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<\/p>\nDevelopers have overwhelmingly chosen their preferred candidate to win Tuesday\u2019s runoff election for the next mayor of Miami.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Eileen Higgins \u2014 who served eight years in the Miami-Dade County Commission representing Liberty City, Little Haiti, Overtown, Wynwood, Edgewater and the Upper East Side before resigning to run for mayor \u2014 has pulled in nearly 10 times more in campaign donations from real estate than her opponent, former City Manager Emilio Gonzalez.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n Miami City Hall at 3500 Pan American Drive\n <\/p>\n
Higgins garnered about 36% of votes on Election Day out of a field of\u00a013 candidates, while Gonzalez landed nearly 20%, triggering a runoff because\u00a0neither\u00a0reached the 50% threshold.<\/p>\n
Since then, the real estate industry has collectively donated roughly $29K to Higgins\u2019 campaign, including from Pinnacle Housing founder and President David Deutch, Housing Trust Group<\/a>, Rilea Group<\/a>, Adler Properties, Integra<\/a>, Berkowitz Development Group, Spector & Sons and Edward W. Easton & Co.<\/p>\n That\u2019s on top of the $150K that\u00a0Higgins brought in before Nov. 4 from\u00a0real estate sources like\u00a0Terra, Related Group<\/a>, Swerdlow Group<\/a>, Dacra<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a013th Floor<\/a>, The Real Deal reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n Gonzalez, by comparison, has received just under $5K from individuals and entities that listed their occupations as real estate since Election Day. That\u2019s in addition to the $20K he received in contributions from six entities tied to Little Havana developers Bill Fuller and Martin Pinilla, TRD reported.<\/p>\n Despite a lack in donations from real estate leaders, the\u00a0retired Air Force colonel has racked up endorsements<\/a>\u00a0from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis<\/a> and President Donald Trump<\/a>, who posted on social media<\/a>\u00a0that Gonzalez is “fantastic.”<\/p>\n As for issues that pertain to the commercial real estate community, Higgins and Gonzalez are campaigning on fast-tracking permitting systems and affordable housing as voting day nears on Dec. 9.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat everybody in the development community is looking for is making sure that whoever wins the City of Miami mayoral race is going to ensure that some of the inefficiencies that are there are actually looked at and fixed, so that the actual development community could operate at a faster pace,\u201d said Alex Ballina<\/a>, the former Miami-Dade County director of public housing and community development and founder of Florida Development Building Group.<\/p>\n Unlike in other major cities, the mayor of\u00a0Miami is a part-time job<\/a> with limited power. Miami\u2019s mayor has no commission vote but can veto legislation and hire and fire the city manager, who\u00a0runs day-to-day operations.\u00a0<\/p>\n The 44th mayor of Miami will\u00a0succeed Mayor Francis Suarez, a Republican real estate lawyer and the son of former Miami Mayor Xavier Suarez.<\/p>\n Suarez, who briefly entered the Republican presidential race in 2023<\/a>, spent eight years as Miami commissioner and another eight as mayor. In his two terms, he advocated for turning Miami into the next Silicon Valley and the epicenter for cryptocurrency.<\/p>\n But his relationship with the real estate community has been tangled in tension in recent years.<\/p>\n In May 2024,\u00a0Suarez\u00a0was subpoenaed<\/a> by the Securities and Exchange Commission<\/a>\u00a0over $170K in payments he received from an affiliate of developer\u00a0Rishi Kapoor<\/a>\u2019s Location Ventures<\/a> over a two-year period during which the developer sought approval from the city for developments.<\/p>\n The city as a whole has racked up a reputation for shady dealings.\u00a0Miami City Commissioner\u00a0Joe Carollo<\/a>, who also ran for mayor this year, was held liable for more than $63M in damages after developers Bill Fuller and Martin Pinilla \u2014 who donated to Gonzalez\u2019s campaign \u2014 accused him of directing code enforcers, police officers and other city staff to go after their establishments, The Real Deal reported<\/a>.\u00a0He\u00a0was cleared of criminal charges this summer.\u00a0<\/p>\n Cleaning up corruption has become a pillar in Higgins\u2019 campaign.<\/p>\n \n Bisnow\/Chloe Gallivan\n <\/p>\n \n Miami residents have until Tuesday to choose their new mayor.\n <\/p>\n \u201cMiami voters are demanding a City Hall they can trust, and that starts with ending corruption and delivering results,\u201d Higgins said in a statement shared with Bisnow. \u201cAs Mayor, my focus will be restoring integrity, tackling Miami\u2019s affordability crisis with proven solutions, keeping our community safe, and fixing the broken permitting system so homeowners, businesses, and the City of Miami can actually get things done.\u201d<\/p>\n For both candidates, another key sticking point is the permitting process in Miami, which is\u00a0often criticized<\/a> for its long wait times and complex requirements that can delay projects.\u00a0<\/p>\n While Higgins hasn\u2019t released details on how she plans to approach the city\u2019s permitting process, Gonzalez has said he will use \u201csmart technology\u201d to deliver faster services, according to his website.<\/p>\n \u201cThe city of Miami has struggled through the years, and most of the development community will tell you through their permitting process,\u201d Ballina said. \u201cIt’s a tedious task to go through the city of Miami to finalize your permitting. I’m sure whoever the new mayor is will be focused in on assisting to streamline a lot of the processes that they can control to help expedite building.\u201d<\/p>\n Another issue many are keeping an eye on is affordable housing. Miami-Dade County has a shortage of more than 90,000 units for households earning less than $75K, according to Miami Homes For All<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n It\u2019s something the next mayor is going to have to focus on, Ballina said.<\/p>\n Higgins, who would be the first Democrat to run Miami in 25 years if she wins, has campaigned leveraging her involvement in building nearly 7,000 affordable housing units when she led District 5. As mayor, she plans to use city-owned land<\/a> to build new housing for working families.<\/p>\n While advocating for affordable housing, she\u00a0opposes\u00a0the Live Local Act<\/a>, which was passed by the Florida Legislature in 2023. The law allows developers to circumvent local zoning regulations as long as they dedicate a portion of their projects to workforce housing \u2014 increasingly stripping power from local governments<\/a>.<\/p>\n Gonzalez, a\u00a0Republican, dismisses Miami’s existing affordable housing structure, calling it a \u201cmisnomer,\u201d and thinks the city needs a more realistic approach so teachers and police officers can afford it.<\/p>\n He supports the\u00a0effort to get rid of property taxes on primary homes in the state \u2014 a policy DeSantis has pushed to implement<\/a> in the last year. Its intent is to lessen the financial burden on residents, though critics warn it could mean drastic cuts to public services<\/a> like schools and infrastructure.<\/p>\n \u201cAd valorem real estate taxes make up less than 10% of the city budget,\u201d Gonzalez told Local 10<\/a> in October. \u201cIf working families, when they have to tighten their belts, you go, \u2018Honey, you know what? You\u2019ve got to cut back 10%.\u2019 You can do it. We can do it as a city.\u201d<\/p>\n Despite providing major backing for their respective candidates, commercial real estate leaders have been tight-lipped leading up to Tuesday.<\/p>\n Terra, Related Group, Swerdlow Group, OKO Group, Blanca Commercial Real Estate and 13th Floor either declined or did not respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n The Easton Group<\/a> founder, Chairman and CEO Ed Easton<\/a> told Bisnow in a phone call that he doesn\u2019t have a \u201chorse in the race.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI just hope whoever gets in there doesn\u2019t become an anti-development person,\u201d\u00a0he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Developers have overwhelmingly chosen their preferred candidate to win Tuesday\u2019s runoff election for the next mayor of Miami.\u00a0…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":75111,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[42579,42576,42578,3674,4077,123,125,124,42577,42575],"class_list":{"0":"post-75110","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-miami","8":"tag-alex-ballina","9":"tag-easton-group","10":"tag-ed-easton","11":"tag-eileen-higgins","12":"tag-emilio-gonzalez","13":"tag-miami","14":"tag-miami-headlines","15":"tag-miami-news","16":"tag-terra-group","17":"tag-the-related-group"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75110","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75110"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75110\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75110"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75110"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75110"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/p>\n