Miami Today: Week of Thursday, March 19, 2015

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WEEK OF THURSDAY, MARCH 19, 2015

A Singular Voice in an Evolving City

WWW.MIAMITODAYNEWS.COM $4.00

BANKING & FINANCE

On digital currency: open mind but caution, panel warns, pg. 15 ASIA AIR LINKS: Miami-Dade aviation leaders met last week in Taiwan with key government and airline officials in a bid to create a passenger air link. “Our MIA team is being very deliberate in its efforts to bring direct Asia passenger service to Miami for the first time,” said Emilio González, county aviation director, who along with aviation Director of Marketing Chris Mangos met in Taipei with airline executives from the Republic of China’s flag carrier China Airlines and with Taiwan-based EVA Air. They also met with the Taiwanese Civil Aeronautics Administration along with customs, immigration, economics and foreign affairs leaders. Miami has since 1997 had cargo links with China Airlines Cargo. Direct Asian passenger service would expand Miami-Dade’s international trade, tourism and business, said Mayor Carlos Gimenez.

City National Bank sale to Chile group is ‘in final stages,’ pg. 16

THE ACHIEVER

BY LIDIA DINKOVA

OUTPOURING ON BRICKELL: What developer Florida East Coast Realty says will be the largest single concrete pour in Florida history will begin at 10 p.m. Friday as more than 175 concrete trucks make a minimum of 1,440 round trips from five concrete plants to 1101 Brickell Ave., where the company is building 83-story, 830-foot-tall Panorama Tower. The tower’s 19-story pedestal is to contain 100,000 square feet of medical office space, a 2,000-car garage, a 208-room hotel and 50,000 square feet of retail and restaurants. Above that are to be 64 stories with 821 residential rental units. The concrete pour is to take 26 to 30 hours over the weekend, with more than 600 people working, including 62 police officers to control traffic as the trucks roll in and out, over and over. A FARE ISN’T FAIR: Miami-Dade commissioners overwhelmingly voted Tuesday not to charge a fare on Metromover. The measure needed a two-thirds vote but instead failed 11-2. Among other things, opponents of the measure have argued that if there were a fare on the currently free people mover, ridership would decrease. The Metromover has been free about 12 years. County voters approved in 2002 a half-percent sales surtax with the understanding that part of the revenue would support a fare-free Metromover. Commissioners Barbara Jordan and Sally Heyman pushed for a Metromover charge. Ms. Jordan said she might take the initiative to charge Metromover riders to the voters at a future referendum. “I really feel that if we went to the voters today and asked the voters, ‘Do we want downtown Metromover riders to ride for free?’, they would say ‘No’.”

Jordana Pomeroy

Photo by Maxine Usdan

Director seeks sharper Frost Art Museum identity The profile is on Page 4

UM stem cell research on heart may go national BY LIDIA DINKOVA

University of Miami stem cell research on generating healthy heart tissue in heart attack survivors is on track to be tested across the US. The National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, part of federal medical research arm the National Institutes of Health, is to fund the $8 million cost if the trial wins necessary approvals. The trial, the first of this research in humans, is a step toward restoring full heart function in heart attack survivors. The research developed at the UM Miller School of Medicine’s Interdisciplinary Stem Cell Institute is on combining two types of stem cells to generate healthy heart tissue in heart attack survivors. Scientists have in the past studied using one type of stem cell at a time, a method that’s worked OK, said Dr. Joshua Hare, founding director of the UM stem cell institute. But UM research shows that combining two types of stem cells expedites healing and regeneration of healthy heart muscle. “We could remove twice the scar tissue

AGENDA

Tourist tax might fund new transit

than with either cell alone,” Dr. Hare said. “We had some scientific information that they actually interacted and worked together, so we tested that. It worked.” Researchers combined mesenchymal stem cells, usually generated from human bone marrow, and cardiac stem cells, isolated from a mammal’s heart. Stem cells are cells that haven’t matured to specialize to work in a particular part of the body, such as the heart. Because these cells are in a way nascent, they have the potential to become specialized for a particular body function. Doctors have been using stem cells to regenerate lost tissue – from bones to heart muscle. The mesenchymal and cardiac stem cells each work well in generating healthy heart tissue in heart attack survivors, Dr. Hare said. Combining them expedites the process, according to the UM research. After a heart attack, scar tissue replaces a survivor’s healthy heart muscle. The scar tissue essentially hinders the normal heart function of pumping blood in and out. Dr. Hare used a sports analogy to explain what the dual-stem cell therapy is believed

to achieve. “The normal shape of a beating heart, the inside of the beating chamber is shaped like a football,” he said. When there’s scar tissue “the whole thing remodels and blows up like a balloon and becomes a basketball, and that’s very undesirable. So by replacing that scar tissue, that can cause the chamber to revert back to a football shape.” The research is to be tested at seven centers: UM, the University of Florida, Stanford University, Texas Heart Institute, University of Louisville, Minneapolis Heart Institute Foundation and Indiana University. The Food and Drug Administration and a board of the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute still must approve the trial before patients are recruited and the funds are granted. The trial is on testing the research on heart attack survivors only. But Dr. Hare said this therapy could potentially help other patients, including children born with congenital heart defects, a severe condition where even post-surgery patients could face problems with heart function.

Miami-Dade wants to increase tourist taxes and use the added income to fund mass transit projects. The county commission Tuesday voted to urge the state legislature to allow the tax increase. The initiative reflects a county push to secure funds for mass transit aimed at alleviating traffic congestion. Commissioner Esteban L. Bovo Jr., who sponsored the legislation, conceded at the meeting that increasing the taxes won’t be easy. “This is a very prolonged dance and a very long shot,” he said. The legislation seeks permission for the county to levy 1% more tax on each of two existing tourist taxes. The county wants to increase the tourist development tax, now 2%, and the convention development tax, now 3%. As it is, 60% of the tourist development tax revenue goes to the Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau and the rest is split between the county’s culture department and the City of Miami. Most of the revenue from the convention development tax goes to the county. State statute provides for the two taxes, which means the state, not the county, would have to enact legislation that allows for changes of the taxes. William D. Talbert III, president and CEO of the convention bureau, opposed the county action seeking the tax hike. He said tourists already put money in the government’s pocket with the existing taxes – about $142 million last fiscal year. “At least 25% of your gas tax is paid by visitors, and that funds a lot of transportation projects. Also, at least 25% of your sales tax is paid by visitors,” he said. He added that Miami Beach increased its bed tax to help reconstruct its convention center. The tourist and convention development taxes are paid throughout the county except in a few coastal municipalities.

RENTERS IN COUNTY INCREASED 25% IN SEVEN YEARS ...

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PILOT EFFORT COULD BRING CAR CHARGING STATIONS ...

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TURKISH BROTHERS PLAN TO BUILD BUSES IN COUNTY ...

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BIG JUMPS SEEN IN DOWNTOWN TOWERS’ VALUATIONS ...

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STATE GIVES NOD TO TRIMMING BOULEVARD’S LANES ...

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APPRAISER FINDS FRAUD IN HOMESTEAD EXEMPTIONS ...

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VIEWPOINT: BIG DRAMA AT GROVE PLAYHOUSE IS REAL ...

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CHINA BANKING LINK TO FOLLOW HONG KONG MEMO ...

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