FYI Miami


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FYI Miami is a weekly feature of Miami Today, keeping readers ahead of the news. Here are highlights from the most current edition.

Complete coverage, including The Insider and all information columns, is available in the e-edition. Sign up now.

   CITY CUTS: Miami commissioners unanimously approved a bevy of cuts to personnel costs at a special commission meeting Tuesday, including tiered, across-the-board pay cuts of up to 12%, changing insurance plans, capping pension payouts at $100,000 a year and calculating pensions based on an average of five years of highest-paid service rather than the single-highest year's salary. Officials said the cuts were necessary to balance the fiscal 2011 budget, which begins Oct. 1. The city needs to fill a projected $110 million deficit and personnel costs make up 90% of city expenditures. "This city has to function," Commission Chairman Marc Sarnoff said before voting for the cuts.
   JOBS PRESERVED: If commissioners hadn't approved personnel-cost reductions — which City Manager Carlos Migoya has cited as $84.7 million in savings — officials said the city would have had to lay off 1,300 workers. Still, all of the city's union heads spoke out against the measures. Robert Suarez, who represents the firefighters' union, said "the experiment that's being played on City of Miami employees" was "neither just nor legal." Armando Aguilar of the police union said he planned to file a lawsuit against the city asking that "this so-called [financial] emergency be deemed unconstitutional."
   BROWARD COUNTY CONTRACTS: After a nearly year-long effort to get a list of Miami-Dade contracts being awarded locally versus non-locally, Commissioner Carlos Gimenez might soon get his answer. He requested the list at a committee meeting in October 2009. While his office received a memorandum from County Manager George Burgess in November, he said he did not see it until this month. Upon reviewing the memo, he discovered that Broward County contracts weren't included in the local count. While businesses operating within Broward get local preference in Miami-Dade, only those with zip codes within Miami-Dade were included in the report. Seeking an accurate account of local allotments, he sent another request for the data last week. According to his assistant, Inson Kim, the county's procurement department has contacted Mr. Gimenez and is working on his request. Once the department completes the report, Ms. Kim said she expects it to go to Mr. Burgess for final approval before it goes to Mr. Gimenez.
   FAST GROWER: Miami-based Avisena, which provides practice-management and revenue cycle-management software to doctors' offices, has been named one of the 5,000 fastest-growing companies in the nation in Inc. Magazine's annual list. The company's 140% three-year sales growth was good enough to earn it the 1,927th spot on the list and it's among the 50 fastest-growing companies in Miami, according to a press release.

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