American Magazine Fall 05

American Magazine | Spring 2007

Class Notables

David Dermer, SPA ’83

David Dermer is the second Dermer to hold the keys to the city of Miami Beach. His father, Jay Dermer, became mayor in 1967 after defeating FDR’s son Elliot Roosevelt. Despite his lineage, Dermer says he came to his job “from the outside.” “The way I got into it was more of an unorthodox fashion,” recalls the AU justice, law and society graduate. “I led a hostile citizen’s drive.”

In a display of grassroots activism, Dermer gathered thousands of signatures for a ballot initiative that would limit building along the Miami Beach waterfront. Those opposing the initiative spent $2 million to the $25,000 Dermer’s camp expended, and “small money won,” he proclaims.

“Small money” also won in 2001 when Dermer beat an opponent who outspent him by three to one on the mayoral race. He was reelected with little opposition in 2003 and ran unopposed in 2005.

As he winds up the last few months of his final term, Dermer is still plenty busy making sure his eight-mile strip of paradise-by-the-sea works as well for its 100,000 permanent residents as it does for the weekend tourists who more than double the city’s population.

While hosting hot ticket events like the 2007 Super Bowl and the annual South Beach Food and Wine Festival are icing on the cake, Dermer’s top priorities are public infrastructure issues—fire, police, and sanitation. Dermer also counts a dramatically improved city parks system and increased outreach to the homeless among his administration’s accomplishments.

“What’s great about being mayor is that it’s a local position, you can do things that you cannot do in places where there’s partisan politics . . . Here, as a mayor, I’m a nonpartisan official and I’m able to be innovative and progressive.”

Among his proudest accomplishments, Dermer points out that Miami Beach was the first city to employ a distance separation ordinance for sexual predators and offenders that requires them to stay a specified distance from playgrounds and school yards. He’s particularly pleased that the Florida state legislature and many other U.S. cities have since adopted the practice. This year Dermer also performed the “unheard of” act of giving back $300 to every homesteaded resident of Miami Beach. The “labyrinth of ethics legislation” aimed at taking special interest money out of the campaign process is another feather in his cap.

The city Dermer will pass along to his successor, when he returns to the legal profession, looks much different from the Miami Beach his father governed. “The median age in ’67 was 67,” he says. “Today, the median age is 38. There are a lot of young families here. It’s one of the few places with an urban community and a beach right next to it . . . I think it’s probably the best place to live, work, and play on the planet.” —Melissa Reichley

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