Miami, FL
Politics as usual 2, taxpayers 0, in Miami’s ‘ghost job’ scandal. Surprised? | Editorial
File picture of Jenny Nillo’s desk on the Omni CRA constructing.
jflechas@miamiherald.com
When the scandal blew up at Miami Metropolis Corridor final yr, the fallout was fast — however it didn’t final.
Jenny Nillo, a group liaison on the Omni Neighborhood Redevelopment Company and a longtime household buddy of Commissioner Alex Diaz de la Portilla, was fired from her job in March 2021 after she was seen by investigators swilling gas-station beers in her city-issued automotive and operating errands for Diaz de la Portilla as an alternative of doing her CRA job.
Diaz de la Portilla, chairman of the CRA on the time, had helped her get the job, together with a metropolis automotive to which she wasn’t entitled. Police received concerned when allegations surfaced that it was a “ghost job.”
In newly launched Florida Division of Legislation Enforcement data, Nillo tells investigators that she purchased wine and tequila and spent an hour at Díaz de la Portilla’s dwelling in the course of a workday morning as a result of he’s requested her to purchase the alcohol and decide up his dry cleansing.
When Nillo was fired, Diaz de la Portilla additionally paid a worth, although a small one. The Metropolis Fee stripped him of his CRA chairmanship amid a bitter public alternate, with one commissioner, Joe Carollo, along with his typical overkill, calling Diaz de la Portilla “the most important disappointment of my complete political historical past” and including that, “You make me wish to vomit.”
And but this yr, the endlessly forgiving fee returned Diaz de la Portilla as chairman of the CRA, which has a tax-funded price range of about $66.5 million. And Nillo, after being fired from her $53,000-a-year CRA job, additionally landed on her toes, because of her buddy in excessive locations. Diaz de la Portilla employed her in a $40,000-a-year job as a liaison in his workplace.
In Miami, the gamers change locations, however one factor stays fixed: Nobody is standing up for taxpayers.
The FDLE concluded that the commissioner’s conduct didn’t rise to the extent of a criminal offense. But the company famous, in very pointed wording, that the actions concerned “might have been immoral, unethical or [an] exploitation of his powers.” The case stays below investigation by the Miami-Dade Fee on Ethics & Public Belief, because it ought to. The Miami-Dade State Legal professional’s Workplace additionally reviewed allegations within the case and didn’t open a corruption investigation.
We’re all for second possibilities. Nillo, who had been convicted of mortgage fraud in 2018 and sentenced to 3 years in jail, has clearly gotten that and rather more, on the taxpayers’ dime. And simply because the FDLE discovered no foundation for prison expenses doesn’t imply there’s nothing mistaken right here. The FDLE data reveal a deeply problematic state of affairs that hasn’t gotten higher just because politicians have moved on.
Nillo stays on the town payroll. Diaz de la Portilla is again to overseeing the CRA. And we’re left with a bitter style in our mouths and the sense that Miami politicians run the town to profit themselves and their cronies, however not the individuals who pay their salaries or put them in workplace.
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This story was initially revealed June 1, 2022 5:21 PM.