Talk of Downtown
Maurice Ferré Park
A Green Oasis or Homeless Shelter?
Maurice Ferré Park (MFP) is located between Biscayne Bay and the Park West residential towers, and between the museums and the American Airlines Arena. To the south, it edges the Florida East Coast Railway Deep Water Slip (FEC slip), where luxurious yachts sometimes anchor. The FEC slip also attracts ambitious developers. Recently, one proposed erecting a massive hotel, the Wave, impervious to the fact it would have obstructed the view of Park West residents, and aggravated the already chaotic traffic — a heavy case of urban cholesterol.
Along the slip runs a beautiful promenade lined by decaying palms where homeless individuals relocated from other parks, other neighborhoods, cities, and states sleep or drink. It is well known that cities as far as Chicago give their homeless one-way tickets to winter in the Sunshine State, specifically downtown Miami. Also, some of these homeless individuals are released from mental health institutions to roam free.
“They have all received the memo,” said Claudia Roussel, a resident walking her dog. “We have no security anymore and they flock to MFP. When I look at our park from the time we lost security until now, I clearly notice the slow but obvious decline. The “Broken Window Theory” comes to mind. The park’s neglect encourages further bad behavior like graffiti, rubbish and such... Hence, the slow decline will speed up if there is no intervention.”
The Complex Problem of Homelessness
Inept and allegedly corrupt organizations and bureaucracies exasperate the problem. Miami residents pay $37 million to the Homeless Trust through a one-cent food and beverage tax. In addition, the Homeless Trust receives another $30 million in federal and state funding to eradicate homelessness. Ask downtown residents about the progress this $67 million a year has brought to their streets and parks, and the answer is bound to be a rotund middle finger to the horizon, a manifestation of both helplessness and indignation.
Another Park West resident, Michael Feuling, caught up with me during my daily cardio-walk to point out how a homeless lady uses the children’s water fountain outside the MFP’s bathroom as a bidet. Merriam Webster Dictionary defines bidet: “A bathroom fixture used especially for bathing the external genitals and the anal region.” He added a word of advice to parents: “Keep your children away from that water fountain.”
How can that be? “Simple,” Mr. Feuling reiterated, “MFP has no security. The park attracts thousands of visitors to the museums, yet, security was terminated without a rational explanation.”
Maurice Ferré Park (formerly Museum Park and Bicentennial Park) was designed by the prestigious urban developer Victor Dover to provide a green oasis for the overly developed urban core. It must be noted that downtown’s ratio of green space per resident ranks very low in the City of Miami, albeit accounting for the biggest share of the tax base for the entire city.
Another resident pointed out a significant language shift: “Local politicians have redefined parks as cash-cows. “They see a park and they see an ATM. Parks no longer are spaces for community enjoyment, which is precisely how the City Charter defines Bayfront Park. (Maurice Ferré Park is part of the Bayfront Park complex, and is under the jurisdiction of the Bayfront Park Management Trust).
“Still,” he concluded, the MFP is an oasis, an ailing oasis. Well, when it’s not rented and walled-in for private events.”
