Miami Lakes mayor is supporting a colleague’s challenger in the November election

Manny Cid is running unopposed for his second term as mayor of Miami Lakes, but that doesn’t mean his presence won’t be felt in a November election with two town council seats on the ballot.

Cid is endorsing candidates in both races, including the challenger to Councilwoman Marilyn Ruano, who had floated her own run for mayor against Cid and has been one of his toughest critics. The mayor is instead backing Ray Garcia, a first-time political candidate and former parks director in nearby Hialeah Gardens.

In another race for the seat vacated by Nelson Rodriguez, who ran unsuccessfully for state representative, Cid is putting his weight behind Tony Fernandez, who runs an information technology firm and has been campaigning since late 2018. Fernandez is facing Nayib Hassan, a defense attorney who previously ran in 2016.

Some of residents’ central concerns in the northwest Miami-Dade suburb involve traffic and maintaining the small-town feel of a community assembled out of cow pastures in the 1960s. The town’s population boomed in the decade after it was incorporated in 2000, from about 22,000 to over 29,000 in 2010. It has continued to grow, but more slowly, with an estimated 31,000 residents last year.

The candidates don’t purport to differ greatly on key issues. All four say they oppose reopening two bridges to vehicles over Interstate 75 at Northwest 154th and 170th streets in a battle with neighboring Hialeah over connectivity between the two communities. Miami Lakes filed a lawsuit last October asking a judge to prevent Miami-Dade County from reopening the 170th Street bridge, which has been closed for decades.

Hialeah Mayor Carlos Hernandez has branded Miami Lakes officials as “racists” for refusing to provide access to services in Miami Lakes for residents of his working-class community. But in Miami Lakes, where the $73,000 median household income is more than double that of Hialeah, some officials have suggested their neighbors are simply trying to punish Miami Lakes residents for Hialeah’s woes.

“I believe there was neglect by Hialeah, overpopulating without having the proper infrastructure,” Ruano told the Miami Herald. “Opening bridges is their escape route.”

Ruano’s opponent, Garcia, agreed that reopening the bridges would “really hurt our standard of life.”

“You don’t need 30 studies to tell you,” he said. “It’s just gonna add to the bottleneck.”

Candidates also said they would work to address residents’ concerns about blasting from the Hialeah-based White Rock Quarries. Residents on the west side of Miami Lakes have felt the effects for decades — literally, in the form of what feel like mini-earthquakes — as miners detonate buried explosives to extract limestone and other rocks from the ground.

Residents fear it’s damaging their property. Garcia said that, when he worked in Hialeah Gardens two decades ago, the blasting caused his office building to sink six inches into the earth on one side.

“Two earthquakes a day, five days a week for decades — you’re gonna tell me that doesn’t destroy property?” he said.

Ultimately, any solutions to both the bridge and blasting problems may come from the state level. The bridges are owned by the Florida Department of Transportation, and the blasting is regulated by the state.

The town council and a blasting advisory board have been pushing for relief in Tallahassee.

“The state heard us, and a lot of state representatives outside our area have learned about it,” Ruano said.

Aligned on fiscal priorities

Another common thread among the candidates: They all say they support low taxes and limited spending in a town that leans Republican. In an approximately $40 million budget passed last month, the town maintained its current millage rate, which is among the lowest in the county.

“I think we need to avoid the misspending of taxpayer dollars on services we don’t need,” said Hassan. “Government was created for necessity.”

Ruano said she wanted to lower the millage rate, pointing out that rising property values will still cause taxes to increase slightly. But her colleagues didn’t concur.

Significant spending proposals in recent years have been met with resistance and become campaign fodder today. Two years ago, Cid pushed for a referendum on a $55 million bond measure for parks and other capital improvements, but it never moved forward.

Cid told the Herald the proposal is no longer on the table, criticizing Ruano and Hassan for citing it in their current campaigns as an example of irresponsible governance.

“If it ever comes up again, our residents should be empowered to make the decision,” Cid said. “When it comes to big spending items, people should be empowered [to vote on them].”

The town, which has a large Cuban-American population, became the unlikely site of a series of Black Lives Matter protests this summer, and later pro-Trump rallies organized in response. The town’s elected officials are mostly registered Republicans in non-partisan seats, but council candidates have steered clear of national politics in a presidential election year.

Garcia, for example, said his “favorite president” was Ronald Reagan, and that he considers himself a fiscal conservative. But, he said, “the first loyalty is to Miami Lakes. My personal, national political beliefs shouldn’t be a factor.”

Ruano talked about mayoral run but stayed put

In March, a local Miami Lakes blog reported that Ruano was considering a run for mayor. Ruano said she was “constantly receiving phone calls, emails and texts, posts asking me to please consider running for mayor.”

Ultimately, Ruano qualified this summer to seek a second council term and said she had never planned to run for mayor. “But I can see how [Garcia] would have thought that,” she said.

Garcia, a health insurance manager for WellCare and a member of the Miami Lakes Neighborhood Improvement Committee, says the rumors led him to run for Ruano’s position, Seat 3 on the seven-member council.

“I think that she’s a great person and she’s done a good job. I know I have an uphill battle,” Garcia said.

He said his experience with projects and budgets as a municipal parks director, combined with his more recent experience in the health insurance industry make him a strong candidate. “Most people love this town. They want to [keep] it safe and quiet,” he said.

Ruano, who was appointed to the council in July 2017 after former Vice Mayor Tony Lama vacated the seat, touted her creation of a special needs advisory board and her 23 years as a Miami Lakes resident. Garcia moved to the town in 2015.

“To start fresh with a new candidate who has not been involved very long I think would be a disservice,” Ruano said. “I’ve proven myself to be a good leader in this community. I will challenge the status quo.”

Cid said he has been impressed by Garcia’s campaign — including a social media blitz that involves posting photos and descriptions of Miami Lakes residents on Facebook, taken as he knocks on doors — and that he doesn’t believe Ruano wants his support.

“I’ve talked to all the candidates,” he said. “She’s never spoken to me about her candidacy.”

Concerns about campaign flyers in Seat 1 race

Hassan got 23% of the vote in a three-person race in 2016 when he ran for Seat 5, which Cid had vacated to run for mayor. He has served as chair of the town’s veterans committee, helped organize a charity 5K event and hung banners along 154th Street honoring local veterans.

“I’ve gotten heavily involved in the community through community service,” Hassan said.

Hassan was a prosecutor in Broward County for three years before starting a firm as a defense attorney in 2008. Last year, he purchased the condo he had been renting as his office.

He told the Herald that a political committee supporting his opponent, Community Voice, distributed a campaign mailer that criticized Hassan for representing a particular client as an attorney. The client was Middle Eastern, as is Hassan, he said.

The mailer was “targeting fears of individuals,” Hassan said, adding that he simply defends “people with constitutional rights.” Hassan said he didn’t have a photo of the mailer to provide to the Herald.

Fernandez wasn’t available for an interview before this story was published.

Cid, the town’s mayor, raised his own concerns about a mailer distributed by Hassan’s campaign. The mailer reads: “Our local leaders trust Nayib Hassan to be our voice as our next Miami Lakes councilman in Seat 1!” Alongside that message are photos of Hassan standing next to Cid, Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart, and Councilman Luis Collazo, who defeated Hassan in the 2016 election and is running unopposed this year.

Cid said he believes the flyer is misleading because he and Collazo support Fernandez, not Hassan. Hassan responded: “In no way, shape or form is my flyer misleading since he in fact does trust me.”

Collazo told the Herald that, while he’s backing Fernandez, he appreciates both candidates’ involvement in the community.

Fernandez is the president and CEO of an information technology firm called Layer 8 Solutions, which works in the K-12 sector, according to his website. He was the chair of the Miami Lakes Youth Activities Task Force and a member of the town’s Neighborhood Improvement Committee.