MIAMI MIRROR TRUE REFLECTIONS

Miami Beach police officer (L) overseeing Espanola Way Special Event

SOUTH BEACH SPECIAL EVENT ENFORCEMENT FIASCO

The Espanola Way of Doing Things

5 January 2015
By David Arthur Walters
THE MIAMI MIRROR
Miami BeachDenizens of the City of Miami Beach expected a new kind of government from
the new regime installed after the latest round of F.B.I. busts, but it appears that their great
expectations have been in vain. What Solomon once said of old, that there is nothing new
under the Sun, is being proven true after all on historically corrupt Miami Beach, where a
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goodly number of his descendants are firmly ensconced, even presiding now over the city
commission after decades of competitive discrimination.
What may be realistically expected of the banana republic government on the beach is what
true republicans sacrificed their lives to defeat for over three centuries, the rule of special
privilege and everything that goes with tyranny. What stakeholders can be rest assured of
under a dictatorial mode of city government is the habitual violation of their right to due
process and equal protection of the laws if they do not go along with it. Indeed, a clause in the
Miami-Dade County Bill of Rights set the tone when it implied that citizens do not have the
rights asserted therein unless they respect officials. Old-timers say, off the record for fear of
retaliation, that there are two constants on the beach: selective enforcement of the laws, and
retaliation for exposing official misconduct.
That is not to say that the overwhelmed majority of people do not love to be ruled against their
own best interests, or that there is not another side to the story for the sake of journalistic
balance. Many city officials are well meaning, are good in the Kantian sense of having a good
will, yet are unable to match deeds to words to suit the integrity their resumes advertise
because they lack the intellectual capital and the democracy to get things done rightly.
The New Years Eve Special Event on Espanola Way, Al Capones old hangout, illustrates both
sides of the story while leaving plenty of confusing gray area in between to excuse officials for
either abusing their offices by permitting wrong to benefit themselves and cronies, or to cover
their asses because of unintentional mistakes, or permitting wrongdoing because they are just
stupid.
In their defense, maybe they are stupefied by the farrago of ordinances dished up by
commissioners to gouge the public and benefit their benefactors, especially their favorite real
estate moguls. The legal profession flourishes off the confusion of the laws, a wall behind which
bureaucratic asses, beholden to their feudal bosses for their fiefdoms, may grow fatter by the
day.
Miami Mirror readers will recall how city officials shut down club promoter Floyd Bostics No
Crowd Control event at Scott Robins 743 Washington Avenue nightclub, a few blocks from
Espanola Way, during Black Week aka Urban Beach Week in 2014.
A confidential official source bragged that although Robins friend and partner, Mayor Philip
Levine, was present at the raid, Levine did not intervene in favor of Robins, who, according to
Bostic, had taken $20,000 in cash from Bostic to rent the club for two nights.
But Robins, with whom Levine had incidentally partnered with the city in a major real estate
venture in Sunset Harbour among other ventures, gained the $20,000 cash for virtually nothing
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because Bostic was the one against whom multiple charges were made, of which only one
survived, the failure to have a so-called Special Event permit. He appealed the $1,000 fine.
The administrative magistrate for the special master facility, which is the final enforcement arm
of the city government, which has no independent branches, denied his appeal, not on the
grounds that he needed a Special Event permit, for which no evidence at all was presented, but
on the grounds that Robins nightclub company, operating on his property, had not paid the
renewal fee for the usage of his property as a nightclub until four days after Bostics party.
Tellingly, the citation against Robins for allowing the event in his nightclub was dropped, so
Scott Robins is scot-free.
Never mind that Bostic should not be responsible for Robins transgressions, or that city policy
permits businesses to operate for many months after their business license fees are due; that
is, if they are not troublemakers to be retaliated against.
In fact, Scott Robins has been running Espanola Way Suites, a transient apartment hotel for
tourists on Espanola Way, for three years without even having a use permit and business tax
license for it, the certificate of use having actually been denied in 2011. It has operated with
impunity until someone recently complained, putting officials on the spot, and even then they
dragged their feet before referring to their special master facility.
The penalties for failure to obtain a business tax receipt license include, among other things,
such as having your business shut down, 60 days in jail or a fine up to $500 or both. As a matter
of fact, Rod Eisenberg was arrested and his Sadigo Apartment Hotel shut down related to the
particular kind of permit he was allegedly supposed to have. His tourists were thrown out onto
the street, because, a federal suit against the city alleges, he exposed official corruption that
reportedly resulted in the departure of a city manager and a city attorney.
Eisenberg versus the City of Miami Beach is scheduled for trial in January. The attorneys are not
talking due to impending litigation. Attorneys hate press trials for several good reasons; one
being that the public might see what sort of nonsense is going on to its detriment.
And the lawyers for Antonio Halabi, who owns the Flame restaurant on Espanola Way, are not
talking about the retaliatory suit brought against him by Scott Robins, who owns two major
parcels along Espanola Way, because he complained to city officials that they were allowing
other tenants to violate city code regulating sidewalk cafes by putting out unpermitted chairs
and businesses to capture the tourist flow before tourists got to him and other tenants at the
back end of the block, costing him and his tip-oriented staff many thousands of dollars. Once he
complained, city officials forced the resignation of the sidewalk caf coordinator, proceeded to

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do their best to expedite permits for new seating arrangement for the offenders, and began to
enforce other code requirements he kept nagging them about.

The pretext for the retaliatory suit to evict Halabi is the violation of a lease term requiring
businesses to open at 1 PM. The landlord knew very well that he had been opening at 6 PM all
along because business is absolutely dead at the end of the block. When Robins threatened him
in writing, firstly on the basis that he was disturbing other tenants by having city officials
enforce the law, he proceeded immediately to open at 1 PM, at an additional cost to him of at
least $10,000 per month, but he was still sued.
Ironically, at the time of the citation at Robins 743 Washington Avenue nightclub, the Hosteria
Romana closed on the pretext of renovation, the reason being the same as other
establishments had closed, the Black Scare or White Fright of Memorial Day weekend. In fact, a
visiting black executive of the Burger King organization complained about the closure to me
while on Espanola Way.

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Halabi, who refused to discuss his litigation on the advice of his counsel, also complained to law
enforcement that he and his wife felt threatened by certain mafia-like visitations from
members of an offending group of restaurants, wherefore the police department is keeping a
watchful eye on the Way.
Espanola Way was packed when I arrived New Years Eve. I was reminded of the popular street
parties John Gotti used to sponsor in Little Italy. I did not see Scott Robins in the throng. His
presence would certainly have been celebrated. Not only is he publicly extolled by the press for
his integrity and for restoring historic South Beach buildings, he is the potentate of Espanola
Way, having at one time led the business association on the street.
After initially studying the situation, I had proposed that everyone get together and resolve the
issues Halabi presented to the city, and work towards making the back end of the block
including the plaza, more attractive, but nothing came of it. A business leader, who asked that
his name be withheld for fear of retaliation, said the mayor himself had promised to look into
the situation to that end, but nothing has obviously come of the promise.
I noticed two officers protecting the public at the Espanola Way Special Event, one from MBPD
and one from another jurisdiction. Given my interest in Special Event permits since the 743
Washington Avenue nightclub affair, I inquired as to whether or not Special Event permits had
been obtained.
The MBPD officer said there were two permits for the event, and the one for Oh Mexico was
posted on the establishment it is a violation NOT to post a Special Event permit at the event
itself. He said it was impossible that there was no Special Event permits for either place
because that is why the officers were assigned to the Special Event.
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I took a few casual pictures of the event. Tables and chairs were on the street in front of the Oh
Mexico and related Nuvo restaurant, and the Hosteria Romana across the Way. Large speakers
and a DJ were entertaining on the north side of the Way near Washington Ave, just west of
Habana 57. At midnight I heard a band playing inside Hosteria; it sounded like live
entertainment. I did not go inside because the entrance was too crowded and two men were
watching me intently. My reports on Espanola Way have not been appreciated. A gentleman
identified to me as Mr. Tramposo even went out of his way one day to curse me.
I spoke with the new manager of the Flame, a Mr. Casey, and he said three code officers had
showed up earlier on with police officers, and that he was told by the code officers that Mr.
Halabi has Jimmy Morales ear, which seemed to imply that this was the city managers
response to Halabis complaints about violations on the Way. The earful expression reminded
me of the pig-ear sandwiches with white bread and ketchup that one could buy at the illegal
Negro nightclub for a dime, the beers costing a quarter, when I was an underage kid.
I checked the citys Special Event website, which is immediately available to the public as well
as code officers, for approved permits to discover that Hosteria Romana did not have a Special
Event permit. I wondered why Hosteria had not been shut down and cited for that as well as for
having unpermitted sidewalk caf seats. When I subsequently checked the online Permit
Manager system, I found two tickets had been written.
CE15003562, written that night was coded sidewalk caf violation. There was no narrative
beside the Description on the online record except sidewalk. The Status was marked
XXXXXXXX, indicating, as Code Administrator George Castell explained on 9 October in
response to a previous inquiry on coding, The violator is located out of town and XXXXXXX is
the status for case that will be processed for certified mail in order to obtain service on the
case. Once it is delivered the compliance date will be based on the date they receive the
violation. The other ticket, CE15003563, was a duplicate of CE15003562.
Time and time again I had besought public officials to put full officer narratives by the
Descriptions on the online forms immediately available to the public, only to be told that that is
only done for noise complaints because that is the only important category. Even that
explanation of procedure betrays inconsistency, for some other complaint forms besides noise
complaints do bear full narratives. Actually, the only thing a really consistent around here is
inconsistency, which customers at the bowling center I managed once said about the oiling of
the lanes.
To discover what the officer actually reported requires the curious person to go through the
rigmarole of making a public record request, and, perhaps not understanding that such
requests can be made anonymously, of having a record of his requests compiled for purposes of
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retaliation. Even worse, the narratives can be concocted to order. The computer system can
allegedly report when narratives are originally entered or changed, but just try to get that
information.
After I reported on the enforcement nonsense that occurred at the 743 Washington Avenue
club during Black Week, the head of the code compliance department remarked that I had not
asked for the file, which he referred to by saying that Bostics company was cited because there
was a large crowd on the street that officers thought would go inside and break the occupancy
limit therein, and because they thought minors would be served alcohol, and because they
thought some of the crowd would go to a pool party at a nearby hotel. He provided no
evidence that any of that was done from the file. Beware of what officials THINK in Miami
Beach.
I did obtain a public record of an email sent by Graham Winick from Special Events on 2014-1231 at 10:38 GMT-05:00, wherein he stated this specious excuse: Because the Commission has
recently closed Espanola Way and both restaurants have merely asked for sidewalk cafe
expansion (which they obtained through Public Works) and no entertainment uses, the permits
were cancelled as there was no need for a special event permit.
Wrong. There was indeed entertainment. Sidewalk cafes are lawfully extended by a whole
different process. Closing a street and putting tables and chairs and other equipment on a
street requires permission from Public Works precedent to the approval of a Special Event
permit. That is why the allegedly cancelled Oh Mexico Special Event permit stated Public Works
approval was had to that end.
Therefore, since both permits were cancelled according to Winick, both the Espanola Way
Special Event should have been shut down, the Oh Mexico and Hosteria Romana restaurants
fined $1,000 each, and fined for having set out extra chairs and tables.
Let the sophists pull rabbits out of their hats and argue all that one way or another because
that is how magicians their fortunes. Let someone with common sense examine the events and
the rules and the excuses, and he will have reasonable cause to believe that public officials
including the lawyers among them abused their offices to the advantage of a few people, or
that they were mistaken and are simply covering their bureaucratic asses, or that they are
simply stupid. If they were just mistaken, do not expect them to admit it or to rectify the
mistakes.
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