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JUNE 1 - 7, 2010
New poles will close gap in 104th Street lighting B
BY RICHARD YAGER y mid-October federal stimulus funding will have paid for completing a missing gap of street lighting on SW 104th Street. Except for a segment between 137th and 147th avenues, SW 104th Street between the Shula Expressway (SR 874) and the east entry to The Hammocks at SW 147th Avenue is lighted, according to the MiamiDade Department of Public Works (DPW). Project work has been underway since Mar. 30. Construction during May continued on the north side of SW 104th Street where power installations were completed to accommodate the first of 29 decorative poles, each 40-feet high and equipped with 400watt, high pressure sodium lighting, according to Delfin Molins, DPW spokesperson. During daytime hours, westbound traffic flow was restricted to single lane travel in work areas, west of SW 137th Avenue, as Underpower, a Miami subcontractor, completed underground wiring for FPL installation of power lines. The $312,828 project is funded by the (American Recovery and ARRA Reinvestment Act) following recommendations by Miami-Dade Commissioner Joe Martinez and the DPW. “To become eligible, the project had to meet a list of specific criteria,” Molins said. “Included is a requirement that plans must be ‘on the shelf,’ a project that is ready to go to
MDC Kendall president named to board of WK Baptist Hospital
W
BY TARNELL CARROLL
Silvio Martinez, Underpower company foreman, indicates end of FPL-contracted power installation on SW 104th Street
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– construction without further planning needed.” ing of SW 104th Street had been revived.” In 2006-07, Backer and Jane Walker, area Manuel Orbis, aide to Commissioner Martinez, added, “ARRA funding has very residents, successfully led an organized protest specific limits as to where and how the fund- to delay indefinitely a $6 million widening of ing can be used. Public Works along with the SW 104th Street to six lanes in the same area. During several meetings with public offiFlorida Department of Transportation determined that yes, lighting that portion does cials, residents argued against the necessity to widen the section line road from four to meet the criteria, so it was approved.” “The project signage initially worried me,” six lanes (as determined by increased traffic said Martha Backer. “When I saw the whirls and counts), as well as uprooting mature palms markings on the sidewalk, I wondered if six-lan- and existing median and swale landscaping.
est Kendall Baptist Hospital has named Miami Dade College (MDC) Kendall Campus president Dr. Armando Ferrer to its board of directors. Dr. Ferrer has served MDC for 36 years in various capacities, including dean of students at North and Kendall campuses. Appointed president of the Kendall Campus in 2009, Dr. Ferrer provides leadership and direction to more than 5,000 full- and part-time employees who serve more than 72,000 credit and non-credit students. The seasoned educator is an active DR. ARMANDO FERRER member of the State –––––––––––––––––––––––– See
FERRER, page 4
Homeowners protest expansion proposed for Colony of Dadeland
A
BY RICHARD YAGER controversial expansion of the Colony of Dadeland apartment complex will be protested by at least three East Kendall homeowner associations during a public hearing scheduled for Tuesday, June 22. “We’ll voice our objections at the continued hearing because of the increased density expansion will create,” declared Holly
White, president of Continental Park Homeowners Association and East Kendall Homeowners Association (EKHOA). Residents of the existing 328-unit complex also plan to resume their protest along with Kingston Square Condominium Association, a neighboring property, all objecting to increased density and traffic on two-lane SW 77th Avenue. The homeowners met recently at Continental Park’s Dice House in answer to
EKHOA flyers asking for a May 24 rally of area residents opposing the project. Community Council 12 members questioned the proposed eight-story building’s height during a May 13 public hearing that ran out of time, forcing deferment of an application to add 92 additional units on the 11-acre property at 9555 SW 77 Ave. Attorney Miguel Diaz de la Portilla said the ownership plans to convert an existing office building and tennis court to an apart-
ment building. Higher density is allowed under zoning rights granted the original owners in 2001, now allowing expansion by J. Milton Dadeland LLC, owners of the property since December 2009. They now seek modification of a 2001 resolution to demolish the tennis court to allow construction of the new apartment structure.
––––––––––––––––––––––– See
COLONY, page 4