Dunn vs. Spence-Jones, the re-mix
Once and future opponents Michelle Spence-Jones and Rev. Richard Dunn II
So, Rev. Richard Dunn is throwing his hat into the ring and will challenge Michelle Spence Jones for her dearly departed commission seat. Great. Just … bloody … fabulous. It’s also a blast from the past — since the first meeting between these two, for the very same commission seat, was a knock-down, drag out affair, complete with a lawsuit. Check out this article from back in the day (2005) … it’s called “Bad vs. Worse” — not my title. I swear …
(Miami New Times) Sometime after 3:00 p.m. this past October 27, Miami City Manager Joe Arriola ministered to Hurricane Wilma-weary residents at the Orange Bowl. He also relayed a message to citizens in District Five, which includes much of Overtown and Liberty City.
A vote for Richard Dunn II will get nothing done.
“I’m telling people Dunn is the wrong person,” Arriola says. “Nothing will happen in District Five if he is elected because he has zero support from the city manager, zero support from the mayor, and zero support from the majority of the city commissioners.”
Miami’s primary election, which had been scheduled for this week but was delayed until November 15 owing to Hurricane Wilma, is a largely drab affair. Mayor Manny Diaz and Commissioner Joe Sanchez have only token opposition, for instance. But the District Five race to fill the seat vacated after the stunning suicide of Arthur Teele is a serious test of Diaz’s power.
During Teele’s final days on the city commission — before being suspended in August 2004 — he was the lone voice on the dais against an ambitious condo-retail project, known as Crosswinds, in Overtown. Teele viewed it as a “land grab” to gentrify the neighborhood, one of the nation’s poorest.
Dunn, a close friend of Teele’s, has made opposition to Crosswinds the lynchpin of his campaign. A popular black minister who served on the city commission in 1996, he has the most recognizable name in a field of nine candidates that includes Jeffrey Allen, who was appointed after Teele’s suspension. “Black folk are tired of the mayor, the manager, the uncontrolled development, and their general lack of concern for poor people,” Dunn rhapsodizes.
One only need scour the campaign finance reports of Basil Binns II, Michelle Spence-Jones, and Willie Williams — three other District Five hopefuls — to realize they are relying on campaign contributors and political operatives aligned with Arriola, Diaz, and City Commissioner Johnny Winton, Dunn contends. Indeed the reports show money from publicist Seth Gordon, Barbara Carey-Shuler, and Charles Dusseau, all close allies of city hall’s top clique.
“All of them are tied to city hall,” says Dunn, who has the support of several city unions. “These candidates are imposters and carpetbaggers created by Arriola, Manny Diaz, and Johnny Winton. I’m the people’s choice.” (Diaz and Winton could not be reached for comment.)
Back at the Orange Bowl, however, Arriola ripped into Dunn’s credentials. He reasoned that District Five voters should know better than to choose a man who was busted for petty theft in 1998 and who nine years earlier was forced to resign as assistant pastor of Drake Memorial Baptist Church after admitting he had used church funds to pay personal bills. “Why would anyone elect a man who’s been arrested for stealing and who was taking money from his own church?” Arriola questions.
The city manager also criticized Dunn’s stewardship of the Word of Life Community Development Corporation, a defunct religious nonprofit organization that received federal grants through the city’s community development department between 1998 and 2003. Word of Life was awarded $1.1 million in federal block grants to build houses, renovate store faades, and administer a tutoring program.
Arriola gave New Times records showing that, in fiscal year 1999, Word of Life spent $207,804 from two grants to pay for staff salaries and operating expenses in connection with the development of six affordable houses in District Five. In the end, the CDC built only two houses. (Read the whole article here)
Had enough?
Arriola would later turn on Spence-Jones (though not enough to publicly criticize her during the recent election,) and he’s had his own troubles as well. Meanwhile, there could wind up being four or even five people in the race, with the deadline for filing coming tomorrow. Odds remain very good that Spence Jones will win back her seat, regardless of who contests it (making that $200,000 a shame to spend, don’t ya think?) … but Dunn in the race makes it a race. His name recognition is as high as Spence Jones, and they share overlapping constituencies. None of the other people rumored to be running have the name ID of these two (unless Patrick Range, son of South Florida legend M.Athalie Range, decides to run.) So for now, it’ looks like a Spence-Jones v. Dunn rematch.
It’s enou
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I remember Arthur Teele, Hurricance Wilma, and standing in line for 4 hours for the equivelent of a box lunch and a bag of ice at the Community College on 120th. Ah good times (actually)