build a
light-rail line linking the city to downtown Miami; and bring Dade County's
convention and performing-arts facilities under a single public trust.
How the chamber would promote those goals has not been settled. Blumberg
said he has yet to work out the specifics with the chamber's board. But the
bottom line is that the organization would go back to doing what chambers
anywhere have traditionally been identified with -- promotion of economic
development.
Beyond that, Blumberg hopes to succeed in building a united front of the
city's various civic groups, which he said have filled a vacuum left by the
chamber.
"There are too many voices on Miami Beach, and there should be one voice,
because we all want the same goal -- a better Miami Beach, " he said.
Among them, he noted, are Miami Beach Development Corp. , Lincoln Road
Development Corp., the Art Deco developers and hotels, the
historic-preservation group, 41st Street Merchants Association, South Florida
Hotel & Motel Association and Greater Miami Hotel & Motel Association.
"I believe that if the chamber had remained what it should have been,
there wouldn't have been splinter groups, " Blumberg said. "They would have
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'-remained in the chamber."
Blumberg sees positive things happening -- the convention center
expansion, tentative interest on the part of several hotel chains,
redevelopment in the South Pointe area, changes on Lincoln Road, plans for the
light-rail system.
"I believe, " he added, "that the Beach is going to position itself over
the next four or five years, not to where it was in the heyday of the '40s and
'50s, but to a position of eminence in this community. . . . I really believe
we are sitting on the verge of a boom town. I really believe it. It's in the
air. "
Blumberg said he recognizes what the chamber cannot do, and that is
return to "the days of 'we're the Beach chamber and you're not. ' "
For one thing, Miami Beach is no longer the center of Dade's economic
activity. Tourism has become a less potent segment of a more diversified
economy. Also, the mainland has lured a good chunk of tourism away from the
Beach.
Moreover, countywide forces -- the convention bureau, the Beacon Council
and the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce -- have emerged to wield power that
the more narrowly focused Miami Beach chamber cannot hope to match.
In Blumberg's view, however, the chamber can concentrate on city
development issues that might need closer attention than countywide groups
would give them. Thus, he believes, the chamber can again "be a major voice. "
When Blum became president on Oct. 1, the chamber had about 600 corporate
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❑members. Now, said Blumberg, it has about 800. It also has a new executive
vice president, Bruce Singer, who took over the day-to-day operations on May 1
after the retirement of Leonard A. "Doc" Baker.
Blumberg said his goal is to have 1,000 members by early next year. (He
believes that its all-time peak was 1,200 members. )
A lure for them would be the turn toward development issues, he said.
Expansion of the convention center was a chamber goal five years ago, said
Blumberg, and "the chamber has not structured an economic goal since then. "
What the chamber can push for, said Blumberg, is "to bring back an
economic stability to the Beach, so that we won't be red-lined by banks and we
can get banks to come in and loan our developers some money. . . . It's unreal
that a community like ours hasn't had a new hotel in 21 years. "
Blumberg knows about that. In 1967, he became the first manager of that
last new hotel, then called the Hilton Plaza. Later, it became the Playboy,
then the Konover, now the Castle.
Born in New York 51 years ago, Blumberg came here at age 6, attended
Miami Beach schools and obtained a political science degree from the
University of Florida.
He returned to work as assistant manager of the Miami Beach Auditorium
and Convention Hall; held hotel jobs at the Aztec and Singapore, partly owned
by his wife's uncle; did public relations work; operated a wholesale tour
company; worked as a vice president of Tibor Hollo's Florida East Coast
Properties; and joined Muss in 1986.
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❑ On June 2, he moved into the chamber limelight, and he exudes optimism
about it. "We have a positive image, " he said of his city. "We have a positive
act going. We're having difficulty getting that message out there."
That, too, is one of his goals.
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