I know its hard for even my loyal readers to keep up with my stories about the crazy shit that goes on at City Hall, especially when it come to Commissioner Joe"Big Mouth" Carollo, so let's go back to last year, to set up this story.

Remember last year when Carollo got the board of the Bayfront Park Management Trust to approve his transferring $3 million dollars from their bank account to the city's bank account, because as he said at the time:

          "In order for us to truly balance the books for the

          general fund, the city of Miami would be greatly

          appreciative, and is looking with baited breath that

          the Trust can provide $3 million dollars of the reserves

          that we have...I will pass the gavel to Christina and

          make a motion for $3 million dollars be given to the

          City of Miami's General Fund reserves, from our reserves

          here, I said, General Fund reserves, General Fund..."  

Of course that was all bullshit. There was no need to balance the books, because the city's were already balanced.

The $3 million was nothing but the equivalent of a cash payment trough a bit of hocus-pocus bookkeeping to the AFSCME Union Local 1809, whose President Sean Moy and board member, Mary Lugo, had been so helpful in Carollo's efforts to dig up Code Enforcement issues in his fight with Calle Ocho businessman Bill Fuller.

Lugo's efforts earned her both a seat on the Bayfront Park Management Trust, and inclusion as a defendant in Fuller's federal lawsuit against Carollo

So that was then, and Carollo was all gung ho to give money to the city's general fund, because as he repeatedly stated, all the Bayfront Park Management Trust money is actually city money.

Now we go to last week's commission meeting when Carollo asked the morons and asskissers who sit on the commission with him to express their support for a concert to be held on Saturday to supposedly benefit the folks in Venezuela.  

As you can see, this event is being co-sponsored by multiple groups, including Miami-Dade County, where Carollo's pal, Carlos Gimenez is the mayor, and where Gimenez's son and daughter-in-law hang out in Carollo's City Hall office like it's their pied-à-terre on the Bay.

Yet, when it came to providing a location, and more importantly, money to pay for this event, it's the City of Miami who's footing the bill.

When Carollo introduced the Resolution asking for his fellow commissioners to support this event he made it a point at the very beginning to state:

     "There's no dollars involved in this request to the commission."

Carollo then moved on without explaining where the dollars would come from.

The $30,000 financing this concert it turns out is coming from the Bayfront Park Management Trust. Here is the budget which was estimated on there being an attendance of approximately 2500 people.

When Carollo wanted $3 million to basically use as a payoff to the leaders of the labor union who were out in the streets digging up dirt on Bill Fuller, he turned to the Bayfront Park Trust bank account.

When he wanted $10,000, to finance a 4th of July Party ay Josi Marti Park, which is in his District, but not part of Bayfront Park, he took it from the Bayfront Park Trust bank account.

When he needed $30,000 to put on a concert to support the folks in Venezuela, who, there is no question are having a hard time of it, where does he go? The Bayfront Park Trust bank account.

So, the big question is, if the reason that Carollo used that the $3 million his siphoned out of the Bayfront Park Management Trust last year was really City of Miami money,  and if the $10,000 he took to finance the party in his District is also City Of Miami money, then why isn't the $30,000 City of Miami money?

Joe Carollo constantly talks about how the city is going broke, and how there's a need to raise more money, yet he never seems to have a problem spending taxpayers dollars from the Bayfront Park Management Trust bank account - an account that he seems to treat like it's his personal piggy bank - for activities that benefit his personal or political goals.

Again, the folks in Venezuela are definitely having a hard time, and there's humanitarian reasons for offering them help, but you got to wonder if Carollo's wife - she is at the microphone - wasn't Venezuelan whether he'd be so gungho?

Carollo not only has a history of exploiting the misery of others to enhance his political standing among some ethnic groups in the city, but worse, he's a complete maniac as the Chairman of the Bayfront Park Management Trust.

The first person to leave after Carollo took over was the Financial Officer, and tomorrow is the last day on the job for Jose Gell, the acting Executive Director who has resigned his $100,000 plus job for reasons he won't discuss.

While Gell himself has remained silent over why he suddenly chose to resign, the persistent rumors are that among the harassing tactics that Carollo used as the Chairman of the Trust was to tell Gell on numerous occasions that if he didn't do things the Carollo way, he would start docking his pay.

What kind of shit is that?

Carollo acts like a gangster who continues to bully people and abuse common decency because Mayor Francis Suarez and City Manager Emilio "Colonel Klink" Gonzalez, are abject cowards who, like all cowards fail to understand that survival requires a modicum of personal courage.

Carollo's goals currently include crippling Suarez political aspirations, and getting his ass-kissing fellow commissioners to go along with his plan to fire Gonzalez.

When that happens, and it will happen faster than many currently believe, because among Carollo's unwitting enablers is Commission Chairman "Sellout" Russell, who keeps looking like he wants to wrap his arms about Carollo, hug him and ask, "Why can't we all just get along?"

In the meantime, since Bayfront Park is a public park, and the money generated by the activities sanctioned there is public money, then somebody at the city, or the Trust Board, or all of them collectively, need to create a clear and equitable way that other groups, and other worthy causes can receive the same financial underwriting of events at the park that this weekend concert is receiving.

It's either that, or cut it out all together, because no matter how worthy, if the only person who is going to have the opportunity to choose what political causes can be hosted and paid for by the Bayfront Park Mangement Trust is the Chairman, then I fail to see how this is any different that the way that Venezuelan presidente Nicolás Maduro is running his country!

It's the Banana Republic of Miami, Bitches!