Floridians could see as much as $30 million in financing to buy new homes, including $9 million in Miami, according to a pledge by Wells Fargo, the South Florida Business Journal reported. The funding will target down payments under the NeighborhoodLIFT program. “We have been working with Wells Fargo in securing abandoned houses and we have a great relationship with them,” Miami Mayor Tomas Regalado said. The plan would give grants as high as $15,000 to home seekers who are eligible. [SFBJ]

Thanks to an unanticipated wrinkle, the city of Miami could be on the hook for the property taxes it agreed to build for the new Marlins stadium. County officials say that unless city property is used for purely public purposes, it is not exempt from property taxes, and the bill could be as high as $2 million per year, according to Mayor Tomas Regalado. “That’s going to be huge,” said Regalado, who was against the stadium deal while serving as a city commissioner.  1 Comment

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Mayor Tomas Regalado

Miami Mayor Tomas Regalado, a former journalist, first joined the Miami City Commission in 1996, and was elected to two successive terms, until running a successful campaign for mayor in November 2009, defeating former Commissioner Joe Sanchez with more than 71 percent of the vote. Much has changed in Miami real estate since his election, headlined by a number of large-scale projects like Genting’s purchase of the Miami Herald site, and the UM Life Science and Technology Park, where The Real Deal caught up with Regalado at its official opening yesterday. The mayor talked to The Real Deal about the impact of the park, the changing development climate in Miami and new projects in the Design District and Omni. [more]

One out of every six Miami employees, mostly police or firefighters, earned more than $100,000 last year, largely from overtime, special assignment pay, unused sick days and other benefits. According to the Miami Herald, this is just one example of how labor costs comprise 90 percent of the city’s everyday expenses in its 2011 operating budget.

Those contracts were negotiated by unions emboldened by the immensity of the South Florida real estate boom. Police and firefighters were largely able to get what they wanted, in part, experts say, because of the political danger politicians faced by quarreling with those departments. [more]

Miami city commissioners voted unanimously yesterday to approve zoning changes for the six-building Brickell CitiCentre project at South Miami Avenue and 7th Street, the South Florida Business Journal reported. The commission will review the project for a second and final time July 28.

The administration of Miami Mayor Tomas Regalado was a co-applicant along with developer Swire Properties. [more]

Miami commissioners will vote Thursday on three major development projects that would see millions of square feet in residential, commercial and hotel space come to the city’s urban core, the Miami Herald reported.
The largest of the developments is a 9-acre Brickell CitiCenter project, which would spread 4.68 million square feet of mixed-use development over three and a half mostly vacant blocks south of the Miami River. The administration of Miami Mayor Tomas Regalado’ is a co-applicant along with developer Swire Properties. The city’s planning and zoning board unanimously recommended approval of the project last week. [more]

The Miami City Commission’s consideration of a new, pedestrian-friendly zoning code in Miami has been delayed for several months as its proponents make changes to the proposal. With the support of Mayor Tomas Regalado, Miami Neighborhoods United has proposed even amendments to the Miami 21 code, among which are measures which would lower allowable building rights in some medium-density districts, along with giving residents the right to challenge developer approvals. One provision that has attracted controversy would cut back the effective life of development permits on which no construction has taken place. [Miami Herald]
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Miami Mayor Tomás Regalado wants the city to renegotiate its contract to build a $100 million parking garage serving the new Florida Marlins stadium in the Little Havana neighborhood in the wake of reports of the team’s hefty profit margins, the Miami Herald reported. The intent is to find a way for the city to get a better return on its investment in the $642 million stadium plan. Leaked documents published by Deadspin.com last week showed that the Marlins franchise made $49 million over the past two years. The team’s new 37,000-square-foot stadium is slated to open in 2012, and now Regalado, who voted against the plan while he was a commissioner, wants the city to receive 100 percent of the advertising revenues that come from signage on the garages, as opposed to splitting them 50-50 with the Marlins. Yesterday, Miami-Dade Commissioner Rebeca Sosa asked county administrators to reopen the stadium deal to try to get a larger contribution from the team, which had been set to pony up $155 million, including a $35 million county loan. Marlins President David Samson replied, “I think she understands a contract is a contract.” [Miami Herald] 

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The Miami-Dade Commission has approved a provision of $3 million to refurbish the Miami Marine Stadium off of the Rickenbacker Causeway on Virginia Key. The 12-0 vote gave the nod to a voter-approved issue of bonds, but the city is required to demonstrate a feasible plan for the project. According to Miami Mayor Tomas Regalado, the city should have its plans finished within 18 months, despite that the county granted a five-year period to do so. A private analysis showed that corrosion in the skeleton of the building could mean up to $8.5 million in renovations. [Miami Herald] Comments

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The woeful state of city finances has Miami in crisis mode, commission chairman Marc Sarnoff said, and the projected $45 million shortfall in this year’s budget could force it to sell off assets, including real estate. Mayor Tomas Regalado, who has already had to scramble to resolve a $118 million budget shortfall from 2009, is working with the Securities and Exchange Commission as well in its probe into whether previous administrations committed fraud in the course of budget adjustments for its bond ratings. Current estimates show the city could have financial reserves of less that $10 million by September, said Larry Spring, Miami’s CFO. Regalado and other officials have declined to specify which property assets may be put up for sale, and have not weighed in on projects such as the Port of Miami tunnel and some large-scale affordable housing projects. [NBC]