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Key Biscayne Stories will showcase the people, history, and magic that make this beautiful village a paradise and a great place to live. The KB Stories Podcast is exclusive for residents and for all those who love Key Biscayne.
Welcome to another episode of KB Scayne Stories where neighbors meet neighbors. Today, we have Charles Collins the Key Biscayne neighbor for 9 years and he's running for village council. So we're gonna get we're gonna get to know him and and his story. Welcome, Charles. How are you doing today?
Charles Collins:Very well. How are you all? Thanks for having us.
Host Alejandro:We're excited. Very excited. So we're gonna ask you an icebreaker to get started.
Co-Host Matilda:So what is the best piece of advice you've ever been given?
Charles Collins:A lawyer who specializes in in corporations once told me, if you're gonna be when when you start something, you're gonna be an outlier. You're gonna be a disruptor, and only your friends are gonna support you. But if you stick with it and it's a valid initiative, you don't have to do it yourself. You have to to depend that others will come behind you that are more qualified and move your initiative forward. So, basically, in politics, you don't have to do it alone.
Charles Collins:All you need to do is find people, like minded people, and the initiative will take a life of its own.
Co-Host Matilda:Tell us something about yourself most people don't know.
Charles Collins:Probably related to the key, I think most people don't realize or don't know that I was the stage manager and the DJ for the 4th July Key Biscayne parade for almost 30 years starting in 1992. To this day, Tim Stickney knows me. By recognition, he still doesn't know my name. I was completely it was my favorite gig of all the shows I did. We did, like at one point, we were up to 400 shows a year.
Charles Collins:But somehow, Key Biscayne, that parade, that that one day, we got, you know, the old roadie song. I was the first to come and the last to leave. We get over here at 9, 10 o'clock in the morning, start setting it up. Can't remember her name. But her and her husband would show up with their Cadillac full of refreshments.
Charles Collins:And Tim would show up, and we'd do the parade. And then everybody'd go off and have a party, and then we'd break down the set and leave. And it was just we used to do, like, 6 shows on on 4th July. That was, anyway. It was a cool that was back in the eighties, so things were fun.
Host Alejandro:Awesome. Cool. So I I also wanna add the one one of the things that that we like to do with these shows when we interview the candidates for Ritz Council is an opportunity for for our neighbors now to to get to know you a little more, some of your backgrounds, and then what have you done, what are your goals. What is the most important thing in your life today?
Charles Collins:Well, I think it's 72 I've sort of reached that Maslow's hierarchy of needs so most of the important things I hope are taken care of. For the next 50 days the most important thing in my life is an election.
Host Alejandro:I I can imagine it's even even for such a small community it must be challenging to to run for office and to go out there and, it's different I think a little bit.
Charles Collins:You're saying is there any difference between running a national campaign as opposed to running for a village council member? Well, I've done both. Yeah. There's there's differences and there there's similarities. The similarities is the strategy is always the same.
Charles Collins:It's name recognition. It's getting out. It's getting exposure. The difference is here, people know you per a majority of the voters know you personally. I mean, if you brought up here, you've been involved with politics or, you know, just living it so small that you can't get away with pontificating.
Charles Collins:You know? People know who you really are. So in a big campaign, everybody works on spin and trying to massage the message. Here, you're gonna see the guy at the club after us. You're not gonna get away with that.
Charles Collins:If you're gonna take a position, you better be able to defend it to your friends and neighbors and not trust that you can massage it through message through a media.
Co-Host Matilda:So how did you end up in the key?
Charles Collins:Well, my family got here a long time ago. This was a destination before there was a bridge. So, you know, it was like it hang out on the boat. When I was born per my my personal backstory is when I was born, this was the de facto beach and and celebration. So, yeah, literally, I'm 3 months old.
Charles Collins:I'm out here doing, you know, beach things. Also, remember Jamaica Inn? Were you around for that? That wasn't the go to family restaurant. We would come out anybody's birthday or anniversary.
Charles Collins:It was either La Casita Tea Room in the Grove, which is long gone or or the Jamaican Inn is on the key. And then somewhere around the seventies, I told the story earlier, but somewhere around the seventies, I had an apartment out here for a while. And then I left and went off to college. And then, like I said, I I worked here a lot. And we did all the all the, 4th July parades.
Charles Collins:We did the tennis tournaments. Do you remember superstars back in the eighties? We had, they had this thing in the eighties called superstars. They'd bring all these a listers in that were basketball or golf stars, whatever. And then they make him do these ridiculous, like, long jumps and things.
Charles Collins:Anyway, it was a national TV show, and it broadcast live from the island. So that was, you know, on and off connections literally since I was born.
Host Alejandro:The most I mean, when I first arrived, I was 10 years old, and I remember there was a KFC. There was a KFC right next right next to the Key Executive, and then the Key Colony Plaza was not here. So it was just an empty lot where people would play soccer.
Charles Collins:That was me when I was when I was visiting first. We have completely well, anyway, that's sort of where we're heading on this whole election. Is that island gonna be is even the island gonna be here in another 3 generations?
Host Alejandro:Got it.
Co-Host Matilda:So tell us what inspired you to run for office?
Charles Collins:The thing I wanted to focus on was I didn't really run for office. I had a private argument with the village attorney about the Florida legislature mandating ethics for all state workers. It's always been for state and county, but they wanted to expand it to Key Biscayne, and the village attorney, well his law firm, had orchestrated a class action suit to block it. And as I mentioned, I spent a long time in government, and I am really focused on ethics. And so I thought if I challenged him personally, and not personally, but if I hit.
Charles Collins:And so I did. The rule was that the state legislature came down and said everyone has to file full financial disclosure. The governor, the legislature, school boards, all are covered under a financial disclosure law. About 30% of the complaints coming into Tallahassee were from ethics complaints from municipal governments that weren't covered under the financial disclosure law, so the state legislature expanded to include municipal and governments. The village attorney's position was this was a violation of privacy and it would restrict, people wouldn't run for office because they didn't want to divulge their personal finances.
Charles Collins:So by filing, I was showing the courts and giving support to the legislature that people would in fact file under full financial disclosure. And I'm not a rich guy, so I was trying to also make the point that it's not really about what you're worth. What the law is designed to do is to track your net worth over time where you're looking for people that are getting money under the table essentially. And by requiring his full full disclosure every year, the media and anybody else can kind of keep an eye on what's going on. And then the second part of that equation was, well that's going to limit the availability.
Charles Collins:That's going to eliminate the candidate pool. And so the second part of that equation is I wanted to figure out a way to expand the candidate pool, and one of the things the village charter does, or re the attorneys interpreted to say was, you can't run for mayor and council. You have to pick one race every, election cycle and that's it. Well, that's restrict I thought that was restrictive and I read the charter a different way that you could run for one or the other but not at the same time. So in practical terms, you could file to run and that's another thing.
Charles Collins:There's 2 different elections. You can file to run for mayor in June and campaign all through the summer in the heat and spend all that money and then the camp the primary comes in August and you lose in the primary, you're out of luck. Well, there's time between the primary and the filing deadline for council members that you could switch races and they were going, no you can't do it. So again, best way to do it was to challenge it. So there was no primary so I physically resigned the office that week of the primary and filed a run for counsel.
Charles Collins:And I took my paperwork over to the bank and I got my new, Charles Collins for counsel account set up and I brought it back and boom. I was a candidate. They never even challenged me. So now we have a legal precedent that by 2026, you can now go out and file a run for mayor in June. Campaign all summer.
Charles Collins:If you don't make it in the primary, you can then turn around and file for council race. And theoretically you would start off as the as the favorite. Would you spend all this money on name recognition? So ultimately I think it will expand the candidate pool. Well, it'll make government more accessible to people that wanna run.
Host Alejandro:So, tell me more about the financial disclosure. I know that's a new thing, but tell me, if you could explain to us what it is for people that don't know.
Charles Collins:I think the best I could give you is give you an example. Financial disclosure isn't about how much you're worth now. It's financial transparency to how your net worth increases over the term of your public service. I can I'll give you an example. I, I was a union rep back in the days and, union supported Danielle Cava for, a county commission seat against, Linda Bell who was the republican incumbent down in South Dade.
Charles Collins:Daniella went to Columbia or Hubbard. Her husband's a successful, physician with a concierge practice. They're they're by any definition, they're a comfortable family. But during the campaign, one of the hits against Daniella was that she was worth so much money and that, you know, whatever for whatever reason that was the hit they were getting. And, after the election, even the Herald made a point that she was the richest person on the council.
Charles Collins:And I I know don't quote me, but I wanna say it was between 13,000,000 at the time. So this last election cycle, Daniela's campaign finance form, which is the expanded one the counties are required to file, had her somewhere around, I think, 13 or $15,000,000 over her career. Now this is an entire career within public service. Why didn't she get that hit this time? Because the critics had the campaign documents or had the financial disclosure documents dating back to when she first was elected.
Charles Collins:And if you read it, it's it's a tomb. It's 35 mine was 4 pages. Hers is 35 pages or or longer. Every investment, every whatever she's into is in there. And so you couldn't opposition couldn't get any traction saying that she's wealthy because it's evident it's not from it's has nothing to do with her position as mayor.
Charles Collins:So at one side, it protects the candidates. On the other well, we've all heard horror stories. This is Florida. Everybody people go into office, you know, with a 6 figure ain't with a 6 figure net worth, and they come out multimillionaires, and we never know why. But that's what that's what the Florida sunshine amendment was about.
Charles Collins:That's why this law is applied to state county and and, judicial positions since I think 71 or whenever the law was started. The hit was it was gonna discourage people from revealing their net worth and we wouldn't get candidates. So I wanted to take it a step further and increase the opportunity for candidates to increase the pool by creating, making it easier or more financially viable to run for office. And then one of the problems with the elections on Key Biscayne is we run a mayor's race and a council race. It's not done as one.
Charles Collins:So part of this transparency is okay, let's say we get we are gonna get people willing to run, but the way the village of Key Biscayne sets up their elections is you've got to run for mayor all summer and spend all that time and money. And then if you lose the mayor's race, you can't run for council. So you've got to pick one race or the other each election cycle. And my belief is if you knew that you could run for mayor, spend all that time and money invested in the mayor's race, and if you lose in the primary, you come in 3rd in a primary, then you could switch over to council race and leverage that name recognition and that effort and run for council. And people will be more inclined to take the risk of running for mayor if there was a sort of a backup plan.
Charles Collins:So that didn't exist. We had some disagreements with the village attorney and the and the clerk. And so I also challenged that law. That was part of the process of filing for mayor. And in August when the primary was due, I physically resigned the office, resigned the race for mayor.
Charles Collins:I refiled for council. I took the paperwork next door, got my bank, campaign account set up, brought that back. The clerk the clerk the clerk filed my documents. There was never it just the whole controversy evaporated. So now we have a legal precedent in 2026.
Charles Collins:You could run for file to run for mayor, come in 3rd or not make the primary, switch over to the council race and you still sit on council. And the fact of the matter is it's a weak mayor. There's no huge advantage to being the mayor. You get to appoint positions, but actually you got a lot more work to do and you still only get one vote. So if you wanna impact public policy, this makes it a lot a lot easier.
Charles Collins:I don't know if it's easy. It's hard, but at least it expands the opportunities And all you're sacrificing is transparency. Or you're not sacrificing it. All you're sacrificing is your I didn't even say sacrificing. The cost of running for public office is public transparency.
Host Alejandro:Okay. So moving on to the village. What are some of the important issues the village is facing today?
Charles Collins:The biggest issue in this particular election is gonna be the big dig.
Host Alejandro:What is the big dig for those that don't know?
Charles Collins:The big dig is a, is the village's answer to sea level rise, I guess, is the best way to frame it. The we've got Noah predictions that, since 20 since 1990, the sea level is rising at a predictable rate. So the good news is we'll know we know where the sea level will be in a 100 years. The bad news is it says we're gonna be under 10 feet of water. So somewhere along that line, we need to do something.
Charles Collins:And what the village has decided to do is we're first thing we're gonna do is address rainwater and build what is reportedly somewhere between a $350,000,000 and $750,000,000 storm water system to pump out the rainwater as quickly. Well, that's the other debate. How quickly? 2 inches an hour. My position is I'm not convinced this is the best ROI available, return on investment available to address that ultimate problem of 11 feet sea level rise in a 100 years.
Charles Collins:I'd like to step back and look at the bigger picture about how we can really look at that long term. And I understand their their version of long term is 50 years, but I'm talking a true ex existential threat. If we're gonna be underwater at some point, it's lights out. I mean, we could go to 1 of 2 ways. We could either do sort of a, New Orleans approach and, build up the die build up the walls and they used, what do they call them out there?
Charles Collins:Levee, was it? Levees and Well, anyway, yes. That's lack of a better word. They essentially build a coffer dam. They surround the city with walls and levees and then they pump as fast as they can.
Charles Collins:Realistically, that's the only way we would save the village in the long run, 2 or 3 generations. But the practical aspect is the state and the county aren't going to protect the parks like that. They're just going to let them flood. So what are we left with? You know, 1, 1.1.4 square miles in the middle of a of a bay.
Charles Collins:That's not gonna that's not a viable solution. So what else can we do? Well, we can put it off as long as we can by building like the keys do. We can elevate all the homes. We can raise the streets.
Charles Collins:We can raise the buildings and just let the water flood through. In those last years, it's going to be the spring tides and the storm surges that are going to, you know, is gonna be the first effects. And at least we can postpone that, maybe a whole generation by building smarter not harder. Creating a $350,000,000 plan now that'll only handle rainwater just seems like literally shoveling sand against the tide. I wanna see if there's a a larger a longer term solution to to postponing the inevitable.
Charles Collins:You could argue I actually wanna spend more than half a 1000000000, but I'm not spending it on rainwater.
Host Alejandro:So you mentioned in the Ormond's model approach of of the walls. What about the water that comes from underneath the key?
Charles Collins:Well, part of the the plan that they're putting forward now has to do with increasing the capacity of the surface water. It hasn't been designed the New Orleans models are designed to constantly pump the groundwater as well as the surface water. So as I mentioned before, I may wanna I I wanna take a larger look at this. That how what other ways can we approach that rising groundwater. And this may include using, the island model, the the Keys model where we build the houses up and let the water it can come up.
Charles Collins:It's going to impact how long it takes rainwater to drain, but it won't be as critical because the rainwater will not be standing in people's garages like it does now. So this also has the advantage of long term if you if the chart if the NOAA schedules are right, and this is an inevitability by raising the island instead of building bigger drains, we will survive longer, or at least we'll push the push the inevitable out further. And ultimately, the money that would normally go into a very expensive storm water system can be redirected into more into structural issues of raising the island, physically raising the roads, the properties, the homes, and the buildings, which obviously is not only a longer sustainable solution, but not, it doesn't require constant maintenance. And again, this plan is only about rainwater. It's not addressing storm surges or groundwater per se.
Charles Collins:I mean, it's impacted by the groundwater, but it's not designed to cut constantly pump down the groundwater. It's only designed to pump off the surface water.
Host Alejandro:Are there any other issues you think the key is facing today that you'd like to talk about?
Charles Collins:I think the other big one that's taken a lot of attention is the issue with the ebikes and mobility in general. I have a lot of connection to bikes. I was part of the original Everglades bike club in the seventies. Went off to University of Florida where I worked as a bike mechanic off campus. I saw how off campus was ripping off to students.
Charles Collins:So I started the on campus, bicycle clinic, student bicycle clinic, which I is still there. 70 let's see. Whatever many years from 1974. Came back to Miami and the bike three zero five program that the county parks runs, was out of my warehouse. So I had a lot of connection to those events.
Charles Collins:And I still volunteer in Coral Gables for bike, Walk USA, which is the Coral Gables, City of Coral Gables program that, we do historical tours once a month. So when it came to the bike mobility issue out here, I'm 72 years old and I don't like kids riding up behind me at night. It scares me. But on the other other end of it, I like to take a big picture approach that mic micro mobility is gonna be part of our future and that we can't just stonewall it. It really needs to be addressed properly.
Charles Collins:I think I can bring some solutions to the table. Ultimately, what we see in most of the successful Europeans and South America's old cities that had addressed it is it's it's about lane segregation that you don't have bicycles with pedestrians, with cars, with, baby strollers sort of a thing. Now, do we have the real estate to do it under right now? No. But are there are there solutions for, like, bike corridors or or bike are there other solutions available?
Charles Collins:I think we we could look into that. But, yes, in the meantime, we're probably gonna have to keep the ban up until we come up with a more permanent solution.
Host Alejandro:Okay. So the next question is, can you share something with us that the village is doing well in your eyes?
Charles Collins:From 91 when we founded, I think it's been a model of incorporation that the smaller government, the local government, hyper local government is a much better model than UMSA. The what's what what the county operates the, what they call it, unincorporated municipal service areas, which was the model we were under before. I was staff on the other side of this debate in in the early incorporation effort that I was a county employee and I I saw the the model, would impact our unions because you wanted to incorporate and that meant the, county unions were gonna lose work workers. But I also and this is a rather selfish confession, but I also realized as a union organizer, this would provide more opportunities for the unions, that what these independent incorporated areas were looking for was better service, which would require more fire and more police and more municipal workers. And then it ultimately, in 10 years, that would translate to larger union memberships.
Charles Collins:So I took a very proactive approach during the Key Biscayne Incorporation so as to not have the unions get involved in a short term solution of saving a half a dozen jobs on Key Biscayne. And yes, we recognized very early that this is a very good model if you could get away with it. And as it turns out, by the 3rd or 4th incorporation, the county shut it down. But in the interim, you guys or Key Biscayne, we became the model of the of the village governance. And I think it's been very successful.
Host Alejandro:Anything else that comes
Charles Collins:to mind? No. I think we got a great parks department.
Host Alejandro:So one of one of the main challenges of being in council is working with people with different ideas. You know, people are gonna like your ideas, and people are not gonna like your ideas. How how do you see yourself working with those that oppose your ideas?
Charles Collins:I think the whole point of local government is to have different voices on council. I think it gets pretty boring if everybody is not boring, it's not efficient if everyone is in lockstep. There's actually a a business model called the 10 man rule that if 10 people are at the table and they all agree on the on the issue, it's the job of the 10th man to take the other position just to vet out what are the negative possibilities. The whole point of governance is you is to arrive at a, a conclusion and I think the best governments do it in a diplomatic fashion without screaming and yelling and oh my god some of the stuff that I've seen. But I think, if nothing else, I think I'm a pragmatic person that I am able to work towards the gold and not let personalities get in the way.
Host Alejandro:When elected or if elected, by the time that you finish your term, how would you like to be remembered?
Charles Collins:I'd like to be remembered that I survived it. Politics like he was king could be a blood sport.
Host Alejandro:It has it has changed over the years.
Charles Collins:It has. Yep. But like I said, that out of that conflict comes the best resolutions.
Host Alejandro:So now we're going to, to a different set of questions. After a long stressful day, how do you relax?
Charles Collins:A retiree on Key Biscayne. There is no long stressful day.
Host Alejandro:That's a great quest that's a great way to answer the question. Regarding the other candidates, how do you feel you stand out? Or what makes you different than the other ones?
Charles Collins:What makes me stand out from other candidates is the only thing I have that really offers me as a part is I do have a lot of experience in counter government. And part of that experience was I used to be part of the training team that would train the new county, electees as they came on for the board of county commissioners. We all start as neophytes, that it's a learning process. It's almost like being on jury duty that you're presented the facts and you reason them out and you come up with a solution. So I think we've got a team.
Charles Collins:I don't think anyone stands out as being a having unique insights in the sense of, you know, divine and divine intervention on the solutions. But I think they were all reasoned and I think the only thing I offer is advantages. I hit the ground with a little more experience in the process than maybe some of the others.
Host Alejandro:Well, you count you worked for the county for how long?
Charles Collins:35 years to today.
Host Alejandro:And I thank you for your service.
Charles Collins:It was ironically, I would there's a bunch of us in the county that had jobs that we would have done for free but didn't don't tell anybody. It was like, what I did, I loved it. Some of the guys, like, the helicopter guys, the marine patrol guys, some of the fire special duty guys, they're never gonna take a promotion. It's it's we love what we did and I being a sound engineer, your hearing gets worse as you get older. There is a finite, you know, world.
Charles Collins:I maybe wasn't the most qualified to do that anymore, But I did teach the guys that have taken the place. In fact, we're talking about the parade earlier. Your DJ to this day is the guy that I I got started.
Host Alejandro:No. Not I like to think that the show is more like a like a light approach to get to know you, but we have some fun related questions. Okay. What is your go to meal for a last minute guest for dinner?
Charles Collins:Shrimp kebabs on the grill. A what? Shrimp kebabs. You know? Pineapple shrimp pineapple shrimp on the grill.
Host Alejandro:Okay.
Charles Collins:Standard. Easy, cheap, quick.
Host Alejandro:I like it. I like it. What do you love most about the key?
Charles Collins:Well, it's paradise. There's a I have this expression, a wizard of Oz epiphany for those of you not familiar with the movie. Dorothy goes on a long trip and the end of the movie was there's no place like home. So for me, the key represents my childhood and my adolescence. And the fact that I'm living next to the park, I don't know.
Charles Collins:It's got this sort of 19 seventies vibe to it still despite the fact we're 10 minutes from a major major crazy city.
Host Alejandro:As a closing question, we ask this out of all our guests. What is a perfect weekend for you and your family in The Key?
Charles Collins:What's my perfect weekend on The Key? I spent my career working weekends as an event guy. So for me, the perfect weekend is staying at home and giving the island up to the visitors. So it's kind of a loaded question. But in general, what I what we like to do is basically, we do our walks to the lighthouse.
Charles Collins:We go to have dinner. We watch movies. And when things get too crowded out here, we head to the mainland and and do the same thing on the mainland. It's it's we're old and well, I'm old and speaking for the Esposa. But I'm old and retired, and I enjoy chilling out.
Host Alejandro:I'm with you. I'm with you. It's like when when they ask me what I like is if I don't have to leave the key, it's it's the best. So well, Charles, thank you so much for jumping on the show to give an opportunity for neighbors to get to know you, and good luck. You know?
Host Alejandro:And I tell everybody who's running for office to thank you for for your willingness to serve because it's it's a lot of work. So and it takes time and away from your family and and life so thank you for It's
Charles Collins:my pleasure. It's a labor of love.