Mayor Christine Moreno

Howard Neu was the mayor and he'd asked me to chair his re-election campaign. He'd appointed me to the Planning Commission. I declined chairing the Commission but accepted the vice-chairman position. I had way too many things going at the same time. I'd helped him form Task Force 101, also known as The Mayor's Economic Task Force. Then twenty years ago he suggested that I run for John Haggerty's seat on the city council. Running against an incumbant didn't exactly seem like a good plan but he said that he'd help me raise money and endorse me. Why not? I figured, I'll give it a shot. I went to the city clerk's and filed to run for Haggerty's council seat. Within a day or two I heard that Haggerty had decided not to seek re-election.(Did Howard Neu know something I didn't?) I was in! With the mayor backing me I was unlikely to draw new opposition.

WRONG! Next thing I hear is that Howard Premer, the owner of radio station WKAT, had filed for the seat. Now things were getting tough. It would be difficult to raise the kind of money that Premer could just write a personal check for! I considered dropping out until somebody told me that Howard Neu was now backing Howard Premer, not me. Supposedly in exchange for a weekly radio talk show. This was WAR! Never piss off a scorpio, and I was pissed big time.

A few weeks later my wife Claudia and I were attending a Chamber of Commerce dinner at the Miami Shores Country Club. We sat with city attorney Will Splitstoesser and his girlfriend, a young good looking barely out of law school attorney, Christine Moreno. Her father was a realtor and very involved in the city but Christine hadn't been. Christine was sitting between Will and myself as we discussed the upcoming election. Suddenly she asked "How come nobody is running against Howard?" At exactly the same tme, as if we'd rehearsed it, Will and I both turned toward Christine and said in unison "Why don't YOU run?"

Come morning and I started getting phone calls. They were all "Did you hear that Christine Moreno went to the city clerk's office and filed to run against Howard Neu?" A plan formed in my evil scorpio mind! I must admit that the plan likely resulted in my losing the council race by a narrow margin, but even with all his money Premer won by a very narrow margin. Right after the votes were tallied he told me that up until the last precinct was counted he wasn't sure of the outcome.

Getting back to the mayor's race, which is where I'd invested way too much time and effort, a friend who was familiar with the city's politics and the major players, but whose voice wouldn't be recognized by the Miami Herald reporter (this was before caller I.D.) called the reporter almost every day with more juicy morsels about the mayor. No deeds truely illegal, but enough off track to raise serious doubts about him, along with whom to call to follow up on the items. The day before the election the editor at the Herald wrote something like yes, Christine Moreno was young and inexperienced, but there were too many doubts about Howard Neu. They endorsed Christine. She won. She became North Miami's first,and so far only, female mayor.

A year or two later Howard Neu packed up his law practice and moved up to Broward County.

"NORTH MIAMI IS A HAITIAN CITY AND WE HAVE THE RIGHT TO RUN IT!"

Marcellus and his entourage were doing a great job of acting like a bunch of little boys who'd just been told that they couldn't go outside and play ball until they'd finished all of their homework.

In the top photo attorney John Dellagloria is presenting his case that Marcellus wasn't qualified to run for the council seat because there was evidence that he hadn't actually lived in the city long enough. The case was already filed in the circuit court and Dellagloria argued that Marcellus couldn't be seated until the court rules in about six weeks. His client, candidate Michelle Garcia, is sitting behind him wearing a grey suit.

I can usually take a sharp photograph at slow shutter speeds, in this case 1/8 of a second, but when I have shouting irate arm waving guys dancing two feet away from my feet it isn't very easy. If you look closely though, you'll see that it's mostly the people that are blurry, even the woman across the aisle, because they were moving too fast. The ceiling, chairs, etc. are fairly sharp.

When Marcellus's attorney started to argue his side of the case it was mostly that Marcellus should be seated now and the judge could later remove him, but that ignored the fact that any of his votes on council items would become null and void if the judge removed him. That would cause a lot of havoc, requiring everything to be done over again, and perhaps trigger some lawsuits in itself.

Several other people came up to the podium claiming to be co-council, but with no proof to back up the claims, and did their share of shouting. There were times where the mayor had a problem getting the audience to calm down and stop screaming and chanting. Overall, their main argument was that white people are a bunch of racists and hate Haitians. Thankfully we had a good police presence. Chief Shannon and his men excercized restraint and didn't make any arrests. The decision was made to let the court decide. The incumbant councilman, a Haitian, will retain his seat until the judge decides who will be the replacement.

I doubt that the bailiff at the courthouse will put up with that kind of behavior. They'll make arrests. Last I heard it's official: NORTH MIAMI IS AN AMERICAN CITY.

Elect Al Kaplan North Miami Mayor in 2011

A few years ago a bunch of us decided to go to the February annual camera show at the North Miami Armory (sadly now torn down) and we met up at Jimmie's Place for brunch first. Paul Neuthaler from Hollywood snapped this shot of me in front of Jimmie's Place and posted it on a photography forum. Then James Mitchell, another amateur photographer who is from Washington D.C. and is frequently in Miami on business emailed me. He wanted to use the photo on a T-shirt, Paul said "Go for it!", and suddenly people from Alaska to Europe to God knows where were posting pictures of themselves wearing their "Al Kaplan T-Shirt" on that photo forum. I scanned the photo on the shirt to post it here, which accounts for the texture.

A few months ago people around North Miami were getting fed up with the way the city was being run, about the 1,000% raise the city council awarded themselves on top of a new gold plated pension plan and health benefits better than Obama gets from the feds. The way to balance the depleted city budget? Raise the utility bill! But the water plant is falling apart from lack of maintanance and half the water pipes around town are leaking like seives. The city parks are in horrid shape. The mayor, council, and city manager can afford to drive oversize SUV's that probably get 8 miles per gallon around town while the tax paying residents are losing jobs and falling behind on their mortgages.

People started asking me to run for mayor. I don't want to be mayor. Really! I don't. I'm not on an ego trip. I couldn't run for city council this go around anyway because my district's councilman, Scott Galvin, still has two years to run on his term.

OK, I'm making the announcement! It's official! I'm running for mayor in two years. Vote for Al Kaplan in 2011. Monkette will be thrilled! She's been bugging me to do it for months now! She can't wait to start mapping out strategy and throwing campaign parties withe big platters overflowing with fresh fruit and lots of bananas. With her at the helm there's just no way I can lose. After all, there's just no way anybody would dare to run against me. Can you imagine having to explain to people how you lost a race against a candidate whose campaign was chaired and managed by a toy monkey? It's better to just not run at all.

Now I need YOUR help on a big decision. I'll need a photo to give to the papers, use on posters and handouts, and yes, probably a T-shirt as well. I can't decide on whether I should use this photo or the color shot of me (scroll down) with the cuts on my face and the black eye. Email your vote to preacherpop42@aol.com

Me And Frank At Our Drug Dealer's Place

I don't even want to think about how long I've known Frank Wolland. It dates back to before cell phones, but not quite to the days of comic books and Dick Tracy with his amazing "two-way wrist radio". It dates back to the days when picking up prescriptions at the drug store wasn't a normal every day part of life. The good old days! The days when you knew that it would be ready when they said it would, and somebody was there ready to take it out of the bin and hand it to you when you walked up to the counter.
Oh well! Between his phone calls and my phone calls we managed to get at least fifteen minutes worth of chatting about the upcoming city election before we got our precious bags of drugs. Don't forget to vote on May 12th. Vote for Frank Wolland for mayor.

Frank Wolland Has The EXPERIENCE To Be North Miami MAYOR

For one thing, he's been mayor before. That convinced Monkette to back him! Two years ago she got involved in Mayor Kevin Burns' re-election campaign and she must have been doing something right!

Day after day, throughout the whole campaign, if you Googled things like North Miami Mayor, Kevin Burns, or any similar group of words there it was: Monkette's coverage of the race above the Miami Herald's story. That's right! The Price of Silver was getting more hits than the Miami Herald's on-line edition! But Kevin can't run more than two consecutive terms.

So Monkette and I put our heads together and decided to back Frank Wolland. He and I spent a few years working together on the North Miami Planning Commision, and he went on to become a city councilman followed by sitting in the mayor's chair. He was a good and effective mayor, and he and I pretty much think alike on most issues. I told Monkette "Hey! Go for it!" I'm not sure exactly what her motivations are, though. Banana plants in every yard? The ego trip of writing blog posts that beat out the Miami Herald website for readership? The thrill of running another successful political campaign?

When Frank stopped by here yesterday she was thrilled to put one of Frank's yard signs in the front lawn. She set it at just the right angle so it's visible to cars regardless of which direction you're driving on either N.E. 14th Avenue or N.E. 133rd Street. Tuesday night she's dragging me over to the Central North Miami Homeowners Association meeting. That girl has some serious politicking planned! Her candidates ALWAYS win. She has a 100% track record!

Al Kaplan For North Miami Mayor

It's odd but the little strip mall has a Starbucks at its southern end, which is within the city limits of North Miami. A few store north and across a narrow alley is the City of North Miami Beach. One itty bitty strip mall, two cities. Just about everybody at Starbucks knows me and I'll talk with just about anybody and everybody. So I'm talking. To anybody and everybody! It's probably well past the time for just talking. Yup, time has run out for sure. The 13th hour has arrived!

For the past few years I've also been talking with everybody and anybody around city hall about "The Fence Issue" and getting nowhere. Today the deputy city manager, Dennis Kelley, came by my house. He agreed that the neighbor's fence was taller than he is. It's taller than his six feet for sure. Six feet maximum is what the code allows, and my contention is that at the time the fence was constructed the code said five feet. Even if the code was changed afterwards the fence should have been made to conform when I first complained. I'm also contending that it should have come in front of the Board of Adjustment for a variance, even if it was after the code was changed, bacause it's still overheight and it was constructed before the change.

Well, it seems that Clarence Patterson, our city manager, thinks that the fence is just fine as it is. That's great. An appointed official gets to make law? That's not the way I read the city charter. We have an elected council and an elected mayor. THEY make the rules and THEY hire and fire the city manager. For at least two years now people have been encouraging me to run for mayor. I still have that photograph of my bruised, cut, and bloody face courtesy of my neighbor's contractor. Well the cuts and bruising are courtesy of the contractor. My son Jonathan took the photo. What folks are telling me is that picture would make for a fantastic campaign poster. It would make for a great T-shirt. It would grab attention as the cover of a campaign brochure. It would probably get coverage in the Miami Herald and on TV as well. I'll even insist on using it as my official portrait to hang in city hall along with all the other portraits of North Miami mayors.

Yesterday I had lunch with the guy who made up the last "Al Kaplan T-shirt" a couple of years ago. Stay tuned...

Crap! I Just Might Have To Get A Haircut

Councilman Scott Galvin said that he was going to introduce a resolution at the next city council meeting to give us poor starving advisory board members our first raise since 1961. I've been going all over town telling people that there's just no way that I'm going to squander two months pay on a haircut. As Judy Feldman told me Saturday "What! You mean that they're still paying the same $10 that they were 35 years ago when you and I were on the planning commision together?"

"Yup, still ten bucks" I said. "That's absolutely rediculous!" she replied.

Well, tomorrow night is the council meeting, and I've been sitting here scheming, thinking of people who might be talked into running against the incumbants next year, and contemplating ways to assure the success of The Revolution if it has to come to that. Hell, I just might tell a group of already organized people "YES! I will run for mayor!" Then I could afford a haircut. The mayor and council just gave themselves a huge raise and a ton of generous benefits. I might even be able to start dating again without having to do it Dutch Treat.