South Florida Job Climate

While President Obama is rolling out his plan to generate jobs on a national scale, Miami-Dade County cannot afford to wait for the federal government to bring prosperity back to our community. Our local leaders must drive an innovative local jobs initiative focused on leveraging private financing to accelerate construction projects that will quickly put thousands of people back to work.

Mayor Carlos Gimenez has, in short order, set the stage for economic growth by proposing to lower property taxes and streamline county government services through a top-down reorganization.  The missing component of this economic growth agenda is a local jobs initiative via expediting construction projects.

Just look at the University of Miami Life Sciences and Technology Park — a state-of-the-art research complex that has generated 1,150 direct and indirect jobs during the construction phase and will create thousands more well-paying jobs in the science and research industries while in operation.  Construction projects are having a profound impact in our community.

BUILDING BETTER COMMUNITIES

The obvious projects to expedite are those that voters overwhelmingly approved back in 2004 under the Building Better Communities $2.9 billion bond program. To date, the bond program has provided opportunities to hundreds of local companies and thousands of workers. Nearly 450 projects have been completed and approximately $750 million in bond funds have been invested in the community.

Recently the bond-funded new Miami Art Museum (MAM) project conducted a job fair to fill 300 construction jobs.  Steps away from the new MAM, the Miami Science Museum will soon begin construction.

PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS

The mayor and county commissioners have the ability to engage in public-private partnerships to ensure these and many other worthwhile “shovel-ready” bond-funded projects get off the ground as soon as possible.

Public-private partnerships leverage private financing with public funds to deliver such projects as the Port of Miami Tunnel. Private companies may design, build, finance, and even operate and maintain a project and assume substantial financial, technical and construction risk.

In return, the county upon delivery of the project may use bond revenue to pay off the project in a lump sum or over a fixed period of time. Such partnerships are widely accepted nationally and are an innovative approach for construction projects.

One thing is clear, as we work through one of the darkest economic periods in our history, we cannot solely rely on Washington to save us (if at all).

While bringing our community back to economic prosperity will not be easy and may take time, capital projects will help us in the short-term with immediate job creation and in the long-term by improving the quality of life in our neighborhoods for years to come.