Who Are the Highest-Paid Miami-Dade County Employees?

Here's a list of the 20 highest-paid Miami-Dade County employees as of September 2024.

September 6, 2024

Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava delivers the 2021 State of the County. She doesn't even get a whiff of this list. Photo by Miami-Dade County

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Who earns the biggest piece of the public-salary pie in Miami-Dade County?

In many other municipalities, it might be the mayor or perhaps the top cop, but that's not the case in Miami-Dade. Instead, county data on employee pay shows that the majority of the county's most well-compensated employees are lawyers who work in the County Attorney's Office — including the county's top-paid employee, who rakes in $205,000 more than Mayor Daniella Levine Cava — who in 2020 cut her own pay from $250,000 to $200,000 and wouldn't come close to sniffing the top 20 either way.

From attorneys to doctors to (spoiler!) more attorneys, here's a list of the 20 highest-paid Miami-Dade County employees as of September 2024, arranged from highest to...not-quite-so-high:

1. Geraldine Bonzon-Keenan, county attorney: $405,012
2. Jess McCarty, executive assistant county attorney: $394,159
3. Gerald Sanchez, first assistant county attorney: $394,159
4. Steve Bass, assistant county attorney: $370,743
5. Ralph Cutié, director of Miami-Dade Aviation Department: $363,303
6. Ken Pyatt, deputy director of Miami-Dade Aviation Department: $362,806
7. Eduardo Gonzalez, assistant county attorney: $358,721
8. William Candela, assistant county attorney: $356,725
9. Jimmy Morales, chief operations officer for Miami-Dade County: $349,686
10. Bruce Libhaber, assistant county attorney: $348,734
11. David Murray, assistant county attorney: $348,197
12. Roy Coley, director of Miami-Dade Water and Sewer Department: $345,168
13. Kenneth Hutchins, chief medical examiner: $344,609
14. Cynji Lee, assistant county attorney: $343,125
15. Bernardo Pastor, assistant county attorney: $342,817
16. Terrance Smith, assistant county attorney: $341,283
17. Lynda Slade Bendavid, assistant county attorney: $340,943
18. Marlene Klein, assistant county attorney: $340,567
19. Debra Herman, assistant county attorney: $340,303
20. Jorge Martinez-Estevez, assistant county attorney: $339,459

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Alex DeLuca is a Miami New Times staff writer who focuses on news, crime, and public safety, education, and cannabis. Prior to joining New Times in June 2020, Alex worked for the South Florida Sun Sentinel and freelanced for The Appeal. She holds a bachelor's degree from the College of Journalism and Communications at the University of Florida.

Contact: Alex DeLuca

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