Latest news with #Miami-Dade
CBS News
04-08-2025
- Automotive
- CBS News
Florida gas prices dip more than a dime in a week. Here's what you'll pay at the pump.
There was good news at the pump for Florida drivers last week as gas prices dropped more than a dime. On Monday, drivers were paying an average of $2.94 a gallon for regular unleaded, down from $3.09 a week earlier, according to the AAA auto club. For several months, average prices in Florida had been moving about 15 cents a week in both directions until holding around $3.10 a gallon during the last two weeks. Nationally, the average price Monday was $3.15 a gallon, up a penny from a week earlier. Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, said prices could dip before Labor Day. "Oil prices continue to hover in the mid-to-upper $60s (a barrel), and with gasoline demand starting to ease as we head into August, we could see prices gradually decline as we approach Labor Day," De Haan posted online. "That said, this is also the time of year when the tropics begin to stir, so we'll be keeping a close eye on hurricane activity that could disrupt supply and shift the outlook." In Miami-Dade on Monday, the average price for regular unleaded was $2.95 a gallon, down 11 cents from the week before. A month ago, the average was $3.09 and a year ago drivers were paying $3.45 a gallon. In Broward, the average was also $2.95 a gallon, down 16 cents from last week. A month ago, the average was $3.14 and a year ago it was $3.49 a gallon. AAA encourages drivers to combine errands, drive conservatively, remove excess vehicle weight, shop around using the AAA mobile app, and consider paying with cash to avoid credit card surcharges. AAA members can also save by enrolling in gas rewards programs, such as Shell's Fuel Rewards or discounts at Love's Travel Stops. Travelers can find updated gas prices and plan routes using AAA's tools at
Miami Herald
18-07-2025
- Business
- Miami Herald
Florida Keys guts road-raising projects, slashes jobs. Budget cuts derail climate plans
Facing federal uncertainty about hurricane relief funds and budget holes, the Florida Keys went on a slashing spree: gutting funding for its landmark road-raising program, exiting a decade-old regional climate change compact and cutting emergency staff roles designed to help prepare for storms. President Donald Trump's administration has vowed to gut and remake the Federal Emergency Management Agency, including lowering how much cash the federal agency gives states to rebuild after a disaster. Specifically, a leaked memo from FEMA suggests the agency is considering dramatically raising the threshold for what qualifies as a disaster, which would lock local governments out from any federal cash if a disaster were small enough, like a hurricane that only brushes Key West but not the rest of the Keys. That could put Monroe on the hook for up to $174 million for a single hurricane. 'We would have zero reimbursement. That could be devastating for the Keys,' said Christine Hurley, Monroe County's administrator. READ MORE: Florida says it's ready for hurricane season, with or without FEMA's help In response, Monroe County commissioners decided to quadruple the amount of money it has socked away for a rainy day, to $40 million. To make that happen, the Keys cut 40 staff roles, including a floodplain mitigation manager, one employee in the resilience department and cut and consolidated several emergency management roles, just ahead of the peak of hurricane season. It also exited the Southeast Florida Climate Change Compact, a four-county agreement with Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach that was established in 2009 — during the great recession — to save $100,000 a year. The exit was first reported by WLRN News. But perhaps the biggest hit of Monroe's tightening of its purse strings is to its nationally leading program to raise roads ahead of sea level rise, which is already swamping a handful of Keys neighborhoods and expected to inundate up to 90 of them in the next few decades alone. The estimated cost is enormous. So far, Monroe has spent nearly $300 million to raise roads in just seven communities. The total project list compiled by the county would cost an estimated $4.7 billion — a staggering price for a county of around 80,000 people with an annual budget of about $680 million. And each project has suffered from cost overruns as well. In the Stillwright Point neighborhood, which made headlines for flooding for 90 straight days, Monroe has secured $40 million in grants, but it still needs to come up with another $10 million to cover rising costs since it was first designed. Massive shifts in price aren't uncommon for these kinds of projects. In Miami Beach, elevating just a small portion of the First Street neighborhood was initially estimated to cost $46 million in 2021, which rose to an expected $178 million by 2024. The county already heavily relies on federal and state grants to fund the vast majority of the projects, but after about five years of funding even a small portion of each project, Monroe has officially decided to stop funneling county tax dollars toward these projects. Now, it says, residents will have to pick up the tab. Many will face a big tab if the projects move ahead. County mapping shows that 42 neighborhoods will need their streets fixed in the next five to 10 years to stay above sea level, and up to 90 will need work in the next few decades, Hurley said. In the case of Stillwright Point, that would mean the 20-or-so homeowners would be on the hook for the $10 million gap. 'Who's going to pay that deficit? Should it be all the taxpayers in the county, knowing that number multiplied by 42 or 90 neighborhoods is only going to grow and grow and grow?' she said. The new policy requires neighborhoods to come together and ask the county for a project to protect their homes. Then, the county will seek out more grants to design and build the project, and have residents formally pledge to pay an assessment fee over the next 20 years to cover costs above and beyond the initial estimate, as well as operations and maintenance fees. Making residents pay for part of these projects has always been on the table in the Keys. But first, the county wanted to levy a 1% sales tax on the entire county, pointed mainly at tourists, as a way to raise some of the funds. Tallahassee shot that down in 2023. Now, the commission has decided that assessments — plus as much grant funding as possible — are the way forward. 'The county is still very much dedicated to rebuilding resiliently. We're not stopping what our effort is, but we're shifting from expecting all taxpayers in the county to fund these small neighborhood improvements,' Hurley said. That could be an uphill battle in the Keys, where pushback against these projects, even if they're at no cost to residents, has been intense. Neighbors in the very first neighborhood to see its roads raised, Twin Lakes, recently complained about the $2,000 a year assessment the 200-or-so residents would have to pay to cover maintenance for the new pumps that keep the streets dry. Hurley said that another project on Big Pine Key, for Father Tony Way, has been bid out twice, but it's so over budget that the county stopped pursuing the project. 'And they don't want it either. They came and protested it,' Hurley said. Monroe says it still wants to work with neighborhoods that want the project, like most of the residents in Winston Waterways in Key Largo. It just wants them to sign formal agreements to pay for cost overruns and maintenance costs. Those residents often cite concerns that repeated flooding could damage their property value, which could start to impact county budgets in places like the Keys, where there is no income tax. Monroe commissioners are aware of the risks, Hurley said, but for now, they think it's worth saving money where they can and pulling back on the flood protection projects. 'They know it can, but I don't think decreasing property values in a small neighborhood, even in the next 10 years, would be such a decrease that it would affect county revenue seriously,' she said. 'The 90 neighborhoods, eventually, would be a different story.'
Miami Herald
17-07-2025
- Business
- Miami Herald
A ticket bought at a Broward Publix shared a Florida Lottery jackpot
Wednesday's Florida Lotto, Cash4Life, Powerball and Fantasy 5 drawings produced two jackpot wins, one going to one winner and the other split among five winners. Neither of the jackpots were in the Powerball or Florida Lotto games, which will have top prizes at $288 million and $17.85 million, respectively, for Saturday's drawings. MORE: Tickets from Miami-Dade and a South Florida Publix split lottery jackpot A player at an Avon Park gas station took the Fantasy 5 midday drawing and, winning $52,979, was the rare midday draw jackpot winner to win more than an evening draw jackpot winner. Not just more, but far more than twice as much as an evening draw winning ticket. That's because Wednesday's evening draw numbers — 2, 10, 18, 19, 20 — were on five tickets. In addition to the Coconut Creek Publix at 4849 Coconut Creek Pkwy., there were tickets from a Brandon 7-Eleven at 1020 S. Kings Ave.; Tampa Deli & Grocery at 1811 E. 23rd Ave.; a Palmetto 7-Eleven, 208 U.S. Hwy. 41; and Love's Travel Stop, 1025 State Rd. 206 West, in St. Augustine. Each ticket won $22,777. These tickets must be cashed at the Florida Lottery main office in Tallahassee or one of the district offices, which are open 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. Appointments can be made, but aren't required. That Coconut Creek Publix is almost midway between the district offices in Miami Lakes and Palm Springs. The Miami Lakes office is at 14621 Oak Ln., and can be reached at 305-364-3080 and MIARC@ The Palm Springs office is at 4360 Forest Hill Blvd., and can be reached at 561-640-6190 or WPBRC@
Miami Herald
25-06-2025
- Miami Herald
Where is ‘Alligator Alcatraz'? In the heart of the Glades, out past the airboat rides
The state of Florida's controversial new immigration detention facility dubbed 'Alligator Alcatraz' sits smack in the center of the Florida Everglades. The project — which initially will consist of tents, trailers and portable bathrooms — is located on the north side of the historic east-west corridor long known as the Tamiami Trail but formally designated as U.S. 41. The camp is being quickly thrown up on the site of the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport, a property owned by Miami-Dade and recently seized by the state. Few travelers would even notice the road leading to the airport gate as they zoom by at 60 mph-plus. The site lies about 40 miles west of the Miami International Airport and about halfway to Naples, out past a series of tourist stops offering airboat rides like Coopertown and Everglades Safari. It's also west of the Shark Valley outpost in Everglades National Park, famed for its tram rides and long biking trail. The closest large landmark to its east is the Miccosukee Indian Village. Drive west and there are a string of camp grounds, then 10 miles later you'll see famed Everglades photographer Clyde Butcher's Big Cypress Gallery. Keep going and you'll pass Skunk Ape Research Center, an attraction devoted to the mythical swamp dweller. A little further and you'll see the Ochopee Post Office, reputed to be the smallest operating post office in the country. The facility is within Big Cypress National Preserve, federally protected land, and surrounded on three sides by Miccosukee and Seminole tribal infrastructure, including homes and ceremonial sites. The airport was constructed in the 1960s as part of an ill-fated effort to build the largest airport in the nation, the Everglades Jetport, before environmentalists shut it down. Since then, the airport has served as a training ground — or emergency landing spot — for pilots of planes large and small.
Miami Herald
30-05-2025
- Business
- Miami Herald
American Dream mega-mall sued by Miami-Dade over years of construction delays
Stalled and years behind schedule, the planned American Dream Miami mega-mall faces a new problem: a demand for $5 million from Miami-Dade County over missed development deadlines. Once billed by county leaders as a historic economic opportunity, the 175-acre project by the owner of Minnesota's Mall of America is now the subject of litigation by Miami-Dade over a broken agreement in which the mall's developer promised to have development permits in hand by 2020 and a grand opening this year. Neither happened, with the development site still vacant where Interstate 75 meets Florida's Turnpike north of Hialeah. There's also no hint of progress toward the slew of county permits and approvals needed to even start planning construction for the 6-million-square-foot retail theme park complex, according to Miami-Dade's lawsuit. In 2015, Miami-Dade arranged the sale of 82 acres of government land to American Dream Miami developer Triple Five in a no-bid transaction that included a $5 million penalty if the project wasn't on track for a 2025 opening. Instead, Triple Five subsidiary International Atlantic LLC hasn't even filed a site plan with the county, according to the suit, a situation Miami-Dade describes as a 'flagrant disregard of its contractual obligations.' In a statement, a Triple Five lawyer said the developer is making progress on other county requirements in the development process related to the construction of new state roads around the project site. Triple Five says it is using its influence and engineering studies to speed along state construction of a new network of off ramps and wider roads to allow higher traffic volume around the site. Eventually, developer fees from the project will go toward road construction, too. 'While we disagree with the county administration's interpretation of the matter, we are nonetheless working with the administration to resolve this disagreement amicably,' said Miguel Díaz de la Portilla, a Triple Five lawyer and lobbyist and a former county commissioner. Triple Five is already in court with another former ally over the delayed project. Last year, Triple Five sued the Graham Companies, the Miami Lakes developer that provided Triple Five with the bulk of the project site. The suit asked a judge to block the Graham Companies from canceling the original 2014 land deal, which the Graham Companies said was void after Triple Five failed to meet development deadlines. That litigation continues, with Graham refusing to let Triple Five close the original sale on the land, which was under contract but never finalized. 'As the County's lawsuit shows, International [Atlantic LLC] has made no significant progress,' a Graham lawyer, Scott Hiaasen, said in a statement Friday. American Dream Miami won near-unanimous support from Miami-Dade commissioners in 2018, along with a sister residential and commercial project by the Graham Companies next door. That project is also stalled, but Graham owns its development site without the development requirement that Triple Five had agreed to in acquiring real estate from Miami-Dade in 2015. Triple Five had a supporter in Miami-Dade's mayor at the time of the 2018 vote, Carlos Gimenez, whose administration negotiated the disputed land deal. The current mayor, Daniella Levine Cava, was a county commissioner in 2018. She cast the lone vote against approving the mega-mall project, citing traffic, the low-wage jobs another mall would bring, and concerns about water use at an attraction that planned both an indoor ski slope and an artificial lagoon deep enough for submarine rides. Triple Five executives funded a failed effort to oust her in the 2018 commission election, and she became mayor in 2020. Her administration sent Triple Five a March 6 letter demanding the $5 million payment, communication that was the prelude to the lawsuit. The letter states the deadline for applying for the county approvals needed for an opening this year was the spring of 2020. 'The County has found no evidence of [International Atlantic LLC] diligently applying for and pursuing all of the Necessary Approvals,' wrote Francesca de Quesada Covey, chief innovation and economic development officer under Levine Cava, in a letter to Díaz de la Portilla.
