Tag Archives: Rio Vista

Fort Lauderdale Mayor Hanging Out With Group Attacking Commissioner Ben Sorensen Over “Trantalis Tower”

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Fort Lauderdale Mayor Dean Trantalis was all smiles when he recently visited the activists attacking Commissioner Ben Sorenson in television commercials. In a series of commercials airing on WTVJ/NBC6, Sorenson is attacked over his opposition over plans by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) to build a sixteen story building dubbed “Trantalis Tower.” The massive project, featuring more than 600 micro-units, is located in Fort Lauderdale District 2 which Sorenson represents.

The latest commercial urges residents to contact Sorenson in order to stop an affordable housing crisis. Even though Sorenson is a leading advocate for the homeless, he drew the ire of AHF after he listened to the concerns of nearby residents. In addition to complaints over the size of the development and traffic issues, local residents are concerned over AHF’s lack of transparency over potential residents of “Trantalis Tower.”

The ominous sounding “Meet The Faces Of Fort Lauderdale” ad claims Ben Sorenson “turned his back on those who need his help the most.” Yet, the people in ad are not the ones “who need his help the most.”

One of the “Faces Of Fort Lauderdale” we meet is local attorney Sean Ford. In his free time, Sean Ford is the Broward co-director of New Leaders Council (NLC). Another “face” belongs to local paralegal/law student Vanessa Villaverde. According to the NLC website, Villaverde is a member of the 2019 NLC Fellows class.

IS NLC THE POLITICAL ARM OF AHF?

Last month, REDBROWARD exposed the role NLC played in a meeting held at Fort Lauderdale City Hall. For a candlelight vigil at City Hall, AHF filled two buses with employees of AHF, members of affiliated groups and even young Democrat Party leaders. The made-for-television vigil was orchestrated by AHF legislative affairs director Ebonni Bryant. In a post-meeting Facebook message, Bryant thanked several fellow members of the New Leaders Council (NLC) for their support.

Bryant is a former NLC official.

Stephanie Rosendorf, another NLC member, used her official Broward County e-mail address to spread word about the candlelight vigil. Rosendorf is the aide for Broward County Commissioner Nan Rich, a supporter of the AHF tower project.

According to the NLC website, the group is “the hub for progressive Millennial thought leadership.” NLC claims its training program “equips our leaders with the skills to run for office, manage campaigns, create start-ups and networks of thought leaders. NLC leaders take their activism back into their communities and workplaces to impact progressive change.”

Following the vigil, Ben Sorensen held a meeting to discuss the AHF project. Chadwick Maxey, the director of the NLC Broward chapter, spoke at this meeting. Claiming he was troubled by the lack of affordable housing south of the New River, Maxey gave alleged information on rental properties from the Apartments.com website. Even though he never revealed his affiliation with NLC, Maxey sat with Ebonni Bryant, Sean Ford, Vanessa Villaverde and other NLC members at the meeting.

During his failed January 2018 campaign for Fort Lauderdale City Commission, Chadwick Maxey received two campaign contributions from Jason King, the former AHF lobbyist/legislative affairs director. In a January interview with the Sun-Sentinel, Mayor Dean Trantalis called Jason King his “plus 1” and said King introduced him to AHF CEO Michael Weinstein.

Despite strict Federal regulations prohibiting political activity, it appears AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) forged close ties to NLC over several years. REDBROWARD obtained photographs showing numerous NLC events being held at AHF headquarters in Fort Lauderdale.

According to the Council of Non-Profits, “In return for its favored tax-status, a charitable nonprofit promises the federal government that it will not engage in ‘political campaign activity’ and if it does, IRS regulations mandate that the charitable nonprofit will lose its tax-exempt status.” The IRS does allow a 501 (c)(3) to engage in issue advocacy and voter education measures. According to the IRS, “certain voter education activities (including presenting public forums and publishing voter education guides) conducted in a non-partisan manner do not constitute prohibited political campaign activity. In addition, other activities intended to encourage people to participate in the electoral process, such as voter registration and get-out-the-vote drives, would not be prohibited political campaign activity if conducted in a non-partisan manner.”

Questions regarding Michael Weinstein using AHF funds for political gain have been raised in California.

In 2016, The LA Weekly reported AHF “spent more than $22 million on a pair of statewide ballot measures it authored — as well as more than $1 million on local ballot measures.” Experts claimed such expenditures by charitable groups were not the norm. “It is unusual for a 501(c)(3) nonprofit to spend multiple millions of dollars,” said Kathay Feng, executive director of California Common Cause. “Even large organizations like the ACLU don’t have funds set aside for campaign purposes that can match the money major corporations or unions put into a campaign.”

Garry South, a political consultant working for AHF, told the LA Weekly there was nothing odd about the group spending millions of dollars on laws forcing porn actors to wear condoms.

“I don’t think it’s unprecedented,” South said. “501(c)(3)s have the ability, under federal law, to spend money on advocacy, and many of them do. This is not unusual or unprecedented at all.”

While AHF support of condom laws, drug price legislation and housing initiatives may fall squarely under the “voter education” exemption of Federal tax code, the group’s ties to NLC may drag the group into partisan politics.

TRANTALIS ALL SMILES AT RECENT NLC VISIT

Despite the controversy over the AHF project, his close ties to the former AHF lobbyist and the role the NLC is playing in attacks on a fellow Commissioner, Trantalis attended last month’s NLC meeting. In pictures posted on Facebook, Dean Trantalis is all smiles as he receives an official NLC coffee mug from Chadwick Maxey and Sean Ford. Vanessa Villaverde watches the presentation from the front row.

Did Dean Trantalis discuss the AHF project with NLC? Did Trantalis defend Ben Sorenson from the NLC-aided attacks? Why is Dean Trantalis playing politics when the City faces so many pressing issues?

AHF CEO Michael Weinstein Admits His Plan To Change US Cities “Sounds Radical But Doable” While Mocking Fort Lauderdale Residents

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Earlier this month at The Sanders Institute Gathering in Vermont, AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) CEO Michael Weinstein discussed his “radical” plans to change Fort Lauderdale, Los Angeles and other U.S. cities. Weinstein was representing his Healthy Housing Foundation, the same group seeking to build a 680 unit building near downtown Fort Lauderdale. Weinstein discussed his ideas alongside Sen. Bernie Sanders and actor Danny Glover.

Michael Weinstein’s ideas were filled with the coded language favored by socialists and far-left activists.

Noting he is a world traveler, Michael Weinstein called Los Angeles the homeless capital of the world. “I have never seen more homelessness than in the city of Los Angeles,” Weinstein said. “It’s scandalous…shameful.”

Weinstein said, “We cannot treat shelter as a commodity.” He said housing is the number one economic justice issue and inequality issue in America. “People choosing between food and shelter…it’s scandalous.”

Weinstein placed blame on Democrats who “run the biggest cities in the country.” He said Democrat politicians have “been involved in the multi-billion dollar giveaways to the real estate interests.” Weinstein claimed a political contribution to council members or the mayor could allow a developer to build bigger towers. “All of it luxury,” Weinstein said.

Weinstein said citizens should not be happy with “crumbs” politicians give in the form of affordable housing. He said 1/3 of every new building should be set aside as affordable housing.

Weinstein recounted his failed ballot initiative to force new rent control policies on local cities.

Weinstein even proposed putting micro houses (aka granny units) in everyone’s backyard. “Our nation is filled with backyards,” he said.

Weinstein called for the end of “speculative building” as well as a “crackdown on AirBnB that’s taken away a lot of housing stock.”

Weinstein said we must secure “housing for Americans” and not foreign investors “who are moving their money from one despotic country.”

Weinstein admitted this “sounds radical but it’s doable.”

MARXIST PAST

As REDBROWARD reported last week, Michael Weinstein has a long history with the American communist/Marxist movement.

In the 1960s, fourteen year old Michael Weinstein was part of “a group of activists occupying” a New York high-rise development to protest the gentrification of their Brooklyn neighborhoods. At the Sanders Institute Gathering this month, Weinstein lamented “When you plunk a luxury building into a working class area everything around it becomes gentrified.”

According to an April 2017 exposé in the New York Times Magazine, Michael Weinstein is an “ex-Trotskyite” who founded one of California’s first gay communist organizations. After his move to Los Angeles in 1972, Weinstein started the “Lavender And Red Union.” In 1977, a socialist newspaper reported the Lavender And Red Union, “a self-proclaimed “communist’ gay liberation group…recently embarked upon a cautious ideological turn toward Trotskyism.” The socialist paper said the group’s call for a “permanent revolution” was “a clear break with the Stalinist/Maoist/New Left milieu from which we emerged.”

Months later, the same socialist newspaper claimed Weinstein’s group betrayed the gay liberation movement. According to the report, “About 85 conference attendees witnessed the pitiful and ironic spectacle of the [Lavender And Red Union] majority members vilifying their own gayness and past struggles in order to fuse with the notoriously anti-gay and anti-feminist Spartacist League.”

Weinstein went on to become an editor for “Young Spartacus,” the official newspaper of the Spartacist League. Throughout the late 1970s and early 1980s, Young Spartacus produced the typical pro-Communist screeds. Headlines of the Young Spartacus blasted US attempts to undermine the Soviet Union or Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini, while other stories praised unions and left-wing political groups.

WEINSTEIN MOCKS FORT LAUDERDALE RESIDENTS

Last week, REDBROWARD covered Michael Weinstein’s stunning press conference at AHF offices in Fort Lauderdale. In his opening statement on Tuesday, Michael Weinstein said his Fort Lauderdale project is a “moral issue.” Yet his remarks were filled with the political language of an experienced communist newspaper editor. He said, “Will Fort Lauderdale…and these other communities of great wealth, continue to be places that are hospitable to people of low income or will these cities become, in essence, rich ghettos.”

Weinstein said he would continue to oppose development in Los Angeles. He said, “We have been against granting exemptions to luxury development in working class areas.”

Weinstein mocked residents who opposed his project because, “I see cranes everywhere. If the drawbridge goes up as soon as it involves poor people, it doesn’t speak well for the community.” He said, “Why is the luxury building going up? I see them everywhere.”

Weinstein tried to paint the opposition as bigots. He repeatedly said residents referred to not wanting “those people” living nearby. Weinstein refused to give specifics.

At the Sanders Institute Gathering On December 1, 2018, Michael Weinstein used a question about climate change to mock concerned residents in Fort Lauderdale. Weinstein said:

We are attempting to build 680 micro units in downtown Fort Lauderdale right now. And you would think we’re trying to overthrow the entire government, Ok. It is so ugly and raucous, the opposition. This is in a non-residential area south of downtown Fort Lauderdale. We have to organize at the local level for sure.

The audience laughed and cheered.

Michael Weinstein may not want to “overthrow” the government, but his plans would definitely change what he calls the “housing industrial complex.”

Does Mayor Dean Trantalis subscribe to Michael Weinstein’s “radical but doable” ideas?

Would Mayor Trantalis pull the welcome mat out from under Canadians and South Americas who own homes in Fort Lauderdale?

What happens when Michael Weinstein wants to “plunk” micro units near the beach, Coral Ridge or Victoria Park?

Do Mayor Trantalis and Commissioner Steve Glassman support remaking established Fort Lauderdale neighborhoods with privately-owned “working class” housing projects?

Will Trantalis and Glassman rebuke Weinstein’s attacks on Fort Lauderdale residents?

Or will it be business (and development) as usual in Fort Lauderdale?