Dr. Marvin Dunn will host a teach-in and press conference in Overtown Wednesday to counter President Donald Trump’s scheduled appearance at Miami's Kaseya Center for the America Business Forum.
The South Florida community leader and retired Florida International University professor is currently in the midst of a legal battle over the fate of valuable downtown Miami real estate previously owned by Miami Dade College that the state is trying to give away for the Trump presidential library. Miami Circuit Court Judge Mavel Ruiz temporarily blocked the transfer after Dunn filed a lawsuit claiming that the school's Board of Trustees violated state transparency laws.
Dunn, who told WLRN that “no president should be given this land,” says that this event will not focus on Trump. Instead, he intends to educate the community on the college’s history and the “vulnerabilities" that it currently faces.
READ MORE: South Florida community leader calls for investigation of land transfer for future Trump library
“Miami Dade College is a public institution that serves primarily Black and brown students,” Dunn told WLRN. “They're struggling for scholarship money. They're struggling to keep faculty and staff on board and then to have this giveaway is just an insult to the community.”
Dunn added that he is trying to rally all residents who are upset about the transfer. WLRN reported in October that a poll conducted by public research firm Bendixen & Amandi showed 74% of respondents believed that Miami Dade College should keep the land. The opposition to the transfer included 59% of Republicans.
“We want to have students out there,” said Dunn. “We want to have faculty members, community members, anyone who cares about the future of Miami Dade College, who wants to come out on the same day that the president is speaking to say, ‘Don't take this land from our kids.’”
A transfer without details
Miami Dade College’s Board of Trustees voted Sept. 23 to transfer the downtown lot next to Miami’s iconic Freedom Tower to the state — in a special meeting with an advance notice that merely noted trustees would discuss: “potential real estate transactions.”
Trustee Roberto Alonso said the board received a request from Gov. Ron DeSantis' office on Tuesday, Sept. 16, asking the college to convey the property to the state "for the good of the public," without any additional detail.
The same day as the trustees voted, DeSantis announced that the Florida Cabinet would vote on gifting the plot of land for the future Trump Presidential Library. But the transfer that has been halted because of the ongoing lawsuit.
The 2.6 acre land that stands in the middle of downtown Miami’s bustling Biscayne Boulevard is worth at least $67 million, according to property appraiser records. The College paid $24 million for the plot in 2004.
The college received no money in return for signing over its land to the state, while it could cost the college up to $300,000 in legal fees, Javier Ley-Soto, the general counsel for the college, testified in a court hearing last month.
The office of Republican Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier is now representing the college in the ongoing lawsuit over the transfer, court records show.
”It hit me immediately as a theft of land that belongs to children unborn in Miami-Dade County,” said Dunn. “You're stealing land from children who are not even born yet, and any politician who would stoop to that… is entitled to my sense of anger and repulsion.”
Wednesday's teach-in will take place noon at the Overtown Teach the Truth Garden. It will be followed by a 1 p.m. press conference.
The next hearing for the ongoing lawsuit about the land transfer is scheduled to take place on Nov. 24.
