Gladys Mezrahi and Rachel Saltzman Friedland are political rivals in Aventura FL but are running together for a Shiitake Award nomination

 I've seen plenty of weird things while running the Shiitake Awards over the years, but this may be the first time I've posted political opponents together for a single nomination. However, this story makes both candidates Shiitake-worthy. I truly cannot decide who is worse here. Quite frankly, I think one is just as bad as the other. I'm not King Solomon here; therefore, these two political rivals are running together for worst politician of 2020.

The short version is these two candidates for the Aventura City Commission live in the same complex, and both are falling over each other trying to be the one to take credit for forcing a Registered Person out of the building while claiming her opponent is the friend of the registrant. 

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/aventura/article246000700.html

This candidate claimed she kept a child molester out of her community. Not exactly.

BY AARON LEIBOWITZ

OCTOBER 02, 2020 06:00 AM, 

The Aventura City Commission race between incumbent Gladys Mezrahi and challenger Rachel Saltzman Friedland has featured some of the mudslinging that’s typical in local politics: allegations of improper campaigning, disputes over who deserves credit for getting things done — including, in this race, ensuring there wouldn’t be school on Yom Kippur at a local charter school.

But the battle between Mezrahi and Friedland reached more unusual territory recently when Friedland brought up a 2018 effort to drive a convicted child molester out of The Point, a community of condo towers and townhouses where both candidates live. In an email that was shared with the city commission, Friedland accused Mezrahi of refusing to engage in the community effort because she knew the sex offender personally from their time growing up in Colombia.

Mezrahi hit back hard, filing a complaint with the Miami-Dade Commission on Ethics and Public Trust that alleged Friedland had violated the county’s Fair Campaign Practices ordinance by making various false statements in her email. She said that Friedland’s statement about the situation at The Point was “a fabricated lie,” and that “what really happened was the total opposite.”

But Mezrahi’s description of “what really happened” stretches the truth. Mezrahi makes several claims about how the debacle played out in 2018 that are directly contradicted by records from the county’s Department of Corrections, statements from people involved, and messages from a community WhatsApp chat where the issue was discussed at the time.

For example, Mezrahi writes that she “helped this family arrange to move out of the building prior to the husband returning home from his [prison] sentence in order to make sure the sex offender never stepped foot into The Point again.”

“Within 24 hours of the announcement that he was released from his sentence, the incident was resolved without anyone being hurt or put in danger,” Mezrahi’s complaint says.

ut that timeline doesn’t check out. A Miami-Dade Corrections spokesman said Ricardo Moreno — who was sentenced to two years in prison in 2015 after being convicted of molesting multiple teenage boys while working as a golf instructor in Hollywood — moved into The Point immediately after his release in June 2017. He then moved into a different unit in the same building eight months later, which is when a group of residents learned he lived there and pushed to change that.

Mezrahi also says in her complaint that “the reason that the family was able to move out of our complex quickly was because of my help.”

And she went even further in attacking Friedland in an email to the Herald, saying Friedland “is the one who knew Ricardo Moreno, knew he was a sex offender, and did absolutely nothing about it when she knew he moved into our community. She knew he was a resident of The Point, but allowed him to stay at The Point and kept silent. What was she hiding?”

But that’s also not accurate. Messages from a community WhatsApp chat show that Friedland and other residents started discussing Moreno’s presence in the community on Feb. 20, 2018, one week after Moreno had moved from a rental unit into a condo that his wife bought in the same building, according to property records.

“Spoke to Linda [Marks] and sent her the statute,” Friedland said in a WhatsApp message that night, referring to a city commissioner who was also the president of The Point’s master condo association at the time. “She’s looking into all. It’s late now but let’s see if there is progress tomorrow.”

LET’S GO TO THE TAPE MEASURE

The conversation continued over several days, with Friedland and others discussing the need to measure the distance between Moreno’s home and the nearest playground. Florida law prohibits child sex offenders from living within 1,000 feet of certain locations where children congregate, including schools, parks and playgrounds.

On Feb. 21, 2018, Friedland sent an update: “[Attorney] Raquel Rothman did the research. [Building] only 666.65 feet from playground in violation of statute.” That night, a group of residents held an in-person meeting to discuss their next steps.

Then, on Feb. 26, a resident shared an email her husband had received from Marks. “Please be advised that the convicted sex offender has been given notice that he is no longer permitted to reside in the North Tower,” the email said, adding that Moreno would have “visitation rights during the day” and that, unless he appealed the decision, “he must vacate in the next few days.”

Two days later, records show, Moreno moved into a hotel in Doral, where he stayed for about a month before moving to an address in Miami.

Marks confirmed that version of events in a statement to the Herald. She said Friedland provided her with a copy of the relevant Florida statute, and Marks passed that information on to the city attorney “and made it very clear that time was of the essence.”

“Within about a week, all legal steps were taken, and the authorities prohibited the pedophile from residing at The Point,” Marks said.

In her ethics complaint, Mezrahi said she contacted Marks to inform her that she was helping the family “move out of the community as seamlessly as possible.” Marks declined to address whether Mezrahi contacted her.

The true nature of Mezrahi’s involvement isn’t quite clear. In an interview with the Herald, she softened her stance after a reporter pointed out apparent discrepancies in her previous statements.

Mezrahi acknowledged that she knew Moreno and his wife from attending the same synagogue in Colombia, but she said she wasn’t aware in 2018 that Moreno had been released from prison and was living in The Point, nor that Friedland and others were working to have him removed.

“My involvement was very simple,” she said. “I just did a phone call to the wife, told them to move away and that was it. She told me to give her a couple of weeks to move away and that was it.”

Moreno’s wife didn’t respond to a request for comment from the Herald. An Aventura resident who Mezrahi said could corroborate her account — Rothman, the former law partner of Friedland who helped The Point residents with legal research — declined to comment.

Mezrahi withdrew her ethics complaint Sept. 17, saying the city attorney had asked her to do so “and not create any scandal for the city.” But she re-filed it Sept. 24, despite acknowledging in an interview that she wasn’t sure if certain statements in it were accurate. The complaint was submitted with a signed oath swearing it was true to the best of Mezrahi’s knowledge.

The ethics commission has yet to rule on the complaint.

A RARE PUBLIC SPAT IN AVENTURA

The dispute’s spill into public view is unusual for Aventura, whose officials make a point of closely guarding the city’s reputation.

Friedland’s email in early September that first brought up the issue at The Point was sent in response to an email from Commissioner Bob Shelley, who had scolded Friedland for sending a campaign email that touted her work to reverse the city’s decision to have school on Yom Kippur at the Aventura Charter School and Don Soffer Aventura High School.

“When there are issues to be resolved we deal with them in a professional private manor [sic] so as to not insult or disrespect those that work hard for the good of our city,” Shelley wrote.

Mezrahi, who works in event planning and marketing, was elected to her first four-year term in 2016. She’s endorsed by Democratic State Sen. Annette Taddeo, Miami-Dade County Commissioner Sally Heyman, and three sitting commissioners in Aventura, according to her website.

Marks, the city commissioner and former condo association president, was previously listed among those endorsing Mezrahi, but her name was removed from the website last week. She didn’t respond to a request for comment on why it was pulled.

Friedland is an attorney who is seeking public office for the first time. She’s endorsed by Florida Commissioner of Agriculture Nikki Fried, as well as Congresswoman Debbie Mucarsel-Powell and Congressman Ted Deutch.

Friedland was previously engaged to Jeremy Ring, a former Democratic state senator and Democratic nominee for chief financial officer of Florida in 2018. Ring has donated to Friedland’s campaign.

Another candidate, Joshua Mandall, is also running for Mezrahi’s seat. Mandall faced Mezrahi for an open seat in 2016 and received 44% of votes.