FYI Miami: October 12, 2023

Bellow are some of the FYIs in this week’s edition. The entire content of this week’s FYIs and Insider sections is available by subscription only. To subscribe click here.

ARTS FUNDING SHIFT: $5 million in county funding approved in a $2.9 billion county general obligation bond package in 2004 for a 485-seat Florida Grand Opera Theater is being shifted to build a North Dade Cultural Arts Center in Miami Gardens. Without discussion, the Chairman’s Policy Council of the county commission approved the shift in fund use on Tuesday, sending the action to a future county commission final vote. The legislation says the Florida Grand Opera project was to rise beside the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts at Northeast 14th Street and Second Avenue, but that the opera has moved to Doral, the site has been developed as a residential tower and the opera has no contract with the county to build a theater. The legislation says the Miami Gardens Community Redevelopment Agency aims to construct a cultural arts center to serve North Dade “with world-class productions and performances.”

IN (SLOWER) TRANSIT: Completion of the South Dade Transitway, the only one of the six corridors of the Strategic Miami Area Rapid Transit (Smart) Program yet under construction, is now anticipated for June 2024, Maria Perdomo, assistant director for program management in the county’s Department of Transportation and Public Works, told the Citizens’ Independent Transportation Trust. The last estimate by the department had been March 2024. A one-year delay to begin Transitway operation was announced more than a year ago as supply chain problems choked off concrete, steel and fiber strands needed for the 20-mile corridor triggered additional costs. The dedicated high-speed bus corridor covers 20 miles with 14 stations all in construction, Ms. Perdomo said. The corridor, which broke ground in June 2021, was originally to be in operation in January this year. Last year that was pushed ahead to March 2024.

MORE ARTIFICIAL REEFS: Miami Beach is asking Miami-Dade County to piggyback on its authority to place artificial reefs in Biscayne Bay and offshore in the Atlantic Ocean. If the county grants the opportunity, Miami Beach would sink artificial reef materials at the county’s South Beach artificial reef site. The permitting legislation says that the artificial reefs protect natural resources, increase fishing and diving opportunities, and provide additional habitat in barren sandy areas for the growth and settlement of benthic organisms and foraging opportunities and shelter for fish. The county has been deploying artificial reefs since 1981, placing nearly 300 of them in authorized sites. The current legislation would not only let Miami Beach use the county’s permits for reefs but would allow others to place reefs at their own expense with county agreement.