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There is a classic paradox that asks, “What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object?” Well, residents in Cutler Bay are about to find out.
In this scenario, the unstoppable force is attorney Ron Book, who’s known mostly as a lobbyist, but he also is the chair of the Miami-Dade Homeless Trust. The Trust administers the proceeds of a one-percent food and beverage tax that we all pay, together with federal and state grants. All told, that amounted to over $89 million according to the most recent figures.
The Homeless Trust conducts more than 100 housing and services programs operated by about 20 competitively selected non-profit providers and government entities. The bulk of its budget is spent on both emergency housing, transitional housing, and operating permanent housing for the homeless.
The latest – and perhaps most controversial – proposal is for the Homeless Trust to purchase the La Quinta Inn on Caribbean Boulevard in Cutler Bay, which has 107 rooms, for $14 million. On the face of it this appears to be an admirable effort. But on closer examination, it works out to almost $131,000 per unit. And at about $650 per square foot of living space, that’s pretty pricy for a living space that averages just about 200 square feet.
However, this La Quinta project is something that Book has his mind set on. He is the “unstoppable force” and Cutler Bay Mayor Tim Meerbot is the “immovable object.”
The La Quinta Inn property is directly across the street from Southland Mall. This massive property is set to see a $1 billion redevelopment into a “city within a city” with more than 4,000 new residential units, over 500,000 square feet of curated retail. The project is slated to take seven-years to complete and is expected to create approximately 2,700 new jobs and generate $44 million in property taxes ad valorem revenue in its first five years.
Naturally, Mayor Meerbot doesn’t want the Homeless Trust to complete the purchase and the conversion of the La Quinta Inn. The unspoken fear is that this motel conversion will result in creating little more than a flop house – a place where the homeless will be “warehoused” with minimal services and opportunities for training, therapy, and a chance to develop and sharpen life skills.
On this one, we are going to have to side with the mayor.
Having said that, most of us recognize that helping the homeless isn’t just necessary, it is something that a moral society should do. But at the end of the day, the solution to the homeless problem is one of cost. It is about finding the right combination of financial sources and grants that can help solve the problem rather than just plastering over it.
Adding additional units into the South Miami-Dade rental market, like the Southland Mall redevelopment plan promises to do, will have a long-term downward effect on rents. That is something that’s not likely to happen if the La Quinta conversion ends up discouraging the adjacent development or if it the dissuades the occupation of the redeveloped Southland Mall by a workforce that Cutler Bay very much needs to attract.
Could it be Book’s tenacity is clouding his better judgment? A quick look on Zillow, the real estate app, reveals a number of one bedroom/one bath condos with full kitchens on the market for far less than the Homeless Trust is ready to pony up per hotel room – and well below the cost per square foot of building new apartments.
Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava just cut the ribbon on a senior apartment building in an area nearby the Village of Palmetto Bay. The project is spearheaded by a nonprofit group led by NBA Hall of Famer Alonzo Mourning that managed to parlay federal and state grants together with county money to build a complex that promises to create a sense of home, rather than slapping a new coat of paint on a former “no-tell” motel.
Just because the Homeless Trust has the ability to draw monies from the county treasury to pay the purchase price to buy the La Quinta Inn doesn’t mean that it should.
We encourage Mr. Book to sit down with Alonso Mourning to see how we can do homeless housing right.
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