Miami Lakes council members Luis Collazo, Josh Dieguez and Marilyn Ruano discussed traffic, development and their political careers with the Miami Lakes Chamber of Commerce.
The elected officials spoke during the chamber’s Aug. 9 luncheon at Miami Lakes Hotel on Main.
Collazo and Ruano are term-limited for their council seats and leave those offices in November, 2024.
Dieguez would not confirm the open secret that he is running for mayor, though Collazo told the audience that Dieguez is a candidate and that he’d “completely support him.”
In reply, Dieguez said, “I am still evaluating my options. By the end of the year, I’ll make a final decision.”
As for concerns that two residential developments in Miami Lakes -- South Pointe is being built and Miami Lakes Golf Club is in the planning stages -- will bring more cars to town streets, Dieguez said, “There is not going to be a magic bullet to traffic.
“In 2016, I remember up to that point we hadn’t had any development really in the town for 10 something years, and yet traffic was getting worse. The areas around us have gotten more dense, and it’s out of our hands because we don’t control those jurisdictions,” he said.
As for new apartments planned, Dieguez said, “And then within the town’s boundaries there are development rights that we have to respect, or we frankly could also be on the hook.”
Ruano said, “the council has more teeth, we just refuse to use them” when it approves developments such as The Graham Companies’ seven-story building with apartments and parking within it planned for the golf course. It was not designed for maximum allowable density, but Ruano opposed it.
“To me, it didn’t conform to the surrounding areas,” she said. “…We need to try our best and to try a little bit harder through our planning department and through conversations with developers to try to do better. … We cannot absorb any more traffic.”
Ruano faulted drivers for not respecting intersections or lights, prompting the town to spend money on police at those locations just to keep traffic moving.
Collazo recalled when he was a new councilman in 2016, there was opposition to the 6600 Main mixed-use project.
“Residents are scared of change and at the end of the day, that’s what it is,” Collazo said. “Town center is not going to look like this forever. You’ll eventually see vertical.”
“We are probably blessed to live in this community when we have great partners and great people who are still here, like the Grahams,” Collazo said.
“I can’t think of another company that has taken more time, more thought, more energy to develop this community,” Collazo said.
“They don’t want to see us turn into something that maybe they didn’t have a vision for,” he said.
He described a recent drive through Doral and being surprised at the growth there.
“Go to other cities and see what they have … see the overdevelopment,” he said.
St. Thomas University President David A. Armstrong is scheduled to address the chamber on Sept. 13.
For more information go to www.miamilakeschamber.com.