Ocean Drive tourism sputters without a plan BEACH MONORAIL

Can you imagine New Orleans without the French Quarter? How about Las Vegas without The Strip? Nashville without Music Row? Doesn’t make much sense does it?

Miami Beach though, has decided it no longer needs its number one tourist attraction: the vibe of Ocean Drive. Over the years, the city let Ocean Drive deteriorate through lack of supervision, enforcement and vision, then blamed the businesses on the iconic street for its current condition.

The plan for the future: a cultural and arts district. The words “entertainment” and “nightlife” are stricken. This lack of vision, coupled with a total lack of understanding of the convention and hotel industry, does not bode well for a city trying to come out of a pandemic.

A much-needed $600 million renovated convention center and proposed HQ hotel predicted a bright future for tourism growth until the pandemic. Now the future is much darker because conventions will be relying more on remote than live attendees and the hotel is no longer a priority.

If there were no pandemic, would the city strip Ocean Drive so that meeting attendees would have no place to go for entertainment?

There are not many of us left who have been through three reincarnations of Miami Beach. Each time, a partnership of elected officials, business interests and residents sat together and planned a new beginning.

This time. there is no partnership. There is no common vision for the future. The convention bureau’s current campaign of touting our national parks is just as dumbfounding.

There has not been one pure tourism official on the Miami Beach City Commission since David Pearlson almost 25 years ago. That speaks volumes.

Miami Beach is at a crossroads. If it continues on this path, its future in tourism is bleak.

Let’s save some time and money. Ask Genting to include in any monorailrelated contract that it will never again ask for a casino in downtown Miami.

The citizens have rejected casinos many times.

Our elected officials should ignore the lobbyists and listen to their constituents.

– Chris Crystal, – Coconut Grove

UGLY POLITICS

The upcoming election for vice mayor and councilperson in District 2 in the Village of Palmetto Bay makes it obvious why many well-qualified people won’t run for office on the local, state or national levels.

In the vice mayor’s race, a former village manager is running a negative and misleading campaign. In the contest for District 2, the incumbent is doing the same. In their campaign mailers, they are using similar tactics. Rather than stating what they believe, they are attacking the mayor, who isn’t up for reelection, in an attempt to tarnish opponents.

It would be great if the candidates told us their ideas and what they plan to do rather than telling lies and spreading misinformation.

– Howard J. Tendrich,

– Palmetto Bay