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Florida abortion measure meets signature requirements

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Florida abortion measure meets signature requirements


TALLAHASSEE – Supporters of a proposed constitutional amendment aimed at ensuring abortion rights in Florida have submitted enough valid petition signatures to get on the November ballot, a key step in what could become the state’s biggest political battle this year.

The Florida Division of Elections website Friday morning showed that 910,946 valid signatures had been tallied for the proposal, which is sponsored by the political committee Floridians Protecting Freedom. That topped a requirement of submitting 891,523 signatures to qualify for the ballot.

Also, Floridians Protecting Freedom met a requirement to meet signature thresholds in at least half of the state’s 28 congressional districts. Unofficial totals on the Division of Elections website showed that the committee exceeded the thresholds in 17 of the 28 districts.

Now, the focus will shift to the Florida Supreme Court, which has to sign off on the wording of proposed ballot initiatives. The court has scheduled a Feb. 7 hearing on the abortion initiative, which Attorney General Ashley Moody and other opponents are trying to keep off the ballot.

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“Make no mistake: we will put abortion on the ballot in 2024 and take back the rights that have been stolen,” Senate Minority Leader Lauren Book, D-Davie, said Friday in a post on the social-media site X.

But Moody and the other opponents are urging the Supreme Court to block the measure, contending it would be misleading to voters – an argument that initiative supporters dispute.

The Supreme Court will review the proposed ballot summary and title, the wording that voters see when they go to the polls. The proposed ballot summary says, in part: “No law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider.”

Moody and other opponents have raised a series of objections, including contending that the word “viability” can have multiple meanings.

Floridians Protecting Freedom announced the initiative in May after the Republican-controlled Legislature and Gov. Ron DeSantis approved a law that could prevent abortions after six weeks of pregnancy. The six-week limit is contingent on the outcome of a legal battle about a 15-week abortion limit that DeSantis and lawmakers passed in 2022. The 15-week case also is pending at the Florida Supreme Court.

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The proposed constitutional amendment has come amid the backdrop of ballot fights in other states after the U.S. Supreme Court in 2022 overturned the landmark Roe v. Wade abortion rights decision. The U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling left abortion decisions to states.

If the Florida Supreme Court signs off on the wording, the Floridians Protecting Freedom initiative is almost certain to spur a fierce – and expensive – political battle. The six-week limit approved this spring by lawmakers and DeSantis would largely halt abortions in Florida, where a reported 72,087 abortions were performed during the first 11 months of 2023, according to state Agency for Health Care Administration data.

The petition-gathering process is complicated and costly, and Floridians for Protecting Freedom faced a Feb. 1 deadline for meeting the requirements. It had raised $8.91 million for the initiative as of Sept. 30, while spending $8.79 million as it worked to collect signatures. It will have to file an updated finance report by a Wednesday deadline.

The signature totals posted Friday morning on the Division of Elections website showed that the largest number of valid signatures, 54,277, had been collected in Congressional District 14 in Hillsborough and Pinellas counties. Meanwhile, 45,673 had been collected in Congressional District 10 in Orange County, and 45,268 had been collected in Congressional District 21 in Martin, Palm Beach and St. Lucie counties.

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TA Realty Buys Back Miami Warehouse Campus for $48M

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TA Realty Buys Back Miami Warehouse Campus for M


TA Realty bought back an industrial park near Miami International Airport, paying $47.6 million, property records show.

Called Webster Business Park, the 178,521-square-foot property includes four buildings at 7200 Northwest 25th Street, sandwiched between Palmetto Expressway and the Miami airport. The 7.8-acre campus was built in the 1970s. 

SEE ALSO: Bain Capital, 11North Partners Acquire Five Shopping Centers for $300M

The transaction equates to about $267 a square foot.

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Boston-based TA Realty owned the asset between 2005 and 2016, before selling it for $16.6 million to Cofe Properties. AEW Capital Management, another Boston-based investor which served as the seller in the recent sale, purchased the campus for $25 million in 2019. 

The purchase marks at least the second time TA Realty has reacquired a South Florida asset it previously owned. In October, the firm paid $193 million for a 476-unit multifamily community in Palm Beach Gardens — roughly $89 million more than the price at which it sold the property in 2017.

On the industrial front, TA Realty has been building up its portfolio in Miami-Dade County. Last year, it bought a 43-acre industrial development site for $106 million, and a 361,461-square-foot portfolio for $84 million. The previous year, it paid $160 million for a four-building, 509,522-square-foot campus nearby. 

Representatives for TA Realty and AEW Capital Management did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Julia Echikson can be reached at jechikson@commercialobserver.com.

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Inside the latest in separate deadly incidents in Miami waters tied to real estate

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Inside the latest in separate deadly incidents in Miami waters tied to real estate


Two separate tragic incidents in Miami’s waters — both tied to prominent local real estate figures and which each ended in the death of a teen — are headed for very different legal outcomes. 

Commercial broker George Pino, CEO of Doral-based State Street Realty, faces a felony vessel homicide charge, and his attorneys recently filed a slew of court motions seeking to keep statements made by Pino and other information related to his alleged alcohol consumption before the crash from being mentioned by prosecutors during his trial, slated to start on June 1, the Miami Herald reported.

Pino was steering the boat on Biscayne Bay on the Sunday of Labor Day weekend in 2022 with 14 occupants, including his wife, daughter and 11 other teenage girls when the craft crashed into a concrete channel marker. The crash killed 17-year-old Luciana “Lucy” Fernandez and left Katerina “Katy” Puig, now 21, with a lifetime of physical disabilities.

Pino’s defense team is asking the court to exclude during trial a statement he made to an investigator the night of the crash that the wake of a larger boat headed toward his vessel and caused the crash. 

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His attorneys are asking Judge Marisa Tinkler Mendez to bar testimony from the jury trial that recounts a witness’ statement that Pino had bloodshot eyes the night of the crash and that he had told police he had had “two beers” that day. The defense also wants to preclude the jury from hearing that Pino’s boat contained 61 empty alcohol containers when it was pulled out from the water after the crash.  

Pino had given some of his statements to police and an investigator before he was read his Miranda rights, according to his attorneys. 

Pino’s attorneys also filed motions to dismiss the criminal charges or to move the trial to Palm Beach or Orlando due to extensive media coverage of the crash in Miami-Dade County. 

Pino originally faced misdemeanor charges of careless boating, but prosecutors issued the more serious vessel homicide charge in 2024 after a witness came forward. 

This year, a neurologist issued a report on whether Pino had suffered a traumatic brain injury, causing amnesia and false memories for his recollection of the incident. The neurologist was hired by Pino’s attorneys, indicating they may use the doctor’s testimony in the trial. 

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In another fatal incident in Miami’s waters that devastated the real estate community and the city as a whole, 15-year-old Ella Riley Adler –– daughter of Adler Real Estate Partners’ Matthew Adler –– died in a 2024 incident. Adler was wakeboarding in May 2024 in waters off Key Biscayne. She had fallen off her wakeboard when another boat struck her. 

The captain of the yacht that was towing the 15-year-old struck a plea deal, the Miami Herald reported. 

Edmund Richard Hartley pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor charges of navigational rule violations. Under the plea deal, prosecutors dropped two other misdemeanor charges, and Hartley was ordered to complete a boating safety course, barred from steering a vessel for 60 days starting next month, and was sentenced to six months probation. For the second charge, he also faces a second six-month probation term, though prosecutors could terminate this if he completes the first term. In addition, no criminal conviction will appear on Hartley’s record. 

Adler’s parents approved of the plea deal, though Matthew Adler told Hartley during a court hearing on Tuesday that he should have been more cautious. 

“At just 15 years old, Ella was flourishing. Her final year was in many ways her happiest and most exciting,” Matthew Adler said in court, the publication reported. “She was thriving academically, participating in debate, performing in the school musical ‘Chicago’ and growing into an exceptional young woman with limitless potential ahead of her.”

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The captain of the boat that struck Adler, Carlos Guillermo “Bill” Alonso, also received a deal, pleading guilty to misdemeanor careless boating charges. He was sentenced to six months of probation and ordered to complete a boater safety course. 

The Adler family started the Ella Ridley Adler Foundation that supports Jewish life, education and art. —Lidia Dinkova 





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Carlos Vives Pours Colombian Pride Into Miami With Tour Al Sol: ‘It Is Important to Be in This City’

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Carlos Vives Pours Colombian Pride Into Miami With Tour Al Sol: ‘It Is Important to Be in This City’


Miami’s Kaseya Center filled up with sombrero vueltiaos and Colombian flags to receive Carlos Vives’ Tour Al Sol on Saturday night (May 23). 

At 9 p.m. sharp, three large screens — including a round one in the center that represented a sun (hence the tour’s name) — lit up the sold-out arena: “We all need the sun to be happy,” Vives’ voice recited in an intro video.

In the conceptual two-hour show, the Colombian star took spectators on a journey through the solar system all the way to infinity, but “in my homeland, the sun hits incredibly hard,” he continued in the clip before he got on stage. 

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Flaunting a black denim jacket and jeans, and his bouncy, signature dirty blond curls, Vives kicked off the concert with “Volví a Nacer,” followed by “La Bicicleta” and “Canción Bonita.” 

“How are you, Miami? The city of all,” he said. “For me, it is important to be in this city. Music took me around the world — not to become more famous, but to show my family what lay beyond Colombia. I have been singing for many years, and one learns who it is they sing for: my country, my land, my people, my region.”

Throughout the night, Vives, who was joined by 11 musicians, also serenaded fans with his vallenato and cumbia classics, including “La Gota Fria,” “El Cantor de Fonseca,” “Carito,” “Pa’ Mate,” “Cuando Nos Volvamos a Encontrar,” “Fruta Fresca” and “Robarte un Beso.”

Among his notable surprise guests were Niña Pastori for a performance of “Sombra Perdida”; Sergio George for “Si yo volviera a nacer”; Grupo Niche for the salsa-cumbia version of “La Tierra del Olvido”; and Fonseca for “Quiero verte sonreir.” 

 “Each show of Tour al Sol will be a concert from sunrise to sunset — a journey through the emotions of music that moves with the sun,” Vives previously told Billboard Español. “In short, Tour al Sol is a concert with the sun of La Provincia.”

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The Tour Al Sol, which kicked off April 16 in Toronto, will wrap June 5 at the Coliseo de Puerto Rico José Miguel Agrelot in San Juan.

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