Frankel looks at issues for 2016
Courthouse, sober homes on her list
Two of the biggest items on South Florida’s wish list — a new federal courthouse for Fort Lauderdale and federal action that could help alleviate the proliferation of so-called sober homes — are moving closer to resolution, U.S. Rep. Lois Frankel said Wednesday.
Frankel, a Broward-Palm Beach county Democrat, has been heavily involved in both issues.
She’s pushed for a new courthouse in response to complaints about the current building from judges, lawyers and civic leaders. Frankel said the government agency in charge of federal buildings, the General Services Administration, has concluded that building a new courthouse would be substantially cheaper than repairing the existing structure at Broward Boulevard and Northeast Third Avenue or some kind of public-private partnership in which developers would build a new facility occupied by the courts.
The development, disclosed by Frankel in an interview with members of the Sun Sentinel Editorial Board and reporters, doesn’t mean quick action. She said the General Services Administration findings are under review by the government budget agency, the Office of Management and Budget.
Next stop is in June before a panel that evaluates judicial space and facilities. If the project gets the green light there, Frankel said it could be included in the first budget proposed by the next president, for fiscal year 2018, which starts Oct. 1, 2017.
Frankel didn’t have cost figures immediately available, but said a new government building would be tens of millions of dollars cheaper than a public-private partnership. Previous estimates have put the tab at $250 million.
Soon after her 2012 election to Congress, Frankel also began work on sober homes, which are group homes that shelter people recovering from drug and alcohol addictions. Sober homes have proliferated in parts of Delray Beach, Boca Raton, Deerfield Beach and Pompano Beach.
Neighbors seethe over unsupervised residents congregating in and around the homes, and city officials say they are powerless to do anything, even in the face of problems, because people recovering from addictions are protected under federal fair housing and disability laws. Government officials don’t know who’s staffing the homes, who is residing in them, or even basic numbers about how many of the homes exist and how many residents are there.
Frankel said group homes are good things, and the idea of people assimilating into communities as they recover from drug addition is a smart approach. “With that said, too many is not good. It changes the character of the neighborhood and it’s not good for the residents of sober homes. What good is assimilating in a neighborhood that is filled with sober homes.”
She said she expected that the federal departments of Justice and Housing and Urban Development “soon” will issue guidance for local communities that would allow them to regulate the placement of sober homes. Local governments
have been unable to act under threat of legal challenges from sober home operators, Frankel said. “They know they’re going to get sued.”
She said a united push by Democrats and Republicans — especially U.S. Rep. Dan Webster, a Central Florida Republican — has helped moved forward expansion of Port Everglades. Similarly, she said working with U.S. Rep. Jeff Miller, a Panhandle Republican who wants a courthouse in his district, has helped her advance the Fort Lauderdale courthouse proposal.
“It’s very interesting how Washington works,” Frankel said. “It’s not about speeches. It’s about relationships.”
Because of an unusual mid-decade congressional redistricting implemented by the Florida Supreme Court, Frankel is running for re-election in a district that lies entirely in Palm Beach County. U.S. Rep. Ted Deutch will run in BrowardPalm Beach county district that includes what is currently Frankel’s section of Port Everglades.
Frankel, a member of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, said she wouldn’t abandon her efforts on behalf of the port as her focus shifts to a new district. “Are you kidding? I will be at the ribbon cutting, you can be sure,” she said. “This is one of the best projects I had the opportunity to work on.”
She said the redistricting ruling wouldn’t be in the long term best interests of South Florida. While the
newly configured congressional districts are more compact than the existing districts, Frankel said a county like Broward would eventually suffer because it will be divided among four members of Congress rather than the current six members.
“It makes a difference when you’re in the room with an agency and there are six of you there and not one of you,” Frankel said.
The need to work with the state’s other members of Congress helps explain why people should not expect moves from Florida members of Congress to change laws dealing with Cuban immigration or welfare benefits absent signals from Cuban-American members of Congress from Miami-Dade County.
The Cuban Adjustment Act, which gives Cubans residency status and a pathway to citizenship, is considered unfair by people from other countries. And the Sun Sentinel has reported this year how some Cubans cash in on U.S. welfare and return to the island, making a mockery of the decadesold premise that they are refugees fleeing persecution at home.
“Most of us in the delegation would like to see our Miami delegation take the lead,” Frankel said. “The non-Cuban members of the delegation, most of, if not all of us, defer to the Cuban members of the delegation when it comes to that. That’s just the way it is. We all like to get along. We all have to work on a lot of mu-
tual issues together.”
She insisted it wasn’t a hot potato politically. Instead, she said, it stems from working a 435-member House where everyone specializes. “you pick out five or six issues. That’s your issues. That’s how it works. You defer to people who you respect on issues.”
Frankel said she did “not really” support President Barack Obama’s re-establishment of diplomatic relations with Cuba. She said U.S. Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Mario Diaz-Balart, Republicans from MiamiDade County, make a good case that the Fidel and Raul Castro are “so despotic, and it’s like we’re feeding the Castro government. I think it’s going to change, I think, maybe, when the Castros are gone. You know what? It’s not my issue. It’s not my issue.”
Frankel also responded to questions on several other political and government issues:
Highway legislation. She praised the new highway law that provides a plan for transpiration projects for six years, though she acknowledged it was financed largely through “hocus pocus” gimmicks. She said she’d vote to increase the gasoline tax to fund road and bridge projects if there were a consensus to move in that direction, but said Republicans would never vote for any tax increases of any kind. “Right now, it’s off the table,” she said. Talking “logically, that’s not exactly how it works.”
All Aboard. Frankel said
the planned high-speed train service, called Brightline, from Miami to Orlando isn’t really, as advertised, about train service. The real driving force is the development projects that coming with the stations going up in the three South Florida cities with stops: Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach and Miami.
U.S. Senate. Frankel supports U.S. Rep. Patrick Murphy, who represents northern Palm Beach, Martin and St. Lucie counties, for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate. To her, “it’s not even close” between Murphy and primary opponent U.S. Rep. Alan Grayson, DOrlando — largely because of temperament.
“You can either go up there and be a speechmaker or you can be someone who goes along and gets something done,” she said.
Trump and Sanders. Frankel said the non-establishment Donald Trump, leading for the Republican presidential nomination, and Bernie Sanders, giving strong competition to frontrunner Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination, are fueled by great public dislike of politicians.
“People are tired of politicians, that’s all, and Sanders and Trump are the non-politicians,” Frankel said.
Jeb Bush. She said she’s surprised at the former Florida governor’s struggles as a Republican presidential candidate. She was the Florida House Democratic leader while Bush was in office and briefly sought the Democratic nomination to
challenge his re-election in 2002.
“I didn’t agree with a lot of what he said. I thought he said it well. I thought he was energetic. I thought he was articulate,” she said. “The reason Jeb Bush is not doing well is because of his name. He is part of a long, establishment Republican family and this is not going well with the Republican Party.”
“The Democrats are not like that,” she said. Frankel supports Hillary Clinton, the former first lady, former U.S. senator from New York and former secretary of state for her party’s nomination.
Marco Rubio. Frankel said the Republican presidential candidate and Florida U.S. senator is articulate, charming and “obviously seems smart.”
She said he participated in one meeting to help on Port Everglades, but hasn’t been much engaged as a Florida senator.
“I really think he needs to learn to do a job first,” Frankel said. “He says he doesn’t’ like it [serving in the Senate]. What if he doesn’t like being the president? I don’t’ think it’s a good excuse, I don’t like the job.”
“Experience wise, I don’t think he cuts it,” Frankel said. Reminded that Rubio has more experience than President Barack Obama did when he was elected president, she said she supported Clinton for the 2008 nomination. “Although Barack Obama did a fine job as president. He really did.”