Bill Di Scipio, a Southwest Ranches resident who is spearheading the campaign against a proposed ICE detention facility, has bombarded the town with public-records requests for months now. Some of his requests have been successful, yielding emails that provide a glimpse into the otherwise secretive negotiations that have gone on…
As the 99 percent draw attention to their less-than-equitable situation, sacrosanct holidays and traditions become a target for protests. Adbusters, the same (Canadian!) publication that launched the Occupy Wall Street movement, has advocated “buy-nothing day” on Black Friday, the annual mass hysteria of commercialism that creeps closer and closer into…
They didn’t have much reason to do it before, but the Bahamas and Cuba have defined an international boundary in the waters off the coast of Florida. Now, the reason is clear: Both countries are poised to start drilling for oil from floating rigs.Former Florida Sen. Bob Graham cochaired a…
Murmurs from people associated with the Occupy Palm Beach movement, which has been encamped in West Palm with the city’s blessing since October, tell New Times that the group has been told to leave the site by next weekend.Though the agreement that the occupiers forged with the parks department allows…
U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz wrote a letter (see below) in April to ICE Director Gary Mead indicating her support for the proposed immigrant detention facility that private contractor CCA wants to build in Southwest Ranches.Today, she went on the radio with WIOD-AM (610) host Jimmy Cefalo. Toward the end…
As long as we’re talking ferries and bikes, we may as well point your attention to another exciting mode of alternative transportation that’s making its way to South Florida’s urban centers.That’s right — the people who dream up such things say that passenger rail is on its way. That means…
A Barcelona-based company that offers fast-ferry service to the Balearic Islands has set up shop in Port Everglades and will soon offer fast-ferry service to the Bahamas in two and a half hours, as we reported Monday.The ferry Pinar del Rio will travel at 32 knots and carry up to…
Believe it or not, bike sharing is coming to car-choked Broward County… and the first of dozens of automated rental stations are appearing in high-traffic areas around Fort Lauderdale. The first one went up on Sebastian Street on Fort Lauderdale beach, and we spotted the one pictured above — at…
Today, about a third of all American adults will go shopping. Many of them lined up in the early-morning hours, breathlessly filling daily-newspaper pages with pictures of their unchecked wanting, pushing and shoving to get their piece of an engineered discount, forking over cash for shit they don’t need.And, last…
Herman Cain, the presidential contender who loves to shout the number “nine,” took a whirlwind tour through Florida last week, visiting Sweetwater, Miami, Coral Springs, West Palm, and Palm Beach. While he was down in Miami, he bent to Spanglophone tastes by shouting “nueve, nueve, nueve” instead.But what lit up…
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has extended the public comment period for a proposal to turn 150,000 acres of savanna ranch land north of Lake Okeechobee into the “Headwaters of the Everglades National Wildlife Refuge.” The acquisition would cost $700 million, and around a third of the land would…
It wouldn’t be fall without crisp air, pumpkin-spice-latte-sipping locals pretending they live somewhere that requires sweaters, an influx of Canadian license plates, and — of course — the annual warning from the Broward Sheriff’s Office that if you’re an idiot, maybe you shouldn’t be deep-frying a turkey next Thursday.The BSO…
The CEO of Genting Group, which bought the Miami Herald’s property on Biscayne Bay earlier this year and dreams of turning it into a mega-casino, wasn’t exactly subtle when he said the project would result in a net gain of jobs for the state — especially in Miami-Dade and Broward…
A couple of weeks ago, Pembroke Pines Commissioner Iris Siple got up in public and promised to try to cancel an agreement that said Pembroke Pines would provide fire, medical, water, and sewer services to a new ICE detention facility being planned for a plot of land near the Everglades.The…
Florida residents probably know there are plenty of ways to buy prescription OxyContin over a counter. But for those bent on acquiring pills in the most shady way possible, they’re still available from street dealers. Those street pills are getting cheaper — thanks to a new formulation that makes the pills…
Oh, what fun it must be to be a congressional representative, traveling your home territory in search of causes to support, being bombarded at every turn by lobbyists and carefully crafted P.R. Balancing pork-barrel people-pleasers with national security interests (and those of your campaign donors). In the case of the new…
We’ve just discovered the austere yet intriguing Twitter account of Southwest Ranches Town Attorney Keith Poliakoff — perhaps the perfect 140-character medium for the man who stated, “the less we say, the better off we will be.”His feed did alert us to a recent examination by PolitiFact Florida of some…
Start inking up a big government contract with a for-profit company and you can bet your sweet tax dollars that things won’t stay transparent for long.Which gives a nice boost of high ground to the people who are already fed up with an all-but-inked plan to bring an ICE detention…
Tuesday saw the first of two public hearings at the Broward County Commission about redistricting in the wake of the 2010 Census — deciding how the county’s nine commissioners will split up their constituencies in an attempt to meld geographical equity with a little well-intentioned gerrymandering: The current districts, which…
Several environmental groups, led by the Washington-based Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, filed a lawsuit last week against the National Park Service, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service over plans to open up the Big Cypress Addition Lands to a few hundred permitted…
Once again, Hallandale Beach Commissioner Keith London found himself the lone dissenter on a vote in which the gung-ho City Commission voted, under the leadership of Mayor Joy Cooper, to spend millions on a real-estate purchase without clear plans for what the property would become.William Gjebre at Broward Bulldog has…
Mike Machak, who has the unenviable job of public affairs manager for prison contractor CCA, stood at the door of the Southwest Regional Library in Pembroke Pines, looking at the line of opponents gathered on a cool Saturday morning. A few held signs, many wore stickers, but the crowd was…
