The New City Budget
At first glance, the new city budget (for the fiscal year that started Oct. 1) looks substantially reduced from last year. It appears that the “public safety” budget, which includes salaries for police and fire, and “general government” expenses, which includes salaries for most other city employees, are both substantially cut, while there is a big jump in transportation costs.
These are both misinterpretations of what underlies the budgetary items, explains assistant finance director Keith Kleiman.
It all comes down towhat’s been allocated for capital projects. In public safety, for example, last year $12.4 million was earmarked for projects, like the new public safety building. This year it’s only $3.3 million. Staffing levels for police and fire were not reduced.
The same goes for the general government. The reduction of $10.5 million is almost entirely accounted for by a reduction in funds set aside for projects like the city’s new admin building, from $15 million last year to $4.67 million this year.
The same goes for projects in the “physical environment” which included sewage and drainage systems. Conversely, the jump in transportation expenses is due to funds being set aside for the new downtown Mobility Hub.
On the revenue side, meanwhile, the news is good. Emerging from the pandemic, the city expects revenue from everything – taxes, licensefees, use charges, investment earnings, etc. – go up by $43.4 million this year, for a total of $240.7 million. The gap between that figure and total expenses of $268 is covered by city loans for capital projects, borrowed at just two percent, thanks to the city’s triple A bond ratings.
Making It Real
The City Moves to Reign in the Abused Mediterranean Ordinance
You can find a plaque at the Coral Gables Museum,in their history section, which describes the city’s Mediterranean Ordinance. “In the 1980s, citizens worried that the city’s business district was filling up with 13-story, flat-roofed glass office towers… In June 1986, the city passed the Coral Gables Mediterranean Ordinance that gave bonuses to builders who either built or remodeled buildings in the Mediterranean style.”
Fast forward to the last decade, when the ordinance has been consistently used to break the zoning codes for height and density for virtually any building, all claiming to be vaguely Mediterranean. The result has been oversized, and often very modern looking, structures.
For the last two years Vice Mayor Michael Mena has brought this to the attention of the city commission, but to little avail. This year newly elected city Commissioner Rhonda Anderson has been catalytic to the process of returning the ordinance to its original intent. In July, she successfully pushed to establish a blue-ribbon committee to review the ordinance and how developers were able to skirt its purpose.
That volunteer committee, chaired by architect Felix Pardo and comprising a half dozen prominent Gables architects, has now submitted its conclusion to the city commission. As of press time, citizens were invited to attend a public hearing, Nov. 15 at 5 pm in the Public Safety Building, to listen to the recommendations and offer input. Check the city website for updates.
What residents can expect to hear is a proposed overhaul of the ordinance so as “to preserve the historical context and quality of life of this beautiful, planned city,” Pardo told the commission when he accepted the job of heading the committee. Projects approved over the last 10 years have consistently violated the intent of the ordinance, he said, creating “incompatible uses of scale, mass, height and the loss of architectural character.” Stay tuned.