Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said Thursday a controversial letter directing the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Biscayne Nature Center to vacate its Crandon Park facility was “automatically generated” amid a budget crisis, and she regrets the threatening language used.
Appearing on the “Anti-Social” podcast with Tony Winton and Jan Dillow, Levine Cava sought to calm community outrage over the directive, stating the County is not closing the center and is actively seeking a new contract.
“We’re on a month-to-month basis. It’s status quo as far as programming goes, while we sit down together to negotiate the future,” Levine Cava said. “This is a key resource, not just for Key Biscayne, but for our whole community… and the team at the Biscayne Nature Center, headed up by Thea Long, has done a great job.”
Earlier, Levine Cava had proposed a 45-day extension, prompting a rebuke from Long, a disciple of the nationally known environmentalist Marjory Stoneman Douglas.
The conflict began Aug. 22, when the County Parks Department sent the letter saying the license was about to expire. Later, the Department identified the building as a potential source of $1 million in new revenue from eco tourism packages, revenue needed as the County faced a budget crisis — and the approved County budget includes the revenue line.
“This all happened in the context of a budget storm. We were facing a huge budget shortfall,” Levine Cava explained. The Parks Department, funded by what she said was a “constrained” general fund, identified 49 positions to be eliminated and “were looking everywhere for additional revenue.”
Levine Cava disavowed the August letter’s tone.
“So this was an automatically generated letter. We regret the language we’ve said,” the mayor said. . “It was a kind of a form letter which will be revised. We’re not going to be using that language in the future… I was not aware that it was generated, but nonetheless, legally, the contract expires.”
As the dispute deepened, Levine Cava granted a 45-day extension. But in a Nov. 7 reply, the center dismissed the extension and said the history of the building’s construction places its right to operate on firm legal ground. “We do not recognize the County’s asserted authority to unilaterally alter, suspend, or otherwise terminate the relationship that has governed our presence at Crandon Park.”
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When pressed that $1 million is a grain of sand in the County’s nearly $13 billion budget, Levine Cava pushed back, noting the general fund is much smaller.
“A million dollars in the Parks budget is not insubstantial,” she said. “We do have qualified staff. We do run nature centers and other parks.”
The mayor said the goal is a new contract that expands services. “We do think there is the opportunity for increased programming in conjunction with the parks department,” she said, suggesting expansion to private schools or more summer weeks.
“We never, ever contemplated closing it down. And that was exactly what was said, which was misinformation from the start, and that is what created the upset,” Levine Cava said. “It is our plan going forward to continue to operate this in partnership.”
On Anti-Social, Levine also tackled several other subjects:
The closing of Seaquarium and the lease of the property to Terra Company
Efforts to manage the traffic on the Rickenbacker Causeway in the short term
Replacing the Bear Cut Bridge
The current vacancy on the County Commission
Her future political aspirations.
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