Tag Archives: Stephanie Toothaker

Fort Lauderdale Mayor Dean Trantalis Pushing Water Plant Public-Private Partnership With Company Represented By His Political Advisers

“You never let a serious crisis go to waste. And what I mean by that it’s an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before.”–Rahm Emanuel

Mayor Dean Trantalis’ continued push for a public-private partnership (P3) solution to Fort Lauderdale’s failing water infrastructure could reap big rewards for his closest political advisers. For several years, the City of Fort Lauderdale promised to fix the aging Fiveash Water Treatment. One month after the disastrous sewer breaks in Rio Vista, Victoria Park and Coral Ridge, Mayor Dean Trantalis held an infrastructure update meeting at City Hall. Trantalis tried to combat public perception that he was not doing enough to address the infrastructure issues plaguing the City. After laying out a plan to fix sewer lines, Trantalis brought up the Fiveash Water Treatment Plant.

After declaring we “simply need a new plant,” Trantalis revealed, “several international players in the water industry have expressed an interest in a fast-tracked public-private solution that can bring more efficiency, more stable cost, guaranteed maintenance and higher water quality.” Trantalis said “we’ll see” if it is the right solution for Fort Lauderdale.

Less than one year earlier, Fort Lauderdale wanted to fix the existing Fiveash plant. In February 2019, the City Commission gave Carollo Engineers a $650,000 contract to create a “road map for use, reuse and/or potential replacement” of Fiveash. In April 2019, the City asked for proposals from companies interested in completing Fiveash “reliability upgrades and disinfection systems replacement. The City budgeted $30 million dollars for the project to fix Fort Lauderdale’s yellow water.

Bids were due by 2:00pm on Friday June 7, 2019 at City Hall.

On June 8, 2019 Mayor Dean Trantalis took a taxpayer-funded trip to Israel.

According to the Sun-Sentinel, Trantalis’ entourage included city manager Chris Lagerbloom, Trantalis’ chief of staff Scott Wyman, Police Capt. Bill Schultz and Director of Sustainable Development Anthony Fajardo. For the ten day trip, “Taxpayers paid $33,411.96 — $6,682.39 per person — for Trantalis and the four city officials, according to city spokesman Chaz Adams.”

City Commissioners questioned Trantalis’ overseas tour. “The trade mission has city commissioners questioning the process that goes into planning a ‘trip that no one knew about,’ according to Commissioner Robert McKinzie.”

The Road To Hadera

According to the Westside Gazette, Dean Trantalis met with five major Israeli investment groups for “discussions involving partnerships for major infrastructure and public works projects in Fort Lauderdale.” While in Israel, Trantalis took a field trip to Hadera:

“Mayor Trantalis’ delegation will also visit the Hadera desalination plant, which uses cutting-edge technology in the production of drinking water. City officials want to learn more about the facility because Fort Lauderdale’s Fiveash Water Treatment Plant is at the end of its life expectancy. It soon must be replaced or substantially renovated, but at the same time, the future supply of water in the region faces challenges due to continued population growth and climate change.”

Trantalis posted pictures of his visit to the water plant on his Facebook page.

Dean Trantalis in Israel

After returning to Fort Lauderdale, Trantalis wrote about his trip to Israel in a Sun-Sentinel op-Ed. He wrote, “a critical aspect of the trip was our visit to the Hadera water desalination plant. The builder/operator of the plant has been pursuing public-private partnerships around the globe and provided insights about long-term water solutions.”

The Hadera plant was built by Israeli-based IDE Technologies, which recently constructed a new desalination plant in Carlsbad, California. “[IDE Technologies] reached a 30-year operation and maintenance agreement with Poseidon Resources, which last week said it had secured $922 million funding for the project. Poseidon Resources, a subsidiary of Poseidon Water, said the treated water will be delivered into San Diego County’s water system.”

THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE

At its August 20, 2019 meeting, the Fort Lauderdale City Commission rejected the two bids it received to fix issues at the water treatment plant. According to a City staff memo, both bids were “significantly over budget” with the lowest bid coming in at $47.3 million dollars. The City’s projected cost was just $32 million dollars.

With the rejection of bids to repair Fiveash, the push for a public-private partnership (P3) began in earnest.

On October 7, 2019, Mayor Dean Trantalis and City Works Director Paul Berg attended the City’s Infrastructure Taskforce Committee meeting. When the topic of Fiveash was brought up, Berg said Carollo Enginners warned the process to remove the yellow color from City water would cost $100 million dollars per year, so they recommended rebuilding the Fiveash facility. While the Carollo Report would not be issued until December, Berg said the Fiveash reliability project would be rebid “this week.”

According to the meeting minutes, “The Chairperson reminded the committee that it had decided to not second guess the Fiveash report. The Committee will be proactive in reviewing the funding sources.”

Trantalis went on to describe his trip to Israel. He said he “met with Israeli companies, Poseidon and Suez, both companies want to forward a P3 proposal regarding the water plant.”

When asked about the P3 process by a committee member, Trantalis said, “that at this it isn’t known specifically how the process of using a P3 approach will work with competitive job bidding.”

“The Mayor expressed when the private sector gets involved projects get done much quicker. He used Lockhart Stadium as an example. He expressed that the water, wastewater and water plant systems were more complicated…but he would like to explore the P3 approach to the projects as well.”

At the November meeting the Infrastructure Taskforce Committee received a thirty-page presentation entitled “To P3 Or Not To P3” which explored the benefits of water system public-private partnerships. The Committee would vote to recommend a P3 solution to Fiveash as well as the hiring of a P3 consultant.

Even though he pushed for a P3 solution since June 2019, Trantalis would not have an official meeting with the “international water industry players” until December.

TRANTALIS POLITICAL TEAM HIRED BY POSEIDON

According to official meeting logs, on December 2, 2019 Mayor Dean Trantalis met with a Poseidon Water lobbyist. Trantalis had a noon lunch with attorney Stephanie Toothaker at Doc B’s restaurant in Fort Lauderdale. Trantalis and Toothaker were joined by Poseidon Water Senior Vice President and General Counsel Kelly Huffman.

According to the logs, two hours later, Toothaker met with Commissioner Ben Soresensen at the neighboring Kelley Uustal (KU) law firm to discuss Poseidon Water. The logs indicate Sorensen and Toothaker also discussed the Beckham/Lockhart Stadium project. Toothaker is the registered lobbyist for Beckham’s Inter Miami CF MLS soccer team. Nearly two hours later, Toothaker traveled to City Hall to discuss Poseidon Water with Commissioner Heather Moraitis.

While she logged the meetings with Trantalis, Sorensen and Moraitis, City records show Stephanie Toothaker is not the only registered lobbyist working for Poseidon Water.

Records show Carol Howard, the former executive director of the South Florida Water Management District, registered on October 31, 2019 as a Poseidon Water lobbyist. On November 19, 2019, Toothaker registered as a Poseidon Water lobbyist. One day later, Eric Johnson of Johnson Solutions registered as a Poseidon Water lobbyist. Then, on December 2, 2019, (the same day Toothaker met with Trantalis, Sorensen and Moraitis), James MacDiarmid of Layline Solutions registered as a lobbyist for Poseidon Water.

Published reports state Eric Johnson (via Johnson Strategies) represents Dean Trantalis. In his 2018 run for Mayor, Trantalis paid Johnson Campaigns $6,600 for consulting. According to State of Florida records, Johnson Campaigns is owned by Eric Johnson. City of Fort Lauderdale records show Johnson represents several clients.

While these same records show James MacDiarmid only represents one client, he is no stranger to City Hall. State records show Layline Solutions LLC was formed by twenty-one year Ian MacDiarmid in March 2019. The State records list a Miami Beach address as Layline Solutions’ place of business.

Official voter registration records show Ian MacDiarmid’s father, James Blake MacDiarmid, is registered to vote at the same Miami Beach address.

During the 2018 campaign, Blake MacDiarmid was a paid consultant for Commissioner Heather Moraitis. On November 14, 2017 Moraitis paid $10,000 to Blake MacDiarmid Inc (at the same Miami Beach address) for “professional fees.”

On his website, MacDiarmid, the self-proclaimed “mayoral whisperer,” claims to be an adviser to Dean Trantalis, Steve Glassman, Ben Sorensen and Heather Moraitis.

Pictures from the January 9th Infrastructure Update meeting show MacDiarmid seated in the front row. The night before, MacDiarmid and Trantalis Chief of Staff Scott Wyman sat together at the Board of Adjustment meeting hearing the AIDS Healthcare Foundation appeal.

Is it a coincidence that Dean Trantalis’ political advisers stand to profit from a public-private partnership to build a new water plant?

Is a deal with Poseidon Water imminent?

Will Mayor Dean Trantalis seek any public input?

Did any Trantalis advisers work on the the AHF, Lockhart Stadium and Holiday Park/Florida Panthers projects?

City of Fort Lauderdale voters deserve answers, right?

REDBROWARD asked Mayor Dean Trantalis for comment. We will update story if he responds.

More to come…

Blake MacDiarmid

Stephanie Toothaker with Commissioner Steve Glassman

Blake MacDiarmid, on right, at recent fundraiser for Commissioner Steve Glassman

Is AHF CEO Michael Weinstein Forcing His “Twisted Political Views” On City Of Fort Lauderdale?

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When he was just fourteen years old, Michael Weinstein joined a “group of activists occupying” a New York high-rise development. Weinstein and friends were opposed to the gentrification of their Brooklyn neighborhoods. Flash-forward fifty years to find the same Michael Weinstein declaring war on Fort Lauderdale residents opposed to his sixteen story building filled with nearly 700 “micro units.” On Tuesday, Weinstein, the CEO of the AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), held a press conference to blunt growing criticism of his pet project in Fort Lauderdale.

The damage control press conference was a disaster. Michael Weinstein repeatedly interrupted members of the media and the public who dared to ask questions. Weinstein repeatedly threatened to shut down the event if people kept asking questions. He even threatened to “count to five” if this reporter asked a follow up question.

Instead of forging a compromise, Weinstein declared war on the residents of Fort Lauderdale. Weinstein said, “We are as capable of waging a fight as anyone because People living with AIDS have face more discrimination and more hate than any other group.”

When asked about putting the project in a less residential area, a snarky Weinstein said, “Further from Rio Vista, is that what you’re saying? Further from the wealthy communities?”

FROM COMMUNIST LEADER TO CEO

The class warfare lingo used at the AHF press conference is nothing new for Michael Weinstein. According to an April 2017 exposé in the New York Times Magazine, Michael Weinstein’s 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.

By the late 1980s, Weinstein’s activism turned to the growing AIDS crisis. According to the NYT Magazine, Weinstein’s AHF, Inc. currently has a $1.4 billion dollar budget equaling the budget of Planned Parenthood.

CODED LANGUAGE

As he explained in his opening statement on Tuesday, Michael Weinstein sees his Fort Lauderdale project as 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.”

Despite statements that the development will not exclusively cater to those living with HIV/AIDS, 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.

TWISTED POLITICAL VIEWS

According to activist Peter Staley, a Weinstein critic, AHF’s noble mission to help those with HIV/AIDS is hurt by Weinstein’s political agenda. Staley told the New York Times Magazine, “A.H.F.’s problem is that once it created the largest AIDS empire on the planet, it started using that power for nefarious purposes: Michael Weinstein’s twisted political views.”

Is Michael Weinstein waging class warfare on Fort Lauderdale’s “wealthy” neighborhoods? He openly mocks Rio Vista residents.

Who’s next? Victoria Park? Idelwylde? Coral Ridge?

Will Fort Lauderdale leaders allow Michael Weinstein to morph Fort Lauderdale into Los Angeles or San Francisco?

Did Weinstein discuss his “twisted political views” in his meetings with Mayor Dean Trantalis and Commissioner Steve Glassman?