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Closing out last year, we accomplished a lot. At our annual holiday Christmas shopping program, alongside the 100 Black Men of South Florida, we served over 250 underprivileged kids, taking them on a shopping spree at Walmart. We were also able to donate gift cards to some of our seniors who are on a fixed income. We had holiday giveaways throughout the City and may have provided over 10,000 turkeys to several deserving families.
Early Progress
In the first quarter of 2022, we rolled out our grant-funded Housing Rehabilitation Program, allowing us to assist residents with landscaping and upgrades. We were offering almost $2,000 per home. We organized free legal aid services to help residents understand some of the documents received in the mail about selling their houses and assist with some estate planning. We also launched our community karaoke, which had about 400 attendees. That was a fantastic start.
We’ve been working with crime watch groups and homeowners associations with traffic calming devices in neighborhoods where speeding has become a significant problem.
We’ve expanded our trolley services to better serve our seniors, ensuring there are stops at the senior living facilities and making sure our residents can take advantage of the Senior Family Center’s opportunities. They also provide free transportation for the kids at Norland Middle School and Miami Norland Senior High School.
Infrastructure
Over the past three (3) years in my district, we’ve had over $8 million of infrastructure work done in Lake Lucerne to resurface the roads and sidewalks, making them ADA-compliant. Now, we’re doing similar work in the northern area from NW 12th Avenue to the Turnpike and from NW 183rd Street to about 200th Streets.
Every park in the Seat 2 district has had ground broken and is rolling according to schedule, with Cloverleaf Park — the newest park — coming pretty soon. We also have a brand new, 3-acre park that was donated by Coastland Construction. In my next Community Connection meeting, we’ll talk about some of the other infrastructure projects and upcoming plans in my district that will be moving forward.
Looking ahead
We don’t know where COVID is going, so we still have our COVID site up and want to ensure that resources are readily available for the residents.
With Formula 1, the Miami Tennis Open, and all of these major events happening, we want to ensure that we continue to put our residents first, that they’re able to move throughout the City, and that these activities are not impeding on their way of living. We must be able to coexist together with the mindset that we’re still a residential community.
The annexation of the northeast area will provide additional tax dollars to the City to prevent us from needing to raise residential taxes. With a $123 million investment, we’ve had UPS just open up in Miami Gardens. DHL and Peloton recently opened as well. We have a number of world-class businesses now calling Miami Gardens home, and we’re able to create jobs that offer livable wages for our residents.
