Miami International Airport director Lester Sola out under Mayor Levine Cava

Lester Sola, director of Miami International Airport since 2018, resigned his county post abruptly Tuesday in an apparent ouster by Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava, who has faced controversy over some aviation contracts since winning office last fall.

Sola, a veteran county administrator, was replaced Tuesday by a deputy at the county’s Aviation Department, where he had been the director since 2018. Levine Cava announced the move in a memo to county commissioners on Tuesday afternoon.

The mayor said she would name a permanent replacement for Sola at a later date. For his interim replacement, she named Ralph Cutié, an assistant director in charge of Aviation facilities and engineering.

The surprise move, which leaked hours before Levine Cava released her memo, follows months of friction for Levine Cava over MIA contracts and agreements. The airport is county owned, and produces almost $1 billion in revenue a year — making it fertile ground for contract fights and lobbying expenditures, as well as for campaign donations to Levine Cava and commissioners.

Multiple sources who have spoken to Sola and Levine Cava said that Sola was asked to resign as Miami-Dade’s Aviation Director, a post the county’s former mayor, Carlos Gimenez, gave Sola in 2018. Levine Cava has pushed out prior Gimenez appointees — including Internal Services director Tara Smith in May and Water and Sewer chief Kevin Lynskey in December. The Sola departure is the first to bring a public rebuke from a member of the county commission.

“He has been a person in county government I respect tremendously. He’s honest and a hard worker,” Commissioner Rebeca Sosa, former chair of the commission’s Airport committee, said Tuesday. “I am not happy. This will be very bad for Miami-Dade County.”

Several of Levine Cava’s early stumbles or roadblocks on the contracting front involved MIA agreements. While Internal Services takes the lead in negotiating contracts at MIA, Sola and his staff administer the agreements and can play key roles in winning approval for them from commissioners.

In April, Levine Cava tried to throw out bids tied to a $33 million contract at the airport but backed off after a lobbying blitz from firms ranked highest in the procurement competition that began under Gimenez and Sola.

MCM, the builder behind the collapsed FIU bridge, convinced Miami-Dade commissioners in May to overrule the Levine Cava administration’s recommendation to replace the company as an MIA contractor.

Levine Cava recently disavowed a memo under her name outlining extensions and more favorable terms at MIA for the airport’s influential vendors and tenants. They want rent breaks and other concessions to make up for lost revenue during the COVID-19 pandemic and the ongoing travel slump.

When the memo became public last month, Levine Cava’s office said the mayor’s signature was added to it in error and that the negotiated terms weren’t final.

Sola, 55, served as Gimenez’s fix-it person, taking over Water and Sewer and Internal Services after getting good reviews for his tenure at Elections, where he arrived after Miami-Dade’s recount debacle in the 2000 presidential election. He ran MIA during its steepest financial crisis, as the COVID-19 pandemic idled the airport for months and left traffic levels at historic lows.

Last year, he was the county’s second highest-paid employee in 2020, earning about $406,000. His departure package includes another year on the county payroll as a part-time adviser. Sola is nearing 30 years in county employment, a key milestone for receiving a full pension upon retirement.

The MIA director reports to the mayor, giving Sola a new boss since Levine Cava was elected in November. He also faced a commission with six newcomers after term limits forced a historic wave of retirements. (The next historic wave comes in 2022 for the remaining long-serving commissioners, including Sosa.)

Keon Hardemon, a former Miami commissioner, took over the Airport committee this year. In March, he had sharp words for Sola over an apparent slight in not learning ahead of time about a contracting decision at MIA.

“Am I being treated differently ... because Rebeca Sosa isn’t the chairperson of this committee,” Hardemon said.

“I’ll take the blame and the responsibility for that, Mr. Chair,” Sola responded. “Going forward, I’d be happy to involve your office.”

This story was originally published June 22, 2021 at 2:59 PM.