ELECTION CENTRAL 2014

THE CAPTAIN REPORTS:

WELCOME TO THE MONTH OF AUGUST:  IF THE CALENDAR READS AUGUST, THEN IT'S TIME TO KICK-OFF FOOTBALL SEASON, IT'S ALSO THE PEAK OF HURRICANE SEASON, & MOST IMPORTANT OF ALL, IT'S TIME FOR ELECTION CENTRAL .....

On August 26th, 2014, voters go to the polls to decide on eight contested judicial elections.  But, early voting begins next Monday, August 11th and continues through Sunday August 24th.

This past week, the Dade County Bar Association (DCBA) released the results of it's Judicial Poll.  The numbers below indicate: (Exceptionally Qualified/Qualified/Unqualified).

In the past week, the Miami Herald has also printed their recommendations.  Give the Herald credit for going the extra mile.  They begin with an extensive questionnaire and end with in depth interviews of all candidates before their Editorial Board.  The candidates face off in these interviews side by side.

Also, the State of Florida, Division of Elections, lists the campaign account information for all of the candidates.

CIRCUIT COURT

GROUP 16 (Leon Firtel retiring)

Thomas Cobitz v. Stephen Millan

Cobitz 23%/57%/20%

Fundraising: He has raised $21,790 from 103 contributors.  He has also dug deep into his own pocket and borrowed a whopping $500,000 to win the seat.  Tom, seriously, a half a million dollars?!

Millan 18%/59%/23%

Fundraising: He has raised $34,080 from 117 contributors.  He has also added $50,000 of his own money.

Mr. Millan received the HERALD endorsement.

GROUP 26

Judge Rodney Smith v. Christian Carrazana

Smith 47%/45%/7%

Fundraising: He has raised $133,409 from 529 contributors. He has added a measly $100 of his own money, (to open the campaign account).

Carrazana 8%/29%/64%

Fundraising: He has raised $19,450 from 35 contributors.  He has kicked in $7,000 of his own money to the campaign.

Judge Smith received the HERALD endorsement.

GROUP 27 (Ron Dresnick retiring)

Mary Gomez v. Alberto Milian V. Joseph Perkins

Gomez  13%/51%/36%

Fundraising: She has raised $17,551 from 76 contributors.  She has not added any of her own money to the campaign.

Milian  13%/41%/46%

Fundraising: He has raised $160,789 from 186 contributors. He has contributed another $100,000 out of his own pocket.

Candidate Joseph Perkins has dropped out of the race.  He cited "health issues in my family" in a letter to the DBR.

Ms. Gomez received the HERALD endorsement.

GROUP 58 (Marc Schumacher retiring)

Oscar Rodriguez-Fonts v. Martin Zilber

Fonts  17%/61%/22%

Fundraising: He has raised $76,463 from 277 contributors.  He did not loan himself any money.

Zilber  21%/45%/34%

Fundraising: He has raised $156,123 from 462 contributors. He has kicked in $100,000 of his own money.

Mr. Zilber received the HERALD endorsement.

GROUP 67

Judge Fleur Lobree v. Mavel Ruiz

Lobree  47%/46%/7%

Fundraising: She has raised $55,585 from 246 contributors.  She has added $100,000 of her own money to the campaign.

Ruiz  14%/42%/44%

Fundraising: She has raised $28,026 from 127 contributors. She added no money of her own.

Judge Lobree received the HERALD endorsement.

GROUP 70 (Sandy Karlan retiring)

Veronica Diaz v. Renier Diaz de la Portilla

Diaz  13%/34%/54%

Fundraising: She has raised $64,697 from 202 contributors.  She has added $40,000 of her own money to the campaign account.

Diaz DLP  8%/29%/62%

Fundraising: He has raised $70,200 from 126 contributors.  He has added only a $200 contribution of his own money, (to open the campaign account).

Mr. Diaz de la Portilla received the HERALD endorsement.

COUNTY COURT

GROUP 19

Judge Jacqueline Schwartz v. Rachel Dooley v. Frank Bocanegra

Schwartz  16%/45%/39%

Fundraising: She has raised $67,786 from 301 contributors.  She has added a huge contribution of $200,000 of her own money to the campaign account.

Dooley  24%/55%/21%

Fundraising: She has raised $36,233 from 151 contributors. She has added only $1,600 of her own money.

Bocanegra  11%/41%/48%

Fundraising: He has raised $24,962 from 112 contributors.  He has contributed $10,000 into the campaign account from his own pocket.

Judge Schwartz received the HERALD endorsement.

GROUP 36

Judge Nuria Saenz v. Victoria Ferrer

Saenz  29%/52%/19%

Fundraising: She has raised $87,674 from 260 contributors. She has added no money of her own to the campaign.

Ferrer  16%/42%/42%

Fundraising: She has raised $84,749 from 183 contributors. She has added only $2,500 from her wallet to the campaign.

Judge Saenz received the HERALD endorsement.

THE DCBA POLL .....

A word about the poll.  To give any real weight to this poll would be a disservice to the voters of our community.  There were a total of 15,061 attorneys eligible to vote in the poll.  A grand total of 1,211 voters returned their ballots; a figure of just over 8%.  But, in reality, the figures are even more dismal. 

You see, not all 1,211 voters voted for every judge/candidate listed on the poll.  Citing three examples, only 220 attorneys voted on candidate Carrazana; only 185 on candidate Bocanegra; and only a ridiculously low 173 voted on candidate Mary Gomez.  These numbers are typical throughout the poll when looking at those that are not on the bench.

Even the judges currently on the bench had low numbers of attorneys weighing in on their qualifications.  Three more examples: Judge Marcia Caballero garnered votes from only 385 attorneys; Judge Cristina Miranda 373; and Judge Maria Sampedro Iglesias had only 326 attorneys who apparently knew who she was.

So, sadly, the DCBA poll, may be, in a word, worthless.  That is not the fault of the DCBA.  That is clearly the fault of attorneys.  We seem to be so opinionated on these legal blogs.  But when it comes time to weigh in on those that get to wear the black robes, and sit for six years in the judgment of others, we have little to contribute to the poll takers.  In a word, sad.

Therefore, this BLOG post's author will not comment on the results of the DCBA poll; if you really want to read the results, go to the DCBA home page at www.dadecountybar.org and read them yourselves.

CAPTAIN OUT ..........
Captain4Justice@gmail.com

THE CAPTAIN REPORTS:

ELECTION UPDATE .....

Welcome to our 6th in a series of nine weekly reports breaking down the contested judicial elections in Miami-Dade County. In Week One, we focused on the only contested County Court race of Lindsay v. Lesperance. Since then, we have provided you with the Circuit Court races of Cueto v. Velis; Migna v. Manny and Colodny v. Kopco v. Millan and last week, Garcia v. Glick. As we reported on May 2, 2008 on this blog, there are nine contested races here in Miami-Dade County; eight in the Circuit Court and one in the County Court.

Today, it's Group 50, a seat currently held by retiring Judge Stuart Simons. Our goal will be to attempt to provide you with a weekly contest overview and then let you have at it and give us your opinions on why we should or should not vote for a certain candidate.

The candidates for Group 50 are Ricardo "Rick" Corona and Abby Cynamon.

RICARDO "RICK" CORONA .....

This is a campaign that has had lots of publicity over the course of the past couple of weeks. We do not want to rehash it all, but if you want to read what Rick had to say about all that has been written by the DBR and others, go back and review his front page post on this BLOG of June 22, 2008. I think Rick rightly pointed out that, The Florida Bar had the opportunity to thoroughly review all of the allegations and history of the FDIC charges that his father and brother were tied up in. The Bar gave Mr. corona a license to practice law.

Mr. Corona has been in several different occupations during his lifetime. Banking, supermarket owner, real estate developer are just some of the things he has accomplished in his career. Now he want to be a Circuit Court Judge. He filed in October of 2007 and has only reported raising $1,250 from three contributors and loaned his campaign an additional $16,000. He has a lot of catching up to do if he plans on matching his opponent dollar for dollar. Rick has been a member of The Florida Bar for 11 years.

We have been unable to locate a website for Mr. Corona's campaign.

ABBY CYNAMON ....

Ms. Cynamon has also had much written about her on this BLOG. She is a graduate of the UM Law School and has been an Assistant General Counsel for the 11th Judicial Circuit from 1993-2008. She was the President of FAWL from 2006-2007. Abby has been licensed for 18 years in Florida.

Ms. Cynamon is running this campaign and leaving nothing in the bag, so to speak. Her Campaign Treasurer is Hector Lombana. She has stormed the fundraising scene with $51,363 from 259 donors; (and that does not count what she has raised in the past three months as second quarter reports are due to be filed any day now). She also throw in $300,000 of her own money.

She has hired the entire hit list of campaign gurus: Susan Fried, Robert Levy, Armando Gutierrez and ?? have each been paid $11,000 so far. Tangela Sears has been paid an additional $4,500. In fact, Cynamon has spent over $100,00 already on the campaign.

You can read all about Abby on her website at abby4judge.com.

Please do your homework on the two candidates. Help out our readers by giving us your comments, pro and con, on each of the candidates.

The election takes place on Tuesday, August 26, 2008.

CAPTAIN OUT .........

DCBA JUDICIAL POLL RESULTS ......

Also, this week, the DCBA posted the results of their annual Bar Poll of the Judicial Candidates. We will not comment on the results of the non-elected candidates, but we do feel that it is important to comment on three TOP FIVE lists of the sitting judges.

EXCEPTIONALLY QUALIFIED:

1. Judge Emas - 70%
2. Judge Farina - 66%
3. Judge Robert Scola - 64%
4. Judge Reemberto Diaz - 60%
5. Judge Tam Wilson - 58%

UNQUALIFIED (lowest five):

1. Judge Schumacher - 4%
2. Judge Robert Scola - 4%
3. Judge Prescott - 4%
4. Judge Farina - 5%
5. Judge Emas - 5%

UNQUALIFIED (highest five):

1. Judge Esquiroz - 43%
2. Judge Jacqueline Schwartz - 36%
3. Judge Eig 30%
4. Judge Butchko - 30%
5. Judge Donner - 25%

These last five judges need to figure out what it is they are doing that is causing their ratings to be so low. Granted, there were only a small percentage of attorneys voting in this poll, but these numbers still represent the voices of anywhere from 400-900 practicing lawyers in this County. The people of Miami-Dade County deserve better.

As for the other two "top five" lists, those jurists are to be congratulated for being such fine public servants.

CAPTAIN OUT .....