prior to my administration. It had zero residential life, and became a ghost town after five o’clock. So I sat down with Jorge Pérez, a friend and real estate developer. Jorge told me he would not build a single family home in Miami, much less a major project, because government in Miami simply didn’t care about the way downtown looked and operated. If City Hall doesn’t invest in the neighborhood, why should he?
I told him things were going to change, and they did. We began to invest in all our neighborhoods, doing the things citizens should expect from their government. We put money into safety, infrastructure, the arts, picking up the garbage, fixing the streets, making our city livable once again. We would call it “Safe, clean, and green!”
Aware of our plans to build a baywalk that would extend for miles on our bay front, Jorge decided to test our resolve, to determine whether our words would match our actions. Prior to moving forward on his first project, Jorge set one condition: that we build a $4 million baywalk lined with beautiful art in the area abutting the project. We agreed. As a result, Jorge built One Miami, the first residential project in Downtown Miami in decades. He would become one of the largest real estate developers in Miami and among the largest in the world.
Having worked in the private sector all my life, I knew that developers (and for that matter, most businesses) are hesitant to be pioneers. However, time and time again, I had witnessed what happens when you convince one prominent pioneer to lead the way: others quickly follow. And follow they did. Our initial investment produced a private sector explosion to the tune of tens of billions of dollars, a threefold increase in our tax base, and a skyline rated third best in the United States, trailing only New York and Chicago. Government kept its word, made the initial investment, and the private sector followed.
Midtown Miami is another example. What was an abandoned 56 acre railyard full of prostitutes and crack dealers when I took office became a multi-billion-dollar project housing one of the fastest growing residential neighborhoods in the city. Its success has spilled over into other once neglected neighborhoods, Wynwood and the Design District. This time a New York developer, Joe Cayre, would serve as the pioneer in an area of the city where district commissioner Johnny Winton and I had failed to convince any local developer to invest. Prior to going “hard” (that is, nonrefundable) on his purchase deposit, Joe also tested our commitment. Once convinced that we would deliver on our promises to expedite the project and invest in its infrastructure, he looked me in the eye, shook my hand, and the rest is history.
This would repeat itself throughout the entire city, including the story of investor Lev Leviev and the Africa Israel investment group, whose land assemblage will one day become a multi-billion-dollar project known as the Miami World Center, to be developed by Art Falcone, Nitin Motwani, and their investment group. Why? Government invested in these areas. We cleaned them up, built new roads and infrastructure, and made them safe. Private investment then followed. For every dollar the city put in, we got and continue to receive exponential returns.
GOVERNMENT NEEDS TO go back to the principles of making targeted investment in the people and things that will yield results. When you invest in people—through education, job training, the arts, health, public safety—you develop a citizenry that is educated and prepared to compete with the best and brightest in the world. They may even grow up to become mayor of a major metropolitan city.
When you invest in place—through better infrastructure that includes bridges, roads, ports, and technology—you create the kind of communities where private investment follows, and that people are proud to call home. As a country, we need to set aside differences and instead have a conversation about our shared priorities. Where do we as Americans need to invest in order to get the best possible results? The answer: in our cities. Let us agree on our priorities, fund them, invest in our people and places, then get out of the way and let America’s entrepreneurial spirit take over.
This is the lesson you learn as a mayor—when one minute you are meeting with a Fortune 500 CEO and the next minute you have a lady in your office who has a pothole in her street. Every person matters. Every problem is important to the person who faces that problem. Government’s role is to create the climate where both the CEO and the lady are confident that government is reactive and responsive to their needs, where government has made an investment for their success. It is a lesson that worked for Miami, one that can work for our nation as well.
Chapter 1 July 21, 1961
IT BEGAN AS a fairly typical morning for me—a typical morning for any six-year-old child in Cuba. I awoke to the beautiful sunny skies of Havana, “La Habana,” and sat down for a breakfast of “café con leche”—coffee with milk—and bread. At the table sat my mother, Elisa, and maternal grandparents, Benigno and Hortensia Galnares, as the traditional Cuban home very often included several generations under the same roof.
But this was not to be a typical morning.
My father, Manolo, would start his day as a political prisoner in possibly the worst Cuban prison of its time: “La Cabaña.” Several of his friends had been executed at the “Paredón,” a massive wall covered in the blood of those killed, and my father’s fate was yet to be decided. That day we were joined by my paternal grandparents, Manolo, Sr., and Lucía, who also dropped in for breakfast. My grandfather would not stop crying and I had no idea why. It would be the last time I ever saw him. It would also be my last day on Cuban soil. Mom told me that because Dad was in prison, it was probably best if I spent the summer vacationing in Miami with aunt Aida, uncle Benigno, and cousins Lena, Julio, and Alex Galnares. So, after breakfast, we drove to José Martí Airport for my first plane ride, a late morning Pan Am flight to Miami.
At the airport, my mother was approached by one of Fidel Castro’s militia members, a miliciano, and was told that my seat on the flight had been sold for $500 to another passenger. My mother now believed we would never be allowed to leave Cuba. The miliciano ordered us to wait in a glass-enclosed area of the airport known as “La Pecera,” the Fishbowl. While I sat there, I could see my grandparents on the other side of the glass, crying. They cried, my mom cried, I cried. Finally, the miliciano returned to tell my mom that we could board the plane, but I would have to sit on her lap during the flight. We were the last to board.
When our plane finally took off, my mother started to cry again. She cried the entire flight. She would never again set foot in her country of birth. I can only now imagine the worries she felt, separated from her husband and family, wondering if she would ever see them again. And what fears, starting a new life with her six-year-old son in a foreign country, only a dime in her pocket (so she could phone my uncle when we landed), and enough clothes to last a few days.
We landed in Miami in mid-afternoon. My uncle met us at the airport and drove us to his small apartment in Little Havana. (Forty years later, I would open the headquarters for my mayoral campaign just two blocks from my first home in America.) We all had some more café con leche and bread—now called Cuban bread in Miami—and the eight of us went to sleep, not knowing the fate that awaited us all.
It was indeed a typical day that July 21, 1961: a day I will never forget. It changed the course of my family. Like other Cuban families in exile, we were bound by the hope that one day soon, we would return to celebrate true freedom and independence for our homeland. Every single year since, my mom calls me on July 21 to remind me that this is the day we left Cuba to start our new lives in our new country. It would be a year and a half before I saw my father again.
MY FATHER’S FAMILY was very poor.
Fulgencio Batista, Castro’s predecessor, is credited
