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Commissioner Danielle Cohen Higgins, Martha \u201cVega\u201d Hero and former Palmetto Bay Vice Mayor John DuBois are running for Miami-Dade County commissioner in District 8. Election Day is Aug. 18, 2026.<\/p>\n
To win a second four-year term<\/a>, Miami-Dade Commissioner Danielle Cohen Higgins is running as a fighter against bad development and against ducking tough decisions. Her opponents say they\u2019re the best choice for real reform, knocking Cohen Higgins for a bloated county budget and worsening traffic in a district that includes Cutler Bay, Palmetto Bay and parts of Homestead.<\/p>\n Two challengers are running against Cohen Higgins: John DuBois, 64, a former vice mayor of Palmetto Bay, and Martha \u201cVega\u201d Hero, 61, a first-time candidate who owns a consulting firm and runs a nonprofit in Homestead that helps immigrant communities.<\/p>\n As the District 8 commissioner, Cohen Higgins, 44, represents a suburban area with some of Miami-Dade\u2019s most affluent bedroom communities.<\/p>\n Split by U.S. 1, traffic is a friction point as neighborhoods complain about congestion from commuters using local streets to bypass the county\u2019s main north-south highway. District 8 is also home to some of the top growth frontiers as the suburbs give way to farmland that\u2019s a source of new land for developers.<\/p>\n Though she faced criticism<\/a> for backing some development within District 8, Cohen Higgins led the fight on the County Commission against a project just outside the area that was one of the County Commission\u2019s biggest development battles.<\/p>\n That was in 2022, when developers wanted to expand the county\u2019s suburban construction zone \u2013 known as the Urban Development Boundary \u2014 to build a commercial project outside of Homestead. Commissioners approved the plan, with Cohen Higgins casting one of the four no votes. But an adverse ruling by the administration of Gov. Ron DeSantis voided the approval, setting up a redo vote on the board.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve taken on big fights,\u201d Cohen Higgins told the Miami Herald Editorial Board on June 30, \u201cand really mobilized the community and brought stakeholders locally \u2014 and frankly, at the state level \u2014 on a very controversial application to move hundreds of acres inside the urban development boundary.\u201d<\/p>\n Both DuBois and Hero cite traffic and housing affordability as problems that the District 8 commissioner needs to be tackling over the next four years.<\/p>\n \u201cResidents are fed up with what used to be 20- or 25-minute commutes to downtown now taking an hour to an hour-and-a-half each way. That\u2019s been the number one issue,\u201d DuBois said during a July 9 appearance<\/a> on the Community Newspapers podcast. \u201cI have taken on development. \u2026 I wrote the legislation [in Palmetto Bay] to preemptively zone 69 acres [to] one house per acre, against the wishes of the developer, who obviously wanted very high density.\u201d<\/p>\n For Hero, she wants the District 8 commissioner to find a way to make housing more affordable for older residents. \u201cI\u2019ve been working for several years with elderly residents\u201d who rely on modest Social Security checks for income, she told the Editorial Board, \u201cand right now they can\u2019t even pay the monthly rent.\u201d<\/p>\n Cohen Higgins also is running on affordability message, telling audiences that Miami-Dade can\u2019t just be affordable for the \u201cbillionaire class.\u201d<\/p>\n Though she\u2019s a first-term commissioner, Cohen Higgins has been on the 13-member commission for six years. A political novice at the time, she was appointed to the District 8 post in 2020<\/a> when commissioners named her to the seat left vacant when then-Commissioner Daniella Levine Cava won the mayor\u2019s election that year.<\/p>\n Cohen Higgins, a lawyer, won her first election in 2022, and on Aug. 18 she\u2019s on the ballot for what would be her final four years on the commission before Miami-Dade\u2019s term limits would require her to leave office in 2030.<\/p>\n Cohen Higgins is one of the top fundraisers on the 13-member commission, with $1.6 million in the bank from two political committees, Fight for Our Future and We are Miami-Dade, and her campaign account. With financial support from lobbyists, developers and county vendors, she\u2019s raised nearly $2 million since her last election.<\/p>\n DuBois, who owns a global video-surveillance company and reports a net worth of $25 million, said he\u2019s planning to self-fund his campaign. The latest filings show his campaign with $53,000 to spend, and he has not registered to raise money for a political committee. Hero\u2019s campaign reported less than $25,000 to spend.<\/p>\n