Meeting Minutes - November 13 20181
Mayor’s General Obligation Bond Advisory Panel
Meeting Minutes
November 13, 2018
City Manager’s Large Conference Room
Vice-Chairperson Saul Gross called the meeting to order at 6:09 p.m.
Attendance was taken. Mayor’s General Obligation Advisory Panel Members in attendance were as
follows:
Last Name First Name Present Absent Phone Not Sworn in
Rivo Karen X
Breslin Ray X
Glottman Jack X
Gross Saul X
Jones Carolina X
Leibowitz Debra X
Libbin Jerry X
Malakoff Joy X
Meiner Steven X
Peter Marie X
Ramos Margueritte X
City of Miami Beach employees and City of Miami Beach residents present included:
John Woodruff, Chief Financial Officer
Commissioner Alemán
Commissioner Arriola
Cilia Maria Ruiz-Paz
Sean Smith, resident
Michael Barrineau, resident
Roll Call
Attendance of the Panel was taken.
Vice-Chairperson Saul Gross spoke about the G.O. Bond results and all of the hard work staff, the
Panel, etc. put in.
Commissioner Alemán spoke and said she wanted to thank each and every one of the members of
the Panel for their work. She spoke about how blown away she was with the results of the ballot
questions and how all of them passed. She was very impressed by how the residents supported the
questions.
Discussion was held regarding the results.
Discussion was held about the process of how the ballot questions came about.
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Discussion was held about staff putting in a lot of effort and attended many meetings to educate
residents about ballot questions.
Commissioner Arriola walked into the meeting and thanked all of the Panel members for their hard
work and congratulated everyone.
Minutes from October 4, 2018
The minutes were reviewed and approved.
Motion by: Margueritte Ramos. Second by: Debra Leibowitz. All in favor of minutes being approved.
Election Results
a. LTC from City Clerk (handout)
John Woodruff, Chief Financial Officer, spoke about the election results and he mentioned he had
the 1999 G.O. Bond results as well to compare them. He said he has never seen such great results
where people are voting yes to tax themselves. He said we did a lot of things right, which included
many people’s hard work including this Panel. He said he feels that everyone involved felt like this
was worth doing.
Discussion was held about the turnout and results.
The Panel felt it was the right thing that we pursued the November 2018 election.
Debra Leibowitz said that it was tough to disseminate all of the information in the short amount of
time given, but we did it and it is good to be a part of it.
Discussion continued and the members gave their opinions on what they think helped these bonds
pass.
Vice-Chairperson Saul Gross said he was curious to see how many properties are homesteaded.
John Woodruff said we came up with a few talking points and one was that 24% of properties are
homesteaded, but they only pay 16% of the tax bill, which means 84% of the tax bill from the G.O.
Bond is getting paid for by someone else.
Marie Peter said she felt that the Commission did a great job by putting together this resident panel
because then residents felt comfortable that residents were working with residents.
Commissioner Alemán said now that the members made these connections is a benefit for the
future.
G.O. Bond Next Steps
a. Draft funding timeline (handout)
b. Project sequencing
c. Project management
d. Transparency and communication
e. Creation of oversight committee
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John Woodruff said that a lot of this is high level and there are a lot of discussions that still need to
happen. He walked through what some of the things are. He spoke about having cash in hand and
the timeline was given out to the members. The funding should be available in Mid-March. He also
spoke about the sequencing of the projects and what makes sense. He said they met as a
management team and will have many follow up meetings with the City Manager so we will figure it
out very quickly. He said they have tabbed all the projects to a department and the departments
have started looking into those that are ready to go and which need design, etc. He said we probably
don’t need a program manager at this point. For the 1999 G.O. Bond it was different because the
City did not have the capacity to do capital projects like we do now. The sequencing of the projects
is very important and in the end it will be taken to Commission because they need to make that vote
of what the order should be.
Discussion was held about projects that would probably be ready to start soon.
Discussion was held about having transparency about completing the projects.
There will be a website to track all of the projects for people to stay informed and to know what is
happening.
Discussion continued about the projects.
John Woodruff talked a little bit about the oversight committee and that is something that the
Commission will hopefully be talking about at the Commission meeting tomorrow.
Debra Leibowitz said she would be interested in being on the oversight committee and asked if the
panel members can put their names in to be considered. She asked if there was a list.
John Woodruff said part of what needs to be figured out is the composition of residents, but there
can be a list started.
Marie Peter said she believes the discussion from a while ago included the composition being a
chair of the committee and then 2 members from North Beach, 2 members from Mid-Beach, and 2
members from South Beach.
Discussion was held about the OIG, Internal Audit, and the role of the resident oversight committee.
Commissioner Alemán said we need to define the roles of all of these entities.
Discussion was held about the responsibility of the oversight committee, but also have residents on
the ground to have neighborhood engagement for each project.
The Panel feels that even if we have professionals on the oversight committee, they should still be
residents.
Discussion was held regarding the different types of professionals should be on the committee.
The Panel members believe there should be a forum for residents to voice their concerns.
John Woodruff said that although Karen Rivo couldn’t be present she wanted to express her thanks
and gratitude for all of the hard work that the Panel did.
Adjournment
Meeting adjourned for the final meeting at 6:43 p.m.