‘A complete lie’: Gabela debunks text blast by ‘yes’ group on Miami marinas question

Miami-Dade County National admin October 15, 2026 0 Comments

‘A complete lie’: Gabela debunks text blast by ‘yes’ group on Miami marinas question

On Tuesday afternoon, some Miami voters received an “urgent message from Commissioner Miguel Ángel Gabela” from the Help Save Virginia Key political committee. It had a quote attributed to the Miami District 1 city commissioner, urging people to vote yes on the city’s Referendum 3 ballot question involving the redevelopment of two city-owned marinas.

“The current operator of the Virginia Key Marina and its campaign have deceived me and are lying to all of us. But this ends now! We cannot allow them to keep misleading our community,” part of the text reads.

But Gabela, who clearly opposed the measure during a City Commission meeting this summer, told the Miami Herald that he never said what was in the text blast and has not changed his stance.

“I didn’t say that, and my team didn’t write that,” Gabela told the Herald Tuesday evening. “I have no idea who wrote that.”

The question on the ballot, if approved, would allow Virginia Key LLC — a joint venture between Texas-based Suntex Marinas and Miami Beach-based RCI Marine Group — to lease and redevelop about 28 acres of city-owned land in Virginia Key, including the city-operated Marine Stadium Marina and the Rickenbacker Marina.

During a June 11 meeting where the commission reluctantly agreed to put the question on the ballot after a judge ordered them to do so, Gabela was one of the most vocal opponents of the deal, the terms of which date back to 2016 and 2017.

“I think this is a bad deal for the city,” he said. “Something that’s 10 years old. It does not reflect property prices today.”

The current Rickenbacker Marina operator, Aabad Melwani, told the Herald he was surprised to have read the text, initially forwarded to him by several Miami residents on Tuesday, given what Gabela had said at the commission meeting. He has since spoken to Gabela, who told him he had not authorized the quote.

“It’s really unfair to both him and the voters that the ‘yes’ side are taking these desperate measures to basically get, you know, publish these unauthorized … false quotes, and in the process, you know, slandering the current operator, right?”

When the Herald asked about the text and Gabela’s response to it, a communications specialist and partner with Schwartz Media Strategies, hired by the Help Save Virginia Key political committee that’s pushing voters to pass the referendum, said over email that it was their understanding that Gabela “supports the measure.” That person did not answer further questions.

Gabela told the Herald that he is not advising residents to vote one way or the other on Referendum 3 but that he still believes the numbers from 2017 don’t reflect a fair “adjusted-for-inflation” number and that he is not comfortable with the deal. He reiterated that he had no involvement with the quote or campaign text sent by the developers’ committee on Tuesday.

“However it happened, what I’m telling you is the ‘They have deceived me’ part is a complete lie,” he said.

The Help Save Virginia Key PC had received $1.5 million in contributions as of the end of September, all from Suntex Marina Investors LLC, a Dallas entity associated with the developer. It had spent around $1.25 million of those on digital media, direct mail, robocalls, PR and social media engagements, and other purposes, according to a report filed with the city. Most of the expenditures — about $780,000 — went to the consulting media firm Big Tuesday Media. That firm was paid $50,841 in late September for “phone bank/texting,” according to the report.

The Preserve and Protect Miami PC that’s urging people to vote no had received $850,100 as of the end of September. Of that total, $800,000 came from Rickenbacker Marina Corp, which is led by Melwani. It spent almost all of the contributed money on advertisements and consulting.