Miami mayoral candidates Gonzalez, Higgins lay out plans to improve housing, public transportation ahead of runoff – WSVN 7News | Miami News, Weather, Sports

MIAMI (WSVN) – Voters in the City of Miami will have a chance to voice their choice — again — after elections earlier this month failed to elect a new mayor.

Next month, voters will head back to the polls for a mayoral runoff election, with two candidates vying to be the city’s next leader.

Eileen Higgins, a mechanical engineer by training, with a background in manufacturing, currently serves as a Miami-Dade County commissioner.

Higgins is running against Emilio Gonzalez, a former city manager and former director of Miami International Airport. He also served in the Department of Homeland Security during the George W. Bush administration.

The candidates laid out their visions for a better Miami at a nonpartisan public forum hosted by the Downtown Neighbors Alliance on Wednesday at the Miami Dade College Koubek Center.

Gonzalez said he wants to take a holistic approach to lowering the cost of housing by suggesting eliminating property taxes.

“Our young people need an opportunity to stay here. They can’t stay here, which is one of the reasons that I’m so into the idea of doing away with ad valorem property taxes, because you could put money in people’s pockets. Young families that are struggling to buy a new home, imagine if you don’t have to pay taxes,” he said.

Higgins said she wants to eliminate red tape and streamline permitting processes in building new housing, as well as examine property the city already owns.

“That will be a priority for me as mayor, to look at every piece of city-owned property and say, ‘Why aren’t we using that for housing?’” she said.

Both candidates want to reform the city government and root out corruption to change the image of Miami for residents and visitors.

“We need to have a mentality where nobody will get a second chance stealing money, abusing people, being corrupt, corrupting their office,” said Gonzalez.

“From the very top in the organizations, if you look in the mayor’s office, and you look in the manager’s office right now, there are employees that are making well over $100,000, some of them over $200,000, that have second jobs. Doing what? Right? So all this outside employment, number one, has to stop,” said Higgins.

On public transportation, both candidates want to see it expanded and made more efficient.

“I worked on the Better Bus Network several years ago, and the goal of the Better Bus Network was to redesign our bus network to bring high-frequency service to over 300,000 households, and that has worked — our buses are arriving more frequently, they’re on time — and we wanted to integrate the city’s trolley system into this new, efficient system,” said Higgins. “We redesigned it for the city. The city commissioners could not get out of their own way and vote to make these changes, so they have the same old trolley system that they designed 12 years ago. They haven’t made a single change to a single route, even though our community has changed and grown in different ways.”

“The timing is such where you can sit, stand there and wait 40 minutes for a trolley, and then three of them come up, one right behind the other. We need to do a better job,” said Gonzalez.

Asked to describe their future administrations in just one word, Gonzalez said “unstoppable,” whereas Higgins said “resident-focused.”

Mail ballots are being sent to those who requested one starting Monday. The runoff election day is coming up on Tuesday, Dec. 9.

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