Will Rebuilt Liberty Square Be Really New -- Or Repeat of Past Failings?

          Miami-Dade has announced a $200 million plan to redo poor, problematic Liberty Square. Studies show that concentrated poverty in public housing often leads to continued dysfunctional neighborhoods. Author Marvin Dunn has an idea about how that can be avoided this time. Full story HERE.  Posted May 20, 2015

Miami 1980 vs. Baltimore 2015

On the 35th anniversary of the McDuffie riots, several involved in those tumultuous events  say very little has changed in black's poorest neighborhoods -- noting disturbing similarities with recent events in Baltimore. Also: Marvin Dunn, co-author of a book on the 1980 riot, asks Miami to install marker where Arthur McDuffie died. Full report available HERE. Posted May 16, 2015.

How Sweet It Is!

 New Novel about Miami Beach

By John Dorschner
      Just in time for Miami Beach's 100th birthday, novelist Thane Rosenbaum has produced How Sweet It Is! -- a tale of the Beach set in 1972, featuring the Posners, two Holocaust survivors and their son. 
    The book opens with a chapter in the voice of Jackie Gleason ("Everyone loves the fat man"): "Miami Beach is magical, but it is the magic of the dark arts. Black magic masquerading as enchantment."
    Mob financier Meyer Lanksy gets his due, as does police chief Rocky Pomerance, the Republican and Democratic National conventions and, not least, a randy rabbi who frequented the Playboy Club and Hotel on Collins Avenue, "making out with bunnies, two at a time, right in the middle of the lounge."
    But it's the Gleason character who gives the rant on fellow TV star Arthur Godfrey, deriding the politicians who named 41st Street after him. "Everybody knows that Godfrey ... was an anti-Semite who wouldn't allow Jews in his hotel, the Kenilworth, up in Bal Harbour. Here's a laugh, with a name like Kenilworth, he didn't let dogs in either. Imagine that: Miami Beach might be the only city in the country where the majority of its residents are Jews, and they name a street in the very heart of the city after the best known Jew hater in the country."
    Four decades later, the name still stands.
    Rosenbaum, a novelist and lawyer who grew up on Miami Beach in the '60s and '70s, is scheduled to speak at Books and Books in Coral Gables at 7 p.m. Saturday April 18. 
    The book, formally scheduled for release in April, is published by Mandel Vilar Press. 208 pages. $24.95.

Watson Island Update: Surprising Profit, New Opposition

 By John Dorschner
  
    After years of struggle, Jungle Island is suddenly turning a profit on paper, but the huge swing from repeated losses appears to be due primarily to changes in the way it reports its finances.
    Meanwhile, the other major tenant on Watson Island, Island Gardens, is still in search of financing after more than a decade on the drawing boards, and the mayor of Miami Beach is joining its vocal opponents in trying to shut the project down.
    The financial reports of the self-described "Miami"s No. 1 family attraction," obtained through a public records request from the city of Miami, show that in September Jungle Island reported a year-to-date loss of $1.17 million. Its October report indicates it netted $301,432 for the month, while showing a year-to-date net income after allocations of $1.36 million -- a swing of $2.5 million in one month.
    Spokeswoman Rachel Pinzur declined to explain what happened.  "As a privately held institution, Jungle Island does not discuss its finances or accounting practices."
    Jungle Island is required to make monthly financial reports to the city because its revenue determines the rent it pays the city. In October, the rent came to $65,007, considerably higher than $38,216 paid in September, but park leadership has noted in the past that attendance fluctuates by large amounts depending on time of year. In October, admissions brought in $451,402, compared to $253,030 in September.
    One notable difference in accounting:  In September, the park listed fixed income expenses year-to-date of $1.7 million. That included how much the park spends on interest for its loans and for depreciation. That category is missing from the October report.
    Another item of interest: In October, Jungle Island earned almost as much money from its banquet facilities ($442,000) as it does in amusement park admissions ($451,000).
                                                 EXECUTIVE SHAKEUP   
 Jungle Island President John Dunlap continues to make changes in his management team, which has gone through considerable turnover since he took over in June 2013.
    Recent changes: Christopher Gould, general manager of a Fort Lauderdale hotel, becomes managing director, dealing with day-to-day operations, replacing a staffer Dunlap brought with him from San Diego. Eric Eimstad has been named chief marketing officer, moving over from the Miami Seaquarium. Kevin Henderson, from the Minnesota Zoological Garden, is moving from snow-removal issues to handing tropical plants as he takes over as senior operations manager/facilities.
    Spokeswoman Pinzur explained the changes: "Jungle Island is embarking on the largest endeavor undertaken in the attraction’s 78-year history. In doing so, Jungle Island has sought the very best leaders in the industry to help oversee park operations while the company's president remains focused on the master plan project."
    Bern Levine, Jungle Island's lead owner, said he continues to have confidence in Dunlap's leadership. "He's doing great," he said in a telephone interview.
                                  FLAGSTONE KEEPS SEEKING FINANCING
    On the other side of the island, Island Gardens continues to make slow progress in creating a marina for megayachts -- the first step for a massive high rise development that was supposed to have been finished a decade ago.
    Flagstone Property Group continues to looking for funding for its $700 million project. In September, Greenwich Group International, a major investment firm, said it expected to find investment partners for Flagstone "within two months." Greenwich did not respond to a recent query about the investors. 
    Flagstone spokeswoman Bettina Inclán Agen emailed: "Flagstone is in discussions with several prospective parties interested in investing in various components of this world-class development and North America's only super-yacht marina."
     Inclán stated: "Island Gardens is on schedule and on pace. One of the first items set for completion at Island Gardens is North America’s only super-yacht marina. The first phase of the marina will be finished during the first quarter of 2015, with final completion of the marina being accomplished towards the end of the year."
    Meanwhile, a judge has thrown out a lawsuit by some Miami residents who alleged that the Flagstone deal with the city violated the city's charter because it required only $2 million a year in rent when it should be paying $7 million, based on appraised property value.
    A third amended complaint by seven residents, led by Stephen Herbits, was filed in late December. Among other charges, the lawsuit charges that the development would be a disaster for traffic moving along the causeways between Miami and Miami Beach. Their website is causewaychaos.org.
    They're getting increased support. Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine posted on his Facebook page that the Flagstone project "will be detrimental to our already fragile and overburdened traffic infrastructure namely traffic on the MacArthur Causeway. I will continue to oppose this project and have instructed our City Attorney to explore all legal remedies available to the City."

An Astonishing New Book about Vietnam

By John Dorschner      

        My best friend in college, Bill Ingalls, has just published an astonishing book about his year in Vietnam. It is insightful, harrowing, occasionally funny and utterly frank – an account of a onetime Soldier of the Month getting by with pot, booze, a defiant attitude – and a bit of luck.

        He operated a road grader – sitting six feet above the ground, a perfect target for any sniper – especially during a nerve-jangling stretch near the Cambodian border when he helped construct a Special Forces camp. In between, his Army life often consisted of  “backbiting, threats, bribery and blackmail” – while wheeling-dealing, trading Philippine army guys diesel fuel in return for pot.

        The self-published book is Snakes, Rain and the Tet Offensive: War Stories with Photos, based on 50 letters he wrote to his then-wife Faith Rogers, with some later-day commentary added, and 274 photos he took with a used East German 35 mm he bought for $15.

        His letters pull the reader directly back to the moment, as his discussion of family finances: “You should get about $210 or so this month,” after he takes $40 in cash for his expenses. He writes he could get another $40 a month if he's promoted to SP-4, but “I refuse to kiss ass for it.”

        No glorifying the war for him. As he put it in the introduction: “It was an ugly war without a real reason for being beyond the political hysteria of the time. I hated it then, and I hate it now. When I visited the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, I cried. It could have been me with my name on that wall.”

        Some 58,000 American soldiers died protecting South Vietnam – a country that ceased to exist after the United States finally conceded defeat. To put that in perspective, 4,500 Americans have died in Iraq and 2,400 in Afghanistan in the decade-plus we've been mired in those two countries.

        We were roommates at the University of Colorado. He was a bright guy who didn't march to anyone else's drummer – the kind of student who doesn't automatically parrot back what instructors wanted to hear. He might read Thomas Wolfe for the fun of it, but blow off a lit class because he considered the prof pretentious. After several years, he had a grade point of something like 1.95, and the university informed him that since he didn't have the required 2.0 he'd have to sit out a semester or so.

        In the mid-1960s that meant one thing: Vietnam.

        Rather than become a canon-fodder draftee, he decided to enlist for three years, so he could choose a specialty that would (in theory) keep him out of harm's way. He ended up driving a road grader for the 362^nd Engineering Company. In August 1967, he was sent to Tay Ninh Base, 50 miles northwest of Saigon.

Ingalls Today

       When he arrived, his assigned machine was inoperable. He figured out how to fix it himself. “I was getting paid to operate a road grader, and I did the very best I could at all times. I had a job to do and I did it. Being totally against the war, and shirking work, are two different topics for me.”

        Not that the work always made sense. Once an ornery sergeant ordered him to cut a drainage ditch right across a road used by Vietnamese workers. The workers were puzzled/angry about having to walk around the swampy ditch. When the sergeant left, Ingalls filled the ditch back in. “I also fixed drainage problems for the local farmers when they needed help, which I think went a long way toward keeping me alive.”

        But he also learned not to carry tools on the grader – because kids stole them from the tool box.

        In October 1967 – just his third month – he was named Soldier of the Month for his company, but his relationships with superiors quickly deteriorated. “I just wasn't able to keep my mouth shut,” about the war or stupid orders. He turned down a chance to go to officer candidate school.

        More alluring was “dopers' corner – strange music late into the night. Odd smells and an anarchistic ambiance.” He passed guard duty sometimes by reading Wolfe and Somerset Maugham.

        He quickly learned the art of being a dealer, like Milo Minderbinder in Catch-22, occasionally draining his fuel tank to get pot, a “high quality rain suit” or a tubeless tire patch kit, particularly important because he was getting a flat at least once a week. “My high point came when I negotiated steak and ice cream for roughly for three months of Sunday dinners in exchange for fixing the drainage on a … (food) storage yard.”

        In December, his group was assigned to help construct a Special Forces base near the Cambodian border – close to the trails that North Vietnamese soldiers used to infiltrate the south.

A Man and His Machine 1967

        Attempts to clear the jungle led immediately to enemy barrages. The first night, the nervous engineers fired their M-14s into the darkness at the perceived enemy locations, not thinking of the Special Forces set up on the perimeters. The next morning, a pissed Special Forces officer said some of the M-14 rounds had hit his men and if happened again, his guys would turn around and fire at the engineers.

       “The fighting was so continuous that I didn't take my boots off for two weeks,” he writes. 

       Everybody was jumpy. A soldier on the back of a truck extended his rifle so his buddy could grab it and leap up on the truck. Without thinking, the soldier kept his finger on the trigger and when his buddy grabbed the barrel, his finger squeezed, killing his buddy with a shot to the chest.

        Ingalls heard bullets whiz past him – like the sound of buzzing bees – but road graders operated in areas that had already been cleared of vegetation. Much more exposed were the operators of the Rome plows, assigned to knocking down the jungle to make a clearing, with the enemy often lurking a few feet away.

        “A plow is the most hazardous duty in Vietnam for the engineers … they're easy to ambush and because of the noise made by the plow, the operator can't hear anything.” The Rome operators tended to misfits, “people who don't get along in the army at all. Ex-Hell's Angels, guys who get in fights all the time.”

Near the Cambodian border, the road grader was parked in a trench to protect it from enemy fire.

        In late January, the area quieted down. Ingalls didn't know it at the time, but the enemy troops were done moving south and were now attacking South Vietnamese cities across a broad front during the Tet Offensive.

        The lull didn't last long. One day a convoy was ambushed about a mile from camp. A young sergeant rounded up 11 guys to rescue the wounded. “He told me to climb aboard as well, but I refused, citing the first commandment of all heavy equipment operators – never abandon your equipment when attacked. He was pissed, but I sensed that what he was doing was seriously wrong. All the guys on the truck looked frightened. They had no idea what to do.”

        The truck stormed straight into the ambush. All were killed. “They never even got a chance to get off the back of the truck. Stupid waste of life.”

         Americans were dying all the time, of course. Only one incident Ingalls witnessed became a news story. It concerned a Rome plow operator named Thomas Van Putten. At the time of the ambush, he had only a week left in country, and a buddy offered to take his plow assignment. Van Putten ended up in the convoy as a gunner on a scraper. The Viet Cong captured him. A year later, an emaciated Van Putten appeared: He'd escaped after being a prisoner for a year, serving as a VC mule.

        By that time, Ingalls was back in Boulder, where he graduated with a degree in history. The marriage didn't last. “I can't say that the Army destroyed my marriage, but something did, that's for sure,” he writes in a postscript. “By the time I got out of the army I knew it wasn't going to last, and we called it quits within three or four years.”

Ingalls in 2014: He's still a car buff. This 1929 Model
A was handed down to him by his father. He recently
 gave it to his daughter Ursula.

        He became a small businessman, specializing with considerable success in niche corners of the auto industry. He's now retired, living in California. Deb, his wife of 37 years and a professional typesetter, helped design the book. (I was among a bunch of people who gave him him advice on the first draft, and he rewarded me with a free copy.)

        The first edition is a mere 150 copies. The price is a hefty $90 – because of the huge expense of printing color photos. It's available at www.warofwords.co – with free shipping.

        If that sells out, he may think of a larger, cheaper hard-copy edition, or an electronic color edition. Electronic would lower the price to $9.99, he says, but because of the size of the pages and photos, it likely would need to be read on a desktop.

        I was fascinated by his accounts of the absurdity of the war, but the book could attract a completely different readership with the photos and accounts of all the heavy construction equipment. Though they sometimes broke down under brutal conditions, the machines were pretty damn tough. (An enemy shell once knocked an inch-and-a-half hole through an engine block and the damn thing kept going.)

        He hasn't lost any of his old individualism. In this age of Youtube and videos everywhere, he's built a full-fledged sound studio in his garage, producing (among other things) movie-length radio dramas and much shorter book reviews that he's marketing to radio stations.

The Renos

      Glenn Terry, Coconut Grove activist and mangohead extraordinaire, has a moving tribute to his friend Mark Reno on his blog, The Grove Guy. The report on a memorial service at the family home in Kendall includes a rare recent photograph of Mark's sister, Janet, former U.S. attorney general, who announced in 1995 that she had Parkinson's Disease. She is shown in a wheelchair at the memorial service.
        Mark, among many other things, was a onetime professional alligator wrestler. His -- and Janet''s -- parents were celebrated Miami journalists. 


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Jungle Island slashes labor costs, still loses money

Updates on Watson Island

By John Dorschner

      John Dunlap, Jungle Island's new president, has managed to boost admission revenue while slashing labor costs by 40 percent, but the long-troubled tourist attraction still showed a net operating loss of $813,435 for the first eight months of this year, 51 percent worse than the loss for the same period last year.

       Dunlap, 37, was brought in last year from San Diego to transform the property, and he's announced plans to create a “real jungle experience” for tourists, including swimming, zip lines and a beach. “Our goal is to be Miami's water attraction,” he said in a cover story by this reporter in the Biscayne Times October edition, entitled The Long, Dismal Saga of Watson Island, available HERE.

       “Jungle Island is healthy and thriving,” a spokeswoman said in an email Wednesday morning. “While year-over-year admissions were up through August, a host of new (2014) special events and programs have been implemented which has driven down current year profitability.

        “However, all of these initiatives are expected to make a positive impact to the park in the years to come. As an example, we recently transformed an un-groomed and underutilized parcel of land into a spectacular sandy beach with a floating aqua park to take advantage of Jungle Island’s prime location on Biscayne Bay and to expand the average length of stay,” the spokeswoman said. “The installation came at a one-time cost of over $300,000.”

         Meanwhile, another major player on Watson Island, Flagstone Property Group, has filed a motion to intervene in a citizen's lawsuit against the city that is intended to block the development, and a Flagstone spokeswoman has come forward to say the proposed Island Gardens project has many positive elements.

           At time of publication of the Biscayne Times story, government sources had not responded to two requests for information: The city of Miami on Jungle Island's financial reports and state wildlife regulators on the attraction's perimeter fencing requirements. Both entities have since supplied the requested reports.

             State regulators say that Jungle Island doesn't need to meet many requirements because the tigers caged there are only temporary, even though most of the cats have been there for years. More on that later.

                                 BIG SAVINGS IN OUT-SOURCING

            

             The Jungle Island financial reports provided by the city reveal major changes since Duncan took over in June 2013, although most changes didn't start to show up on the financials until the start of 2014.

            The biggest move was out-sourcing many of the park functions, including food concessions, the banquet hall, gift shot and photo shoots. The records show that Ovations, which runs the food and banquet operations, pays Jungle Island 30 to 35 percent of its revenues while picking up all food and labor costs.

             Deals like this have dropped the park's employee costs – including wages, benefits and worker's comp – from $4.24 million in the first eight months of 2013 to $2.53 million for the same period in 2014.

             “Overall cost and the number of jobs provided to the local economy is largely unchanged,” the spokeswoman said. “We have a joint venture agreement with Ovations. All employees under Ovations are Jungle Island employees. ... No Miami based Jungle Island jobs were lost with the shift of these services to third party suppliers. In fact, Jungle Island’s plans to add new attractions to the park will result in job creation.”

              The financial report doesn't mention how many people the attraction employs – a crucial issue because Jungle Island received a federal loan of $25 million to build the facility – on condition that it employ at least 603 people, according to county officials.

Dunlap told Biscayne Times that the park is in full compliance with its loan promises but didn't provide exact employment figures. “We expect that Jungle Island will be forthcoming with that data,” the county told Biscayne Times.

              Another major change: Expanding special events. That helped boost admission revenue from $3.7 million for the first eight months of 2013 to $3.9 million for the same period this year.

               One example: Winter World Island, which featured a beach snow machine. These promotions increased attendance – but at a cost. Special events expenses were $329,000 for 2014, compared to a mere $7,000 for the same period last year.

              “We are putting a greater emphasis on special events in order to broaden our reach and attract new guests to the park,” the spokeswoman said. “However, both figures do not accurately represent special projects in the same category. We also introduced new after-hour events this year and brought in additional labor to service them. Examples include Africa Nights and the current Terror in the Jungle Halloween attraction, which employs 80 cast members.”

               The financial report indicates that Jungle Island is current with its rent payments – paying the city $545,000 for the first eight months.

 

                                 NO NEED FOR A PERIMETER FENCE?

               Because Jungle Island has tigers and other animals considered potentially dangerous, it is regulated by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

                No state official was made available before the Biscayne Times deadine, but a spokeswoman said that Jungle Island was in full compliance with state regulations. She sent along a copy of the rules that indicated generally an eight-foot-high perimeter fence is required, but that older facilities, such as Jungle Island, don't have to abide by that rule.

                Jeff Shimonski, the attraction's former vice president of facilities, said that while the fencing of the individual cages is strong, he was concerned that there were gaps in the perimeter fence. Dunlap says that, as a former zoo director, he understands fencing requirements and Jungle Island has no problems.

                 After publication of the BT article, the state spokeswoman said that upon further checking Jungle Island didn't need a perimeter fence because the “cats currently at the facility are there in travel status only.”

                  The tigers are owned by an outside company, but Shimonski, who left earlier this year after almost 40 years with the attraction, says “I'm not sure how one would define 'travel status.' The cats are there for years. Occasionally one is moved for health or other concerns.”

 

                                         FLAGSTONE SPEAKS OUT

          Bahar Bayarktar, director of communications for Flagstone Property Group, sent a statement on Wednesday: “Construction of Island Gardens started earlier this year, encompassing multiple projects including the development of North America's first super-yacht marina and a multi-acre public use waterfront art park, all of which will be major engines for economic growth, community development and tourism for South Florida. We are excited about the progress, which will help create thousands of jobs to the local economy, and bring in millions in economic impact.”

          She said the construction project could pay over $500 million to workers. “When doors open in 2017, Island Gardens will create 3,000 jobs, providing approximately $72 million in wages to local residents and afford millions in additional revenues” for city, county and schools.

           A far less upbeat view is held by the Coalition against Causeway Chaos. Two of its members last month sued the city, saying that political leaders had violated their own charter in allowing Flagstone to pay less than market value rent for its Watson Island holdings.

            The lawsuit, filed by Stephen Herbits and Sharon Kerby Wynne, complains that the city's own reports show that Flagstone should be paying more than $7 million in annual rent when the project is completed, not the $2 million the contract calls for.

Flagstone has been planning the long-delayed project since 2001, when it first signed a deal with the city. 

          Critics have complained that the Flagstone development really isn't under way yet, with the company only doing some underwater surveying as it prepares to dredge for the marina.