Surfside

Voters in Hialeah, Homestead, Miami and Miami Beach went to the polls Tuesday with a slate of municipal candidates to choose from. In Surfside, voters chose among five charter amendments.

The majority of Surfside commissioners voted not to censure Mayor Shlomo Danzinger for making racial insults and sexist remarks directed at Commissioner Nelly Velasquez.

Two years ago, 98 people died with the Champlain Towers South condo building partially collapsed. Federal investigators have been looking into the flaws in the building's pool deck.

Federal officials say the swimming pool deck of the Champlain Towers South condo that collapsed two years ago failed to comply with original building codes and standards.

Investigators with the National Institute of Standards and Technology will begin testing concrete cores and reinforcing steel in a search for answers from the Champlain Towers South condo collapse.

The bill (SB 154) targeting 'milestone inspections' has been designed, at least in part, to address concerns that emerged as condominium associations started to carry out the law approved after the Surfside condo collapse.

The City of Miami took ownership of the building in 2005 and planned to demolish it to the ground, until activists convinced the city to back off. Some fear it could be happening again.

The Florida Building Commission says there is no reason they see to treat coastal and inland buildings differently. That was a key idea behind the post-Surfside law that passed in 2022.

Surfside commissioners had a surprise during a regularly scheduled meeting this week: They learned that the town manager, Andy Hyatt, resigned earlier that day. Chief of Police Rogelio Torres and Assistant Town Manager Jason Greene followed suit.

An unusual meeting took place last month inside the Surfside Town Hall. Representatives of the developer that bought the former Champlain Towers South site met with some family members of the victims to discuss erecting a memorial on the site. It was emotional and difficult - but the developers say they are listening.

Hundreds of claims on the more than $1 billion settlement from the Champlain Towers South litigation have been tossed out as phony.

Money from the sale of Florida beachfront property where a collapsed condominium tower once stood will be used to pay property taxes of the destroyed units, a judge ordered Monday. Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Michael Hanzman said in a brief ruling that the 2022 tax payments should not be deducted from the $96 million previously earmarked to compensate owners of the 136 units of Champlain Towers South in Surfside, Florida.