Log cabin chaos: Tiny village gets new mayor, manager and attorney in emotional night

On a chaotic Tuesday in tiny Biscayne Park, the village got a new mayor, the manager was suspended, and the attorney was cut loose, all in one dramatic night inside the 3,000-person village’s historic log cabin.

The series of changes marked the climax of a political power struggle that played out in recent weeks, starting with a special election on Jan. 7 to fill two vacant seats after a pair of commissioners resigned last year.

The roots of the conflict go back months, but the latest chapter began around 5 p.m. Tuesday when Mayor Tracy Truppman resigned just two hours before a meeting where the village commission was expected to appoint a new mayor.

Truppman, whose term as a commissioner expires in November, resigned as both the mayor and as a member of the commission, according to a brief resignation letter obtained by the Miami Herald.

“I thank you, the residents, for the opportunity to work for and serve the Village as your Mayor,” Truppman wrote. “I have had the pleasure of working with the Village staff, who tirelessly work on your behalf, and am very grateful for their efforts.”

Truppman didn’t state a reason for her resignation and didn’t respond to a request for comment Tuesday.

When the meeting began at 7 p.m., Virginia O’Halpin, one of the two commissioners sworn in last month after the special election, was appointed mayor by the commission in a 3-1 vote. Vice Mayor William Tudor was the dissenter. In Biscayne Park, the mayor is selected by a vote of the commission, rather than by the general public.

Then the two new commissioners, O’Halpin and MacDonald “Mac” Kennedy — both outspoken critics of Truppman and her administration — made an aggressive move. O’Halpin distributed a last-minute resolution proposing to suspend Village Manager Krishan Manners with pay, and Kennedy said he had drafted a similar resolution of his own.

To justify the proposal, they cited Manners’ role in canceling a Jan. 14 commission meeting last month after Truppman said she couldn’t attend, which delayed O’Halpin and Kennedy’s swearing-in. The new commissioners, who were ultimately sworn in two days later, argued they could have been sworn in without Truppman there and reached a quorum and then proceeded with the meeting.

O’Halpin and Kennedy also hammered Manners for a lawsuit the village filed last month against a sitting commissioner, Dan Samaria, alleging Samaria might not reside in the village because he was facing foreclosure and thus might be ineligible to serve. The lawsuit was dismissed after a Jan. 30 hearing where Samaria told a judge he had not yet been removed from his home.

Kennedy accused Manners of “gross insubordination” and “willful neglect of duty.” Only the commission has the power to remove a fellow commissioner, he said, arguing that Manners had no place bringing the lawsuit against Samaria without consulting the elected body first.

“I just think that the things that have happened recently are serious enough that I don’t trust him in the position,” Kennedy said.

A contract attorney for the village, Julia Mandell of GrayRobinson, advised Samaria that he could face an ethical conflict by casting a vote to remove Manners, given that the allegations against Manners are related to litigation involving Samaria. But Samaria, realizing his vote was needed to seal Manners’ suspension, didn’t heed her advice.

Tudor, the vice mayor, also said he hoped to seek legal guidance before a vote to suspend the manager. He accused his fellow commissioners of wanting to “burn everything down” instead of working cooperatively, and suggested the village needs a drastic change amid the turmoil.

“I’d make [this] recommendation to the governor: appoint somebody to run Biscayne Park,” he said.

The vote went ahead anyway, another 3-1 result with Tudor dissenting. Manners was promptly escorted by police from the log cabin to his office in an administrative building next door. He now has 15 days to request a hearing on his potential termination.

Manners declined to comment on the suspension as he departed.

Tensions were still running high after a short break, and Tudor stormed out of the cabin and didn’t return, telling his colleagues: “I think there’s a lot of liability and I want no part of this circus.”

With three commissioners left on the dais, the group appointed the village’s public works director, David Hernandez, as the interim city manager, though he seemed torn as he accepted the position.

“It hurts me because I’ve worked with Krishan,” he said. “It’s a sad day.”

One last maneuver sealed the village’s rapid shift in power. Late last month, GrayRobinson told officials it was resigning as the village’s contract attorney, citing unspecified “recent developments” and saying it would stay on for 30 days. On Tuesday, the commission voted to waive that transition period and end the relationship immediately.

Several commissioners had criticized another GrayRobinson attorney, Rebecca Rodriguez, for her role in canceling the Jan. 14 meeting and in bringing the lawsuit against Samaria.

Mandell, the attorney sitting in for the firm Tuesday, stood up from the dais and left the building after the vote. The commission appointed John Herin of Fox Rothschild, a former partner at GrayRobinson, as its interim attorney.

By the end of the night, the only commissioners left in the room were a trio of political allies: O’Halpin, Kennedy and Samaria. The targets of their ire — Truppman, Manners and GrayRobinson — were gone.

“It was never my intention when I ran for this position to come in here and do a big, sweeping housekeeping like I did here tonight,” Kennedy said. “I did not take it lightly, I did not enjoy doing it, but it was the right thing to do.”

Most of the residents who remained in the log cabin for a public comment period after 10 p.m. were supporters of the new regime. They praised the commissioners for suspending Manners and welcomed what they said would be a new era of transparency and productivity in Biscayne Park politics.

But Tudor, standing outside the cabin after he had stormed out, saw a different picture. He noted that three commissioners, including Truppman, have now resigned since October. Another, Samaria, was sued over questions about his status as a village resident, Tudor said. And now, the manager has been suspended and the attorney has resigned.

“With the chaos that’s going on in our village, I personally think somebody needs to step in,” Tudor said. “I have a concern that some of the actions being taken by the new commissioners may put liability on the village, and I am not gonna have my name tarnished by that.”

As the meeting drew to a close, one resident said she was uneasy about what had transpired. “I don’t know about tonight. I have a bad feeling in my gut,” she said.

O’Halpin, from her new seat as mayor, told the resident the changes were difficult but necessary.

“This is not something that we enjoy doing at all,” she said.

This story was originally published February 4, 2020 at 6:48 PM.