City Hall Stinks

Conway was fired by the city last July following the arrest of 11 members of the capital improvements department, which she headed. Prosecutors say the 11 employees were doing private consulting jobs during regular work hours. Conway claims she turned them in — and recently collected a $200,000 settlement from the city after filing a whistleblower grievance.

This past January 16, around 10 a.m., Conway sat before six attorneys inside a Coral Gables law office. In response to a question from John Shubin, a well-known local land use attorney who works for the Related Group, she revealed a close relationship with Sarnoff. "He was very supportive of me and my position at the city," she said. "I had frankly reached out to him and to Joe Arriola for help and guidance."

Sometime in late March or early April last year, Conway said, she had lunch with Cuervo and Grindell at Mr. Moe's Cantina in Coconut Grove. Soon after sitting down, Cuervo received a call from Related lobbyist Rosario Kennedy. After an indeterminate time, Cuervo hung up. She was "a bit exasperated that [Commissioner Spence-Jones's] office had requested that $50,000 be paid to Barbara Carey-Shuler, and that it had already been paid," Conway testified. "And the exasperation was now that they were requesting another $50,000 to be paid to Barbara Hardemon."

After the lunch meeting, Conway says, she met with Grindell, but did not specify when or where. "I was soul-searching whether I should share with the State Attorney's Office that information that I heard at the lunch," Conway said.

This is where Conway's story begins to diverge from the events described in Sarnoff's memo. On April 30, 2007, she says, the same three women rendezvoused for lunch at Garcia's Seafood Restaurant, a popular eatery on the Miami River. This time they were joined by Arriola, who was there to celebrate his birthday. He made cryptic comments about Spence-Jones. "Something to the effect that the commissioner better be careful.... If she continued this type of behavior, she was going to get herself in trouble," Conway says.

Shubin then read aloud to Conway the first paragraph of Sarnoff's memo, in which he describes Arriola's revelation about the $100,000 paid to Spence-Jones's friends. "Is the substance of Mr. Sarnoff's first paragraph true?" Shubin inquired.

"No, it's not true," Conway replied. "While I was at the [Garcia's] lunch, there was no specific discussion regarding payments associated with the Mercy project."

Next, Conway reported she had met with Sarnoff on May 1, before the commissioner's meeting with Arriola. Though Sarnoff told the Miami Herald (and later New Times) that Conway was wearing a pink dress and crying during that meeting, she denied both. However, she admitted telling Sarnoff the payments were discussed at Mr. Moe's.

The memo "has elements of truth, but it is not completely true," Conway said.

The Herald, the South Florida Business Journal, and other media outlets have reported that Conway's deposition is consistent with Sarnoff's memo. But there has been little mention of the discrepancies.

During an interview this past January 10, Arriola insisted he never met Sarnoff at the Grand Bay and that he certainly did not tell Sarnoff about any alleged payoffs. "He called me and asked me if I had heard the rumors about this and that," Arriola recalls. "I told him to be careful with rumors he hears at city hall. End of story."

And Carey-Shuler dismisses Conway's testimony as idle gossip from secondhand sources. After all, Conway admits she got her information from Cuervo, who in turn claims Kennedy told her about the cash payments.

Of course, Kennedy denies the whole thing. "That conversation never happened," she says.

Carey-Shuler acknowledges receiving $50,000 to $100,000 from the Related Group, but says she earned it as a lobbyist. Spence-Jones, she adds, did not know about the payment. "In politics there is a rumor out there every day," Carey-Shuler adds. "I have never heard of a commissioner writing himself a memo and then turning it over to the state attorney. To me that is evil, vicious, and racist."

Michelle Spence-Jones is sitting inside the Lost & Found Saloon, a pleasant, dim Mexican restaurant on NW 36th Street in Wynwood. It's a cool, sunny afternoon. Before munching on a plate of shrimp, chicken, and pork tacos, the pretty, tender-voiced lady with jet-black, shoulder-length dreadlocks bows her head and says a prayer before eating.

"Maybe the investigation started with him first," she says, referring to Sarnoff. "He got scared so he decided to go after me and present his theory that the only black commissioner in this town is corrupt. How is that not racist?"

Spence-Jones is a true Miami girl. Born and raised in Liberty City, she attended Lorah Park Elementary in Brownsville and later graduated from North Miami Senior High School. As a child, she played with Carey-Shuler's son at the then-county commissioner's home.

After working for the city for a few years, she was elected to the city commission in 2005. As with Sarnoff, that election was controversial. She was recently fined $8,000 by the Florida Elections Commission after it was determined she had paid poll workers in cash instead of checks. "I've been a target of allegations since the day I was elected," she says. "But that doesn't mean they are true. I have done nothing wrong."