To Be or Not to Be, Part 3: Exhibits

Here I briefly summarize the various exhibits to the resolution I reviewed previously, however I will analyze some of the included documents later--especially the NEMAC and PAB resolutions respectively; the Ojus Urban Area District; where exactly the county demands retention of certain roads; and eventually the other documents included in the 71 page file at the bottom of these post.

If you're just jumping in to the fray you can read the other posts in the series:

1. Resolution calling special election

2. To Be or Not to Be: Whereas

3. To Be or Not to Be: Resolution

Exhibit A

I spoke briefly about this map already because it featured at the end of a portion of  the resolution discussing the boundaries of incorporation:

The resolution references various sets of boundaries, including this map. Note the map includes the open space portion of Greynold's Park and any roads over which the county would hypothetically retain control.

Exhibit B

I plan to more explicitly detail the North East Dade Municipal Advisory Committee. You need to know BCC created it to write a report, it then approved its own report and sent it to BCC. Much of what we see in this resolution and accompanying agreement coincide with the BCC resolution, but includes many important things not seen earlier. For that reason I mostly bring up the new things not in my previous posts.
Hopefully I can resolve some of these issues.

The following claim stuck out to me:

As highlighted in the County resolution by Commissioner Heyman, part of the terms as set by the BCC were the result of the "conceptual agreement" written by the NEMAC based on the discussions they had with County staff.
The Conceptual Agreement hypothetically depicts the mutually agreeable conditions which the Committee decided upon after discussions with County staff, and two public hearings.
I want to know more about this. Did any of you attend any of these discussions? Feel free to tell me about them, whether the hosts provided any documentation, and especially if you remember any claims made by any of the attendant parties. (Lots of the local back and forth revolves around promises people make about what will or will not happen under incorporation.)

Conceptual Agreement

This agreement makes the minimum service with MDCPD 4 years actually, because even if after 3 years the new city decides to go with its own PD they have to give the County a transition period fo no lass than 12 months

Suddenly start beginning some paragraphs with this,

One can't help but wonder why the this parks "in as-is condition" requires explicit statement? As called elsewhere in the resolution the BCC already expects the new city to help pay for county projects, and they're currently prettying up Greynold's Park, but we HAVE to understand and agree that our parks come as they are and the county will NEVER help us make them nicer. HAHA. If that isn't some really odd and seemingly fire-sale tactic I don't know what is.

Now we get to the first mention of an issue on which most resident electors seem to agree: the county shouldn't get all these roads. Even some members of NEMAC didn't support the agreement, two voted no on the resolution to adopt.
The county got most of the NEMAC to agree to capitulate important roads which connect different parts of the propose city, but different parts of our sector of the county also! Most egregious perhaps the retention of Ives Dairy Road and Highland Lakes Boulevard, hotbeds of traffic congestion.
 

I understand the BCC created this group, and the District 4 commissioner appointed the group, but at what point did they get the power to negotiate on behalf of the resident electors? The "Special Conditions" sections of the as yet non-existent charter more and more seem like both a necessary aspect of incorporation, and an affront to democracy.
As a counterpoint, I recall that the county currently retains control of everything, so regardless of these concessions the resolution still represents significant devolution.

$71M and $55M each

I have little problem with taking on a portion of the county debt, but this agreement doesn't state how much we owe. Despite this NEMAC agrees that the city will pass a bunch of taxes immediately upon incorporation. Public service tax, communication services tax at an equal or greater level than the county rate. Keep referring to the pro-rata share of these bonds, without explaining what it is. I'll figure it out eventually!

The next couple sections didn't jump out to me though I did find the following interesting:

As I can tell this is the only mention in the whole discussion about making sure the new city gets a fair deal on anything, but it only applies to Fire, Library, Solid Waste, and Police.

Exhibit C

This resolution luckily only takes up two pages but I feel like it's going to come back to haunt me shortly.

I wonder what the numbers looked like in 2005 compared to 2016

PAB given NEMAC report by BCC to conduct hearing and provide recommendation.

 Note the language which directs the PAB to base their recommendation of the NEMAC Report. We again see this cirular logic where public boards aren't asked to give a common sense assessment, or necessarily use their best judgment, but rather to make use of reports generated with very guided intent.

I wonder how this second meeting compared to that held over a decade prior.

Based on this quick read through the most substantial divergence the BCC makes rests here, where the PAB recommends the "new municipality retain regulatory control of the Ojus area but not interfere with the implementation of the SMART Plan, essentially a form of shared jurisdiction."
As someone attracted to the concept of more local control it seems a slap in the face that the county would ignore this recommendation.

Exhibit D

This map highlights the portion of the new city over which county would maintain control.

Exhibit E

Open in a new tab to see this in greater detail

Initial Conclusion

At this point we have gone through the entirety of Miami-Dade Board of County Commission Resolution  R-576-18, however this does not incorporate all information the county saw. To make a decision on whether I support this or not I have to look at the rest of the packet Commissioners saw that day.
This includes

• Mayor's Memorandum
• Northeast Dade MAC Adopted Pro-forma Budget (Exhibit 1)
• Northeast Dade MAC Budget Review (Exhibit 2)
• Northeast Dade Incorporate Report (Exhibit 3)

I will go over these documents soon in my continued quest to understand a simple question