When a $600 million dollar welfare check is not enough

Some of our politicians want struggling working families to pee in a cup before they can qualify for $60 a week in food stamps. What do they do to rich people that want a baseball stadium?  They build them a $600 million dollar one and throw in a parking garage on our dime while telling them, “don’t worry about giving the taxpayers any of their money back, they’ll understand.”  According to the Miami Herald, if a City Commission vote today is successful, taxpayers will being paying $2 million a year for a company named Limousines of South Florida (LSF) to operate a local old-school trolley service that would help chauffeur fans from Brickell and other areas to the Miami Marlins stadium, while providing some “localized” service.

The initial money to invest in the 28 trolleys and pay a private service to operate them apparently came from $4 million of federal stimulus money.  What the Herald article didn’t ask is if paying for a gimmick like trolleys is the best way to change Miami’s reputation as one of the worst commuter cities.  Anyone that has ever taken public transportation from one end of Miami to another knows that it is probably faster to take a bus to Disney World.

But an even better question is why the Miami Marlins stadium continues to get the gold star treatment from our politicians considering that:

• The stadium took over half a billion dollars in handouts from Miamians but still left taxpayers on the hook for $2 million a year of property taxes for the parking garage.
• The owner, Jeffrey Loria, allegedly lied about not having enough money to pay for the stadium himself.
• The Feds are investigating the alleged lies that led to the stadium deal.
• Taxpayers will see next to nothing from the profits of the stadium they built.

At least we can enjoy a game at the stadium that we paid for but don’t own…if we can afford the price of a ticket in this economy.

Oh, and in a totally unrelated story, Miami is ranked one of the worst run cities in the country.

This is why we need one Miami for all of us, because otherwise our politicians might steal our city from us and sell it.

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Sources:
[i] /www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/24/rick-scott-drug-testing-welfare-florida_n_1029332.html
[ii] http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/01/12/2584872/miami-commissioners-could-shuttle.html
[iii] http://www.miamitodaynews.com/news/100617/story6.shtml
[iv] http://www.forbes.com/2008/04/24/cities-commute-fuel-forbeslife-cx_mw_0424realestate.html
[v] http://blogs.miaminewtimes.com/riptide/2011/11/miami_on_the_hook_for_millions.php
[vi] http://blogs.miaminewtimes.com/riptide/2010/08/its_official_florida_marlins_s.php
[vii] http://blogs.miaminewtimes.com/riptide/2011/12/marlins_stadium_deal_now_the_t.php
[viii] http://www.miaminewtimes.com/2011-05-05/news/six-lies-about-the-marlins-stadium/
[ix] http://blogs.miaminewtimes.com/riptide/2012/01/miami_named_worst-run_city_in.php