Coral Gables mayor wants forensic audit to prove city isn’t a ‘cesspool’ of corruption

Coral Gables officials plan to conduct a “full forensic audit” after a partially completed review of city Amazon purchases became a vehicle for airing political grievances Tuesday amid an ongoing recall effort for the mayor.

During a discussion about hiring a new city manager earlier this year, Commissioner Kirk Menendez made a bombshell claim, saying the city is “adrift in a cesspool of public corruption.” But Mayor Vince Lago said a partial audit presented Tuesday of employee Amazon charges on city-issued purchase cards, or p-cards, was vindication for the City Beautiful.

“Well, the cesspool of corruption ends today,” Lago said. “You want to know why? Because the p-cards were found to not have any issues here.”

The audit found that “no misuse of City funds has been identified” with p-card spending on Amazon between June 2023 and January 2024. The audit was supposed to look at employee purchases dating back two years, but staff were only able to present eight months’ worth of data because the city had switched to a new system. Staff plan to bring back the complete results in coming weeks after further review.

Commissioner Ariel Fernandez, an adversary of Lago, had called for the Amazon audit after raising concerns about p-card purchases in January. But Lago took it one step further Tuesday, suggesting a “full forensic audit” of the city, beginning with his office first.

“I don’t care what it costs,” Lago said, claiming that dozens of city employees have contacted him “over and over and over to say how demoralized and disrespected they feel” by accusations of corruption.

Lago’s proposal comes at a time when the mayor faces heightened scrutiny for his own financial dealings. On Friday, activists for the recall effort dropped off a batch of petition signatures that, if verified by the county Elections Department, would allow them to advance to the next stage in the process, moving one step closer to a special election. The recall group accuses Lago of “misfeasance and malfeasance” related to the mayor’s business dealings, based partly on his ties to embattled developer Rishi Kapoor.

Recall accusations

Tuesday marked the first City Commission meeting since the effort to recall the mayor launched in mid-March. Commissioners quickly devolved into arguments about the recall in the middle of the public comment period.

Lago accused Fernandez, Menendez and Commissioner Melissa Castro of assisting — even inadvertently — in the recall effort. Fernandez and Castro defeated two candidates with support from Lago and other members of the city’s political establishment last April. In recent months, Menendez has joined the pair on multiple contentious 3-2 votes against Lago and Vice Mayor Rhonda Anderson.

“Everything here is, on a daily basis, throw as much mud against the wall against me in an effort to bring me down,” Lago said. “That’s number one. Number two. You are — all three of you — assisting in the effort to tear me down, to spread rumors about me, to spread lies about me.”

Lago said he wasn’t going to allow his position as mayor “to be tarnished by the continued attacks and attacks and attacks and attacks — unfounded attacks.”

During the back-and-forth, one resident yelled out from the chambers, “You should all be ashamed of yourselves,” calling the commission “pathetic” as she and others left the meeting.

Anderson also accused her colleagues of creating a “circus.”

READ MORE: Coral Gables mayor says recall effort is funded by ‘dark money.’ Where did it come from?

The Miami Herald reported last week that the political committee behind the recall, called End the Corruption, raised $50,000 in the first quarter of 2024, concealing the individual donors behind three Tallahassee-based entities.

Lago has repeatedly accused out-of-town developers of funding the recall but declined to provide specifics when pressed by the Herald about who, exactly, he was referring to.

Fernandez accused Lago of sending out text messages and a letter to residents “attacking” his colleagues — an assertion the mayor did not deny.

“It’s not attacking,” Lago said. “It’s the truth.”

As the back-and-forth continued, a resident who had an agenda item with a set start time approached the podium and interrupted the exchange.

“Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mayor. I’m here for a 10:30 appointment,” the resident said. “I’d like to get to my agenda item.”

Moving forward with forensic audit

The commission instructed city staff to come back to the next meeting with financial estimates for a citywide forensic audit.

Lago said Tuesday that “while isolated cases of dishonest behavior among a small minority of employees have been observed during my tenure,” there is not “widespread corruption” in the city. He said a forensic audit would clear the city of any such allegations going forward while also helping employee morale.

Anderson agreed, saying the purpose of the audit is to “restore the integrity of the employees.”

“No one here has tried to steal money from our city coffers based on the prior policy,” Anderson said.

Lago seemingly took a victory lap at the outcome of the Amazon audit, but Fernandez said he is “not comfortable with these results.”

“I think it would be a big positive for the city if we find no public corruption in this,” he said. “That would be great. But there are questionable charges.”

Fernandez referred to $12,000 in Amazon gift cards purchased in December as a point of concern. But Finance Director Diana Gomez said the gift cards were reimbursed by the city’s insurance company as a credit for staff training.

The audit report included 69 pages of Amazon charges worth tens of thousands of dollars. Items ranged from simple office supplies to mattresses and mattress covers for the police department “to be utilized during mobilizations and extended operations” ($313.72); an air purifier for the public works department ($459.98); and Halloween decor, including pumpkins (over $900).

Fernandez also expressed concern about the purchase of a clothing steamer, which was purportedly used for tablecloths. But the event the steamer was purchased for, Fernandez claimed, did not have tablecloths.

Gomez said it’s up to department directors to approve spending for their employees, and that during the audit, her office sent purchase records back to department directors twice “to make sure that they had a valid business purpose” for each purchase. However, Gomez said she is only able to go off the information the department directors provide to her.

“Don’t take my word for saying there’s no misuse,” Gomez said. “I’m saying, based on the information that was provided to finance ... there’s nothing in here that tells us that there’s any misuse of city funds.”

Fernandez emphasized that the audit was limited to Amazon purchases. “There’s tons of other things that have been paid for with our p-cards, which I am now asking questions about,” he said.

While Fernandez and Lago disagree on many contentious issues, Fernandez said he supports the mayor’s proposal for a full forensic audit.

“There has to be a better way to do it,” Fernandez said of the city’s spending.