Member of Golden Knights Parachute Team Carrying The Mayor, Just Like The Taxpayers Have Done For Six Years
Owing outstanding bills himself, Homestead Mayor Steve Bateman recently voted to expand the city’s use of a debt collector to chase down payments
By Christina Veiga
cveiga@MiamiHerald.com
Homestead Mayor Steve Bateman recently voted to expand the city’s use of a debt collector — and the company could soon be giving him a ring.City records show Bateman hasn’t paid thousands of dollars in fees owed to the city’s development services department. The bills date back to 2006.
Bateman, who voted to expand the city’s debt collections, did not return a call and emails for comment.
The mayor’s bills are owed to Homestead’s development services department for reviewing building plans.
Bateman is the owner of the company Two Brothers Construction.
The original bills are for about $11,000. Bateman has failed to pay even though he got a 30 percent discount on the fees in February 2010, when the city’s then-development services director gave the mayor and 49 other contractors a break. The development services director said the people getting discounts were “charged too much” in the first place.
Development Services staff and the city’s spokeswoman did not respond to questions about whether Bateman will have to pay any late fees.
Bateman and the rest of the City Council voted on June 20 to expand the Homestead’s use of a debt collection agency to include more city departments. Now, the company, Online Information Services, will try to collect late bills from Homestead’s development services and finance departments, in addition to already collecting for the city’s customer service department.
The two new departments are owed almost $1 million in outstanding bills, according to city documents. The development services department is owed $600,000 from bills that span back almost a decade, while Homestead’s finance department is owed $345,000.
The debt collection agency’s cut, should it recover all the money, would be about $240,000, according to city documents.
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