Friday Fishwrap

Well, the week is winding down and of course the big news is the election. Eddie Lim won election as the Commissioner for Harbor Island. I congratulate him - he wasn't my first choice but that was over policy, not competence or respectability, and I know Eddie will serve the whole city well.

Corina Esquijarosa won as mayor. The Elections Department completed the final count last night. This was not supposed to happen. She's a newcomer not very well known in North Bay Village and she defeated a sitting commissioner who announced for mayor from the dais six months ago. Her opponent was well financed, with good name recognition and I would say a better campaign organization if Corina actually had a real campaign organization. And still she won.

North Bay Villagers want things done differently and they rejected the status quo this week. The election was a repudiation of the personal politics that have dominated the Commission, most famously the Trujillo Tax as our decreasing coffers were spent on paying people to go away if Rey Trujillo didn't like them. It was a call to the Commission to act on the issues that affect us on a day to day basis. It was a statement that the city belongs to the residents, not the commission.

Corina won and it's going to be a long hard two years to confront this collapsed economy, to undo the damage that has been done in the last year as Trujillo, Kane and Vogel consistently voted against the interests of the city and in favor of their own.

Corina will face the insults, lies and innuendos from the old guard that our previous mayor did. I hope she doesn't face the same Sunshine busting cabal of three votes already made long before the public hears about an issue. She's not a saint or a miracle worker, and a mayor can't do it alone, so it's time for all of us to reengage in the politics.

See you at the next commission meeting. I'll let you know when it is scheduled. I'm taking the weekend off.

Kevin Vericker
November 5, 2010