Whether to fight the county or make peace with it is a top issue in Palmetto Bay election
In Palmetto Bay, the mostly tranquil slice of suburbia that calls itself the “Village of Parks,” the town’s founding mayor is challenging the incumbent mayor on overdevelopment, traffic and relations with Miami-Dade County leaders.
Like other communities in the southern half of the county, Palmetto Bay, with a population of 25,000, is wrestling with questions about how big, tall and dense it wants to be. Support development and increase the tax base or hold the line and preserve its small-town feel?
Mayor Karyn Cunningham is running for reelection after a four-year term. Eugene Flinn, Palmetto Bay’s first mayor from 2002 to 2010 and again from 2014 to 2018, lost to Cunningham four years ago. Alan Farquharson offers a third option, although his low fundraising numbers make him a long shot. As of mid-October, his campaign has raised $5,250.
Two council members are up for reelection against two opponents.
“The current administration has lost its way,” Flinn said. “Our village is being overrun by high density apartment buildings towering over our once quaint, peaceful bedroom community. I will lead the way in minimizing growth and keeping any required growth in character with our village.”
Among Flinn’s priorities: acquiring the old Burger King headquarters at the Palmetto Bay Village Center, designating the land as environmentally sensitive and blocking it from future development. He does not want to see Franjo Road “turn into a corridor of medical mega development.” He supports “fortifying our single-family home areas to not allow lot-splitting.” He’s eager to fully implement the 2017 master plan for parks.
Flinn, 60, an attorney who raised $34,125 as of mid-October, believes he can forge a dialogue with the county based on diplomacy and eliminate antagonism. He cited the ongoing lawsuit against the county regarding its plan to build the Southwest 87th Avenue canal bridge. Miami-Dade has authority to build bridges on county roads.
“We’re not an island,” he said. “Mayor [Daniella] Levine Cava was our county commissioner before she became mayor. I’d like to work with the county rather than sue the county. It’s not wise to take on such a powerful entity that we also depend on.
“We’re spending so much money on litigation. We need well-thought-out zoning decisions. We need cooperation to get homes off septic and onto sewer. Each city along the Rapid Transit Zone has to produce a housing development plan within two years; we need it to dovetail with the county’s goals. And partnering with the county on a traffic relief plan is essential.”
READ MORE: Palmetto Bay came to Miami-Dade’s County Hall to block a bridge. Then things got testy
Flinn emphasizes “a return to resident-driven government.”
“We’re receiving $12.4 million in federal pandemic recovery funds and there’s been little resident input on how to spend it,” he said.
Cunningham, 59, is a former teacher who works part time for the United Teachers of Dade on public policy and member advocacy issues. As of mid-October, she raised $71,790 for her campaign, which is focused on parks, transportation, sustainability, zoning restrictions and interaction with the county.
“South Dade has the most potential for change and I want to make sure they are smart changes,” said Cunningham, a lifelong resident of the area. “I wish we could go back to yesterday, too, but we need to figure out how to navigate our future. We have so many challenges and opportunities — development, environment and transit will impact our quality of life for years to come.”
Among her accomplishments, Cunningham, a former council member, cites the purchase of pocket park and waterfront property; increased programming at parks; implementing a park-and-ride shuttle system to mass transit stations for commuters; amplifying students’ voices through the Youth Community Engagement Board and Kids’ Town Hall; supporting the opening of more businesses in the village center; and creating a maintenance fund that prioritizes tree trimming and drain cleaning.
“We’ve got to find ways to reduce flood insurance costs,” she said. “I’d also like to improve water quality and reduce pollution, erosion and speeding in our canals. We’re in the process of purchasing a skiff for patrols.”
Cunningham said she voted against upzoning the Burger King property and a proposal to build 485 condos, does not support development east of Old Cutler Road and opposes moving the Urban Development Boundary.
“We passed the downtown Palmetto Bay zoning code which sets a maximum 45-foot building height and eliminates developer incentives for higher density,” she said.
As for Palmetto Bay’s working relationship with the county, Cunningham said she has found it necessary to take “strong positions on county overreach.”
“We want self-determination on zoning within municipalities and not have it pre-empted by the county,” she said. “As a member of the South Dade Municipal Coalition, we are very cognizant of the needs of our residents specific to each town. We were able to make significant changes to the county’s Rapid Transit Zone ordinance to prevent out-of-scale building at transit hubs.
Farquharson, 41, an artist and air conditioning company owner, wants to see better maintenance of Palmetto Bay’s streets, sidewalks, trees and canals; new parks, new bike paths, a new community center and a village farm with horse stables for the public and for a mounted police patrol he wants to create; synchronized traffic lights on U.S. 1 and Old Cutler Road; and more restrictive zoning to dovetail with a streamlined permit process. He would push for a coalition of southern cities to fight for the extension of Metrorail.
“This election is crucial to our village’s future,” Farquharson said on his campaign website. “Miami is going through a renaissance and we’re not going to be left out of it. Under my leadership, residents come first. We must act now in order to build the village that we all can be proud of before it gets built for us.”
In the village council races, incumbent Patrick Fiore is running against Pam Gorman for Seat 1, the northern section of Palmetto Bay. For Seat 3, the southern section, incumbent Marsha Matson is being challenged by Russell Thomas Jones.
Matson, who was on the steering committee that incorporated Palmetto Bay in 2002, leads in the fundraising category with $27,901, followed by Fiore ($14,295), Gorman ($13,583) and Jones ($6,270).
This story was originally published October 27, 2022 at 1:07 PM.
