This August, City of Miami voters might or might not have the chance to decide whether the city should take out $450 million in loans to address what public safety officials and Mayor Eileen Higgins call “deteriorating” conditions at fire and police stations due to a lack of maintenance.
The decision of whether to put the bond on the August ballot was supposed to take place at Thursday's commission meeting.
But after heated debate by residents and first responders, Mayor Eileen Higgins asked to defer the decision about whether to put the item on the ballot until the next meeting, on May 14.
READ MORE: Miami leaders want $450 million for public safety — but need permission from city voters
The mayor's call to spend big on public safety was not on the public's radar just last week. But since announcing the proposal, the mayor and the city administration have been rapidly making the case for why the bond is needed.
Earlier this week, Police Chief Manny Morales walked WLRN and other media outlets through the police headquarters and pointed to evidence of water leaks and flooding damage.
" Without this bond, there is no ability to replace the police headquarters and build a new public safety facility. It's simply too costly," Mayor Higgins told WLRN on Wednesday.
"We have the ability to issue the bonds at our current bond rating to repair all of our fire stations and build a modern police headquarters, fire headquarters, emergency operation center, and 9-1-1 center all in one building," she said.
At the city commission meeting on Thursday, a police labor leader said issues have gone back years.
“ For years, every one of you and those who came before you have known the condition of police headquarters, you have seen it, you have heard about it, and we cannot allow this to continue,” Felix Del Rosario, the president of the Miami Fraternal Order of Police labor union, told city officials. “ We have documented cases of mold exposure affecting employees' health.”
“ This is nothing new. The only question is whether the city is going to fix it,” said Del Rosario.
But the sheer sticker price left many residents wary of forking over the cash, and it is unclear how willing the public might be to approve the bond.
Some residents spoke of a general distrust of city government after years of scandals, even with new faces on the commission and in the mayor’s office.
If approved, the bond would be the largest since voters passed a $400 million bond in 2017, called the "Miami Forever” bond. That bond aimed at repairing stormwater drainage, improving resilience to flooding and sea-level rise, improving parks and addressing affordable housing needs.
Out of the $400 million bond passed in 2017, only $112 million was spent as of January, while nearly all of the money has already been earmarked for specific projects, according to a presentation given to the bond’s Civilian Oversight Board by city staff. Nearly $45 million has already been spent on housing, while $26 million has been spent on parks and $33 million on improving infrastructure to deal with flooding caused by sea-level rise.
Major affordable housing projects like the Wynwood Works development, Platform 3750 in Coconut Grove and the Sawyers Landing development in Coconut Grove were built with partial funding from the 2017 bond, but as WLRN reported in 2023, some of the funding was questionable.
While running for office, Mayor Eileen Higgins said she was unclear where all the money was being spent on that 2017 bond, and called for a full accounting of how the money is being spent.
“ Now is not the time to saddle the city $450 million worth of more debt, particularly when we haven't gotten a full accounting of the money left in the Miami Forever Bond,” said Thomas Kennedy, an immigration activist and city resident.
Others joined the chorus.
“ It's way out of the ordinary,” said resident Christopher Lunding. “ Conceding [that] all the firehouses get replaced, they could be gold-plated and it wouldn't cost this amount of money. So something else is going on here.”
Mercedes Rodriguez, who works at the Community Emergency Response Team program with Miami Fire Rescue, said first responders in the city deserve every dime of the bond money, saying that conditions have been horrible.
" This is our 911 call. This is our siren," she said. "They deserve these buildings, the new fire stations, police stations to be built."
The longstanding issues at the stations impact firefighters every day, said Raul Cernuda, a district chief in the Fire Rescue and labor leader with the International Association of Firefighters Local 587.
" After a challenging fire or a traumatic medical call that will likely stay with us for the rest of our lives, we return to fire stations that are literally falling apart," he said. "At Fire Station one, my home station, water leaks from the second floor onto our dinner tables. When I go and take a shower, water from the drain backflows onto my feet. Mold and vermin are common."
Cernuda said that Fire Rescue "outgrew these facilities 20 years ago," and credited Mayor Eileen Higgins and the city manager to responding quickly once they became fully aware of the longstanding issues.
The vast majority of the proposed money for the public safety bond — $300 million — would go towards building a new public safety headquarters at Miami Freedom Park, close to Miami International Airport. The new building would replace the current police headquarters. The police department, fire department and 911 operations would share the building.
Mayor Eileen Higgins told WLRN that the current headquarters downtown would be sold and the revenue would be used to buy a new fleet of solid waste trucks.
The last $150 million would go to Miami's Fire Rescue Department. The city has identified seven new fire stations that need to be newly built, and would repair and modernize a dozen other fire stations citywide.
In the current City of Miami budget, the police and fire departments combined make-up 56% of all the city spending from the general fund. Out of a city budget of $1.2 billion, a total of $686 million goes to police and fire departments combined.
