WALTERS/LEDESMA CONTINUE TO BLATANTLY EXPLOIT COMMUNITY STRIFE FOR OWN PURPOSES During the 2013 election cycle, the VOTE3 campaign encouraged an us-against-them mentality. The campaign’s narrative set up an imaginary battle between the “old guard” and the “new blood”. The former was supposedly an ultra-conservative cult of pig-headed bigots; the latter a progressive, liberating force. The campaign also sought to exploit other supposed community rifts between new and old residents, east-side and west-side residents, and white and minority residents. None of this bore much resemblance to reality, but it sounded better than saying, “Yeah, we don’t really have any ideas or credentials, but vote for us anyway.” Vice-Mayor Jesse Walters and Councilwoman Ivonne Ledesma have perpetuated this us-against-them mentality during their time in office. They continue to use political rhetoric to mask their own incompetence and create community conflict to exploit for their own purposes. The July 15th equal marriage vote was just one example of the socio-political smokescreen tactic. No doubt hoping to create a wedge issue for the next election, first Ledesma and then Walters , proposed non-binding resolutions declaring the Village’s support for changing the law in Florida to legalize gay marriage. Citing their belief that the Council was not the proper forum for these issues, Mayor Herta Holly, Councilman Jim McCoy, and Councilman Hunt Davis voted down the measure. Walters’ first comments after the vote ran to the electoral consequences, revealing his true intentions. Perpetuating his us-against-them premise, at the end of the meeting he said: “It’s very hard now for some of my colleagues to go after the votes of gay and lesbian people, their friends and allies and family members. […] So many people over the last two weeks told me to withdraw this. They said it was going to fail. They said, ‘The other side is starting the election nine months early and this is what they are going to run on.’” (emphasis added) Posting on the Miami Shores Village People Facebook page the next day, Walters’ partner David Traupman said, “Remember who our community’s friends are next April when Ledesma, Davis, and McCoy are up for reelection!” Walters chimed in to suggest that someone look into the process for recalling Holly, McCoy, and Davis – kicking them out of office! As you read Walters’ statements ask yourself, who is the one that’s really attempting to run on this issue? Who’s really starting the election early? As Walters succeeded in arousing the ire of the gay community, things quickly snowballed out of control. Told simply and inaccurately that the Council had “voted against gay marriage”, many reacted with disdain. Gay residents should have been indignant that Walters and Ledesma would attempt to play upon their emotions in this way. Instead, many of them went for the bait – hook, line, and sinker. The anger was promptly fixed on Mayor Herta Holly. In an absurdly misguided attempt to exact personal vengeance against Holly, a group of indignant residents targeted the Miami Shores Community Alliance’s annual Mayor’s Gala fundraiser. Urged on by Walters and Ledesma, they created an alternative event, ironically called the “Unity Ball”. The group aimed to usurp the Community Alliance’s fundraising role so as to dispense funding only to those organizations whom they deem sufficiently “inclusive”. The implication was clear: anyone who went for business as usual and supported the Mayor’s Gala would be accused of homophobia. The group successfully bullied the Community Alliance into cancelling the Mayor’s Gala with this implied accusation of homophobia. Not exactly a “unifying” move. The result has been to bring further division to the community and to place in peril its many events and civic organizations by depriving them of their usual source of funding. They’ve also harassed Holly into raising the issue again in order to change her vote. This vindictive retribution is wrong and harmful to the community as a whole. Walters stirred the pot further in a letter that appeared in the September issue of the Biscayne Times. This letter did little more than confirm that Walter’s entire purpose was to drum up ammunition for the 2015 election. He outrageously stated that Miami Shores, “stood on the side of bigotry and homophobia,” and how he hoped that, “the voters will remember this day of infamy when we vote in nine months.” Could Walters’ statements be any more transparent? His letter also presented a patent hypocrisy. Despite decrying the intervention of a “Christian extremist group” because it was composed of many non-residents , Walters has marshaled forces from outside the Village. He enlisted an outside professional advocacy group in a smear campaign against Holly, Davis, and McCoy. They recently sent out a mailer to supporters in Miami Shores that fallaciously portrays the three long-devoted public servants as vehement opponents of gay marriage, motivated solely by homophobic animus. Confirm the facts for yourself. Watch the recorded proceedings from the Village website. The way Holly, McCoy, and Davis have been portrayed is false. Walters’ biggest problem is that he persists in conceptualizing our community in “liberal versus conservative” terms. He posted on Facebook that if his supporters gain a majority of Council seats in April, “all of this Republican madness will stop.” In his letter to the Biscayne Times, Walters lamented how this could happen, “in a town with just 20 percent registered Republicans, a town that voted 3-to-1 for President Obama.” But Walters fundamentally misunderstands this community. Opinion on local issues has never split along those right-left lines in Miami Shores. Nobody ever wanted it to. Nobody ever tried to force it to…until Jesse Walters came to town. Most of us would prefer our elections to be about good ideas, qualified candidates, and commitment to the community. Walters and Ledesma would prefer our elections to be about liberal versus conservative, white versus minority, gay versus straight… “us” versus “them”. As an anonymous contributor said so eloquently, “since when?” Since when has all of this strife and turmoil befallen our community? Since when? Since Walters!
Posted on: Mon, 08 Sep 2014 14:35:54 +0000
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