In an early-morning meeting, Miami Beach officials and Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau leaders agreed to set up a private corporation to handle the music conference. The accord will allow the event to skirt a Metro-Dade ordinance that prohibits county funding for any organization that does business with Cuba.
The settlement should guarantee that the MIDEM Latin America & Caribbean Music Market show goes on for the remaining four years of its contract with the Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau. The four-day conference, which brought in artists and entertainment executives from around the world, pumped an estimated $20 million into the local economy this year.
``We have named a chairman to head a committee to privatize MIDEM,'' Miami Beach Mayor Seymour Gelber said. ``We are hopeful that we can set up a program that not only will comply with the Dade resolution but also will help keep the community comfortable.''
Last month, after their first-ever Dade County event, MIDEM representatives said they would not come back unless they could invite Cuban artists and business people. A Dade ordinance bans the county from funding events that work directly or indirectly with Cuba. MIDEM regularly hosts Cuban artists and business people at its Cannes and Hong Kong shows.
A spokeswoman for the Cuban American National Foundation said she was pleased that public funds would not be used for MIDEM.
``Why should taxpayers who don't want to pay for this have to pay for this?'' Ninoska Perez said. ``This is not a matter of freedom of expression.''
Gelber said local entertainment attorney David Bercuson will be chairman of the new committee, which will be made up of business people primarily in the entertainment and hospitality industries.
While no one has been named, Gelber said the group will ask executives from institutions that supported this year's event, including American Airlines, American Express, Criteria Records Studio, Post Edge and the Florida Entertainment Commission.
Contract
takeover
It also will be responsible for other jobs typically handled by the bureau, including event planning and fund-raising. Both the bureau and Miami Beach will help the group as it takes on those responsibilities, Gelber said.
``The bureau intends to get out of its contract with MIDEM and will help in the transfer of the event to the private sector,'' said Merrett Stierheim, convention bureau president.
The group hopes to tap the private sector for the $125,000 in goods and services that was part of the MIDEM contract this year, when the bureau coordinated the fund-raising, collecting $75,000 from the private sector. Another $50,000 came from Miami Beach.
``The whole idea here is to depoliticize the MIDEM event by not taking public funds,'' Bercuson said. ``MIDEM wants to be as good a visitor to the community as it was this year and to change the perception among the international music community that it censored Cuban participation in the Miami event.''
Possible
participation
``The key is to be sensitive to the needs of the community and let MIDEM rehabilitate its image in the artistic community,'' Bercuson said.
Peggi McKinley, chairwoman of the Miami Beach Commission's Fashion, Film, Television and Recording Advisory Board, said she was pleased with the resolution.
``I'm delighted that the community was able to pull together and come up with a potential solution that will allow MIDEM's conference in the city to continue,'' McKinley said.
McKinley, who was dismissed from her advisory position with the Metro-Dade film advisory board for a comment supporting MIDEM, also said Tuesday that she plans to file suit against the county through the American Civil Liberties Union, asking for reinstatement.
``I think it will help bring closure to both me and the community,'' McKinley said. ``I would like to be reinstated.''
Copyright © 1997 The Miami Herald