Late last night - usually beyond my bedtime - I received a series of what appear to be text messages exchanged between Commission Russell and his staff during Commission meetings.

It seems that Russell and his staff communicate with each other via a cellphone or computer chat line while the Commission meeting is in progress, proving him with information, observations,  od responding to his questions.

These exchanges are revealing in many different ways, and I'll be referencing some nuggets related to other issues I've written about in recent months that took place in other meetings, but for now, given the shortness of time, I am posting 9 pages that I believe deal specifically with the Battersea property issue and the claims that Russell has made about the City Attorney's efforts to intercede in the decision-making process in a way to benefit the developers who own the property.

In applying Russell's logic to the actions of Mendez, one could also accuse him of attempting to intercede in the decision making process on behalf of the South Grove residents who have been complaining about lot splitting and other activities that they allege that the city has illegally engaged in, because as these pages below reveal, even after he was advised that whoever his staff had reached out to had determined that a warrant and the 100 foot frontage did not apply to the Battersea property, he not only kept questioning that decision, but went forward with his decision to demand that Mendez be fired.

As you will see in the below pages, Russell's staff reached out to an individual named Devin, and it was he who offered an opinion that ran contrary to the opinion of Russell, his staff  and the South Grove residents had on whether or not the property in question needed a warrant, or needed to comply with a 100 foot frontage requirement.

Just in passing there is also an interesting revelation that I have highlighted in BLUE where Eleazar Melendez talks about taking Miami Herald City Reporter David Smiley out to lunch to "feed him the story."

In any event, I have made public records requests for any documented filed last night or this morning before 9 AM, and if I get any I will immediately post them.

Make sure to get your popcorn ready.

IDENTITY CODE:

R1BOQ - Commissioner Russell

UF5V5 - Eleazar Melendez - Russell's Chief of Staff

H9BKB - Leah Westion - Russell's Staff  Attorney

UPDATED

WITH COPY OF ONLY LETTER ADDRESSED TO COMMISSION THIS MORNING