PRWEB
October 1, 2004

South Beach Constellation Concierge Escorts Hurricane Season Out and Ushers in Fall with South Beach Season Kick-Off Party to Raise Funds for Hurricane Victims.

The first party of the Season raises funds for Madison Avenue for Kids, Florida International University, and Florida’s hurricane victims.

The Constellation Concierge is taking the lead in hosting a much-needed “ South Beach soiree “ on Saturday, October 9th, to shake off the effects of hurricane season and raise funds for Florida’s hurricane victims. Fraser Allport, Constellation’s founder, said, “ Everyone in South Florida needs relief from these storms. It’s time to break the cabin fever and have some real fun, South Beach style. Constellation is all about leadership for a good cause, with panache and pizazz. The Constellation Foundation is going to make a donation to the Red Cross for every person attending the South Beach party.”

So Constellation is teaming-up with sizzling Chilean artist Carla Fache to launch Miami’s Fall Season on South Beach with cool art and cool people. Fache has spent the entire summer in seclusion, painting like a possessed genius and re-creating herself in preparation for launching her new gallery in Wynwood Art District. “ Carla is a beautiful person, and her latest works are spectacular and vibrant. In contrast to these terrible hurricanes, Carla’s art will be a positive re-affirmation about Life, Love, Living, and Giving,” said Allport.

“ The Working Fabulous ” are coming out in droves to raise funds for Florida’s hurricane victims. Among the notables are Venezualean model and celebrity party planner Nayana Nava, Nicole Shelley of Nicole Shelley Models, and Miami publicists Charlie Cinnamon, Nadean Stone, and Amy Alonso.

South Beach’s business community will be well-represented by Gary Brecka from Life Asset Group, Attorney Michael Kosnitzky from Boies Schiller, Michael Milberg and Robert Eichner from Onboard Media, Stuart Blumberg from The Greater Miami and The Beaches Hotel Association, David Kelsey from The South Beach Hotel and Restaurant Association, David Simon of The Simon Group, Israel Velasco from Colonial Bank, Harvey Dana of Guest Informant, Jerry Santeiro of Matrix Home Care, Michael Byron of Majestic Properties, Tim Pedersen of Right Brain Studio, Attorney Richard Lehrman, Hans Mueller and Tony Noboa of Beach Bank, and Bruce Singer and Jason Loeb of The Miami Beach Chamber of Commerce.

Corporate sponsors include The Constellation Foundation, Mary Spio from One2One Magazine, Bacardi, Life Asset Group, Gato Negro Chilean Wines, and Polar Beer.

Celebrity Julia Yarbough of NBC 6 / WTVJ will announce the winner of a silent auction of a Carla Fache original. The proceeds will benefit Madison Avenue for Kids. The Constellation Foundation will make a donation to The Red Cross for Florida’s hurricane victims, and also to Florida International University’s Council of 100, represented by Dr. Jeffrey Horstmyer and Attorney Richard Zelman.

National media guru Mary Spio, the founder of One2One Magazine, will donate 100 paid subscriptions for a year of Online Dating with One2One Magazine’s state-of-the-art online dating service to 100 lucky singles. Celebrity hosts Roddy Benz and Johnny Regan of Vision Miami will pick the winners.

The Constellation Concierge will also hold a drawing. The winner will be treated to “ The Constellation Experience ” –a memorable evening out on South Beach, courtesy of The Constellation Concierge. The drawing will be hosted by philanthropist Miami Attorney Alan Telisman and his wife Rocio.

So put on your dancing shoes (or boots, since it is officially Fall) and join “ The Working Fabulous ” at South Beach’s Fache Art Gallery for a good time and for good causes. See the stunning exhibit of Carla Fache’s new artwork, party with Miami’s Centers of Influence, and enjoy a night out with the monthly Wynwood Art Walk.

“The entire event is geared to help Madison Avenue for Kids, Florida International University, and Florida’s hurricane victims. It will be great fun, with great people, and for three great causes. We all have the good fortune of living in one of the world’s best cities. Miami’s ‘ Working Fabulous ‘ are going to lead the way in showing the world how to have spectacular parties for philanthropic causes. If you are influential and you care, you have to be there,” said Allport.

This elegant South Beach event will feature live entertainment by “ Alex H.”, lounge music, hors d’oeuvres, and complimentary drinks by Bacardi, Polar Beer, and Gato Negro Chilean Wine. Nicole Shelley Models and One2One Magazines’ hot singles will compliment Constellation’s “ Working Fabulous ”.

The party will be on Saturday, October 9th, 2004. The Carla Fache Art Gallery is located in The Wynwood Art District, at 2300 North Miami Avenue, Miami, Florida. Free valet parking provided. The party starts at 7:00 pm.

The party is sponsored by Amy Alonso and Carla Fache in concert with Fraser Allport of The Constellation Concierge.

About The Constellation Concierge
The Constellation Concierge is an elite South Beach luxury concierge service conceived by Fraser Allport, founder of The Constellation Group. Constellation is dedicated heart and soul to lavishing you with service the way it should be, the way it used to be.

By DAVID JONES, The Patriot-News
November 22, 2009, 1:06AM

Now the waiting begins.

It will be exactly two weeks before we know where the Penn State Nittany Lions will go bowling. Saturday’s action narrowed the list down some. But not much.

Penn State is virtually certain to be invited to one of three bowls – either the Orange (Jan. 5) or the Fiesta (Jan. 4) of the BCS strata – or the Capital One (Jan. 1) of the second tier.

The most compelling debate will surround the Orange Bowl and, without getting into all the arcane process here, it will likely pit Big Ten members Penn State and Iowa against each other.

You say, well, that looks easy. The Hawkeyes’ and Lions’ records are identical – 10-2 overall and 6-2 in the conference. You break the tie by looking at the head-to-head match and Iowa beat PSU on the Lions’ own field.

That’s why Orange Bowl football committee member Michael Kosnitzky was a popular man tonight in the Spartan Stadium press box.

Kosnitzky is a tax lawyer, a partner in a Manhattan firm who works there during the week and lives on the weekend at his home in Miami Beach. For kicks and contacts, he is one of about 20 observers the Orange Bowl sends around to various venues during the season to take in prospective products.

His in-person assessment of the Nits on Saturday?

“Penn State certainly accounted themselves very well on both sides of the ball. PSU didn’t hurt themselves today; I’m sure they helped themselves.”

And we assume the Orange Bowl had an observer in Iowa City for the Iowa-Minnesota game?

“Yes and the funny thing is, I was originally assigned to that game,” said Kosnitzky.

Lucky guy. Travel plans changed and someone else got stuck with that exhibition. It apparently was riveting as a seminar session on rewriting tax regulation. Iowa won a 12-0 decision in which punts (17 of them) outnumbered points and the Hawkeyes managed a drowsy 171 yards of offense.

If the process of BCS bowls, the four biggies in which the payout is $17 million, revolved purely around play on the field, PSU would be headed to Orlando. The Hawkeyes beat them 21-10 in another sleepy affair in State College way back in September.

Instead, the tax lawyer got to watch something quite a bit more fun. The Nits bombed the host Spartans with 28 points in the third quarter and did it with pinache, mixing gadget plays with deep strikes.

It wasn’t just fun. It looked like a product that could sell tickets and travel packages and turn on TV sets. This is what the BCS bowls are about, what they must be about, to turn a buck exceeding what they pay.

Kosnitzky will report back on what he saw in a conference call at 4 p.m. Monday with members of the executive committee.

“We’ll start to build a consensus on one or more teams,” he said. “We’ll get some feedback from everyone in the field.”

And then Kosnitzky added this comment, unsolicited:

“The primary goal of the Orange Bowl committee is to get butts in the [hotel] beds and feed tourism in south Florida. All decisions are with that in mind.

“In a different type of economy, that might be less of a need, but in these times it will factor in more heavily than in prior times.”

Not until Dec. 6, the Sunday after all the conference title games and last few straggling regular-season contests will the 7-person executive committee, led by president Phillis Oeters-Pena and CEO Eric Poms, convene for a little get-together where they officially decide on their at-large invitee. By then, Clemson will have faced Georgia Tech in the ACC title game and half the equation will be known.

According to 12-year Orange Bowl committee member Kosnitzky, who is not on the executive committee this year, they will decide based on these factors, in no particular order:

• Potential tourism and economic impact in south Florida.
• Success of the candidate programs, not limited to just this year but historically. The programs’ national followings and how strong they are historically.
• Potential ticket sales of the candidates. For the Orange Bowl, a sell-out is vital.
• A compelling story about the team is also helpful.
• Considerations of stakeholders – television (this year, that’s Fox). Fed-ex and other sponsors.
• Appeal to the fanbases. Travel distance and accessibility from schools. How easy it is for fans to get to Miami.

Now look over that list and compare how Iowa and Penn State fare.

Then, go back and consider how much that head-to-head meeting between the Hawkeyes and Lions appears to factor in. Draw your own conclusions.

Then argue and debate over your favorite beverage. We have plenty of time for that.

Penn State climbed one spot to No. 13 in the BCS standings released Sunday, which almost certainly clinches its eligibility for a BCS postseason game. Two notes of interest, however: Iowa rose to No. 11, which is two places above Penn State and one ahead of Oklahoma State.

Having Iowa rank ahead of Oklahoma State and Penn State gives the BCS bowls added incentive to choose the Hawkeyes, but it’s certainly not make-or-break. As Michael Kosnitzky, a member of the Orange Bowl committee, said Saturday, his bowl will weigh a host of factors, including historical record, how well fans travel and the value for the local ticket-purchasing base.

“The important point I want to make is, it’s not just a one-year evaluation,” Kosnitzky said. “You look at historic winning percentage and how the school’s national profile shakes out. Those are all factored in. I don’t want to imply it’s a one-year view. It’s not a snapshot.”

With that in mind, here’s a subjective look at Penn State’s bowl possibilities, with odds attached to each. The Lions realistically are looking at three bowls: the Capital One, Orange and Fiesta – in that order, in our opinion. BCS bowl invitations will be announced Dec. 6. Non-BCS games will come earlier, depending on whether the teams are BCS eligible. The Capital One Bowl likely will have to wait until Dec. 6 as well, since its primary targets (Iowa and Penn State) are BCS-eligible.

Capital One Bowl: Jan. 1 in Orlando

Opponent: SEC team.

Likelihood for Penn State: 50 percent.

The reasoning: The BCS bowls will be hard-pressed to take Penn State over Iowa, considering the head-to-head result in September. If Iowa gets the BCS invitation, the Capital One Bowl will scoop up Penn State, which hasn’t been to Orlando since the 2002 season.

Orange Bowl: Jan. 5 in Miami Gardens, Fla.

Opponent: ACC champ.

Likelihood for Penn State: 35 percent.

The reasoning: Assuming Texas reaches the BCS title game and Oklahoma State is 10-2, the Fiesta Bowl might feel compelled to honor its Big 12 tie-in and take an eligible at-large team from the conference. The Orange Bowl has the next selection. As hard-pressed as it would be to choose Penn State over Iowa, the bowl can put together a persuasive argument. In 2006, Penn State and Florida State played in front of an announced attendance of 77,912, same as the crowd that watched No. 1 USC play No. 2 Oklahoma in the Orange Bowl the year before. Plus, Joe Paterno is the tiebreaker.

Fiesta Bowl: Jan 4. In Tempe, Ariz.

Opponent: Big 12 champ/BCS at-large.

Likelihood for Penn State: 15 percent.

The reasoning: While it’s true that Penn State brought this bowl to major status in 1987, the Fiesta might hanker for Iowa, which has never played there before. Plus, Iowans love Arizona: They retire there en masse.

The Oklahoma State factor looms large, too, which suppresses Penn State’s chances even further. Figure the Lions are pick No. 3 for this game.

Oct. 26–Backed by a $4 million grant from the Kellogg Foundation and four years of study, Community Voices Miami unveiled an ambitious plan Friday to deal with the problems of people without health insurance by drawing on the resources of employers, governments and healthcare providers.

The Miami Action Plan for Access to Healthcare includes goals to get more workers into employee-based insurance, put more people into the state-federal Medicaid program and cover more children through school-based medical programs.

Pedro Jos Greer Jr., a Miami physician who is the plan’s principle investigator, said the best way to coordinate the effort is by setting up a new countywide healthcare board.

Greer said he hoped to use ideas in the plan to cut by half the figure of 450,000 uninsured in the next year. “Hold our feet to the fire,” he told a group of leaders in the healthcare industry who assembled for a luncheon at the Rusty Pelican to hear about the plan. “We need to work together.” That might be easier said than done.

Michael Kosnitzky, head of the Public Health Trust, which runs the Jackson hospitals, praised the goals of the plan, but was concerned the effort might try to grab some of the $220 million in tax money that Jackson now gets.

Davide M. Carbone, chief executive of Aventura Hospital, owned by HCA, was leery of suggestions that community groups work with existing healthcare providers to bring care to the uninsured. He notes that his firm is already paying $2.6 million in taxes and losing $17.1 million annually in uncompensated care.

The plan’s problem is that, in tough economic times, all of the areas that Community Voices hopes to expand are in danger of getting less funding and medical coverage, not more. Many employers are cutting insurance or demanding employees pay more, Tallahassee has been slicing the Medicaid budget and beleaguered schools’ offering of healthcare is “just a drop in the bucket,” as one speaker noted.

Greer said the plan wasn’t ready yet to say more dollars were needed. “Let’s first get better governance and better accountability of what we have now.” What the county has now is $150 million a year that goes to Jackson through a half-penny sales tax and an additional $70 million or so through property taxes.

Kosnitzky fears that a new board would add “an extra, unnecessary layer of bureaucracy” and usurp the role of the Public Health Trust in dealing with the uninsured. He’s concerned, too, that taking funds from Jackson would dilute the quality of the widely respected Jackson/University of Miami teaching hospital.

Community Voices Miami is one of 13 efforts nationwide funded by $60 million in grants from Kellogg.

The effort here has already led to some successes, such as mental-health programs for the homeless run by Camillus House and grants from United Way to help community groups in Little Haiti and elsewhere to form together to work with local healthcare providers to provide more care to their communities.

Other programs are aggressively finding persons who qualify to sign up for Medicaid and government-sponsored children’s health insurance.

Meanwhile, Mayor Alex Penelas has his own task force on healthcare access, formed in February. John G. Clarkson, a task force member and dean of the University of Miami medical school, said, “We’re making progress, and I’m hopeful, but it has taken us longer that I would have liked.” The task force’s report is due next March.

Greer thinks Community Voices Miami should take priority. “We were here before the mayor’s task force and we’ll be here after.”

To see more of The Miami Herald, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.miami.com

(c) 2002, The Miami Herald. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

Mar. 28–David Boies, one of the country’s most famous lawyers, has made a bold move into Miami with plans to acquire the local law firm of Zack Kosnitzky.

Zack Kosnitzky, which boosted its stature during the presidential election recount, will give Boies’ law firm an additional 25 lawyers with litigation and transaction expertise. It also gives Boies a platform to build its business in Florida and Latin America. The deal is expected to be completed on April 1.

Nationally, Boies Schiller & Flexner will have 160 lawyers and has been involved in such high-profile matters as Al Gore’s fight for the presidency, the federal government’s lawsuit against Microsoft, Napster’s battle to stay in business, and the current defense of Andrew Fastow, Enron’s former chief financial officer.

“This will give us a critical mass to be a major firm in Florida,” Boies said during a phone interview. “We already have major clients in Florida, but until now we served them in part out of New York.”

The new Miami office of Boies Schiller & Flexner becomes the New York firm’s fourth Florida location. It also has offices in Hollywood, Palm Beach and Orlando, with a total of 16 lawyers.

Boies, who owns a home in Boca Raton, said the acquisition is unusual for his firm in that it has never before entered a market by acquiring another firm. Boies Schiller, which is based in Armonk, N.Y., has five offices outside of Florida, including Oakland, Calif., and Washington, D.C.

Boies Schiller’s statewide and national reach was part of the appeal to partners Stephen Zack and Michael Kosnitzky.

“We think there’s an advantage in being with a firm that’s recognized nationally as cutting edge and involved with every major legal matter in the country,” said Stephen Zack, founder of the 8-year-old Zack Kosnitzky firm.

Zack now will hold a seat on Boies Schiller’s five-person executive board. In addition to his legal work, Zack is known in Florida for his involvement with the American Bar Association and his experience as the first Cuban-American president of the Florida Bar.

The two firms have been working on numerous matters together over the last year. Both represented plaintiffs against a half dozen HMOs in a suit that aims to reform America’s healthcare system. They also are both involved in litigation against Ford and Firestone that is pending in federal court in Miami.

Zack said he and Boies flirted with the idea of merging while working for the Gore/Lieberman campaign during the election recount. Three weeks ago, they decided to move beyond talk.

“They have a lot in common with us,” said Michael Kosnitzky. ” We both win cases and close deals but they do it on national scale. This gives us a bigger presence.”

To see more of The Miami Herald, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.miami.com

(c) 2002, The Miami Herald. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

Oct. 11 — Freshly laid concrete is drying outside Bristol Bank President Pete Dunbar’s office, while he irons out contracts on data processing systems, orders stock certificates and interviews senior lenders in anticipation of the Coral Gables bank’s opening.

Across the county line, in Cooper City, newly hired Horizon Bank employees are booking mortgages out of cramped, unadorned temporary space, while President Tom Lunak anxiously awaits the delayed move to the new thrift’s just-completed Pembroke Pines headquarters.

Bristol and Horizon are just two of more than a dozen new banks and thrifts sprouting up in Broward, Miami-Dade and Monroe counties, as Florida rides the crest of a wave of new banks sweeping the nation.

Like the growth of new trees years after a forest fire, a surge in bank consolidation earlier this decade has bred a rush of new bank applications. Investors say they are taking advantage of a market ripe for the taking, where displaced or dissatisfied bankers and disaffected customers have converged, in an industry reveling in a run of record profits.

“It’s a good time to be a banker. It’s hard not to make money,” said David Barr, spokesman for the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. “Banks are going on eight years of record profits, the economy is good so people want loans, people are repaying the loans, and who knows — five or six years down the road, a big bank may buy you out and you’ll hit the jackpot.”

Since 1997, Florida has led the nation with 47 new banks chartered through June, including 18 in the first half of 1999, alone. In Broward, Miami-Dade and Monroe counties, at least 13 new banks and thrifts have either recently opened their doors or applied for regulatory approval.

Among the open banks are Florida Savings Bank in Pinecrest; Home Federal Bank of Hollywood; Horizon Bank, which will soon move to Pembroke Pines; Key West Bank; Landmark Bank, in Fort Lauderdale; Sofisa Bank of Florida, in South Miami-Dade; and TransCapital Bank, in Hallandale.

Other proposed banks that have applied for charters but have not yet opened include Beach Bank, in Miami Beach; Bristol Bank; CoastBank in Fort Lauderdale; Coastal Community Bank in South Miami-Dade; OptimumBank.com, in Plantation; and United American Bank, in the Doral area of Miami.

Many are being organized by former board members and executives of local banks that were recently sold, who are duplicating — or reinventing — their blueprints for success:

United American’s chief organizer, for example, is Ernest Halpryn, who was chairman of Central Bank, purchased by BankUnited last year.

Florida Savings Bank was started by investors including Bernard Janis, the primary shareholder of Consumer Savings Bank, also sold to BankUnited last year.

OptimumBank.com is backed by the former majority owners of Suncoast Savings and Loan, including its chairman, Albert Finch. That bank was also sold to BankUnited, in 1996.

And TransCapital Bank was organized by the majority shareholders of Transflorida Bank, sold to Union Planters last year.

Other new or proposed banks are backed by a local Who’s Who of prominent, well-heeled, investors, attorneys, business people and real estate developers, who are banking on a strong return for their sizable investment:

Patricia Frost, wife of Ivax Chairman Phillip Frost; Stearns Weaver attorneys Gene Stearns and Alison Miller; and attorney Gilbert Haddad, for example, are among those backing Bristol Bank. Each is putting in nearly 10 percent or more, of the $6.5 million capital investment.

Attorneys Stephen Zack and Michael Kosnitzky; CPA Richard A. Berkowitz; former Mount Sinai Chief Executive Fred D. Hirt and former Jefferson Bank Chairman Arthur Courshon are among those behind Beach Bank.

Salomon Smith Barney executive Peter L. Bermont — who has also invested in Beach Bank; Heico Chairman Laurans Mendelson; and Firehouse Four co-owners Thomas Richardson and Augusto Vidaurreta are among those backing Horizon Bank.

Phillip Frost is a director of United American. And developer Charles E. Cobb Jr. is an organizer of Florida Savings Bank.

All the banks’ owners emphasize that their purpose is to fill a void in the community, bringing back personal attention to a business increasingly characterized by nameless, faceless service.

Across the board the new banks say their staff members will know their customers and call them by name.

At recently opened Key West Bank, it’s even guaranteed. If a teller forgets to use the customer’s name, the customer can take a quarter from a jar at every teller stand, said President and Chief Executive Phil Hogue.

And at Bristol Bank, each customer will be introduced to the entire staff when they open an account.

People like Kevin Deuel, president and owner of the Miami import/export firm Agramericas, say they are open prey to the service lure.

“I look for a local bank that can take care of my business, where there’s somebody I can talk to,” said Deuel, who has lost his personal contacts due to repeated mergers, and plans to take his business to Bristol Bank. “When I find that, that’s where I open my account. That’s what I want.”

At the same time, the new banks promise that they are creating institutions for the long haul — although some reluctantly admit that they would have to consider offers to sell in the future.

Banking experts predict that within a decade, many of the new banks will have merged with larger banks. A sale can provide an exit strategy allowing investors to cash out at about 2.5 times book value.

Banks controlled by a handful of investors are most susceptible to sales offers, experts say, while those that plan to go public at least offer shareholders another means of cashing in their shares.

“Every bank will say it’s here for the long run to serve the community,” said Miami banking analyst Ken Thomas. “But in reality, in most cases, the investors are looking at it purely as a business opportunity where they can invest in a start-up bank, and they can hopefully sell out in five to 10 years down the road, and profit from it.”

Richard Hunt, chairman and chief executive of Kendrick Pierce & Co., a Tampa investment banking firm specializing in the financial services industry, already sees the mergers across the horizon.

“They’ll all be sold in seven to 10 years,” said Hunt, who has worked on nearly 100 new bank applications, including 18 in Florida during the past five years. “That is the plan.”

And if the past is any prediction of the future, a Federal Reserve Bank study shows that of the banks chartered during the mid-1980s, nearly 50 percent have been sold to date. Another 25 percent failed as the economy faltered, and just 25 percent remain independent today, said Robert DeYoung, senior economist for the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.

Opening a bank is not for the weak, impatient or faint of heart. Heavy regulatory and capital barriers bar entry to only those willing to go through a rigorous and lengthy approval process that can easily stretch beyond two years. Business plans, market studies, investors and key executives must all pass regulatory muster.

Not only do regulators look into the character and profile of the owners and managers, but also their ability to prop up the bank if profits sag.

Banks are required to open with at least $5 million in capital, though most typically raise $6 million to $10 million, through a private placement. At least one proposed local institution, CoastBank, expects to raise $15 million through a private offering. And another proposed bank, Coastal Community Bank, has turned to the public market, launching an initial public offering to raise $10 million.

Some banks and thrifts, including Home Federal Bank of Hollywood, TransCapital Bank, and Horizon Bank, are establishing themselves as sub-chapter S corporations, eliminating double taxation. Rather than pay corporate income taxes, the bank divides its profits — or losses — among shareholders, to apply to their personal income taxes.

Raising capital, however, can be an agonizing process for any bank, and particularly for sub-chapter S corporations, which are limited to 75 shareholders — thereby raising the amount of money required of each investor.

“The two hardest things are finding an excellent management team and putting the investors together,” Hunt said. “The trend we’re seeing now as opposed to a year ago is that the director pool out there — the available pool for directorships — is becoming pretty thin, statewide.”

In fact, some bank organizers find the process just too cumbersome, or their investors lose interest or opt for other investments before the regulatory process is complete. Others fail to win regulatory approval and withdraw their applications.

The Floridian Bank, for example, which was proposed for Miami, withdrew its application in July 1997, seven months after receiving approval. Hunt, who represented the bank, declined to discuss the reasons.

Bank applications tend to come in waves, affected not just by merger activity, which leads to the availability of personnel and branch locations, but by the economy. Regulators say the current surge, in fact, may be hitting its peak, as markets become saturated.

Last decade, the number of new bank charters peaked in 1985, at 439. The number started dropping after that, and with the Savings and Loan crisis, low stock prices and increased regulation in the early 1990s, new bank charters lost their allure, said Keith Leggett, senior economist with the American Bankers Association in Washington, D.C. By 1993, only 68 charters were granted nationwide.

Last year, after four consecutive years of growth, the number of new charters rose to 218. And 125 have been granted during the first half of this year, alone.

In fact, as a percentage of the total banks operating, the current total is on par with the mid-1980s peak, said DeYoung, the Federal Reserve economist.

“They are definitely filling a market void — kind of like Mom’s home cooking in a sea of fast food places,” said Gerald Celente, director of Trends Research Institute in Rhinebeck, N.Y., and author of Trends 2000.

Florida is among the nation’s most desirable banking markets, analysts say, because of its fast-growing population and rich deposit base. After years of mega-mergers, more than 80 percent of the state’s deposits are now held by out-of-state banks and thrifts. NationsBank, based in Charlotte, N.C., is the largest bank in the state, with 24 percent of the deposits statewide, and First Union National Bank is second, with 17 percent.

Those banks and others nearly as large can offer various advantages, such as serving large corporate customers, offering multiple products and providing vast ATM networks.

But despite the predominance of major banks, and the plethora of other regional and community banks, investors of the new banks appear unafraid of the competition.

“To be successful, we don’t have to peel away much of their business,” said Michael Kosnitzky, chairman of Beach Bank’s organizing committee, “We just have to have the dissatisfied few.”

Moreover, backers of each bank and thrift argue that their bank serves a particular community. Many have a specific niche, such as real estate or small business lending. And all tout their service, which they say will set them apart.

“Everybody looks at the banking industry and says it’s impersonal and sterile,” said Robert Bonnet, president of Florida Savings Bank. “People aren’t interested in how big [the bank] is or how many departments it has. They want to be treated like an individual and not a number.”

New bank organizers say they also have an advantage over many of their competitors because their systems are not only Y2K ready, but more technologically advanced.

Horizon’s checking account system, for example, allows employees to scan a customer’s driver’s license, photo and signature right on the computer screen, simplifying a teller’s customer identification.

Bristol’s documents will be input into a computer, making them easier to access, and eliminating the need for the costly storage of paper and microfiche.

And most of the banks open right off the bat with Internet banking.

At the same time, they can serve as a throwback to earlier days.

Florida Savings Bank, for example, offers passbook savings accounts, which are popular with children, Bonnet said. And bank employees even pick up deposits at Mary Mabjeesh’s restaurant, two miles from a bank.

“They’ll do anything to help you out and make it convenient,” said Mabjeesh, owner of The Muffin Tin.

Nevertheless, organizers of new banks will admit it’s not as easy as opening their doors and watching customers parade in.

Most banks don’t expect to post their first profit until after 18 months to two years.

To boost business, new banks and thrifts will often start out with above-average deposit rates and lower fees than their competitors. And their officers spend a lot of time making the rounds of community events, local school functions and Rotary Club luncheons.

New banks generally open with 10 to 14 employees, including a president, chief financial officer, senior lending officer, head teller, and platform lending, administrative and teller staffs.

Several months before opening to the public, a bank’s president and chief financial officer are already on the payroll, handling myriad preparations. The pre-opening process, executives say, can be more difficult than actually running a bank.

At two months and counting until opening day at Bristol Bank — the next to open in Miami-Dade or Broward — hundreds of details must be attended to. And more than $1 million will be spent — on salaries, construction, computers, software and furniture — before the first customer walks in the door.

Dunbar, a former Citibank executive who met bank investors Stearns and Brian McDonough 2 1/2 years ago on a Lake Forest, Ill., golf course, has been overseeing preparations since June.

Amid the rattle of jackhammers, he works out of an office he shares with Chief Financial Officer Jasper Eanes, formerly CFO at BankAtlantic, who was hired in mid-July.

As construction progresses, Dunbar plans to turn his focus to hiring and training the rest of the staff and overseeing delivery of the systems, so everything will run smoothly on opening day.

“The hardest hurdles are behind us,” he said. “Now it’s just coordination.”

(c) 1999, The Miami Herald. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

Aug. 15–Key Largo is a great place to get conch fritters, snorkel a coral reef or get wasted away again in Margaritaville.

But at mile marker 99.5 people engage in an activity that isn’t typically associated with the laid-back life of the Conch Republic.

They’re bankers. And TIB Bank of the Keys remains steadfastly independent after 30 years, and dominates Monroe County by focusing on the everyday needs of island businesses and residents.

“The only sustainable advantage a bank can have is service,” says Ed Lett, chairman of the institution originally known as The Islamorada Bank. “If you have a service advantage, people will flock to you.”

There are, literally, a couple of hundred banks across Florida like TIB: Community banks that are prospering by filling a need. Though the Sunshine State continues to be dominated by the Tar Heel twins of Wachovia and Bank of America, community banking is enjoying a renaissance, a trend that runs counter to the long-held conventional wisdom that in financial services, size is everything.

How do they do it?

In essence, say the people in community banking, you must know two things: Your community, and banking.

It sounds deceptively simple.

“At the end of the day, it really is nice to know who you’re dealing with,” says Hans Mueller, president of the 4-year-old Beach Bank in Miami Beach. He interrupts the interview to unlock the door — the bank has closed for the day — and let a woman in.

“Can I get some quarters?” she asks.

He ushers her toward the lobby.

Small gestures like that are perhaps one reason why his institution has grown to $135 million in assets and is solidly profitable, although its 8 percent return on equity is below most of its peers, he acknowledges.

It’s also why community banks are gaining market share and the number of new ones is rising, said Ken Thomas, the Miami banking analyst. Recently, for instance, Great Florida Bank, being formed by former BankUnited executive Mehdi Ghomeshi, raised over $50 million in startup capital.

“It’s probably among the best of times for community banks,” Thomas said. “Big banks don’t know how to make money in small communities, where customer service is the biggest thing.”

Florida is particularly attractive for community banking, he said. First, there’s a solid customer base with thousands of small entrepreneurial companies. Secondly, investors inevitably view the state as one of the most lucrative in the country for banking. So raising capital to start is easier, and the potential rewards from a lucrative buyout bid later are greater.

Beach Bank’s Mueller says part of the challenge is to be attuned to a neighborhood’s unique demographics. The 41st Street branch, for instance, is in a heavily Orthodox Jewish neighborhood. So it closes early on Friday, but is open on Sundays.

Conversely, in South Dade his branch opens early — at 7:30 a.m. — to serve commuters, then stays open until 7:30 p.m. on Friday evenings.

Meanwhile, an office being built in South Beach will work toward ascertaining specific financial needs for a large gay community there.

The largest investor in Beach Bank is Michael Kosnitzky, the lawyer and political activist who is currently a candidate for the Miami-Dade school board.

“I’ve always said there were two reasons to start the bank,” he said. One, he detected a civic void left by the demise of civic pillars like Southeast Bank and Eastern Airlines, and bemoaned the disappearance of local banks through mergers and consolidations through the years.

“You didn’t have a Jefferson Bank executive on your yeshiva committee,” he said, referring to the longtime Miami Beach institution that was sold to Colonial Bank in 1997. “The new national organizations strategically spend time on big-picture issues.”

He also detected a market opportunity in “our understanding of the middle-market businesses. (Big banks) don’t focus on that.”

Nelson Hernann, co-owner of Ye Olde Falcon Pub in Davie, agrees. That’s why his business, which has 20 employees and has tripled in size since opening in 1989, is a client of Regent Bank, just down the street.

“In a small bank, service is more personalized,” he says. “You’re not a number on a piece of paper.”

Sid Spiro, the president of Regent Bank, says small businesses like Hernann’s pub are the mainstay of his institution, which got started in the mid-1980s.

“Really, when you get right down to it, community banking is like Vince Lombardi said of football — it’s not a complex game,” Spiro said. “We take care of businesses’ day-to-day transactions. We phone if there’s a problem. Every business has an occasional burp, but we’re pretty adept at telling a burp from a cold from pneumonia.”

Certainly, small banks don’t have the resources of their bigger brethren. But that’s not always an insurmountable problem.

For instance, only about 15 percent of Regent’s deposits are in certificates of deposit — so not being able to pay the best rates in town is less of an issue.

Furthermore, service is crucial to his customers. So the bank offers personal touches like free pickup for its clients.

And finally, most community banks are privately held, so they don’t have to produce the sky-high profit margins that Wall Street expects from publicly traded institutions.

Uniformly, community bank say their biggest challenge is attracting and retaining talent. And longtimers say it has become particularly tough since the demise of Southeast Bank, which had a highly regarded internal training program that inevitably produced managers for other area institutions.

Spiro said one solution is to empower managers, so they get to make decisions that a bigger institution might decide by loan committee.

And he’ll go to great lengths to keep key employees. When senior vice president Pam Brownlee said she wanted to move to North Carolina so her children could be near grandparents, Spiro let her telecommute.

“I halfway expected it to be temporary, but it has worked out beautifully,” said Brownlee, who’s been telecommuting now for several years.

Still, community banks acknowledge they can ultimately feel hemmed in by their communities.

TIB Bank of the Keys, for instance, is increasingly expanding onto the mainland, as growth limits and scarce land make Monroe County a slow-growth prospect.

It has branches in the Homestead area, where it also moved most of its back-office operations due to labor shortages in the Keys.

Now, it’s aggressively moving into southwest Florida, where it has three branches and is opening two more. It also recently moved the headquarters of the bank’s holding company, TIB Financial, which is publicly traded on Nasdaq, to Naples as well.

“It looks overbanked, but this market grows by 87,000 people every five years,” Lett said of the Naples-Fort Myers corridor. “That’s a Monroe County.”

Perhaps the biggest challenge for independent banks is, in fact, remaining independent. Somewhat contrary to other businesses, it isn’t failure that kills off community banks — it’s success. Particularly in Florida, success inevitably brings offers from bigger institutions, often at irresistible premiums.

That’s what happened to Ready State Bank, a West Miami-Dade institution that catered to Hispanic businesses and was sold to Union Planters in 1998.

Many of its officers and managers regrouped to form U.S. Century Bank. It has grown to $300 million in in assets, up from under $30 million when it opened its doors in November 2002. Its second-quarter profits were 78 percent above the same period last year.

But it isn’t going to be gobbled up, vows Octavio Hernandez, president.

“Our dreams are to create the strongest and one of the largest banks in the region,” he said. “We have no intentions of selling anytime soon. In fact, we’re looking at acquisitions.”

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(c) 2004, The Miami Herald. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News. For information on republishing this content, contact us at (800) 661-2511 (U.S.), (213) 237-4914 (worldwide), fax (213) 237-6515, or e-mail reprints@krtinfo.com.

A March 2004 opinion issued by the Miami-Dade County Ethics Commission required plan expediters–which act as builder representatives at local building departments to ensure faster plan approval and permit issuance–to register as lobbyists.

After several meetings with key county staff and among themselves, BASF members and staff prepared a letter with additional information about their job functions for the Ethics Commission to reconsider. In August, BASF presented its new information and report to the full commission. After deliberation, the commission issued a four-page opinion rescinding its earlier position, so that plan expediters will no longer be considered lobbyists and will not be required to register as lobbyists because they do not affect legislation.

Why did the commission reverse its earlier opinion? The reversal was based on new information, which BASF members and staff presented, that explained in more detail what a plan expediter’s role is in helping to obtain approvals for builders’ plans. In fact, the report explained, their main function is to represent the property owner. Plan expediters follow procedures–established by the Miami-Dade County Building Department–for plan approval, in order to obtain faster plan reviews or quicker inspections of a property.

There is one important exception to the ethics committee’s decision that plan expediters are not lobbyists, and it is one that BASF supports: if a plan expediter is representing a client in a hearing, for instance before the unsafe structures board, the plan expediter is then considered a lobbyist and must register with the county.

Proposed Impact Fee Hikes

A working group of Miami-Dade County School Board staff and BASF members has reviewed the county’s $2,500-per-home school impact fee. That is the fee developers pay the county for each home they build; the money is earmarked for school construction.

The consultant who originally prepared the school impact fee ordinance was asked to review the document to update the impact fee formula and related issues. At this time, no details are available on how much the fee will increase.

What’s next? The best estimate is that a cost hike is likely within six to eight months. Other impact fees are also under review. Neither the police nor parks impact fees have been increased since their adoption several years ago. In late August, county parks department staff met with BASF members to discuss future park impact fee increases. Police impact fee revisions began about a year ago, but due to a staff reorganization at the county Public Safety Department, changes were put on hold. Now, new staff is ready to pick up the process where former staff left off.

At BASF’s request, a meeting has been set with all county departments which collect impact fees. The purpose of the session is to gather all staff at one time to discuss future fee hikes and when those increases might take effect. The meeting is set for Thursday, Oct. 6 at 11:00 a.m. in the DIC conference room on the 12th floor of the Metro Dade Center. The address there is 111 NW First Street, in Miami. All members are invited.

Watershed Task Force Meets

The South Miami-Dade Watershed Task force, which was formed nearly three years ago based on a series of Comprehensive Development Master Plan (CDMP) amendments, is preparing zoning and comprehensive plan changes to “balance future land use needs with water quality and environmental protection and the Everglades Restoration project.” The study’s boundary areas are from SW 8th Street/Tamiami Trail south to the Monroe County line, and from the Everglades east to Biscayne Bay. Given that the study area includes the last open developable land in the county. BASF members and staff are heavily involved.

Public meetings will be held in late September and early October, at which time BASF members will be urged to attend in large numbers. Attorney Carter McDowell is the BASF representative.

BIPAC: Winners all around

Broward and Miami-Dade Building Industry Political Action Committee (BIPAC) members should be proud of themselves. They have a perfect record in endorsing candidates who were also primary election winners on Aug. 31. The victory list below shows all the BIPAC-endorsed winners.

Florida Senate
District 39 Larcenia Bullard (D) 

Florida House of Representatives
District 103Wilbert "Tee" Holloway (D)
District 109Dorothy Bendross Mindingall (D)
District 113Carlos Lopez-Cantera (R)
*District 114   Anitere Flores (R)
District 119Juan Carlos Zapata (R) 

Miami-Dade County Commission
(candidates run without party affiliation)
District 3  Barbara Carey-Schuler
District 5  Bruno Barreiro
District 9  Dennis Moss
District 13 Natacha Seijas 

Dade County School Board
(candidates run without party affiliation)
*District 3 Michael Kosnitzky
*District 9 Evelyn Greer 

Please note that those marked with an * will be in a run-off or face
other opposition on Tuesday, November 2, 2004. Please remember to vote
for these candidates on November 2, 2004.

Joe Goldstein, Esq.,

Akerman Senterfitt, P.A.

Chair, BASF Miami-Dade

Legislative Committee

Knight Ridder Newspapers

MIAMI _ The post-Enron world has given rise to a trendy legal specialty: the defense of companies accused of suspect accounting and insider self-dealing. At the top of the field is hot-shot New York attorney David Boies.

Competitors have contended that one man cannot handle as much business as Boies does and do it well. Enter Miami’s Zack Kosnitzky, a 27-lawyer firm that merged into the New York firm Boies Schiller & Flexner in March.

From his law offices in downtown Miami, Stephen Zack, a founder of the Miami firm, has deployed attorneys all over the country to assist Boies in the defense of corporate giants such as Adelphia Communications, Tyco International and Qwest Communications International.

Boies also represents Miami-based Spanish Broadcasting System in its antitrust suit against Clear Channel Communications and Hispanic Broadcasting Corp., which is being purchased by Univision.

At the same time, the Miami lawyers are preparing their case against a half-dozen HMOs in a high-impact suit that aims to reform America’s healthcare system.

In the last few months, Zack has sent lawyers to the Boca Raton offices of Tyco, under scrutiny for its complex accounting and the questionable financial dealings of its chief executive. He’s dispatched lawyers to Denver where Qwest Communications is facing a Securities and Exchange Commission inquiry into its accounting practices.

And he himself has traveled to Boies’ Armonk, N.Y. office to discuss litigation strategies.

“Our lawyers are reviewing documents, meeting with witnesses, gathering facts and helping to move these cases forward,” Zack said. “These are complex cases involving enormous amounts of money. We’re marshaling our resources to attack the issues quickly.”

Zack says his firm brought Boies Schiller much-needed manpower, expertise and exposure to the Florida market, and Boies brought high-profile business. The Boies Schiller firm now has 160 lawyers _ both litigators and corporate attorneys.

“We’re a good resource to them and them to us,” he said. “We did this deal to be involved in cutting edge litigation.”

Zack, the litigator who worked closely with Boies on behalf of Al Gore during the election recount in Florida, is the administrative partner in Miami. Boies is the lawyer who represented the government in its attempt to break up Microsoft on antitrust grounds and Napster in its losing battle with the record industry.

He probably would have been involved in the Enron defense too had he not agreed to represent Andrew Fastow, former chief executive officer of Enron, as a favor to one of Boies’ law partners.

And, it’s not just the Miami litigators who are involved in the big suits. Zack’s partner, corporate attorney Michael Kosnitzky, has been in the thick of it with Adelphia, the nation’s sixth largest cable TV operator.

Adelphia is facing questions about its accounting and accusations of insider abuse by the family of company founder John J. Rigas. Kosnitzky has spent recent weeks in the small town of Coudersport, Penn., with a handful of other corporate lawyers from Miami, helping the company get back as many assets as possible from the Rigas family. They purchased cable systems, stock, golf courses, timber, and an NHL hockey team with corporate borrowings.

Chris Boies, son of David Boies and head of the Boies Schiller & Flexner’s corporate practice, said the merger with Zack Kosnitzky brought his department more tax and accounting expertise, an area greatly needed in delving into corporate books.

“We didn’t have a tax department before them. Also, with Adelphia there are tremendous tax and accounting issues and they have both an accounting and a legal perspective,” he said.

Spanish Broadcasting System was an existing Boies client, but Zack said he has worked with other Hispanic media internationally for more than 30 years and will play a role in that case, filed earlier this month in Miami.

Meanwhile, legal experts predict that defending embattled corporations will become as hot a legal specialty as tech law was during the dot-com boom.

“There’s no question there’s an explosion of plaintiffs’ lawyers suing for professional malpractice and, on the other side, a cadre of defense lawyers making it their specialty to provide legal services to these companies,” said Bob Jarvis, a law professor at Nova Southeastern University.

“Lawyers are more creative in making claims against companies. Before if a company failed, it went into bankruptcy and that was the end of it. Now someone must be responsible, someone did something illegal or improper,” he said.

Jarvis believes more Florida law firms will participate in these cases. “More Fortune 500 business is being done here,” he said. “It’s not surprising the work would spread out and you would see lawsuits all over country.”

___

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Apr. 15–MIAMI-DADE COUNTY

Nicolas J. Muniz joined Morrison, Brown, Argiz & Company, a Miami-based accounting and management consulting firm, as international tax manager. Muniz was formerly with Ernst & Young LLP.

The board of directors of Beach Bank named bank co-founder Michael Kosnitzky to chairman. Kosnitzky served as the chairman during the organizational stage of the Bank. Kosnitzky is with the law firm of Boies Schiller & Flexner LLP.

Heather M. Zorn joined the law firm of Bilzin Sumberg Dunn Baena Price & Axelrod, in the firm’s litigation department. Zorn worked as a law clerk for Magistrate Judge Barry L. Garber in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.

Michael J. Husson was named general manager at Teleswitch, in Miami. He will oversee the domestic and international management teams as well as direct the sales and marketing efforts. Husson was the chief operating officer and general manager for the commercial division of West Virginia Office Products.

Hiram Ocariz was named chairman of the finance committee of the Latin Builders Association. He is a name partner at the accounting firm of Ocariz, Gitlin & Zomerfeld.

PALM BEACH COUNTY

Paxson Communications Corp. in West Palm Beach promoted Joe Siegel to vice president-creative director/East Coast. He joined the firm in 1998. Siegel was previously creative director, East Coast. He will continue to supervise the daily operations of PAX TV’s East Coast, in-house design group, developing creative concepts and materials, as well as manage the production of affiliate marketing and local ad sales promotions and materials, for print, video and online media.

The Palm Beach County Sports Commission named new members to the organization’s 28-member board of directors recently.

Dan Calloway, athletic director of the Riviera Beach Youth Recreation Association for 35 years, is serving a second term as a board member. Calloway is a retired sergeant from the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Department. Stephen Haughn, recruiting and compliance coordinator with Palm Beach Atlantic College in West Palm Beach for the past three years, was also named to the board. In the past, Haughn was in sales and marketing with Seagrams Ltd., American Brands and Rawlings Inc. The executive director of the Palm Beach County Sports Commission is Pam Gerig. The present president of the board of directors is Edward Eissey.

Nancy E.L. Russell has been named director of sales for a Lantana retirement community, Lakeside Village, a Classic Residence by Hyatt. Russell is responsible for Lakeside Village’s sales, marketing and outreach initiatives and events. She was regional director of sales and marketing for the Schonberger Family of Communities, where she was responsible for the sales and marketing division for five senior living communities with primary markets in New York and New Jersey.

The Joseph L. Morse Geriatric Center in West Palm Beach promoted Carmen Shell to vice president of nursing services. Shell will oversee the facility’s nursing department and manage all aspects of nursing services. Before joining the Morse Geriatric Center in November 2000, Shell was with the Shriners Burn Institute as a pediatric burn nurse.

Marc Hochman joined Philadelphia-based VIP Magazines as executive director of market development in Boca Raton. VIP is publisher of VIP Wedding and VIP Event. Hochman was most recently with the CBS/Viacom-owned Sunny 104.3 FM in West Palm Beach.

Sharon Anderson, Cheryl Boltz and Carol Bush were promoted to vice presidents at Fidelity Federal Bank & Trust in West Palm Beach. Bonnie Lansaw was promoted to first vice president.

Lou Toth was named the South Florida Water Management District’s Employee of the Year for 2001 in West Palm Beach. Toth is chief environmental scientist for the Kissimmee River Restoration Project. He was recognized for his vision, technical expertise and dedication to his work. In addition, the district named Ron Bearzotti, Keith Rizzardi and Stephen M. Smith as team of the year. Bearzotti is a senior environmental analyst, Rizzardi is senior attorney and Smith is a senior environmental scientist.

Carol L. Fisher joined Palms West Hospital as director of medical-surgery. Fisher was a Telemetry Unit nurse at JFK Medical Center.

Carolanne Brown was promoted to dean of academic records and advisement at Palm Beach Atlantic College in West Palm Beach. Brown, who joined the college in 1991, was most recently director of evening/graduate admissions. Laura Leinweber was promoted to director of evening/graduate admissions.

Catherine Krug joined Northwood University in West Palm Beach as administrative assistant.

Send items for this column to Cindy Kent by e-mail at ckent@sun-sentinel.com or to People On the Move, Your Business, Sun-Sentinel, 200 E. Las Olas Blvd., Fort Lauderdale, FL 33301-2293.

To see more of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.sun-sentinel.com.

(c) 2002, South Florida Sun-Sentinel. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

Her name is synonymous with ‘Winning.’ The woman that has made political history, and has led the most talked about political campaigns in the cities of Sunny Isles Beach and Aventura to victory is a force to be reckoned with…She is Sydney Faye-Davis, Manager to the Stars.

As one of the most professional working women one could ever hope to meet, Sydney is found everywhere, from Downtown into the Beaches and up and down the Biscayne Corridor. Her job is among the most intellectually demanding thus physically exhausting ones: creating the campaign strategy that gets her candidate the seat sought.

A native of Chicago, Sydney graduated from college with not one, but two Bachelors degrees –one in Marketing and one in Journalism, as well as a minor in Broadcasting. These three creative areas of study would take Davis into the world of high fashion and national politics.

The year was 1982. The backdrop was the City of Chicago, and the mission was to get Harold Washington elected as Mayor. The marketing genius in Sydney devised so meticulous and strategic a campaign that the vote, in this racially divided city, was split between Mayor Jane M. Byrne, Richard M. Daley with Washington sailing into office.

After handling press for Mayor Washington for two years, Sydney entered the world of fashion at Harper’s Bazaar Magazine where she took on creative charge as National Advertising Director. Sydney was then hired away by Rupert Murdoch for the United States and UK launch of Mirabella Magazine as Executive Editor where she covered the International Fashion Collections and remained with much success until her campaign strategies were once again called upon.

The ante was now upped. This race was for the United States Senate and the candidate was, Carol Mosely-Braun, an unknown African-American woman challenging Senator Alan Dixon with 42 years of political experience. Sydney managed that campaign into victory, and made history by putting the first black woman in history of the United States inside the U.S. Senate.

Enjoying success, Sydney headed west to Beverly Hills, California where she became Senior V.P. of Warren Cowan & Associates, and specialized in Entertainment Publicity for Burt Reynolds, Paul Newman, Joan Collins, Estelle Getty, and Diahann Carroll among others.

The City of Aventura became home in 2000 when she opened The Sydney Corp, a multi-talented, successful firm dedicated to campaign management and fashion consulting—because when not running campaigns, she’s lecturing for the cruise industry on fashion! Sydney has managed six political campaigns into victory, as well as working on the successful passage of Miami-Dade’s Children’s Trust Ballot Initiative of 2003. In 2001, Sydney’s marketing genius sat Aventura Commissioner Manny Grossman and Sunny Isles Commissioner Norman Edelcup. In 2003, she led Zev Auerbach (Aventura) and Lew Thaler (Sunny Isles Beach) to their commission seats. And in 2003, Sydney managed the campaign of current Sunny Isles Mayor Norman Edelcup.

At present, The Sydney Corp is busy at work, managing Michael Kosnitzky’s Campaign for Miami-Dade County School Board that will be on the November 2nd ballot. With Sydney’s reputation of hard work, focused energy and doing whatever job that needs to be done, Michael Kosnitzky is poised to be sat!

When she’s not busy winning, Sydney is still hard at work giving of her time to the community. She is a member of the SIB Long Range Planning and Inter Governmental Affairs Committee of the Mayor’s Advisory Council, Sponsor of the 2005 Jewish Film Festival, a member of the Florida Grand Opera Board of Governors, and Chairman’s Roundtable Member of the Aventura Marketing Council.

“I’ve always been motivated by what is honest and honorable. I’m very passionate about what I believe to be right and I don’t back down. I get that from my father, the late Marty Faye. He was a Chicago broadcaster for over 30 years and was the first in the 50’s to seat someone of color next to him answering phones on his Television show,” said Davis, who lives in Aventura with her “long suffering” husband Edward.

“The opportunity to serve on the Miami Parking Authority board of directors has been both a personal and professional reward. The strength of the current board, as well as the professional leadership of the staff, is the result of many years of hard work and presents the perfect opportunity to turn my seat over to someone else as I pursue new things,” said Kosnitzky.

“We are deeply grateful to Mike for his 14 years of devoted service on the MPA board,” said MPA Executive Director Art Noriega. “His guidance as a board member has been instrumental to the continuing growth and profitability of the Authority, which ultimately benefits every citizen of Miami.”

“Mike Kosnitzky has turned in an impressive performance on this board,” said Oscar Rivero, MPA board chair. “We will miss his strong and decisive leadership and wish him well in his future endeavors.” MPA will immediately begin a search for candidates to assume Kosnitzky’s seat on its five-member board. The four continuing board members are board chair Oscar Rivero, principal of Rivers; Arthur H. Hertz, chairman and CEO of Wometco Enterprises, Inc.; Marlon A. Hill, founding partner of law firm DelancyHill P.A.; and Jami Reyes, partner in the public affairs/marketing firm Gordon Reyes & Company.

About Miami Parking Authority
MPA develops and manages affordable and convenient parking facilities in the City of Miami. With more than 22,000 parking spaces under management – including five garages, 51 surface lots and more than 8,200 onstreet spaces – MPA provides parking for approximately 45,000 vehicles per week. Facilities are either wholly owned by MPA or managed through government, non-profit, or public/private joint ventures. MPA was created in 1955 by a Special Act of the Florida State Legislature and was incorporated into the City of Miami’s Charter in 1968. The Miami Parking Authority, as a semi-autonomous agency, is fully self-funded and receives no property tax support or citation revenues. For additional information, please visit www.miamiparking.com.