Judge rules ousted North Miami Beach commissioner can go back to work
Michael Joseph, who was ousted from the North Miami Beach Commission last month, is allowed to return to work after a Miami-Dade judge ruled in his favor in a case over his attendance record.
Miami-Dade Circuit Court Judge Peter R. Lopez on Tuesday granted a preliminary injunction brought by Joseph, agreeing that the city commission lacked a quorum when it held the vote to oust him. He wrote that the city charter does not allow commissioners to expel members of the commission. Lopez also questioned the time frame the commission used to calculate Joseph’s absence from meetings.
“I always had faith that truth will always triumph in the end, and it has.,” Joseph said in a statement sent to the Miami Herald.
READ: North Miami Beach commissioner ousted after missing meetings for 120 days
On May 16, the commission voted 3-1 to remove Joseph for failing to attend commission meetings for more than 120 days in violation of the city’s charter. The city requires five commissioners for a quorum. At that meeting, six commissioners attended but two — Jay Chernoff and McKenzie Fleurimond — recused themselves from the vote as they are parties to litigation related to Joseph’s removal. Commissioner Daniela Jean was the sole no vote. Joseph did not attend the meeting because of illness.
“The court finds that there is a substantial likelihood of success on the merits by Commissioner Joseph,” Lopez wrote in his order, noting that the vote by four commissioners did not meet the requirement for a quorum of five.
“Due to the lack of a quorum, the May 16, 2023 vote on whether Joseph had vacated his position is void and of no effect,” Lopez wrote.
Even if they met the quorum requirement, Lopez said the city’s charter did not grant the commission authority to vote to expel its members from the commission or resolve a dispute about whether commissioners automatically vacated their seats.
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Lopez also said the commission’s calculation of the time frame for which Joseph missed meetings was contradictory to the city charter and prior precedent on the issue. “The Commission’s calculation took into account a time period during which Joseph did not fail to attend a meeting since no meeting was scheduled or took place during that time period,” Lopez wrote.
Joseph attended the Oct. 18 meeting, there was no meeting scheduled in November, and he missed the December, January and February meetings. He was at the March 20 meeting after another judge ordered all commissioners to attend.
Lopez noted the city and Chernoff’s lawsuit used the time frame from which Joseph last attended a meeting and not when he first missed a meeting, as they had in 2018 when they voted to remove then-Commissioner Frantz Pierre.
As part of Lopez’s order, the city cannot hold a special election to replace Joseph.
Joseph’s reinstatement comes on the heels of the suspension of Mayor Anthony DeFillipo, who was arrested on three charges of voter fraud on May 31. Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle said her office used cell phone data to track DeFillipo driving from Davie to North Miami Beach, where he cast ballots to vote in three elections in August, October and November.
He has adamantly denied allegations that he lives in Davie, while acknowledging his family lives there. DeFillipo has repeatedly insisted he lives in North Miami Beach.
Joseph was one of three commissioners who refused to attend commission meetings in protest over concerns about DeFillipo’s residency.
