Hialeah Council condemns colleague suing mayor over ‘abuse of power’ in 911 dispute
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The Hialeah City Council this week condemned Councilman Bryan Calvo for suing Mayor Esteban Bovo Jr. and alleging “abuse of power” in an increasingly ugly dispute over the city’s 911 call center.
In a meeting called specifically to address the lawsuit, the Council voted 6 to 1 on Monday to formally disapprove of Calvo’s “personal and political” agenda. His colleagues said he must pursue the lawsuit on his own dime and admonished him for “frivolously wasting the City’s resources.”
In his own defense, Calvo — who received support from more than 20 people in the audience — read from his lawsuit to illustrate how, in his opinion, the city clerk and legal department had “prevented him” from accessing public information about thousands of unanswered 911 calls and blocked him from communicating with city directors and introducing topics on the Council’s official business agenda.
“You are basically saying that I have a malevolent interest with this lawsuit,” said Calvo, the only member of the Council to vote against the resolution. “I have every right to file a lawsuit.”
Calvo criticized Councilman Jesus Tundidor, who filed the resolution condemning Calvo’s lawsuit, noting that members of Tundidor’s family were suing the city over a dispute involving former Mayor Carlos Hernández and a 2019 police raid of their Hialeah strip club.
“I am not asking for a single penny, as Tundidor’s family has done suing the city for $5 million,” Calvo said.
Calvo said the Council was creating “a very negative precedent in the city.”
“What I want with this lawsuit is for a judge to determine what my rights are as a councilor and whether the mayor has exceeded his duties,” Calvo explained.
Tundidor fired back at Calvo for speaking about his family, saying it showed Calvo’s “desperation.” He said the city’s issues with its 911 call center were not a crisis, nor did they present a problem beyond what is happening in other municipalities around Florida and the nation.
Calvo vs Bovo
Questioned by Calvo, City Attorney Rafael Suarez-Rivas said his office and others had drafted the language in Tundidor’s resolution. Suarez-Rivas did not respond when Calvo asked whether Continental PLLC, which is representing Bovo in the councilman’s lawsuit, were involved.
The mayor, the city’s top administrator and the sole named defendant in Calvo’s lawsuit, only intervened to say that in the last meeting he had with Calvo, the councilman had threatened to “sue him” if he did not receive the public records he was requesting about 911, for which the City Clerk is charging him $6,769.
At the end of the session, Bovo told the press that Calvo’s only accomplishment has been to undercut faith in the city’s emergency services.
“This has sadly become a circus,” he said. “The one that has mocked the Hialeah government, which has been conducted in the same way for 98 years, is the councilman.”
In a sign of how contentious the issue has become, Bovo compared Calvo’s “speech” during the meeting to the oratories once given by the late-Cuban dictator Fidel Castro.
”911 is not failing the people. The rest is political theater,” he said.
Residents supported Calvo, the council ignored them
While Calvo’s colleagues on the dais condemned him, he received support from people in the audience.
Juan Santana, a past candidate for mayor, told council members that they were “hypocrites for trying to silence someone who was elected.”
Jose Azze, a Hialeah resident and former city parks employee, said his father “left Cuba because of this type of persecution.”
“I never thought I would see something like this here,” he said.
Christopher Monzon, a former Hialeah City Council candidate who last year was beaten while canvassing in the city for Republicans, urged the Council to let Calvo “do his job.”
“I am really disappointed in this act that the Council wants to carry out against Calvo for wanting to investigate that these 911 calls are not being answered,” Monzon said.
Elias Montes de Oca, a losing candidate in Tuesday’s Hialeah elections, said he was surprised “at the city’s attempt to block access to public information,” and said it was unseemly to create a narrative that Calvo has a political agenda for wanting to know what happened to thousands of calls that were not answered by 911.
“It is wrong that the Council does not want to get to the bottom of the problem. This resolution is prejudiced, it is flawed,” said Montes de Oca. “This attack against someone who has been elected to do his job is wrong.”
