Posted on Mon, Nov. 16, 2009

In late July, as Miami-Dade leaders confronted the county's worst budget crisis in decades, Commissioner Natacha Seijas boarded American Airlines Flight 56 for a weeklong trip to Ireland.

In September, a day after commissioners voted to lay off more than 500 county workers and cut millions in funding to social service groups, Seijas hopped on a plane for seven days in Brazil. In October, as commissioners imposed steep salary cuts on three unions, Commissioner Audrey Edmonson and her chief of staff embarked on a 12-day journey through Senegal and South Africa.

Taxpayers picked up the tab for commissioners and their county entourages on each trip, which were arranged by the International Trade Consortium, a county agency designed to open global markets for Miami-Dade businesses.

Despite spending more than $217,000 on nine trips since 2007, ITC executive director J.A. ``Tony'' Ojeda Jr. could not identify a single contract signed as a result of the missions. In fact, the agency stopped keeping such records four years ago after a Miami Herald review found them grossly exaggerating the trips' economic benefit.

To critics, the International Trade Consortium has become a punch line.

``It's sort of a common joke that the ITC is International Travel for Commissioners,'' said Mario Artecona, executive director of the Miami Business Forum, which represents the region's top business leaders.

The ITC journeys include stops at luxury hotels from Mumbai to Istanbul, extended stays for personal vacations in South Africa and, in one case, the cost of flying a county staffer across the country to help public officials change planes.

Created in 2002 by the County Commission, the ITC's primary aim is to spur trade between greater Miami companies and the world. To do so, the government agency brings Miami businesses on as many as four trade missions a year to destinations ranging from Poland to Japan. The businesses pay their own way, but travel under the county's seal of approval.

Yet on more than half of the trade missions since 2007, commissioners and county staffers outnumbered the Miami-Dade businesses they were supposed to be promoting, The Miami Herald found.

On the most recent trip to Africa, the cost of which has not been tallied, there wasn't a single active Miami-Dade business. All told, the missions since 2007 have included five commissioners, one mayoral aide and 16 commission aides and county staff, records show.

Despite a $444 million budget hole that forced county leaders to tighten spending, Miami-Dade commissioners refuse to give up their taxpayer-funded jaunts.

Like many county agencies, the ITC's annual funding took a hit -- from $1.6 million a year to $1.2 million. Yet a proposal to eliminate the ITC was defeated by commissioners during September's tense budget debates, and plans are afoot for a trip to Germany in spring 2010. Chairman Dennis Moss, who led a 2007 mission to the Bahamas, voiced strong support for the agency.

Nobody questions the importance of trade. But, Artecona said, the face of trade should be ``a professional whose sole purpose is to promote Miami-Dade'' -- such as the head of the Beacon Council, the county's other publicly funded economic development group.

`JUST RIDICULOUS'

``My opinion is that commissioners should focus on domestic issues,'' Artecona added. ``The reach is just ridiculous.''

Last month, Edmonson led a 13-person trade mission to Senegal and South Africa with four other county employees, including her chief of staff Dr. Mae Bryant. Edmonson billed the trip ``as a chance to capitalize on the business opportunities in these African markets,'' but it failed to include a single active, for-profit Miami-Dade business.

Instead, the mission included a Boca Raton-based lawyer not licensed to practice in Florida, and representatives from North Florida businesses in Daytona Beach, Jacksonville and rural Palatka. The one Miami entrepreneur, retired banker Christa Green, said she specializes in selling hand-crafted jewelry and inexpensive decorative art to friends and dinner guests. State records list her business as inactive.

Asked to name a Miami-Dade-based business owner on the trip, Edmonson responded, ``Names? I can't remember all of that. Somebody with art.''

She said the main purpose of the trip was to work on agreements to become Sister Cities -- an international nonprofit dedicated to citizen diplomacy.

``As commissioners we're not there just to sit and conduct the meeting,'' she added. ``We need to make sure revenue is coming into the county.'' Asked how the Africa trip generated revenue, Edmonson hung up on a reporter.

Shelly Smith-Fano, who chaired Miami-Dade's Sister Cities chapter the past two years and served on its board for more than a decade, said such long trips to sign Sister City agreements are ``overkill -- especially in these difficult economic times.''

``We have more than 20 Sister Cities agreements, and I don't recall us ever going to any of those cities to sign agreements during my tenure,'' said Smith-Fano, who questioned ITC spending practices earlier this year until her post was eliminated by the ITC's Ojeda and County Mayor Carlos Alvarez. Budget concerns were cited as the reason, though Smith-Fano was a volunteer.

In May, Seijas led a 16-person mission to Japan and Taiwan. Five were county officials whose travel was paid for by taxpayers, costing $33,788. Three were representatives of Miami-Dade businesses. The rest were spouses, partners or outside business owners who paid their own way.

One Broward County couple own a small computer repair business, and another Broward woman was proprietor of a ``promotional products'' company that sold plastic toys and lapel pins before dissolving four years ago.

Trips to the Canary Islands and India, and a 2007 trip to South Africa all included more county officials than Miami-Dade business people.

Ojeda defended spending county tax dollars to chaperone entrepreneurs from outside Miami-Dade, even though the organization was founded to promote Miami businesses. Ojeda said he doesn't scour the public record to see where -- or whether -- businesses are incorporated.

``I am not the FBI,'' he said.

Other international trade missions, like those sponsored by the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce and the public-private Beacon Council, frequently travel without elected officials.

The ITC rarely leaves Miami without an elected official; the sole recent exception was a 2008 trip to Peru and Chile that Seijas backed out of for health reasons. The 2007 South Africa trip, costing taxpayers $43,019, included commissioners Seijas, Edmonson and Sally Heyman.

Supporters say the right leader can open doors in foreign countries. ``Of course the higher the rank, the better,'' said Frank Nero, president and CEO of the Beacon Council. While he has had good experience with commissioners, he said, ``it is different if you are traveling with the governor or the mayor.''

Ojeda said it's crucial to bring politicians. ``It provides a degree of officialdom.''

The famously acerbic Seijas, who once told a fellow commissioner she'd ``leave here in a body bag'' during a heated debate, is ITC chair and leader of the county's international trade push. She did not respond to repeated interview requests.

Her global outreach has included stops in luxury hotels in Mumbai, Osaka, Cape Town and Istanbul. In Belfast this August Seijas sampled the comforts of the Europa, a four-star hotel that ``simply epitomizes indulgence,'' its website says.

In September, as the commission opted to keep the program, Seijas played a $40,000 ITC-financed video touting the region's charms.

NO PAYOFF

There's no evidence the taxpayer-funded missions are actually spurring trade. That's because, after a series of reports showing the ITC was vastly inflating the amount of new business it was generating, the agency simply stopped quantifying results.

A 2005 Herald review found that ITC claims of nearly $240 million in ``anticipated'' economic development from trade missions included at least $150 million of pure fiction -- including more than $2 million attributed to a nonexistent business and more than $30 million for a company whose business owner said a Turks and Caicos trade mission was mostly about the cocktail parties.

In 2006, County Auditor Cathy Jackson confirmed that the ITC's numbers were ``overstated and unsubstantiated'' and concluded the agency ``should establish realistic and meaningful performance measures.''

The agency never did, which sets it apart from trade groups like the Beacon Council and World Trade Center Miami. ``For trade missions that have traders, yes, it is essential and it's a global standard,'' said Charlotte Gallogly, president of the WTC.

Instead of reporting the number of contracts signed or anticipated sales, the ITC's annual report includes statistics like the number of business travelers introduced to counterparts in foreign lands.

In the latest annual report, that number is five. Alerted to that detail on page 21 of the 2007-08 annual report, Ojeda said: ``This number five must be incorrect. This has got to be a mistake.''

An assistant informed him the number was accurate.

``You cannot measure me by saying what I did or did not do increases trade,'' Ojeda replied. He said the trips sometimes simply ``increase goodwill.''

The agency spends money even before trips, dispatching a county worker to scout sites months in advance. Ojeda, who grossed $158,800 last year, said it is inconceivable to send a delegation to a country without an advance person making arrangements.

But Ricardo Taño Feijoo, who has led the Greater Miami Chamber's trade missions to Brazil for four years, said he plans trips without such costly advance work.

``It's a waste of money,'' he said of the ITC's approach.

For the Japan and Taiwan trip in 2009, Ojeda authorized spending $5,720 to send a staffer ahead on the ``advance site inspection.'' He paid $488 to fly an assistant to Los Angeles for the day to help delegates switch planes.

``There was a change of terminals and it was very confusing,'' Ojeda said. ``It is a service we provided.''

Officials routinely take advantage of the taxpayer-funded flights to exotic locales for a few extra days of vacation. On the Belfast trip, Seijas attended a three-day conference held by Sister Cities. She then vacationed for four days, paying her own expenses, before flying home on the county's dime.

Ojeda has vacationed following trade missions. He took three days off to complement a five-day business trip to the Canary Islands. He punctuated an ITC swing through Prague, Warsaw and Istanbul with seven days vacation.

``When you finish these trips, which are absolutely killer trips, I need to rest, my friend,'' Ojeda said.